Is WoTC even relevant to you anymore?

[Sunderstone]

WotC has been great for my group. Last two purchases for me were the Drow of the Underdark and the MMV. Both are great and will see use in my campaigns. Other fantastic books include the XPH, PH2, FF, Dragonomicon, Stormwrack, Frostburn, etc.
The only WotC books I avoid are the "Complete" splatbooks.

Im an "official rules" type of DM. That said then yes, WotC is very relevant.

Honestly, I dont understand where all the WotC negativity comes from. WotC still seems to have very talented designers putting out some really good works.

 

[der_kluge]

As a little aside>

Der Kluge (Curtis)

Have we met before? I've been to Gorilla Con, Sooner Con, a couple Conestoga's and usually run a pile of games. Missed GC and Conestoga this year but am likely to hit up one and/or the other next year. (Gorilla Con this year conflicted with St. Patties day, a no no in my Geneological Tree.) Conestoga was a choice between 200 bucks in hotels for conestoga or 200 plane ticket to Gen Con to pimp product released at GC and hang out with Gary Gygax one more time. You can guess which I chose.

Check my links to find my email and drop me a line neighbor!

Case

Don't think so... Never been to Conestoga or Gorilla Con. I did make it to ShaunCon one year in KC (used to live in KC). We had our little Dallas ENWorld Game day the same weekend as Conestoga this year. There's rumors of some folks trying to organize a Con here, though. Maybe something will happen. Does Wichita host a con?

 

[der_kluge]

I think this is inaccurate, but haven't heard about very recent numbers. Hobby games were mostly diving in the past couple of years (with the exception of board games). However, the rest of the hobby game businesses have been recovering (at least as a whole, GW seems to be losing steam for example). Roleplaying games have been the only ones that have seemed to continue dropping.

Gaming=role playing games for purposes of my discussion. So yes, it would seem that we are in agreement.

 

[der_kluge]

Honestly, I dont understand where all the WotC negativity comes from. WotC still seems to have very talented designers putting out some really good works.

I think you misread the purpose of this thread - there's no WoTC negativity here. I've met lots of WoTC folks, and they're super nice, super smart people.

But their books simply do not appeal to me, and haven't for quite some time. I've found love with books from other companies.

That is the purpose of this thread.

FWIW - a lot of the WoTC designers also work on 3rd party stuff - Monte Cook being a prime example. Shame people don't give the 3rd party stuff an equal shake when some of it is written by the very same folks who wrote "core" books.

 

[bowbe]

Wichita

We've had some game days but no con in 5 years now after the last one collapsed and no likelyhood of one anytime soon. People just don't give it the go that they should and prefer to play in their "home groups".

Go to soonercon next year. It isn't all gaming, its mostly sci fi and writing but its a heck of a con and with a lil push could be great for gaming. Gorilla Con in Pittsburg Kansas is pure gaming fun. If it wasn't held over St. Patties I'd go every year.

TLG is working on getting a much bigger turn-out to its con at the castle in Muskogee. Its mostly C&C based but its close to Tulsa and could turn into something with a bit more work.

I miss Contact in Tulsa. That was a great time.

Many apologies for the Hijack!
Back to regularly scheduled flame wars, nerd fights and general love/hate posting over about the relevance of the largest RPG publisher on earth.

Case

 

[bowbe]

Piggy backing on what Der Kluge mentioned about 3rd party developers/and WOTC ties.

Chris Pramas: of Green Ronin formerly of WOTC, Monte Cook: Formerly of WOTC. These are easy home run balls. Everyone knows this.

How about this?

Anthony Pryor: Formerly of TSR, Formerly of Sword&Sorcery Scarred Lands, now Freelancing for WOTC

Joe Carriker: Formerly of Sword&Sorcery Scarred Lands, now Freelancig for WOTC

Ari Marmell (Mousferatu) Most of you know him from the boards. He's written for nearly everyone including WOTC.

Fan Favorite Mike Mearls, Formerly of Fiery Dragon, Formerly of Malhavoc (Iron Heroes) now D&D WOTC R&D.

