D&D General Is DnD being mothballed?

[Micah Sweet]

That thing you've heard about people taking you more seriously if you use an image.
It also applies to TTRPG's.

I took 1e plenty seriously. Not a lot of art.

 

[Staffan]

When you read sources such as Slaying the Dragon, one thing that becomes very clear from interviews with the folks involved is that WotC was very aware of what killed TSR, and remain very wary of making the same mistakes. And though TSR suffered from mismanagement for basically its entire history, the heart of its financial problems has a LOT to do with becoming reliant on an unsustainable publication schedule.

Yes, I don't think the 2e production schedule is healthy. That doesn't mean that anything above today's schedule is unsustainable.

As for "enough money for their corporate overlords":

I mean, we know that previous decisions have been driven by demands from above to not just make money, but to make more money.

Setting aside the cheap pop, trying to grow your product and increase sales is what businesses do, whether a mom and pop store or a big company like Hasbro. If they are doing it unethically, that's bad. But doing it by changing their publication strategy? The horror! Those monsters!

There's a very big difference between "making a profit" and "maximizing profits". I'd wager that the vast majority of non-Wizards companies in the RPG biz are aiming more at "making a profit" – they have ideas that they want to publish, and at the same time keep the lights on, a roof over their heads, and food on their tables. They're not in the biz to maximize profit, because then they'd be in a different business.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

movies, TV series, videogames, novels, miniatures, t-shirts, ...

I thought of that also, but the VTT, an MMO or an arena fighting game would be relatively low effort to maintain once established successfully where as the above are much higher effort and cost to maintain. You need a continuous supply chain of new material.
I presume that they get a licence cut from Wizkids miniatures, that is already in place.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

It kinda makes me mad that he uses these kinda stupid extreme comparisions that doesn't make really sense.

Ironically this* shows that the assumption that people are confused by math holds true...

*to be clear: I meant the post you referred to with your post.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Cute. People take you more seriously if you have a profile pic, or do I've heard. Using my own face seemed like a bad idea, and I like 1e and liches.

Which is exactly why you use good art in books.

 

[Iosue]

Cute. People take you more seriously if you have a profile pic, or do I've heard. Using my own face seemed like a bad idea, and I like 1e and liches.

I read this as “I like 1e and lichess,” and thought, “Okay, that makes sense.”

 

[mamba]

I thought of that also, but the VTT, an MMO or an arena fighting game would be relatively low effort to maintain once established successfully where as the above are much higher effort and cost to maintain. You need a continuous supply chain of new material.

that is as true for the VTT and esp. MMO as well.

They will probably spend more on the VTT than on HAT too, and an MMO would cost even more, so at a minimum they went with the high stakes approach. Either they win big, or they lose bigger than D&D ever has before

 

[Alzrius]

https://investor.hasbro.com/news-releases/news-release-details/hasbro-reports-second-quarter-2023-financial-results

And

https://investor.hasbro.com/static-files/18fce6ae-107c-4c55-81e4-0ccb3b3a6af0

lots of math and some tl'dr shows over 100 mill for D&D the game last quarter as it was up 77% versus a year ago

No, it really doesn't. Looking those over, the best I can figure is that you're looking at the "Second Quarter and First Half 2023 MAGIC: THE GATHERING and Hasbro Total Gaming" entry from the "Hasbro Reports Second Quarter 2023 Financial Results" page (i.e. your first link) and coming to the following conclusion:

• Magic: the Gathering earned $311M in Q2 2023.
• Hasbro Total Gaming earned $491.2M in Q2 2023.
• "Hasbro Total Gaming" is "all gaming revenue," "most notably" M:tG, D&D, and the "Hasbro Gaming" brand (which appears to be the same as "Hasbro Games").
• "Hasbro Games" includes things like Monopoly, Jenga, Clue(do), Risk, etc. From what I can tell, this includes branded content as well.
• With a net revenue of $180M that didn't come from M:tG, most or all of that came from D&D (is what I think you're saying).

Now, that's presumptive, since at no point is D&D's net revenue reported that I noticed. At best, you could point out that D&D has "significant growth" for D&D in Q2, while other areas of Hasbro Gaming remained flat or declined. But that's a comparative ranking which doesn't tell us anything about the total amount earned. We don't know how much Monopoly brought in on its own, for instance, nor is D&D's specific earnings tabulated. (That's not an idle comparison, either; the PowerPoint presentation notes that "...MONOPOLY regained #1 property rank among Games..." though that specifically excludes M:tG and D&D. That's beyond noting the "impairment charge" they received in Q2 for the Honor Among Thieves movie.)

Overall, the fact that Hasbro continues to group D&D in with all of their other "gaming" content, rather than delineating its specific earnings the way they do for Magic, makes it difficult to say how much D&D earned in comparison to all of their other gaming properties. But I'd be wary of saying that it's earning nine figures each quarter.

EDIT: I should underline again that the "most notably" mention in the third bullet point seems to indicate that the $491.2M takes into account more than just M:tG, D&D, and the "Habsro Gaming" brand. Exactly what other gaming revenue is in there isn't specified, however.

 

[SteveC]

Cute. People take you more seriously if you have a profile pic, or do I've heard. Using my own face seemed like a bad idea, and I like 1e and liches.

See I have always thought you were an actual lich, which made me take your opinions extra seriously. Don't want a meteor swarm to drop on my house. Next you're going to tell me Alzrius isn't a kitten!

 

[Alzrius]

See I have always thought you were an actual lich, which made me take your opinions extra seriously. Don't want a meteor swarm to drop on my house. Next you're going to tell me Alzrius isn't a kitten!