Still waiting for news about the future of d20 Modern

[wingsandsword]

Good points Buzz,

Also, frankly, when it comes to d20 Modern, in some ways we don't need as much product support as we would for D&D.

The wave of D&D books includes setting books and loads of very specific "crunch". With d20 Modern, we already have a very, very detailed setting all around us. For plot ideas we can quickly turn to the news, or TV and movies. The modular nature of the class system means we don't need a PrC for Knight Of Some Obscure Order or a new base class in each new book.

While I look forward to buying more d20 Modern books from WotC, I know that even if they never released another one, I'd have enough raw material to play and run this game for the rest of my life.

 

[buzz]

Right, but unless you mean the trade dress and name, what else is there? There is no established setting, just 7 or so modules with nothing linking them.

The original Top Secret had two rulebooks, a screen, and seven modules, with another seven published in Dragon and Dungeon.

Top Secret, S.I. had nine rulebooks, nine modules, and two solo "casebooks".

So, that's 30 products over a twelve-year lifespan. Original TS basically released one product a year between 1980 and 1985, since the TS box set contained a couple of products enumerated above. S.I. released all of its products between 1987 and 1990. The release dates show a spurt of rule accessories in the first year of release, and then 1-2 modules a year afterwards.

I'm posting this because the question of "Why hasn't WotC released a revised Top Secret yet?" is, to me, akin to asking why they haven't revised Amazing Engine or Buck Rogers XXVC (which had more published material than the original TS).

That, and I can't really fathom what a new Top Secret is going to give d20 espionage gaming that SC2.0 and the wealth of d20M support out there hasn't already.

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Secret_(role-playing_game)

 

[JPL]

The original Top Secret had two rulebooks, a screen, and seven modules, with another seven published in Dragon and Dungeon.

Top Secret, S.I. had nine rulebooks, nine modules, and two solo "casebooks".

So, that's 30 products over a twelve-year lifespan. Original TS basically released one product a year between 1980 and 1985, since the TS box set contained a couple of products enumerated above. S.I. released all of its products between 1987 and 1990. The release dates show a spurt of rule accessories in the first year of release, and then 1-2 modules a year afterwards.

I'm posting this because the question of "Why hasn't WotC released a revised Top Secret yet?" is, to me, akin to asking why they haven't revised Amazing Engine or Buck Rogers XXVC (which had more published material than the original TS).

That, and I can't really fathom what a new Top Secret is going to give d20 espionage gaming that SC2.0 and the wealth of d20M support out there hasn't already.

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Secret_(role-playing_game)

The name recognition is something, I guess...but not much.

Top Secret SI had a decent setting (Orion v. Web), but really, it was just a fairly generic Bond vs. SMERSH kinda thing. It's servicable, though, and you could do some interesting stuff by advancing the timeline 20 years.

Mr. Porter is interested in the adventures from the original game...I would be concerned that those adventures are badly dated, both in terms of adventure design and being set in the 1980s.

WotC hasn't done an espionage-focused product for d20 Modern...as Spycraft has shown, it is certainly a rich area to explore.

 

[buzz]

Mr. Porter is interested in the adventures from the original game...I would be concerned that those adventures are badly dated, both in terms of adventure design and being set in the 1980s.

The module included in the original box set would be unpublishable now. It's terrible. I have no idea about the others. The adventures I remember from Dragon were basically dungeon-crawls with guns.

WotC hasn't done an espionage-focused product for d20 Modern...as Spycraft has shown, it is certainly a rich area to explore.

True, but given that SC2.0 already exists, and that, even when in print, TS wasn't much of a seller, I don't know what the incentive is. S.I. would probably have potential as a Polyhedron minigame, or possibly a 96-page splat a la d20P or d20A.

I'm not denying there's potential, I'm just saying that, of all the properties WotC owns, I can't see TS as a big priority, and can't blame them. I mean, Star Frontiers was a much bigger success for TSR, with a bigger fanbase, and it only merited some pages in d20F.

 

[masshysteria]

The trend suggests to me that d20M is a solid seller for WotC. It's probably doing nowhere near the numbers that the top D&D books do, but it's likely doing numbers that any not-WotC publisher would kill for.

The real question is, are these numbers enough to justify it's continued support from WotC?

