D&D General What Does New Coke Tell Us About Designing for D&D

[Micah Sweet]

IMO....

I think over the past year or two sales were finally beginning to fall a bit for 5e, and seeing that trend was one of the driving forces to reinvigorate the brand.

In addition, there was the drive to focus on D&D beyond and online ventures, and they needed a vehicle that was not out in a printable form (D&D basic) already, so that people would turn to beyond for their free version.

Those all seem like profit motives to me. But of course we know there's a disconnect between what 5.5 meant for the designers and what it meant for the suits.

 

[R_J_K75]

If you get ice cubes stuck in your sinus cavity you're doing it wrong.

I've only used a salt spoon so never had that problem, but that would be pretty cold

 

[Bedrockgames]

I do think there is something to the CoC approach where it was relatively easy, if you knew one edition, to jump in on later ones as many of the changes felt more like gradual refinements. But CoC is also engaged with in a very different way from D&D. Dungeons and Dragons really thrives on long, ongoing campaigns. Cthulhu was something you could do long campaigns with but many people used it for one shots and short campaigns

 

[Micah Sweet]

I do think there is something to the CoC approach where it was relatively easy, if you knew one edition, to jump in on later ones as many of the changes felt more like gradual refinements. But CoC is also engaged with in a very different way from D&D. Dungeons and Dragons really thrives on long, ongoing campaigns. Cthulhu was something you could do long campaigns with but many people used it for one shots and short campaigns

Is that a reason for a perceived need to radically change the game between editions (2e-3e, 3.5e-4e, 4e-5e)?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Is it change for change sake to boost sales?

Certainly a factor. The big problem for anyone in the business of selling games is that the customer only needs to buy the game once and they can play as much as they like. So change the game a little in the hope your customers will buy the game again. That’s why CoC is on its 9th (?) edition, WH40K is on its 7th, and there are a million different Monopoly boards.

 

[Doctor Futurity]

We were always a Diet Coke household.

I prefer (and have exclusively drunk) Diet Coke and then Coke Zero once it came out. Sure, they might cause cancer, but better than all that excess sugar!

 

[Remathilis]

I do think there is something to the CoC approach where it was relatively easy, if you knew one edition, to jump in on later ones as many of the changes felt more like gradual refinements. But CoC is also engaged with in a very different way from D&D. Dungeons and Dragons really thrives on long, ongoing campaigns. Cthulhu was something you could do long campaigns with but many people used it for one shots and short campaigns

I wonder what a 3e+ AD&D would have looked like. Would we still have downward AC, saves vs dragon breath, or race/class restrictions? How much would the needle have moved if all 3rd and later did was ".5" levels of change?

 

[Micah Sweet]

I wonder what a 3e+ AD&D would have looked like. Would we still have downward AC, saves vs dragon breath, or race/class restrictions? How much would the needle have moved if all 3rd and later did was ".5" levels of change?

Kenzer & Co suggested that it would look like their first version of Hackmaster ("4e"). I'm not sure they were far off, and I liked that game rather a lot.

 

[The Soloist]

That's how you do it. You don't change the taste, instead you create an iconic character that boosts the brand.

 

[Celebrim]

Well sure, if you redefine your data sets to create the pattern you want, you'll get the pattern you want.

I do the following:

0e: OD&D
1e: 1e AD&D
1.5e: 1e AD&D post Unearthed Arcana
2e: 2e AD&D
2.5e: Skills and powers
3e: As it says.
3.5e: As it says
4e: As it says.
4.5e: 4e post Essentials
5e: As it says.
6e: 2024. I can see the argument for this being the half-edition, but its been 10 years since the release of 5e and this feels more like a major revision along the lines of the 2e revision where, things where things looked largely compatible and could be used interchangeably but there were major shifts in tone and minor across the board changes that made it a new game. It doesn't feel like the 3.5 release which felt more like errata. This is more like, "We want to get rid of demons and devils because we don't feel they are good for the brand, and paladins never should have been a thing anyway."

BECMI I see as an entirely separate and now abandoned branch of development.