What if. . .WotC never bought TSR?

[Nikosandros]

The Dille Family Trust [...]

Thanks! I now remember reading something about that in the past...

 

[Nikosandros]

There was also apparently a condition to the sale of TSR that said DJ could not be revived, or even disposed of. One Lorraine Williams simply didn't want the hated Gary Gygax's game back on the market. (Yes, people can be that petty.) Considering how Adkison returned the rights to Talislanta and Legend of the 5 Rings to their original owners, and sold Ars Magica to Atlas Games for a pittance, I think it entirely possible he would have sold DJ to another party had that been an option.

Wow... that is almost unbelievable...

I'm not saying that I don't believe you, mind you, just that it's mind boggling... :\

On the other hand, I don't think Hasbro is party to that particular agreement. So if they told WotC to sell DJ, then WotC would sell DJ. And stuff Lorraine's complaints.

So there actually is a glimmer of hope, even though it is infinitesimal...

BTW, we did have plans for DJ 2E. Considering how 1e was rushed into publication, it needed serious work.

Yes, it really needed it... but I think that it had good potential. To me it always looked like an uncut gem.

I don't know what level of detail those plans had reached, but would it be feasible to release that kind of information as a "fan project"? After all DF is able to put out material for OOP D&D...

 

[mythusmage]

I don't know what level of detail those plans had reached, but would it be feasible to release that kind of information as a "fan project"? After all DF is able to put out material for OOP D&D...

I think the most 'blatant' I could be would be to take the basic mechanics (and mechanically linked terms ) and present the reworded version of the system. Call it something like, "Infinite Adventures" with a book of core rules plus genre books.

Unless, of course, I receive communication form Wizards or Hasbro explicitely stating they have no trouble with my taking DJ and producing an updated version for possible publication on either an amateur or professional basis.

Hell, if Hasbro were to offer me the full rights to Dangerous Journeys for a pittance my first question would be, "Where do I send the check?"

 

[King of Old School]

Not true, at least according to what I was told while I was working there. In 2E in the last days of TSR (1996), a "good-selling" new book was selling 5,000 copies. With 3E, a "good-selling" new book (and I'm not even talking the big hits like the 3 core books, the FRCS, and so on) was selling almost ten times that much. Clearly, that's better sales than before.

I don't doubt that the D&D brand is healthier now than it was in the waning days of TSR (and for the individual who suggested this was an "edition war" for me: 3.x is by several orders of magnitude my favorite iteration of the game, kthx).

What about the rest of the hobby?

KoOS

 

[seankreynolds]

Define "rest of the hobby."
If there are 100,000 RPG sales every month, I'd say the hobby is doing pretty well. If 95,000 of those are WotC books and the other 5,000 are split among the d20 publishers, that may suck for those publishers (and I'm one of them) but that doesn't mean the hobby isn't doing well.

 

[drothgery]

My suspicion is that TSR would have declared bankrupcy soon after the WotC buyout happened in real life, and someone would have snapped up the rights to D&D and produced a new edition of D&D a few years later (as it's the obvious way to make some money off the deal, and D&D2 was clearly showing its age). It's difficult to say who ends up with D&D in that scenario; though WotC is probably the most likely (as they probably had the best combination of money and interest in the property at the time), but let's assume they didn't (because WotC would probably do the same thing with D&D whether they owned just D&D or all of TSR).

If the game that came out of it was something that connected with D&D players (and the kind of people who become D&D players), odds are that game would quickly blow past WW/Vampire (which was pretty close to overtaking D&D in the final days of TSR) to regain the #1 tabletop RPG spot. But that's not at all certain; WotC had to produce a quality game that was mechanically different enough from AD&D2 to reignite interest in the product and similar enough that most fans still saw it as D&D. And then they needed to sell it to a very skeptical fanbase.

And whoever bought the game would almost certainly be influenced by its own RPGs (or RPG-like products); Wizards' experience with Magic led them to like lots of explicit, detailed rules. Odds are White Wolf would bring their experience with Vampire/Storyteller to the table; Steve Jackson Games would be coming from a GURPs background; Interplay would talk about what works in their computer games.

So there's a fair chance that a non-WotC 3e would have failed, and taken D&D with it. Or alternatively, that we'd end up with a very different game (probably without anything like the OGL and d20 STL).

 

[King of Old School]

Define "rest of the hobby."
If there are 100,000 RPG sales every month, I'd say the hobby is doing pretty well. If 95,000 of those are WotC books and the other 5,000 are split among the d20 publishers, that may suck for those publishers (and I'm one of them) but that doesn't mean the hobby isn't doing well.

If there were approximately 100,000 RPG sales every month in 1996, and there are approximately 100,000 RPG sales every month in 2005, the hobby isn't doing any better now than it was in 1996.

If D&D was making 5,000 in sales every month in 1996 and is making 95,000 in sales every month in 2005, the fortunes of the D&D brand have certainly improved.

If every non-D&D game was making 95,000 in sales every month in 1996 and is making 5,000 in sales in 2005, that doesn't speak well of the health of the industry outside of D&D.

I've heard that D&D sales are better now than in 1996, as can be evidenced by sales numbers and print runs. I've also heard, from people who work for and run RPG publishers other than Wizards, that sales numbers and print runs for non-D&D RPG products in 2005 are a shell of what they were in 1996. I do know that there are fewer companies producing fewer products for the non-D&D segment of the hobby in 2005 than there were in 1996 (I'm only talking print products, not PDFs). There are reasons for this beyond simple popularity -- WEG's non-RPG related financial problems, the implosion of Wizards Attic and Osseum, etc. -- but Occam's Razor suggests that if there are fewer products being published, it's logical to assume there are fewer consumers buying them. This state of affairs is just peachy if your interests begin and end with D&D, but for those of us who believe a healthy hobby has to include non-D&D games as more than just an afterthought, it's disheartening.