This is a SHORT list of folks who started in the 3rd party genre and are now writing hardbacks for WOTC as freelancers or otherwise! Obviously if WOTC thinks the 3rd party guys are good enough to write canon for them, then WOTC must feel that their "3rd party stuff" must not have sucked too bad.

A thing to note: Writing for WOTC is an awesome opportunity and pays pretty well compared to 3rd party enterprises but it has two sides to it. Pay is good. Keep your IP? Not a chance. WOTC "buys that" with the larger than 3rd party paycheck. Hence a lot of guys who were in the "formerly with WOTC" category had started their enterprises while still working for WOTC. Obviously they had ideas/creations/characters/settings that they wanted to keep.

WOTC offers authors the advantage of "getting name recognition'. Just as surely as nobody knows who the hell I am, most EN-world posters know who at least a few of the above freelancers or "new" staff writers and developers for WOTC are. That is AWESOME! Name recognition can pay dividends later on.

At the same time, if your a creative person, you have to weigh it out "what is worth the money vs. what is worth the IP?" To some, IP is worth its weight in dead trees. That "fair use of a character you invented" could come in handy if you say... created the persona of Mordenkainen or Robilar would it not?

Just something to chew on.

Case

 

[Eric Tolle]

So the question is this: do they absolutely have to have that business model to survive, or is that simply the business model they've chosen?

Not if they want to keep the True Fans happy.

Of course the business model that the True Fans want is for the company to put out a single main book (cheap paper, with no artwork), and maybe three world/adventure books, and then never print anything again. That way the company can go out of business, and the True Fans can then ask on web forums years later "Whatever happened to...?" And then lament that the really cool companies have all gone out of business.

At least that's been my experience with that breed of internet gamer.

 

[Kem]

Well, that's not a lot of product by comparison. As far as the tie-in stuff (games, coloring books, etc.) they can make as much of that stuff as they want. It isn't rules bloat.

All I was pointing out was that they put out a heck of a lot more then just "core books, a line of really kick-butt modules, and a setting or two.".

 

[Dragon Snack]

Case, it's like you are reading my mind...

3.5 came along and kicked all of those folks in the junk...

While I could quote your whole post and follow it with a QFT*, this sticks out for me. 3.5 was a let down that sucked a lot of the fun out of D&D for me and thus stoked the flame of discontent for WotC.

I was a huge proponent of 3.5 - before it came out. I thought it was going to fix some wonky rules and still be compatable with 3.0 (yeah, I drank the kool aid). Imagine my embarrassment when all it turned out to be was a collection of house rules that not only left wonky rules in place, but created it's own problems on top of that. Some of the nerfs were debatable (apparently Halflings were teh broke), but they certainly went overboard on some things while looking the other way on others. Let's not even talk about the out of left field power ups (Dwarves and Druids, I'm looking at you) or insulting changes (they wouldn't touch Half Orcs because they were "a popular race" and "it would be a disservice to fans", but Gnomes, eh, "nobody played Gnomes" - I played Gnomes). Then the insulting "you could be playing at the same table as someone still using the 3.0 rules and not even know it" (Hmm, it looks like they've taken that line off their website).

Kicked in the junk, yeah, that about covers it.

Since then, I don't trust WotC. Why do you think I've waited over a year to buy some books? As much as I love D&D, I'm certainly not going to go out of my way to "promote the hobby" for them.

That should probably also be taken as a cautionary tale for all the "4th edition now!" folks. Be careful what you wish for. 4th edition will be me taking my leave of D&D (unless it knocks my socks off, but see above), I've got plenty of other games I can play (and do).


*I will note that I actually do like supplements, more options = good. But it's definitely been taken to the extreme and a couple of my players have taken advantage of the fact that I don't gobble up every new book coming down the pike (lack of errata doesn't help).

 

[Korgoth]

Not if they want to keep the True Fans happy.

Of course the business model that the True Fans want is for the company to put out a single main book (cheap paper, with no artwork), and maybe three world/adventure books, and then never print anything again. That way the company can go out of business, and the True Fans can then ask on web forums years later "Whatever happened to...?" And then lament that the really cool companies have all gone out of business.

At least that's been my experience with that breed of internet gamer.

Well, I've never met anybody like that. I guess we've had different experiences.