Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannyalcatraz" data-source="post: 4411572" data-attributes="member: 19675">My first blush analysis of the hypothetical:Hasbro probably does, in order: 1.  Use the property to make money licensing just the name to games/movies etc., and minimally supports the pnp aspect (see below), as long as it is profitable.2. Scale down production of books supporting the pnp aspect of D&D to probably additions to the core PHB and/or MM.3) Backtrack to revitalize.a) Probably seriously reanalyzing the OGL environement vs the GSL environment: what would making the "source code" open again do for the sales of the core game? If the OGL makes better business sense overall, is the game's market share still big enough to make such a switch a rational business decision, or is it too late to revitalize 4Ed by returning to an OGL-type environment.b) Depending upon the bottom line (and comments above), trying to hold on to do a launch of a 5Ed down the road. 4) Sell off D&D, if possible.  Plenty of RPGs have changed hands, its just a matter of finding the right buyer.  And don't think it couldn't be at a loss, either- just look at the history of Daimler-Chrysler.As for the shape of the industry at 1/3/5:1) Until and unless D&D found a new publisher, the vaccuum caused by the loss of the 800lb gorilla would lead to a change in the overall shape of the industry.  Instead of a single market-dominating system and a bunch of also-rans, each publisher and system would have the space to grow.Consider what happened when Superman was killed by Doomsday.  EVERY publisher of superhero comics introduced a "Superman-esque" character if they didn't have one.  Those that already did refocused attention upon those characters.In some cases, those titles really made the company grow (Image's Supreme), or gained them critical acclaim for their storytelling (Comic's Greatest World's Titan).Similarly, those companies with D&D-esque games would see an increase in sales, depending upon people's edition of choice...Hackmaster, C&C, AU/AE, Pathfinder, etc.Other companies might jump into the fray via purchase or license...GURPS: D&D?  D&D Tri-Stat?  Greyhawk, FR, etc. settings for Fantasy HERO?Regardless, I doubt you'd see the rise of a single company to the position of market leadership that D&D holds today.  At worst, you'd see a few of the major companies struggling for supremacy, possibly serially.  IOW, less of a virtual monopoly and more of an oligopoly.Ultimately, however, even if D&D simply faded away for a while, the hobby would remain strong, and eventually, the laws of Supply and Demand would probably dictate that the price for the D&D IP would fall low enough (either through mere depreciation or coupled with inflation) that someone- Hasbro or some buyer they found- would put out a new version of the game...even if it were identical to one of the previous editions (IOW, a pure reprint).After all, games of lesser sales- Traveller, Battletech, etc.- have switched hands and found to be viable as reprints, at least in the short run.</blockquote>

Verification