I'm not one of those people suggesting the sky is falling on the hobby, but I'm also not going to buy the propaganda that just because TSR was in trouble in 1996, the entire RPG hobby was on the brink of nonexistence. There were lots of good, popular games being played in 1996, and a lot of companies making money in 1996 that don't meaningfully exist in 2005. I'm not saying things are massively worse across the board, but they certainly aren't massively better across the board either. Better for some, worse for others; or more accurately, much better for one and worse for many others.

KoOS

 

[seankreynolds]

If there were approximately 100,000 RPG sales every month in 1996, and there are approximately 100,000 RPG sales every month in 2005, the hobby isn't doing any better now than it was in 1996.

And considering the general state of the economy, that means RPGs are doing pretty well.
And considering all the cries for the last ten years that the RPG industry is failing (Magic, Everquest, the d20 bubble, etc.), that means RPGs are doing pretty well (in that they're not failing like everyone things they are).

If every non-D&D game was making 95,000 in sales every month in 1996 and is making 5,000 in sales in 2005, that doesn't speak well of the health of the industry outside of D&D.

I'm pretty sure ham radios sold fewer units this year than they did 20 years ago, but that doesn't mean the communications-electronics industry is worse off. The market changes, some things get left behind. Non-d20 games seems to be one of them. Yet there is a wealth of d20 product out there. You seem to be focusing on the non-D&D stuff as indicative of the health of the overall hobby; that's like focusing on declining sales of the Winchester rifle as an indicator that military spending is down and there is less war going on in the world.

I've heard that D&D sales are better now than in 1996, as can be evidenced by sales numbers and print runs. I've also heard, from people who work for and run RPG publishers other than Wizards, that sales numbers and print runs for non-D&D RPG products in 2005 are a shell of what they were in 1996.

Pardon my candor, but boo hoo. They're releasing almost no movies on Betamax or laserdisc any more, either.

I do know that there are fewer companies producing fewer products for the non-D&D segment of the hobby in 2005 than there were in 1996 (I'm only talking print products, not PDFs).

To repeat: boo-hoo.

So not only are you judging the health of the industry based on games that aren't related to the industry leader (D&D), you're specifically excluding PDFs, which means you're really only including non-D&D publishers who have a large amount of capital that they can afford to blow on a print run of a product that has a good chance of never breaking a profit. Seems awfully arbitrary, no wonder you are worried about the health of the industry.

But why stop there? Why not limit it to non-D&D print products that aren't traditional fantasy (elves, dwarves, etc.)? Why not limit it to non-D&D print products that aren't traditional traditional fantasy but still draw on real-world historical time periods? Or that plus absurdist themes of prejudice based on hyperbole of real-world examples? If you judge the health of the industry by the lack of RPGs about left-handed Egyptian nobles persecuted by the clergy for financial scandals deriving from the need to pay tutors to make their children right-handed so they can enter a secret society of artists that rule the world, yeah, the industry is sickly or even dead because there are no games like that out there.

Basically, if you're going to draw some arbitrary (to you) line and use things on one side of that for determining if the RPG industry is healthy, then we might as well end this discussion, because according to your definition of "healthy," if every household in America plays a d20 game at least once a week and buys one d20 product per month but the non-D&D market is the same size it is now, then the RPG industry is dangerously unhealthy ... I guess because there isn't enough diversity in the rules systems people are publishing.

There are reasons for this beyond simple popularity -- WEG's non-RPG related financial problems, the implosion of Wizards Attic and Osseum, etc. -- but Occam's Razor suggests that if there are fewer products being published, it's logical to assume there are fewer consumers buying them.

Or there are fewer consumers buying these products, so the people who make them are able to afford to produce less of them? That's capitalism and a free market: if there's no demand for a product you can't sell it, and if you can't sell something you can't make a profit, and if you can't make a profit you go out of business.

Then again, this industry started with the actions of hobbyists who wanted to make games that they liked and usually did so as a side thing unrelated to their day job. Even if there's no money in the non-D&D RPG industry, you're going to find people who make these games for the love of making games.

This state of affairs is just peachy if your interests begin and end with D&D,

Or d20 in general.

but for those of us who believe a healthy hobby has to include non-D&D games as more than just an afterthought, it's disheartening.

Ah, but the hobby does include non-D&D games, and it's not D&D's fault that there are so few of them--some people really dislike d20 or the d20 license or the system that they own or have some neat innovative way to handle a game mechanic that doesn't fit d20 ... those people are going to write their game the way they want, d20 or no d20.

There's nothing forcing people NOT to make or buy non-D&D games (which I'm assuming also means non-d20 games). Yet they aren't, perhaps because of familiarity and compatibility issues (they don't want to learn new rules, they want to play a game where their favorite type of character is doable, etc.).

I'm not one of those people suggesting the sky is falling on the hobby, but I'm also not going to buy the propaganda that just because TSR was in trouble in 1996, the entire RPG hobby was on the brink of nonexistence.

I'm not suggesting that, though other people here may be. White Wolf's games were still quite strong at the time, and I don't think the hobby would have disappeared. Changed, maybe, but not disappeared, and odds are you'd continue to have the many D&D-clones on the market that you had back then, especially as you wouldn't have lawyers from TSR breathing down your neck to stop you (not that they really did that before).

 

[Calico_Jack73]

We'd be playing Hackmaster and coveting our old copies of books since no new editions would be forthcoming.

That or a german publisher might come to the rescue (like they did with Classic Battletech) and we'd be stuck with 2E from here to eternity.