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Kate Welch on Leaving WotC
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<blockquote data-quote="Li Shenron" data-source="post: 8084858" data-attributes="member: 1465"><p>I think R_Chance has a point though... 320 pages cannot be called "easy". The point is that the PHB does not teach you the game, it's a "handbook" i.e. a reference book, and not a tutorial or a guide. It has a complete list of character options presented by type (race, class, spells...) which you can't read sequentially if your purpose is playing the game <em>tonight </em>in the same way you can do with many tabletop games. Then it has a fairly complete set of rules spanning various chapters, which are supposed to tell you almost everything you need to know about combat, exploration, spellcasting... This material is supposed to be read gradually over many days. </p><p></p><p>When I started playing more seriously (3.0) I bought the PHB. I never bought a "starter set/box" because I already knew I was going to be interested in the complexity and magnitude of a RPG, that was already a selling point for me, compared to other tabletop games. But it doesn't work like that for a lot of people, at least not anymore because now D&D has expanded the gamer base to a lot more casual gamers than before, meaning there are a lot more "beginners" trying to play the game, and the PHB is not a good book for them.</p><p></p><p>I think Kate Welch is very correct, the "new user experience" is neglected by WotC. In theory, they have already thought about it since the start when they decided to publish the <strong>Basic rules</strong> and the Starter Set (the latter being meant for beginner DMs anyway). But after the initial release, and despite a few updates to Basic, I don't think Basic is "basic enough". It is still 180 pages! If you think carefully, I am quite sure you can distill the true minimum core of the game into 20 pages + an appendix for spell (not necessary all of them) and another for a bunch of monsters, <strong>enough</strong> for beginners to play a dozen sessions... after that, they are not "new users" anymore and can switch to the current 180 version of Basic or the PHB, but clearly D&D is not leading beginners through this process if the first document presented is 180 pages and not even telling them on page 1 that they <em>don't need to read it all</em>! </p><p></p><p>I can't speak for the Starter Set because I don't have it, but Basic and PHB are written by experienced gamers for experienced gamers, even if now and then they include some incredibly dumbed-down explanations on things that are already so simple they don't need to be simplified... This over-explaining the trivial things and at the same time failing to understand why the audience is still put off by the bigger picture, is a typical symptom of someone who knows their stuff so well that they have become unable to understand someone may not get it so easily. The problem is likely that at WotC they don't have enough knowledge about how to <em>teach</em> something, either they didn't hire enough good experts or they aren't listening to them. At this stage, D&D still largely relies on experienced gamers to teach the game to newcomers, except newcomers who are already attracted by the idea of having to "analyse" hundreds of pages of rules.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Li Shenron, post: 8084858, member: 1465"] I think R_Chance has a point though... 320 pages cannot be called "easy". The point is that the PHB does not teach you the game, it's a "handbook" i.e. a reference book, and not a tutorial or a guide. It has a complete list of character options presented by type (race, class, spells...) which you can't read sequentially if your purpose is playing the game [I]tonight [/I]in the same way you can do with many tabletop games. Then it has a fairly complete set of rules spanning various chapters, which are supposed to tell you almost everything you need to know about combat, exploration, spellcasting... This material is supposed to be read gradually over many days. When I started playing more seriously (3.0) I bought the PHB. I never bought a "starter set/box" because I already knew I was going to be interested in the complexity and magnitude of a RPG, that was already a selling point for me, compared to other tabletop games. But it doesn't work like that for a lot of people, at least not anymore because now D&D has expanded the gamer base to a lot more casual gamers than before, meaning there are a lot more "beginners" trying to play the game, and the PHB is not a good book for them. I think Kate Welch is very correct, the "new user experience" is neglected by WotC. In theory, they have already thought about it since the start when they decided to publish the [B]Basic rules[/B] and the Starter Set (the latter being meant for beginner DMs anyway). But after the initial release, and despite a few updates to Basic, I don't think Basic is "basic enough". It is still 180 pages! If you think carefully, I am quite sure you can distill the true minimum core of the game into 20 pages + an appendix for spell (not necessary all of them) and another for a bunch of monsters, [B]enough[/B] for beginners to play a dozen sessions... after that, they are not "new users" anymore and can switch to the current 180 version of Basic or the PHB, but clearly D&D is not leading beginners through this process if the first document presented is 180 pages and not even telling them on page 1 that they [I]don't need to read it all[/I]! I can't speak for the Starter Set because I don't have it, but Basic and PHB are written by experienced gamers for experienced gamers, even if now and then they include some incredibly dumbed-down explanations on things that are already so simple they don't need to be simplified... This over-explaining the trivial things and at the same time failing to understand why the audience is still put off by the bigger picture, is a typical symptom of someone who knows their stuff so well that they have become unable to understand someone may not get it so easily. The problem is likely that at WotC they don't have enough knowledge about how to [I]teach[/I] something, either they didn't hire enough good experts or they aren't listening to them. At this stage, D&D still largely relies on experienced gamers to teach the game to newcomers, except newcomers who are already attracted by the idea of having to "analyse" hundreds of pages of rules. [/QUOTE]
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