Is Wotc Slipping?

[Beginning of the End]

If WOTC makes something new, I am sure they will look and make that choice again.

Speaking as a 3.5 fan, I completely agree. All WotC needs to do is produce a better version of D&D's original 1974-2008 gameplay and I'll be all over it.

I'd like to know why Essentials did not do as well as I expected, what piece of evidence I missed.

If I had to venture a guess, I'd point to three factors:

(1) The pay-to-preview Starter Set isn't an effective product. (Products like it have been tried more than a dozen times by TSR and WotC. They have never been big sellers.)

(2) The total price point for the softcover Essentials books is higher than the hardcover PHB/DMG/MM trio. So any new players doing price comparisons will figure that they're getting a better deal by PHB/DMG/MM set.

(3) WotC was probably a little too hyper-interested in avoiding another "3.5". They invested a lot of energy into convincing anyone who would listen that Essentials was 100% compatible with 4E and that absolutely nothing was changing. It's really hard to convince existing players to buy something when you're telling them that they already own it.

(4) The Essentials rulebooks didn't actually fix any of the problems that the vast majority of 3.5/PF holdouts had with the 4E ruleset. (Someone like that probably does exist, but honestly the only people I have ever heard claim that Essentials would appeal to 3.5 players are existing 4E players.)

So you've got a product line that doesn't sell to new roleplayers; doesn't sell to existing 4E players; and doesn't bring ex-customers back into the fold.

That's a product line with some problems.

Also, check this out:

(1) Go to wizards.com. Click on "Dungeons & Dragons". Click "New to D&D". You'll end up on this page, which features two videos telling you to buy the PHB/DMG/MM.

(2) Do a Google search for "what do I need to play D&D". You end up on this page on Wizard's website which also tells you to buy the PHB/DMG/MM... for 3rd Edition.

There are, obviously, pages out there telling you to buy Essentials. But there's some dysfunction here in WotC's message.

More generally, I think WotC is really fighting the fact that they literally do not have any effective branding which translates to, "These are the books you need to buy to start playing D&D."

Core? They spent 2008-2010 degrading that term into meaning nothing at all.

Essentials? Even if you actually needed all 11 products in the Essentials line to start playing (and you don't), the idea that you would need to buy 11 products in order to start playing the game would be completely absurd.

The Starter Set might have fit that bill, but they made it using a proven-to-fail product model.

 

[DumbPaladin]

Boilerplate

How many threads have there been in the past few months discussing Amazon numbers and other stray bits of hard-to-decipher information, where the talk went on for numerous pages before it became clear no one can read the tea leaves of "rankings on a website owned by some guy named Bezos" ?

I would LOVE to see someone with a deft control of the EN World search engine collate a list of all of the previous threads similar to this, combined into a boilerplate template that we could simply paste into each talk from here on in, which could inform everyone,

<b>"Numerous discussions prior to this covered the same basic area with no correct answer. Please refer to the following threads, each of which is linked below:"</b>

That would be awesome.

 

[Bluenose]

Before this goes too far afield in attacking 'validity', are there other sites that present info on sales ranking for RPG products? I saw nothing on B&N's site, for example. I do seem to recall someone posting an article -I think from ICV2? - discussing general sales ranking for 3rd quarter RPG sales; is there more information such as this somewhere available to us?

For bookshops there's Nielsen Bookfind. They have around 20,000 participating stores in America and about the same number in the rest of the world. When a participating store sells a book, that data is sent to Nielsen and gets compiled so publishers/bookstores/libraries/other interested parties can see what sales trends are like. This includes RPG books sold in bookstores. However, it costs money to look at the figures.
Edit: That's Nielsen Bookscan, not Bookfind.

ICV2 do indeed discuss general sales figures for RPGs. They do so every quarter. It's not as accurate as Nielsen, but they do contact a lot of retailers asking about sales trends.

It would presumably also be possible to get some idea of the games people are playing (or want to play) by looking at the Looking for Game/Group 'advertisements' on various websites.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Agreed. We have managed to expound on each other, rather than conflict, which is nice.

Let's not do that too often, though, or we might herald the End of Days.

In any event, there is no "double standard" involved in being selective about whose testimony you give greater weight. Experience teaches you who is likely to be accurate, and who is not, and it is not at all uncommon (esp. as different people have different experiences, and evaluate evidence differently) for two people to have wildly different ideas about the accuracy of any one source.


RC

 

[Wicht]

So you've got a product line that doesn't sell to new roleplayers; doesn't sell to existing 4E players; and doesn't bring ex-customers back into the fold.

That's a product line with some problems.

That sounds vaguely familiar.

I'm hoping that Paizo manages to avoid the same problems with their new "basic set."

From what I can tell, they need to have...
1) Enough new stuff in it to make it worthwhile, even to existing customers (I think they are going to be good to go here if the box has as much as they say).
2) A lower price point than the Core book ($35 is lower than $50 so again its good).
3) Enough shiny to appeal to a walk-by buyer.

