Logic behind sales of "Expedition to Castle Greyhawk"?

[Mike_Lescault]

I don't mind people being negative, even if it's for the sake of being negative, which I dislike. wW try to encourage all opinions -- it's part of the hassles of presenting ANYTHING for public consumption.

And I agree 100%. We need people to be critical of what we do and it's very important that people feel they can voice what they dislike without any fear that we'll "take our ball and go home." On the other hand, there will also be people who are just hunting for any word or phrase they can use to focus on the negative. And while it may start to get tiresome, it's part of the price you pay in getting the legit critical feedback that's needed, as you can't allow one without the other.

 

[GVDammerung]

Ok well I guess coming on here and trying to be honest is a waste of time. Next time I post about topics of internal meetings I'll be sure to lie since telling the truth seems to be getting nowhere.

Good times, thanks for the contribution....not.

BTW I have worked on the brand for 18 months so although the history of what has happened in the past is not lost on me 1) I am not my predecessor 2) things change 3) I don't make it a habbit of BSing people.

Your time here is not wasted. It is appreciated.

Things do change. It is very easy to see any company as monolithic and those working for the company as speakers for the monolith. However, change is the only constant in today's business community. People come and go and with them different ideas and approches. Research reveals new or changed situations/opportunities. And then there is the almighty reorg.

While everyone should, IMO, take such matters into consideration, often they do not, IMO, because they don't see how or that the change is occuring. They see what they have been seeing or what they believe they have always seen, usually from a distance or several removes. I think that's a natural if not necessarily always positive reaction.

With specific respect to Greyhawk, its fans, I think, can be described (among other descriptions ) as "long suffering." This is not to condone sharp comments but to perhaps put them in some context. That context is one of a devoted, dedicated fanbase that, given a bit of encouragement would, IMO, be as enthusiastic about a GH setting as they are negative with no such setting in sight. In short, when some GH fans "attack," it is because they care and that passion for the setting is marketable, IMO.

No one iteration of the GH setting is going to please every GH fan but GH fandom remains sufficiently passionate about the setting to be a good base upon which a new GH setting could be founded. Even if not every GH fan gets on board a particular vison of GH, and they won't, there is a foundation there among those who will. New fans can then be added to the foundation, hopefully catching the enthusiam for the setting and propelling sales. But I digress.

I think you have been very open in your thoughts about Greyhawk as you have expressed them here and that is very much appreciated. I hope you will not be overly put off when some Greyhawkers let their passion and sense of "long suffering" get the best of them. I think there is a tremendous opportunity for Wotc to partner with Greyhawk and its fans in a way that will work to everyone's benefit and interests. Ideally, Wotc can find a way to produce or license a new vision of GH that will find an audience, new and not just old, and thereby be very profitable. This is not a thread for suggesting ideas to Wotc but perhaps it would be a thought to have a design contest much like the one that produced Eberron - "How would you redesign the World of Greyhawk campaign setting for publication?"

Anyway, thank you for your time, responses and patience!

Glenn

 

[MadMaxim]

Marginally off-topic heads-up: there is some RPGA play in Scandinavia. Although the main activity seems to be in Finland, I have heard of some groups in Denmark. Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland are assigned the Principality of Naerie in the Living Greyhawk campaign and there are a decent number of adventures written each year by local players - plus of course you can play Core modules and Splintered Suns ones - the latter set all across the remains of the South Kingdom and Iron League. For more information, check out the Naerie Yahoo group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/naerieLG/ or the website: http://www.naerie.net/

Ah, sorry, I didn't know that. Thanks.

 

[Deset Gled]

While still of some use as a test, with the setting out of print, I think the value of the mega-adventure test is somewhat diminished. Perhaps a better test would be to release a limited campaign setting along the design philosophy of Ghostwalk. Not a full blown GHCS but a subset thereof. ... Link that up with the mega-adventure and I think you'd have a much better "test."

While I can certainly see both sides of this part, here are a few reasons why I think WotC would decide to use an adventure as a market test, rather than publishing a limited setting:

1. Isolation. Greyhawk is a setting that has been around a very long time, with input from many different sources. If WotC published a "limited" campaign setting, it is pretty much a given that the Grayhawk community would be using their own material to fill in the blanks. However, some of that may differ from the full scale setting WotC would end up with. This would lead to problems on multiple levels. Basically, WotC needs to know if people are interested in WotC's Greyhawk, not Gary Gygax's or their own homebrew stuff. An adventure is the best way to test this in a vaccuum, since only the parts that they write in will show up.

2. Developement costs. When you look at the bottom line, I imagine it's going to be cheaper, faster, and easier to develop a one shot adventure than a limited campaign setting. It just more economical. Especially in a case like this where fans are probably going to be very critical. (Anyone with more industry experience than me can feel free to correct me on this if I'm wrong).

3. History. If my understanding of history is correct, Greyhawk started as just being some adventures in Gary's standard setting. It did not exist as a formal setting until much later in it's lifetime (at least, not as a published one). It makes sense to me that WotC would grow it in the same fashion.

