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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Azul" data-source="post: 1890444" data-attributes="member: 11779">I used to buy Dragon religiously back in the early-mid 80s until I moved away from 1e to other rpgs.  3e brought me back but I've been mostly dissappointed with what Dragon has become.  Why?Fundamentally, the current magazine bores me.  As several people have mentioned, the writing seems forced into a cookie-cutter dry as a bone template.  It reads like a grab-bag of uninspiring, crunch-heavy material.To be fair, I think it is simply emulating the "appeal to the widest possible audience" approach that WotC has adopted in their rulebooks.  The catch is that Dragon *isn't a rulebook* and it shouldn't read like one.  It shouldn't be a grabbag of underdevelopped and uninspiring crunch.Dragon should be a magazine that makes gamers want to game.  What would make me want to buy Dragon again?First and foremost, make Dragon about ideas and inspiration.  Flavour material should equal or outweigh any new mechanics.  I would much rather read five pages of fluff about single mechanical concept (e.g. a prestige class, a monster, an artifact, whatever), perhaps even including a page or two of flavour fiction that gives me an "in game" feel for how this would fit in to my games, than read 5 pages of back to back crunch with flimsy flavour.  Even if I never use the item in question, all that flavour material will get my creative juices flowing and help inspire me.  In the worst case, it will be a far more enjoyable read than yet-more-bland-crunch.I already have several thousand pages of dry crunch-heavy, relatively well-organized rulebooks.  I barely manage to use most of the crunch I get from WotC.  Why in the world would I want to buy a monthly, dry, crunch-heavy, helter-skelter collection of material?  All I get in the end is a big, disorganized mess of drab crunch.  Even when some mechanical element interests me, I can't find a bloody thing because magazines make lousy reference material.I want Dragon to give me a collection of cool gaming ideas along with the necessary crunch to support these ideas.  The crunch must serve the fluff because RPGs are all about the fluff.  The rules serve the story, not vice-versa.  While WotC's rulebooks have to be rule-centric by their very nature, any additional material beyond rulebooks (like Dragon) should be inspirational and informative in nature, not mechanics-heavy.I do NOT want to read articles that have nothing to do with playing the RPG in some way.  That means I have zero interest in anything relating to the miniatures games, to computer RPGs, or to anything that is not roleplaying.  I can find better fiction elsewhere.  I can find magazines dedicated to computer games elsewhere.  I can find book and film reviews elsewhere.I do NOT want to read a giant ad for WotC's next product.  I refuse to spend my money buying ads trying to sell me products.  I don't mind seeing ads in Dragon.  I absolute hate seeing "articles" that are nothing more than marketing for upcoming or current products.  Previews of future material and enhancements to WotC products belong on WotC's web site, not in any magazine I'm willing to pay for.  In fact, their web site includes the "In the Works" preview section which does a fine job of informing their customers about future products.  I want to be able to open a Dragon magazine a year later and still find all the articles in there to be useful, not find articles that talk about books that I bought (or did not buy) months ago.Supplemental material that enriches existing WotC material is fine in moderation, but I as a customer always want to feel that I got something worthwhile for my money.  An article that adds richness to the Realms or Eberron is cool and will still be useful when I open that Dragon a year later.  A 3 page preview or a ADHD-inspired collection of random crunchy bits that feel like scraps that were editted out of the final document is not worth paying for.Anything relating to the miniatures game or D&D themed computer games feels like an ad because frankly, the vast majority of your readers buy the D&D minis to use in their D&D games and those who play the computer games do it as a seperate hobby.  Yes, there is a community of mini game players and computer players but they are not the main audience of the magazine (and perhaps they should have their own magazine in the case of mini gamers - PC gamers definitely have plenty of other magazines).  To the majority of your readers, those are wasted pages and thus another reason not to buy Dragon.  Stay on topic - RPGs.  Roleplayers who play D&D buy Dragon.  Cater to them and always focus on enhancing their gaming experience.Also, if you touch on WotC's stuff, then an occasional article touching on other d20 fantasy settings might be nice once in a while (e.g. Scarred Lands, Kalamar, Iron Kingdoms).  Paizo isn't WotC, even if they do have a close relationship.  Dragon should reflect the interests of D&D players, not just WotC's marketing department.  D&D players use the products of other d20 publishers too.  A nod to that fact in Dragon would be nice once in a while.The issue of fiction was brought up.  I think independent fiction (i.e. short stories) don't belong in Dragon because it isn't related to roleplaying.  I can buy fantasy fiction if I want fantasy fiction.  I buy Dragon for my roleplaying hobby so I want articles related to roleplaying.  However, I think chunks of fiction should be interspersed into articles (or perhaps be used to lead into an article or finish an article) to help illustrate and enrich the descriptive text and crunch.  Flavour is always good.  Use fiction as a tool to help make your articles come to life instead of presenting fiction as a stand-alone segment.Theme issues are fine if they are done right.  A random collection of articles on a general topic is very hit or miss.  Either the reader already likes the topic and thus likes the issue or he doesn't and feels the issue is a waste of his time.  On the other hand, a theme issue where the articles are geared around inspiring the reader to want to use this theme in his campaign... now that is interesting.  Don't just give me a bunch of articles about demon-related stuff.  Give me a tour of the Abyss and a feel for its inhabitants and then present me with some cool ideas relating to demons, and maybe so demonic lairs or mini-adventures involving demonic themes.Including an occasional adventure (say one every other issue) could be cool, especially if it fit with the theme of the issue.  Here is a cool theme, here are some cool ideas about that theme and here is an adventure showing you how it all comes together when you use this theme in your game.  Linking it all together would make such adventures different from the ones in Dungeon.  They wouldn't just be adventures but would also be a way of illustrating the ideas presented in the rest of the issue.  Dungeon should remain the primary "adventure-filled" magazine but it should not be taboo to have one in Dragon once in a while when it makes sense.Take chances.  Dare to have personality and flavour.  For every person who is turned off by an article with personality, odds are several others read it and thought it was cool.  Even if an article bombs, at least people remember it and reacted to it because it wasn't bland and forgettable.Issues of Dragon prior to issue 100 had plenty of memorable articles on a wide variety of topics.  Often you could read 10 pages of really cool gaming stuff and barely see any stats.  The current magazine rarely has memorable articles... instead it has inoffensive articles.  Templates are for monsters, not Dragon magazine articles.  I don't want to read yet another variation on the same old thing with a mild twist.  For example - Yet another prestige class... sigh... ok, make me care about it and want to use it!  I dare you.  Make it exciting.  Not just mechanically powerful, but make me want to roleplay one.  Do that in the space you would would otherwise use to present 3 other bland prestige classes and I will be much more interested in buying Dragon.I suppose in the end, I want Dragon to grab me, make me pay attention and most of all make me think about my game in new ways.  No forumlaic crunch, nothing unrelated to roleplaying D&D and no marketing material masquerading as genuine articles (ads are ads, articles are articles, preview articles are just ads).That's it in a nutshell - Dragon should make me want to roleplay D&D and should be about roleplaying D&D.  Nothing more and nothing less.</blockquote>

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