WotC So, when do the announce the July book? Guesses on what it'll be? 🤔

[teitan]

(That said, there's also a comment that the DM might have Mul characters start as enslaved people. That will definitely want a change!)

The irony of that would be that someone would be offended that they can’t start as slaves. Everything right now for WOTC is just asking to be shot in the junk on social media.

 

[SkidAce]

p.s. I don't want sex slavery in my game, either. I never bought the Book of Vile Darkness or the erotic fantasy one, nor have I ever played an evil character (except on a one-off, and I didn't like it).

Agreed.

 

[teitan]

And guess what? Those books sold terribly. Bad business.

Vile Darkness didn’t sell terribly. It got truncated because 3.5 was announced shortly after it came out but it had Monte’s name on it and sold like hot cakes for the duration. I recall the controversy wasn’t the subject matter but the handling of the subject matter because people were offended by the portrayal of drug abuse, fetishism and obesity as manifestations of Vile mechanics. I felt those critics went a tad overboard because like today context was ignored. It was kind of a precursor to social media now which amplifies things to 11.

Erotic Fantasy was just awful. Garbage garbage garbage and Exalted Deeds was just Lawful Good twisted into a form of evil really.

Dungeon Crawl Classics handles similar material in a much more mature manner with spell burn, mercurial magic and patrons.

 

[Parmandur]

Vile Darkness didn’t sell terribly. It got truncated because 3.5 was announced shortly after it came out but it had Monte’s name on it and sold like hot cakes for the duration. I recall the controversy wasn’t the subject matter but the handling of the subject matter because people were offended by the portrayal of drug abuse, fetishism and obesity as manifestations of Vile mechanics. I felt those critics went a tad overboard because like today context was ignored. It was kind of a precursor to social media now which amplifies things to 11.

Erotic Fantasy was just awful. Garbage garbage garbage and Exalted Deeds was just Lawful Good twisted into a form of evil really.

Dungeon Crawl Classics handles similar material in a much more mature manner with spell burn, mercurial magic and patrons.

I have seen WotC folks refer to those books as not selling well.

 

[TheSword]

And guess what? Those books sold terribly. Bad business.

It wasn’t aimed at everyone. It was well reviewed and the copy I sold on eBay went extremely quickly for a substantial amount. I did alright by it.

 

[TheSword]

I have seen WotC folks refer to those books as not selling well.

... source?

 

[Parmandur]

It wasn’t aimed at everyone. It was well reviewed and the copy I sold on eBay went extremely quickly for a substantial amount. I did alright by it.

That's not the point. It didn't do well for WotC bottom line, which is why the line fizzled out before I started playing the game.

 

[Parmandur]

... source?

Either Nate Stewart or Ryan Dancer, most likely, but I can't point to where, they said a lot. I remember the what, not the where.

However, the results speak for themselves: that line fizzled out completely, and WotC doesn't make anything like it. If it sold well, they would.

 

[Mercurius]

I think we're talking about three levels (or more, but for simplicity's sake) of "thematic maturity:"

One, vanilla D&D.

Two, low fantasy/sword & sorcery/grimdark. This would include Conan, GoT, post-apocalyptic themes, Dark Sun.

Three, gratuitous/explicitly dark/edgy themes. Book of Vile Darkness, Erotic Fantasy, etc.

The first is the baseline of the core product line. It is listed as 12+, so the implication is borderline PG-13 due to the emphasis on violence and perhaps various concepts that aren't for kids younger than middle school, with the caveat that many kids start playing earlier. But this, at least, gives us a sense of what WotC has in mind.

I would think that the second category would be implied at "14 or 15+" and the third "18+" but of course we haven't seen any such products in the current edition.

The question, then, is there anything intrinsically wrong or overly problematic with WotC having some products in the "15+" category? And if so, should they label it as such? Would that diminish sales enough to make it prohibitive for publication, even if the vast majority of players are 15 and older or simply ignore such guidelines?

I would think 18+ products are a niche market and for that reason alone--limited sales--WotC wouldn't bother with any of the resulting hassles. While I haven't scoured DM's Guild for such material, I'm sure it exists.

But I don't think it would be economically prohibitive to have some products labeled as 15+ or 14+. I mean, there's a huge fan-base for grimdark, and even stuff that isn't overtly grimdark can incorporate more mature, be it slavery or complex politics or environmental themes or simply sword & sorcery.

(I don't think sword & sorcery is inherently for more mature audiences only, but I can see why they'd label it as such. But the question is, should they create sword & sorcery products in the spirit of the tradition, or make "child-friendly" sword & sorcery that may lose something in translation?)

 

[Reynard]

There's an idea: an imprint called D&D Edge, where all the boobs and blood can be found.