RSDancey replies to Goodman article (Forked Thread: Goodman rebuttal)

[Noumenon]

I do appreciate this "forked thread" thing because new threads are the only way I'd ever see these interesting posts.

 

[xechnao]

Could some kind soul sum up what Goodman, Dancey and anybody else is talking about? I see these threads but franklly I'm too busy to get at the nuggets of gold.

Thanks?

Necromancer Games, a prominent and dedicated OGL 3pp of D&D in the past, does not have the possibility to get its product to shops by a distributor. I am not sure if this is only about 2nd tier distribution or also 3rd tier. The blame falls on the relation of 4e and 3pp.
Goodman Games, the only current 3pp left replies to this blame accusation-theory by showing himself off: "I am here and going engines full ahead, look at ME!" In the same time he throws a jab towards his perceived biggest competitor, Paizo by trying to cast an impression why there is no convenient subscription service on behalf of GG, praising for this his company. (I am not sure if Paizo perceives GG as competition though). In short a publicity stunt for its business.
Then Ryan responds to some points of GG's arguments seemingly in an accademic short of fashion. What he says in essence is that the market for this industry is too wild for any big scale business model to last.

 

[WhatGravitas]

If it were me, I'd guess that he was referring to either the rapid evolution of electronic entertainment media (which must be one hell of a force to compete with) or the dwindling current fanbase of table-top RPGs effectively fighting with itself on many different fronts (which does nothing to attract newcomers to the hobby).

Also, in the last couple of years, I got the feeling that - at least on this side of the pond - people tend to move more than before. This tend to tear up established groups and can easily lower the enthusiasm for playing a RPG.

Cheers, LT.

 

[wingsandsword]

Wonder what exactly Dancey meant when he said,

"The forces that are tearing apart the tabletop RPG player networks are utterly outside of Wizards' control".

Possible "forces" he is talking about may possibly be:

- "greying" of the pen and paper rpg customer base?
- MMORPGs eating up more gaming dollars?
- existence of too many "grognards" who refuse to change editions?
- the meaning of life?

The existence of "Grognards" was within Wizard's control to a degree.

They didn't have to put out 4e, after all, or at least the 4th edition that they did produce. Wizards started the Edition Wars in the first place by setting up the circumstances that made it nigh inevitable at least in retrospect. You would think that WotC would have known this would happen from market research, that or they knew it would schism the fanbase and just accepted it (then again, I recall reading in one interview that they thought that pretty much all D&D players would get with 4e in time, one of the interviews during the piracy lawsuit issue, the one where they likened D&D's business plan to a band that makes radical changes to their sound every few years but eventually all the fans still listen and stay fans, thus D&D will radically change its style with every edition and they assume/assumed that almost all D&D players will convert to whatever the new edition is).

Every time they make a new edition, especially one that seriously deviates from that which came before you risk creating a lot more grognards. The 3e to 3.5 switch created very few by comparison because it was a minor switch that seemed like a logical growth of the game. The switch from 2e to 3e also created relatively few because it was patently obvious at the time that 2e needed some kind of revision and while 3e was different in the rules it was clearly meant to support the same play style and made with attention to the traditions and history of the game (assassins, barbarians and half-orcs back in core, for example). 2e did create grognards because it was seen as oversimplifying, and took away options from the core instead of adding them (kind of like the 3.5/4e split).

Yes, the fractioning of the gamer base into diverse camps is bad for the gaming community and game as a whole, but assuming that everybody is going to switch over to a radically new edition that carelessly discards decades of style, tradition, and lore (i.e. "fluff") was a very bad assumption on WotC's part and if it was built on the music analogy it was a poor comparison to begin with.

Note that I am not saying some 4th edition should never have been made, nor that it is a poor game, but making a game that different from what came before both in "crunch" and "fluff", was setting the field for a schism, and WotC didn't help with the infamous "not fun" marketing didn't help either because it started things off on a very sour note for some people.

 

[Alzrius]

This is a very simplistic comparison, but it's interesting how each of the posts thus far have characterized the idea of comparing 4E's marketability to that of previous editions.

Clark Peterson has said that 4E just isn't selling as well as 3E was.

Joe Goodman has said that there are cycles in how well D&D sells, and 4E happens to be at a low point in those cycles, but is selling better than other low points.

Ryan Dancey has said that you can't really make a comparison between 4E and previous editions, because various market factors and the "model" of how the game is marketed are so different across the years.

I guess this just goes to show that even for the experts, it really still comes down to personal opinion.

 

[thecasualoblivion]

The existence of "Grognards" was within Wizard's control to a degree.

They didn't have to put out 4e, after all, or at least the 4th edition that they did produce. Wizards started the Edition Wars in the first place by setting up the circumstances that made it nigh inevitable at least in retrospect. You would think that WotC would have known this would happen from market research, that or they knew it would schism the fanbase and just accepted it (then again, I recall reading in one interview that they thought that pretty much all D&D players would get with 4e in time, one of the interviews during the piracy lawsuit issue, the one where they likened D&D's business plan to a band that makes radical changes to their sound every few years but eventually all the fans still listen and stay fans, thus D&D will radically change its style with every edition and they assume/assumed that almost all D&D players will convert to whatever the new edition is).

Every time they make a new edition, especially one that seriously deviates from that which came before you risk creating a lot more grognards. The 3e to 3.5 switch created very few by comparison because it was a minor switch that seemed like a logical growth of the game. The switch from 2e to 3e also created relatively few because it was patently obvious at the time that 2e needed some kind of revision and while 3e was different in the rules it was clearly meant to support the same play style and made with attention to the traditions and history of the game (assassins, barbarians and half-orcs back in core, for example). 2e did create grognards because it was seen as oversimplifying, and took away options from the core instead of adding them (kind of like the 3.5/4e split).

