Publishers' opinions on v3.5
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Monte At Home
Explorer
Speaking as a game designer who knows the system pretty well (and a lot of the background of why things were done a certain way), I think that some of the 3.5 changes are good and were needed, and I think some are serious mistakes.
Speaking as a publisher, 3.5 scares me. Not as much as it did when it was being worked on a while back, but still somewhat. (If the changes had been larger and more invasive, it would have had the potential to cut the audience right down the middle.) It scares me because all it accomplishes is it makes the straightforward D&D audience (from which I pull my % of customers, just like most every d20 publisher) smaller.
By "straightforward D&D audience" I mean people who understand what you mean when you say "power attack" or "huge greatsword." The common man gamer, so to speak. It means I have to choose, as a publisher, whether my books will support one group of gamers rather than another, when for the last three years, there's just been one group.
Sure, I think most people will switch to 3.5. But does most mean 90% or does it mean 75%? We don't know yet and I don't know of anyone in the industry today savvy enough to really know that answer ahead of time. That's kinda scary. And even if it's 90% (which I think is the farandaway, outside, very best case scenario), why would I be happy about my potential group of customers being cut to 90% of what it was?
I plan on doing an extensive review and commentary on 3.5 when it comes out and my NDA goes away.
Speaking as a publisher, 3.5 scares me. Not as much as it did when it was being worked on a while back, but still somewhat. (If the changes had been larger and more invasive, it would have had the potential to cut the audience right down the middle.) It scares me because all it accomplishes is it makes the straightforward D&D audience (from which I pull my % of customers, just like most every d20 publisher) smaller.
By "straightforward D&D audience" I mean people who understand what you mean when you say "power attack" or "huge greatsword." The common man gamer, so to speak. It means I have to choose, as a publisher, whether my books will support one group of gamers rather than another, when for the last three years, there's just been one group.
Sure, I think most people will switch to 3.5. But does most mean 90% or does it mean 75%? We don't know yet and I don't know of anyone in the industry today savvy enough to really know that answer ahead of time. That's kinda scary. And even if it's 90% (which I think is the farandaway, outside, very best case scenario), why would I be happy about my potential group of customers being cut to 90% of what it was?
I plan on doing an extensive review and commentary on 3.5 when it comes out and my NDA goes away.
jmucchiello
Hero
Technically, I never sent in the request for access. I had expected that I would have two books out in late April and late June and then I could just wait on 3.5 while starting the design for the next book. Unfortunately time slipped away from me and the book that will be most affected by 3.5 is late coming out.die_kluge said:
Trust me. The 3.5 version of CC will be very different than the 3.0 version. Based on what I've seen in the rumor mill. 1/3 of CC is all about ripping the core classes apart and putting them back together to create a class you really want to play. With all the changes on tap for most of the classes, the balance I feel I've achieved is most likely out of whack in 3.5.
Savage Species trumped about 8 pages of my book. (See the preview post in January on the CC webpage.) I'm leaving the pages in because my take on playing monsters is not the same as SS, but I haven't really read SS just in case.
Then there's the pages of skill discussion (with feats) that have been altered. Feats that may or may not make sense balance-wise in a game where two weapon fighting now mirrors d20 modern. That change alters the balance of various feats.
But am I complaining? No. I get to release the book twice. Yeah, Fun. As Monte said, will 90% of players go to 3.5 or 75% or less? There already sarcastic sigs here on ENWorld. Someone's says why switch to 3.5 now when you switch to 3.75 in two years. That is an attitude that cannot be ignored by publishers who feel they can just move to 3.5 by the end of the year.
Mark
CreativeMountainGames.com
It's always been true (since the little white box set in '74) that as a new edition arrives on the scene a few folks remain with the older edition and a few folks become disenchanted with D&D and move toward another system. In regard to the former, this can be a financial consideration or a preference for the system as it stands. In regard to the latter, this can depend on the amount of market penetration in their area a rival system or offshoot can achieve. In both cases this can also be attributed to feeling that the owner of the D&D system has abandoned its customer base in favor of profits. The largest portion of the customer base moves along with the times and upgrades to the newest edition.
What differs with the coming of 3.5E is its relatively strong adherence to its immediate predecesor compared to previous edition upgrades. Whether this has the effect of a slightly larger portion of people staying behind with 3E (perhaps only for an extended period of time) or smoother transition to the newer edition with fewer bumps in the road, remains to be seen but I am leaning toward the latter. While new materials produced in the market will be fairly simple to use with the previous edition this time around, switching to the new edition will hold fewer obstacles. The wider array of materials supporting the new edition through the d20SL will have some influence over this market shift.
It's also been true that with each new edition the market has grown in general and the new edition winds up with an overall larger customer base than the previous edition. In the larger picture, the growth of the market as a whole will mean that 90% of the future market is akin to 110% of today's market. The amount of time at takes for the market to grow to that level is largely a function of the support the new edition gets from Hasbro, WotC and third party publishers.