4. Backlash. There are still people that play Greyhawk now, and they're pretty vocal about it. If WotC released just enough of a Greyhawk campaign setting to get people interested and then cancelled it, I'm pretty sure that vocal minority would never let them hear then end of it (even if it proves to not be economically viable). If they use an adventure, they won't have this problem to anywhere near the same extent. And even if it doesn't work out now, they could publish another test adventure in another few years pretty easily, no harm no foul. If they publish a campaign setting now and it doesn't work out, they'll have an even harder time if they want to try it again in the future.

 

[Riley]

What is easy for all of us to forget (especially those of us at WotC) is that for every poster who is intent on flaming and tearing us down, there's probably 10 or 20 who are just lurking and enjoying the information we're providing.

I'm very glad you're dropping by, and I'm rather embarrassed by the abuse you sometimes receive here and elsewhere from a vocal minority.

For what it's worth, I'm still running a Greyhawk campaign after all these years (thanks, Paizo!), and I'm looking forward to RTTROCG.

 

[Shadeydm]

Ok well I guess coming on here and trying to be honest is a waste of time. Next time I post about topics of internal meetings I'll be sure to lie since telling the truth seems to be getting nowhere.

Good times, thanks for the contribution....not.

BTW I have worked on the brand for 18 months so although the history of what has happened in the past is not lost on me 1) I am not my predecessor 2) things change 3) I don't make it a habbit of BSing people.

Just to clarify Scott, I am not a WotC hater, in fact I purchase a good portion of the DnD products you folks put out (with the exception of Eberron stuff and setting specific FR stuff).
I do appriciate you and your co-workers posting here and I think much of what you percieve as flaming or tearing down might have been avoided if you had placed you initial replies within the context of the 18 months you have been on the job.

Cheers,

 

[Nepenthe]

What is easy for all of us to forget (especially those of us at WotC) is that for every poster who is intent on flaming and tearing us down, there's probably 10 or 20 who are just lurking and enjoying the information we're providing. So it pays to remind ourselves that we'd be doing those lurkers a real disservice if we let the vocal minority chase us off.

I would be one of those thankful (mostly-)lurkers.

/N

p.s. (and everybody thought I was going to write my first post without "Dragonlance")

 

[boerngrim]

Scott (and James, Jason, Eric, and Mike):

I also want to thank you for your willingness to be this open and put with many of the posts on this thread. And it is very much appreciated by many Enworlders, even if they don't let you know it.

QFT

The fact that you guys post here and try to answer questions shows that you do indeed care about what we think and what we want from the product. Thanks.

 

[Razz]

Erik is totally correct here. It was said at D&D XP by me that this would help us to gauge interest in Greyhawk and give us a measure of interest in the setting. We will also look at LG RPGA play data among other things to make determinations on future Greyhawk products.

Me personally I want to make more products. I beleive that is what a segment of customers want and the linch pin on the whole issues is figuring out if the products will sell enough.

The problem I have with that is if you guys come out with more material for Greyhawk based on these "tests", that's going to already eat into the general supplements, Forgotten Realms material, and Eberron material.

I don't think homebrews will be pleased to see that less books are being released because Greyhawk material is now taking up space. The same goes for Realms fans (like me) who've been dying to get some good Realms products (since 2007 FR products are, well, a silly trilogy of adventures and a coffee-table book?), and the Eberron fans will gripe about less Eberron products.

Granted, I am not saying Greyhawk fans should never get material. I just don't think they should be getting hardcore amounts of material like the Realms and Eberron should have. If that is the case, there's plenty of Planescape fans, Ravenloft fans, and Dark Sun fans that'll just gripe about Greyhawk gettings its chance but not them.

As one can tell, I am no fan of Greyhawk. I understand it's necessity for those who want to run very simple, very light, and very low-magic and low-level type games in such a setting. But I highly doubt there's enough interest in it anymore to cull the fat off us FR and Eberron fans.

Then again, maybe these "tests" will prove otherwise, I guess. But I figure I'd throw my 2 copper out there anyway.

It comes down to this one question to you: if GH has a large interest, how much will it dissolve the generic (cap books like Complete series, Races of series, etc.), FR and Eberron material?

 

[the black knight]

No matter how much lip-service these 'brand managers' spout, the fact remains that Greyhawk is the 800 pound elephant no one wants to devote their time to. Sure they're talking now, but hey, they've got a book to sell...

For the past three years, Dungeon magazine has been the saviour of Greyhawk, and now they want us to believe that getting rid of the magazine is somehow a good thing for Greyhawk fans.

So where does a Greyhawk fan go?

Not everyone loves the RPGA. No one wants to drive for three hours to play in a one-off game with people they won't see again. The so-called modules are not accessible for personal use unless you want to send away for them... and illegal downloads are the only way I've seen them circulated in private games. I've downloaded a few of them myself, and while they're good, I don't think they're worth selling as actual product.

This book will stir people up just enough to boost sales, then we'll see nothing from the company for years. They talk a good game, even wasting hours on threads like these to convince us that they care, but they don't, and Greyhawk bears the brunt of such indifference.