D&D 4E The internet: 4E can't have it both ways

[Desdichado]

I'm gonna say no. There are much better ways of getting statistically relevent feedback from the marketplace than listening to internet rants.

Last I checked, at least some WotC books came with the little postage prepaid mail-in feedback responses, for instance. And I trust that their still conducting other market research as well.

Internet feedback is like the opposite of market research. Tiny minorities can dominate discussions and lead to very skewed interpretations of what people in general actually want.

 

[Gort]

I don't see this poll as being particularly useful. You're asking a bunch of people who discuss D&D on the Internet whether discussing D&D on the Internet is a worthwhile pursuit. Are you surprised by the results?

 

[Wormwood]

Not really, no.

Given the paucity of information available to us, I doubt our opinions are useful in any meaningful way.

 

[Anthtriel]

Most of the people in internet communities of anything (except maybe Mensa) are too stupid to design a game, so their opinions generally shouldn't have any weight, especially if they don't have perfect information (and for D&D, Wizards cannot give the community perfect information without giving their product away for free).

Exceptions are purely flavor related questions, and even then, the community tends to loudly complain about names, only to find out there are no better alternatives, so there is nothing productive going on.

The "designers should listen to me!" mentality comes from the misconception that most members of the internet community are somehow more competent than the designers/writers/politicians. Sometimes that's true, but usually when you look closer at the community's proposals, they fall apart.


I mean there are people in this board who seriously believe multiclassing is fine as is in 3E, or that "per encounter" design means you cannot use abilities outside of combat. What can people like that contribute?

(And no, I do not exempt myself from this. I'm quite aware that paid professionals are almost always better than me in their fields.)

 

[Cadfan]

I voted "no" because the only options were "yes" and "no."

But really the answer should be "yes but only a tiny bit."

 

[drothgery]

Forgive the stereotype, but I can't imagine 75% of a nerd, RPing community not having internet access. I would suggest that it's either an exceptional case, or that the LGS owner is mistaken.

At this point, I can't imagine 75% of any community in the US not having internet access (other than one heavily biased in favor of the elderly or the extremely poor). I'd bet a lot the LGS owner is incorrect. That doesn't mean ENWorld and RPG.net and WotC's boards and the rest aren't a small subset of the tabletop gamer community, but it does mean that almost all of us can check our email.

 

[Lord Zack]

They should pay attention to people on the internet, but they should take those opinions with a grain of salt.

 

[jodyjohnson]

My FLGS owner has stated that about 75% of his D&D players have no access to the internet, and it's not like they don't spend money on D&D.

I don't know if it's just that one store or if the market is like that in some places, so I hope that WotC is not listening to the internet voices alone.

I think this is more an indicator of the loss of market for FLG stores than the composition of the D&D market.

If 85% of D&D players have internet access and if all but 5% are using it to buy books at 25%-40% discounts online while the remaining 15% without access plus 5% with access are still using the FLGS then by these sample numbers only 25% of his numbers do have internet access.

It's just that his share of the market is only 1/5 of the total market and heavily skewed toward D&D players without internet access.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

People post more complaints than priase. Listening to message board outcry is often ignoring the silent but satisfied group.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

So there are two opposing viewpoints I see coming up on the boards which seem to be in direct conflict with one another:

Option 1. The internet message boards are a small fraction of the DnD players as a whole. As a result the wishes/complaints from this minority should be minimized and have little impact on WoTC's development/design of 4E.

Option 2. WoTC has embraced the internet and used it as a marketing machine with blogs, online magazines, previews, message boards, etc. As a result of reaching out to the internet community, the community should be invited to provide feedback to WoTC which may impact on design decisions of 4E.

I have my own opinions but will remain somewhat silent as to not bias polling. I am curious what the online community thinks on this matter.

I can't vote on this poll because you forgot to check the "multiple options" box.