Yes, the fractioning of the gamer base into diverse camps is bad for the gaming community and game as a whole, but assuming that everybody is going to switch over to a radically new edition that carelessly discards decades of style, tradition, and lore (i.e. "fluff") was a very bad assumption on WotC's part and if it was built on the music analogy it was a poor comparison to begin with.

Note that I am not saying some 4th edition should never have been made, nor that it is a poor game, but making a game that different from what came before both in "crunch" and "fluff", was setting the field for a schism, and WotC didn't help with the infamous "not fun" marketing didn't help either because it started things off on a very sour note for some people.

You say that the fracturing of the D&D community was inevitable and WotC should have seen it coming. I agree with that statement, and I'll go one further and say that WotC did see it coming. WotC isn't stupid, and 4E was too deliberately designed for me to believe otherwise. This makes me believe that WotC felt they had a good reason to disenfranchise grognards, OGL fans, and people who favored the toolbox/customizable aspect of 3E. I would speculate that WotC decided based on their research that those groups were not a large part of their core audience and that keeping those people happy meant serving their core audience less. Serving the core audience was more important than keeping the fringes happy, and while this would fracture the community a stronger focus on core would more than make up for the loss.

You also mention that the fracturing is bad for the community. I don't think thats entirely true. Its definitely bad for the people who got left behind, but to the silent unwashed masses of the core audience, we get a game that better serves our needs.

This is a very simplistic comparison, but it's interesting how each of the posts thus far have characterized the idea of comparing 4E's marketability to that of previous editions.

Clark Peterson has said that 4E just isn't selling as well as 3E was.

Joe Goodman has said that there are cycles in how well D&D sells, and 4E happens to be at a low point in those cycles, but is selling better than other low points.

Ryan Dancey has said that you can't really make a comparison between 4E and previous editions, because various market factors and the "model" of how the game is marketed are so different across the years.

I guess this just goes to show that even for the experts, it really still comes down to personal opinion.

Clark Peterson didn't say 4E wasn't selling well, he said that the 3pp community under 4E isn't selling well. Like a lot of ENWorld, Clark doesn't separate 3pp from D&D, and he speaks about the two interchangably when they are not in the same boat.

Joe Goodman didn't say anything besides that 4E isn't selling as well as the top two years of D&D sales. You're statement takes things a bit farther than what he said.

 

[xechnao]

the fractioning of the gamer base into diverse camps

I think this is a given. Try to fight it and you will do more harm than any good: see the OGL bloat for example.

making a game that different from what came before both in "crunch" and "fluff", was setting the field for a schism, and WotC didn't help with the infamous "not fun" marketing didn't help either because it started things off on a very sour note for some people.

I agree with this.

Conclusion? I believe the ancient greek recipe "pan metron ariston" is the best rule of how the market works optimally from a publisher's and consumers point of view. Unfortynately the hobby game publisher industry is so young that publishers fail to realize this. This is why it is so wild a ride. Publishers try to capitalize on the custom hardcore trend as much as they can to the point fans burn out. The more it goes on like this in the future, the more the total market will shring to other markets, like the video game market for example.

The industry should not consist of a bunch of behemoths such as D&D, Warhammer and M:tG. There should have been around a dozen of different successful publishers, each one producing one product per month (one product as it more or less happens currently with 4e or Paizo).

 

[Mark]

Conclusion? I believe the ancient greek recipe "pan metron ariston" is the best rule of how the market works optimally from a publisher's and consumers point of view. Unfortynately the hobby game publisher industry is so young that publishers fail to realize this. This is why it is so wild a ride.

I think one might contend that a single book per month plus a low subscription fee follows the "all things in moderation" model fairly well. The early difficulty for WotC might be in having held some (formerly core) material back to sweeten later offerings, though we're almost through the period. It might also be that a publisher following this model needs to be content with only a portion of the previously captured market and a lower percentage of profit, though perhaps sustained over a longer period. We will see.

 

[xechnao]

I think one might contend that a single book per month plus a low subscription fee follows the "all things in moderation" model fairly well. The early difficulty for WotC might be in having held some (formerly core) material back to sweeten later offerings, though we're almost through the period. It might also be that a publisher following this model needs to be content with only a portion of the previously captured market and a lower percentage of profit, though perhaps sustained over a longer period. We will see.

What we need is a bunch of other publishers to rise doing this in the tabletop business so there is more variety in the tabletop hobby. Some that rise to a level of the peak success levels of old FASA, DP9, Chaosium, Palladium, Pinnacle etch.

I hope that the focused scope of 4e will help shape the market for something like this in the future. I am being optimist. Now, with Bioware's rpg it is also an opportunity for the Star Wars universe to take off in the tabletop arena.
...Oh no, should not have said this, it makes Mike Mearls sad. Right Mike?

 

[thecasualoblivion]

What we need is a bunch of other publishers to rise doing this in the tabletop business so there is more variety in the tabletop hobby. Some that rise to a level of the peak success levels of old FASA, DP9, Chaosium, Palladium, Pinnacle etch.

I hope that the focused scope of 4e will help shape the market for something like this in the future. I am being optimist. Now, with Bioware's rpg it is also an opportunity for the Star Wars universe to take off in the tabletop arena.
...Oh no, should not have said this, it makes Mike Mearls sad. Right Mike?

I've always felt that one of the bad things that came out of the OGL boom was the marginalization of all the D&D/d20 alternatives. D&D isn't for everybody(and I'm glad WotC is now embracing that), and people should have alternatives. I'd just rather those alternatives not also be D&D, and rather not have my D&D watered down to be able to cater to thsoe people.

I'd rather the players who are looking for not-D&D to look outside the OGL for a change.

So here's hoping for a non-D&D, non-d20 boom!