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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Consonant Dude" data-source="post: 5806228" data-attributes="member: 6688791">I'm skeptical about a lot of this. That sounds a lot like the myths  started by Ryan Dancey and perpetuated and distorted to this day.   I don't think you need to bake rules bloat into the core to be  successful. In fact, anything that's awful in a game is detrimental to  your success long term. If you bloat books, it's no wonder people are  less and less interested in the rest of the line.  I also doubt you need ultra big core books to boost profit margins.  There's a sweet spot around which people will buy a set of three core  books and it doesn't really matter if they clock at 225 pages each or  325. In fact, there's probably lots of people out there who prefer a  more concise book if it gives everything needed to play.   So ironically, the three things that lead to disinterest and diminishing returns in the line are more probably:  Bloating rulebooks: Because that's awful from both a design and an  editorial standpoint. It gives your readership and users headaches. It's  just bad.   Too much crunch in your core: Because your core books will probably  benefit from anywhere between 2 and 3 years of playtesting but there  will still be things you miss out. And because your supplements won't be  able to benefit from such long playtesting, they need to be produced on  a slim, slick core. If they don't, you have a third problem:  Unbalancing supplements: This is a main culprit as to why there is a  diminishing return in WotC supplements. There is a large portion of DMs  and players out there who not only aren't interested in supplements but actually see them as a threat.  This is a real problem WotC has failed to see for a long while. There  was a time when people were looking forward to game material or at least  were neutral. But if people go "oh noes! They are releasing a new  supplement" you have a real problem. At worse, your release should be  met with indifference. If it's met as a problem, you're Doing It Wrong™.  The OGL community proved that you could thrive and prosper releasing  only supplement material. Ryan Dancey took a look at TSR and decided  arbitrarily that the reason the company went under was because of  supplements. This is ignoring the deeper problems of TSR at the time, I  suspect.   If you release amazing supplements  to an amazing game, they will buy. If you release Elminster's Guide to the Realm's Best Whorehouses, well...</blockquote>

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