D&D 5E Reasons Why My Interest in 5e is Waning

[BryonD]

So again, why 3.0 after only 2 years. Yup, Cook planned 3.5 from the start, but it was supposed to be a couple of years more down the road. People didn't complain about 3e though. It was a pretty darn well received. So, what happened? If there is a correlation between views on message boards and sales, doesn't that mean that 3.0 sold about as well as 4e?

Semi-officially: Because the game was being played by so many people, and so many 3PP options were out, that improvements to the game became apparent.
Unofficially: Because the game was hugely popular and as has been oft-pointed out, the core books sell the best of anything.

 

[pemerton]

It is an ironic observation about people who believe that companies are doomed to not be able to produce products because it costs money for them to produce products.

No one thinks companies can't produce product per se. WotC is producing plenty of Magic cards.

But given that WotC has actually explained that it is not commercially viable for them to produce supplements at the rate they did for 3E and 4e, I prefer to believe their stated estimate of what is commercially feasible for them, to the assertions of those who don't have access to their financial information that if Paizo can do it, then so can WotC.

 

[pemerton]

It all ties back to the complaints (at the time) about how D20 was slowing innovation because so many people were doing D20 stuff.

I was never someone who made such complaints, and in retrospect I don't think I was mistaken.

That period saw HeroWars/Quest, Burning Wheel, the emergence of Vincent Baker as a prominent designer, etc. These are all innovative RPGs, some of the most innovative since Traveller, Runequest and Champions 35 or so years ago.

"gamer" is a pretty vague term. WotC made it very clear at the time that they felt like the "gamer" community was vastly bigger than the TTRPG-gamer community and they thought they could change that.

In the general sense, of course 4E was intensely "gamer-focused". But the vast majority of non-TTRPG gamers remained non-TTRPG gamers.
In the TTRPG sense 4E was highly gamer focused if you were in the niche it fit, notsomuch if you were not. Which of course means the term ends up not having a useful definition for this use.

"Gamer" is a vague term. The main thing I had in mind is that 4e is an RPG based on game play - if you don't care about weighing mechanical options, crunching mechanical outputs, etc then it is not for you. In that respect it is closer to (say) Burning Wheel than (say) Moldvay Basic.

To pick two systems somewhat in the middle of that spectrum, let's take RQ and 3E.

Both RQ and 3E can be quite crunchy if you want them to be. But in those systems you can also look down a character sheet, see a bunch of bonuses/skill numbers (+X to this, Z% that, etc) and thereby form a mental 'picture' of the character. The skill/ability names, plus associated numbers, can fairly easily translate into loose descriptors for the character. Thus, for those who want to play with less mechanical crunch and more free narration, RQ and 3E are (I conjecture) fairly viable systems. Rather than (say) using some complex mechanism for Bluff checks, you look down the sheet, see that the PC in question has +20 to Bluff, and the GM determines that the NPC is fooled. Or you see that the PC has 18 STR, and so yes, s/he can kick the door down if s/he wants to.

4e isn't like that. You can't get a clear picture of who a character is, or what s/he can do (especially but not only combat-wise), without mediating the stats through the game mechanics (either in play, or in imagination). 3E can trend in this direction the more that complex feats and unfamiliar spells are part of the game, but 4e defaults to this.

Someone who is not a gamer - as in, not interested in game mechanics (playing with them, imagining their operation) - is, I think, likely to find 4e unsatisfactory. One limit case of this is people who play 4e and declare only basic attacks for their PCs. Such a person is having no experience - cognitive, emotional - of what his/her PC is actually about, who his/her PC actually is. A very rough analogy would be someone who sits down to "play" chess but only moves his/her pawns and gets confused about what is going on when the opponent castles, or takes en passant.

 

[Hussar]

Semi-officially: Because the game was being played by so many people, and so many 3PP options were out, that improvements to the game became apparent.
Unofficially: Because the game was hugely popular and as has been oft-pointed out, the core books sell the best of anything.

Lol.

So 4e is replaced after two years because it was hugely unpopular but 3e is replaced in the same time frame because it is hugely popular?

You don't see any problems with that?

 

[BryonD]

I was never someone who made such complaints, and in retrospect I don't think I was mistaken.

Agreed and agreed.

"Gamer" is a vague term. The main thing I had in mind is that 4e is an RPG based on game play - if you don't care about weighing mechanical options, crunching mechanical outputs, etc then it is not for you. In that respect it is closer to (say) Burning Wheel than (say) Moldvay Basic.

