So what's up with this "Essential" stuff?

[Jack99]

There are plenty of speculations going round as to what the 'Essentials' line will be. Will it be a new (half-)edition, a re-packaging of extant material without significant rules changes, or something else?

It's hard to say because WotC' own product announcements at D&D Experience have not been overly precise, even when you factor in the additional information they put up on their webpage (under product description).

Personally, to me the most helpful clue comes from a post in 2009 by Scot Rouse, WotC' PR and Brand manager for D&D 4E until late 2009:



Rouse later clarified his post:



If the Rouse quote is still accurate for WotC' plans in 2010, then DMG 2 and 'Village of Hommlet' were WotC' 2009 efforts to regain people actively playing D&D but older editions (as you can see, it wasn't planned that Hommlet was to be available to RPGA-reward people only), and the 'Essentials' line is addressed to people who've never played D&D or a pen & paper RPG before and aren't even familiars with the FR novels. If anything, the upcoming D&D novels line are meant to create a new generatio of D&D novel readers, instead of pleasing extant ones.

If the Rouse quote is still accurate, then the 'Essentials' line will hold only very limited appeal to people who already regularly buy and play 4E now. Which is fine by me, and would explain why WotC haven't been terribly explicit on what extant players can hope to gain from the 'Essentials' line.

I do not think you are right when you assume that Village of Hommlet and the DMG2 were the only 2009 efforts made to gain old players. PHB2 with more of the classes from prior editions was just a big part, if not bigger part of that strategy.

 

[WalterKovacs]

I do not think you are right when you assume that Village of Hommlet and the DMG2 were the only 2009 efforts made to gain old players. PHB2 with more of the classes from prior editions was just a big part, if not bigger part of that strategy.

An the pre-Essentials part of 2010, with psionics reintroduced in PH3, and Dark Sun as the campaign setting also seems like an attempt at inticing players of older editions as well. The 2011 campaign setting may be, comparitively speaking, more accessible to new players.

 

[falcarrion]

6x9 books would work well on the kindle or kindle dx. Makes me wonder if they are planning to go the ebook way as well as printed. As Amazon is a great seller of there books I would be surprised.