This was the same story for Alternity. A fairly reasonable seller (a gold mine for any other publisher), but nothing like D&D. It didn't bring in the money to support keeping the system around, especially in light of the coming launch of d20 and the OGL. I'm only pointing this out to show even alright sales numbers don't mean everything.

I'm not predicting doom and gloom regarding d20Modern. I think we'll see something like what happened with Star Wars. The line will quietly lose support, but no announcements will be made saying it is dead. Then we'll see it come back as a new revision with a bunch of new and interesting game mechanics (chase rules, a change to how damage is handled, etc.), probably soon after D&D 4.

The only question is, do players prefer the new version to branch off in a different direction than D&D 4 or have it mesh almost perfectly with D&D 4 (making D&D 4 + d20Modern 2 somewhat of a universal system)?

Personally, I'd love to see it go in a different direction. I like the heroic fantasy feeling of D&D for D&D, but I want something more along the lines of cinematic realism for modern and sci-fi games (I haven't found anything better than Alternity for this currently).

 

[buzz]

This was the same story for Alternity. A fairly reasonable seller (a gold mine for any other publisher), but nothing like D&D. It didn't bring in the money to support keeping the system around, especially in light of the coming launch of d20 and the OGL. I'm only pointing this out to show even alright sales numbers don't mean everything.

A valid point. Still, there was the WotC takeover going on, the 3e revision, and issue with the Star Wars license that all were threatening Alternity's continued existence. I honestly think that d20M is in a much better position.

Personally, I'd love to see it go in a different direction. I like the heroic fantasy feeling of D&D for D&D, but I want something more along the lines of cinematic realism for modern and sci-fi games (I haven't found anything better than Alternity for this currently).

I think it would behoove WotC to keep d20M in line with whatever direction D&D takes, but I believe that still leaves a lot of room for interesting divergence. There's a lot of baggage D&D has to deal with that d20M doesn't. You could produce a very Alternity-like game, IMO, without changing all that much.

 

[Ranger REG]

4.0 Ed will not SAVE the OGL, it will KILL it.

I don't think so.

It's a general misconception that OGL is only there to support D&D. That's partly right. But you still need the d20 System Trademark License (or d20STL[/i]) to market your product to be associated with D&D.

OGL is simply and purely a content license. It defines what is OGC (stuff any authors, artists, designers could use from someone else's OGC) and what is Product Identity (off-limit material) in a product, and how to apply them in your product.

The SRD is not going away, anymore than the Linux. As long as that base "template" is still around, aspiring game designers can still write for D&D ... and in this case, d20 Modern.

If 4e changes everything for D&D, then we still have d20 Modern. If d20 Modern line is shut down, then the SRD can still be used to make d20 Modern clones without the label.

We don't have to rely on WotC/Hasbro.

 

[Wolv0rine]

Honestly, I have no more well-researched and founded idea of how well D20M is doing for Hasbro/WotC than the next laygamer. But I do know that Year of the Zombie seems to still be picking up new customers/gamers at a pretty steady rate. Not a rate that's going to give me a life of leisure as Head Art Guy or anything, but the official forums keep finding new useras, and the line seems to be spreading.
YotZ is a D20M setting, so it stands to reason that D20M players exist in respectable (if not even ever-growing) numbers.
The 'Blood and...' lines, also D20M based, seem to continue to do well, too.
It's still a side-niche, but it's a good system (not close to perfect, but good) and a LOT can be done with it. If WotC don't/won't support it, it will still see support from the 3rd parties.

 

[Vigilance]

This was the same story for Alternity. A fairly reasonable seller (a gold mine for any other publisher), but nothing like D&D. It didn't bring in the money to support keeping the system around, especially in light of the coming launch of d20 and the OGL. I'm only pointing this out to show even alright sales numbers don't mean everything.

The difference is (and I do think Alternity is a good analogy in a lot of ways) that Alternity had no OGL.

People support Alternity to this day for free.

How many more people would produce Alternity stuff if they could make some money off of it?

I think the license is d20 Modern's safety net.

Unless you only want to buy products made by WOTC, you can play d20 Modern as long as you want.

 

[lmpjr007]

Mr. Porter is interested in the adventures from the original game...I would be concerned that those adventures are badly dated, both in terms of adventure design and being set in the 1980s.

That is the best part of it! I would make them Old School Cold War adventures that you would play in the 80s using D20 Modern then make sequels to them A la the "Return to" mentality that WOTC did with Tomb of Horrors and others for modern day.