One of my consistent criticisms regarding 4E and fitting my personal preference has been that it is gamist. So I can't really argue different now, can I?

I've also always agreed it was a very good tactical game. (even for non-combat). I believe that aligns with what you said.

That said, WotC was still also very openly going for the MMO "gamer" crowd.
That isn't in conflict with your position, but it is another element.

(And, just for clarification, I see a handful of cool ideas from WoW in 4E and I don't remotely agree that 4E was an MMO. )

 

[BryonD]

Lol.

So 4e is replaced after two years because it was hugely unpopular but 3e is replaced in the same time frame because it is hugely popular?

You don't see any problems with that?

I think it is impressive the number of problems you squeezed into one sentence.

 

[BryonD]

Lol.

So 4e is replaced after two years because it was hugely unpopular but 3e is replaced in the same time frame because it is hugely popular?

You don't see any problems with that?

When Essentials came out you, personally, were very firm that it was nothing whatsoever like 3.5 in concept or purpose and yo, personally, also made it completely clear that you did not think 4E was in the slightest trouble at the time.

A LOT of people were saying that 4E was in serious trouble. This does not dispute the fact that there was a solid, devoted fanbase. But there were tons of arguments about 4E going on. And it was easy to walk into any game store and find more people saying "4E sucks" than loving it. (Yes, you could also find places where the 4E love was strong) But, again, that split was huge.

There is no comparison to 3E when 3.5 came along. There were people who HATED 3E. But they were complaining about how it had ruined the industry and made it hard to find other games. And they were vastly outnumbered.

Do you have any evidence that 3E was hurting?
Essentials does not in any way show that 4E was hurting. A lot of people recognized that 4E was hurting at the time and made the connection. In hindsight it is even easier to make the connection, as your 180 on the subject supports. But the evidence of 4E's overall popularity problems was all around.

For 3E all you have is 3.5.

You can LOL all you want. But tell me that 3E wasn't completely dominating the market at that time. Go ahead and call what was being referenced as "the second golden age" was failing. It is absurd. And, frankly, that your sour grapes attitude has brought you to that rationalization is gold for the entertainment value. You can say it wasn't highly popular and the people who were there will know better and nothing in the past or the future will change.

I can make the case that 4E was hurting without ever saying "Essentials". I can make the case the 3.5 was entirely because 3E was doing so well.

You seem to concede (now) that 4E was hurting. But then you jump to the fact that 3.5 exists as you only point of evidence and conclude the 3E was hurting. It is like the witch trial in Monty Python.

You've not only concluded that wet streets cause rain, you have moved on to "".., and swimming pools are wet, therefore cars drive there."

 

[Shasarak]

No one thinks companies can't produce product per se. WotC is producing plenty of Magic cards.

But given that WotC has actually explained that it is not commercially viable for them to produce supplements at the rate they did for 3E and 4e, I prefer to believe their stated estimate of what is commercially feasible for them, to the assertions of those who don't have access to their financial information that if Paizo can do it, then so can WotC.

If someone can do it commercially then it must mean, by definition, that it is commercially viable.

 

[Trickster Spirit]

If someone can do it commercially then it must mean, by definition, that it is commercially viable.

It's was technologically and economically feasible for us to continue funding the space program after the Apollo missions and have a Mars colony by now, but the government didn't see the point in it.

sigh

Point being just because you can do something, doesn't mean there aren't better things you could do with that budget instead.

seriously though there's no better way to spend our budget then a mars colony i want my mars buggy dammit

 

[BryonD]

Point being just because you can do something, doesn't mean there aren't better things you could do with that budget instead.

I completely agree with this.

But doing truly nothing at all makes more sense than limping along.

If they said, hey, it doesn't really make money, here is a nice 5E, see ya, then I'd be very mildly disappointed. But so be it.

But when someone (WotC or other) says that this supports long term brand value, I think that makes no sense.

When someone says this avoids producing the non-valuable part of the game and will support the fan base for years to come, I think that makes no sense.

When someone says we just did a core because that is the only part that makes money, therefore we won't do another core for a very long time, I think that makes no sense.

Doing something better with the money makes TOTAL sense.
But what they are doing now, makes no sense.
I hope (I want to say assume here, but....) that there is just more to the story. But WotC has shown a lot of repetition of dropping the ball going well back into the 3E days.
Having a great game system is one thing, staying in front of your audience is quite another.