 

[BryonD]

If one person is talking about a specific local event, and another is talking about a global issue, then we are talking apples and oranges cases. My criteria for trust in the two cases is not the same.

But that is not accurate. Black Diamond data gets poo-pooed as meaningless and yet "a guy on the internet" is equated to your friend looking out the window at the weather.

Both pieces of data are local and should be considered comparably.

Now, you may question if ProfC has any clue WHY the store actually closed and you may also question whether Black Diamond data is at all meaningful to the larger market. But those are both follow up questions.

You are using "local" and "global" to cover mixing and matching standards in ways which do not apply.

 

[BryonD]

People are taking some very, very narrow bits of information and then trying to spin them into broader facts and conclusions.

That is a ridiculous statement.
What is happening is that repeated and repeated pieces of information from a wide variety of sources keep drawing the same picture.

Using a hand wave to declare it "very, very narrow" does nothing to make that description fit.

Like I've said before I can reach into a bag and pull out a black marble. You can correctly tell me that this one pull says very little about the contents of the bag. But if I reach in 10,000 times and get 5,456 black and 4,544 white then I start to have a good idea about the approximate contents of the bag. You can insist that it is 85% black marbles if you want. And you can say I have not PROVEN that false. But you are not presenting a strong case. Particularly as you lack any evidence at all o the contratry.

In effect you are saying that the first draw was a very small amount of data and doesn't provide enough. So then you arbitrarily round it down to zero. And then you round the next 9,999 draws down to zero and declare your final tally of zero to be meaningful.

 

[Raven Crowking]

It is actually rational to give more weight to a source that you trust than to a source you do not know.

Of course, depending upon the source, that trust itself might not be rational.

Ex., When evidence is presented that strongly refutes his point, Bob agrees that he is (or probably is) in error, depending up the weight of the evidence. As a result, I trust that Bob is probably not simply sticking to his guns on issue X, and refusing to look at the data.

OTOH, Bob knows nothing at all about potato farming, so where his opinion on potato farming comes into play, while I certainly believe he means what he says, I also know that it is not an informed opinion. Joe the Potato Farmer probably knows more, even if I have no direct information about Joe's character. I have to take everything with a grain of salt.

So, one might accept a given poster's testimony with more weight for a number of reasons, some of which are rational (posting history demonstrates accuracy and ability to change mind), and some of which are not (consistently shares my opinion). Examination of posting history of the parties involved should give you some idea what is going on.


RC

 

[MrMyth]

But that is not accurate. Black Diamond data gets poo-pooed as meaningless and yet "a guy on the internet" is equated to your friend looking out the window at the weather.

I think is really at the root of the disagreement here. I actually agree with this statement. I am willing to believe Black Diamond (and that in their experience, 4E has not been selling), and I am willing to believe ProfessorCirno (and that his store owner acted in this fashion, and then had to close shop).

I don't believe that either incident provides enough information to draw conclusions about the industry as a whole. And, in the case of ProfessorCirno, he didn't even try to do so, which is why people found it unreasonable for you to point out perceived hypocrisy about the situation.

As it is, though - you criticized me for perceived 'double standards' about interpreting the best from someone like Dannager, and the worst about posters in this thread. I don't think either such thing occured, but clearly describing things as precisely and accurately as possible is very important to you.

To that end... at what point did "Black Diamond data gets poo-pooed as meaningless" by Dannager?

Has anyone really been that dismissive of the data itself? Or has it simply been that people don't believe that the data is significant enough to be used to draw conclusions about the entire industry?

Both pieces of data are local and should be considered comparably.

Now, you may question if ProfC has any clue WHY the store actually closed and you may also question whether Black Diamond data is at all meaningful to the larger market. But those are both follow up questions.

You are using "local" and "global" to cover mixing and matching standards in ways which do not apply.

Honestly, BryonD, I think you are changing your position rapidly here in order to find ways to criticize those you are in disagreement with. What you are saying right now is very at odds with the actual criticism you offered towards ProfessorCirno:

"We get data point after data point so often they are practically touching. But we get this "enlightened" refrain of "you can connect those dots, that's just guesswork." And sober heads nob in stern agreement.

Then we get a single source anecdote of a claim of one person's behavior and a single source anecdote of a claim of one store closing. And a direct line of association is drawn between the two. And he gets XP for it from one of the people who don't think we know enough about PF/4E."

That seems to very much be criticizing, not the anecdotes themselves, but the follow-up question. You are directly equating accepting the various 'data points' about 4E sales as indicative of a larger truth about the industry with drawing a single conclusion about a single local event.

Now you suddenly are backing off and saying that it isn't about the conclusions or follow-up questions at all, but just about the trustworthiness of the source.

But that is certainly not what you were arguing yesterday.

 

[Wicht]

Has anyone really been that dismissive of the data itself?

Yes.