Nearly everyone knows that 3E was a huge improvement over previous editions but nearly everyone also knows it was in no way perfect. The changes that come with 3.5E will have a similar degree of being viewed as an overall improvement with some amount of the changes viewed as going too far or not going far enough. In the end more people will gravitate toward the hobby and roleplay gaming will see another period of growth.
What differs with the coming of 3.5E is its relatively strong adherence to its immediate predecesor compared to previous edition upgrades. Whether this has the effect of a slightly larger portion of people staying behind with 3E (perhaps only for an extended period of time) or smoother transition to the newer edition with fewer bumps in the road, remains to be seen but I am leaning toward the latter. While new materials produced in the market will be fairly simple to use with the previous edition this time around, switching to the new edition will hold fewer obstacles. The wider array of materials supporting the new edition through the d20SL will have some influence over this market shift.
It's also been true that with each new edition the market has grown in general and the new edition winds up with an overall larger customer base than the previous edition. In the larger picture, the growth of the market as a whole will mean that 90% of the future market is akin to 110% of today's market. The amount of time at takes for the market to grow to that level is largely a function of the support the new edition gets from Hasbro, WotC and third party publishers.
Nearly everyone knows that 3E was a huge improvement over previous editions but nearly everyone also knows it was in no way perfect. The changes that come with 3.5E will have a similar degree of being viewed as an overall improvement with some amount of the changes viewed as going too far or not going far enough. In the end more people will gravitate toward the hobby and roleplay gaming will see another period of growth.
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jaerdaph said:
If a PDF publisher really wanted to get ahold of an advance copy I believe they could have hired Monte or Sean as a consultant. I didn't see any time limit on how long they had to be working for you. So, it would have been possible to hire them for 1 hour of consultation.
Cergorach
The Laughing One
Monte At Home said:
I have to wonder if the potential group of customers for D20 products is the same as the potential group of customers for D&D. I think the former is a lot smaller than the later. The question then is where the first group is located in the spectrum of D&D customers. Is it located in the part of the spectrum that is not affected at all by the migration to a new version of D&D, in the part that is heavily affected by the changes, or is it spread evenly among the D&D customers.
I personally think that the D20 customers are of the sort that either don't care that there's a new version and happily use 3.5E material with their 3E game, or hare happy to 'upgrade'.
It's not as if the changes are a financial burden, the new SRD should be available quickly enough. Thus anyone that's really pissed about having to buy new books should be able to 'upgrade' for free...
Kerrick
First Post
I rather agree with Monte on this one. A lot of the changes are good and logical, things they should have done in the first place, but some of the new stuff looks like WotC was tinkering with things that didn't need to be tinkered with.
Speaking as a producer (we're a production house, not a publisher), we'll be doing both - we'll write the books in 3E format, but we'll be providing sidebars for 3.5 conversion, since it appears that a majority of gamers out there will be going to 3.5. for our home games, we'll be using a mix of the two - 3.25, if you will - along with various world-specific house rules.
Speaking as a producer (we're a production house, not a publisher), we'll be doing both - we'll write the books in 3E format, but we'll be providing sidebars for 3.5 conversion, since it appears that a majority of gamers out there will be going to 3.5. for our home games, we'll be using a mix of the two - 3.25, if you will - along with various world-specific house rules.
Drawmack
First Post
First, that is one huge banner for The Brood.
Now on topic.
I do not understand Monte's Concern about loosing x% of his market.
Mark makes a valid point about the market growing. A new edition, or revision as the case may be, will bring a new media barrage which will bring new platers. Secondly the continued support of the core rules, versus the suppliment fest of 2e, will also draw in people who currently play other systems. Additionally if it really is as compatible as I'm hearing then won't the poeple who stay with 3e be able to use the 3.5e suppliments just as easily as those who convert can use their 3e suppliments?
Chris said it's only minor tweaking to use the GR stuff under 3.5 then how much teaking is it, really, to go the other way?
If anyone will be negativly impacted by 3.5 I believe that will be WotC and not the 3rd party publishers.
Now on topic.
I do not understand Monte's Concern about loosing x% of his market.
Mark makes a valid point about the market growing. A new edition, or revision as the case may be, will bring a new media barrage which will bring new platers. Secondly the continued support of the core rules, versus the suppliment fest of 2e, will also draw in people who currently play other systems. Additionally if it really is as compatible as I'm hearing then won't the poeple who stay with 3e be able to use the 3.5e suppliments just as easily as those who convert can use their 3e suppliments?
Chris said it's only minor tweaking to use the GR stuff under 3.5 then how much teaking is it, really, to go the other way?
If anyone will be negativly impacted by 3.5 I believe that will be WotC and not the 3rd party publishers.
Mark
CreativeMountainGames.com
coyote6 said:Didn't Ryan Dancey or someone say that 2e sold less than 1e?
Or perhaps he said that eventually, the 2e market shrunk to smaller than the 1e market. I don't recall.
I'd love to see that quote.
D&D's market may have been shrinking during the final days of TSR but 2E surely outsold 1E. Monte might be able to tell us as I believe both he and Sue were at TSR during the 1990's prior to the WotC buyout.
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