Why DO Other Games Sell Less?

[Ridley's Cohort]

FWIW I would say that 3e is a very strong game. The 3e PHB, by what I would call a reasonable set of objective standards (although not the only reasonable set), is probably the best RPG product every created. It is well playtested, well edited, and has consistent and well designed mechanics.

I have a different opinion about 1e/2e.

(3e has its flaws, too. I recognize that it has too much number & feat crunching for some people's tastes as well as too much of a miniatures focus. Those complaints have more than a kernel of truth, even if I do not find them to be a problem by my personal tastes.)

 

[a2ndchapter]

I find a game that purports to be a "roleplaying" game that aids as little, and in some cases actively discourages the player to have the PC act with personality of that character as much as D&D does to be flawed extrodinarily deep.

This really comes down to what your definition of "roleplaying" is.

The active discouragement I presume is things like the Bluff or Intimidate skills? If that's the case then what if you have a player who is crap at bluffing but wants to play a character who is great at bluffing (using the character as an aspirational figure). How do you manage that within roleplaying without having a skill or mechanic to replicate the bluff? Or would you use a GM ruling to block that player having that character?

Roleplaying is not acting.
Roleplaying is also not rolling dice and then deciding what to do.
Roleplaying is exploring characters whether they be similar or different from yourself and using the rules to help that exploration both in terms of rules light and rules heavy depending on the circumstances.

In answer to the original post I think D&D is where it is because of relative stability and collectability. Considering the "panic" over a 4th Edition in just over 30 years (well ok 5th edition if you include OD&D) that could only happen in a game with so many players who buy in to it. The same noises aren't as forthcoming or indeed visible for other games like Shadownrun which is also in it's 4th edition in less than half that time (I think).

Would the 'industry' (if one really exists) still exist without D&D? Not the one that exists today no, I believe a lot of players would (over time) simply stop playing RPGs.
Given that the percentage of gamers who actually use websites like this and RPGnet will be in the vast minority of actual gamers, you can be pretty sure that those gamers will not be aware of the vast array of games out there.
Plus if you consider that if D&D were to die, so would a majority of FLGSs which in turn would impact on the number of gamers out there as people would have less places to go to buy games.

The RPG Hobby Market is not big, remove D&D and it moves from not big to really small. It wouldn't die but it also would be unlikely to grow to it's former size.

Dave

 

[sullivan]

This really comes down to what your definition of "roleplaying" is.

Right in my quote I explain what I see D&D rules discouraging, that the PC consistantly act with the personality of the character.

Roleplaying is exploring characters whether they be similar or different from yourself and using the rules to help that exploration both in terms of rules light and rules heavy depending on the circumstances.

Which D&D does poorly at encouraging, and in some ways discourages.

The active discouragement I presume is things like the Bluff or Intimidate skills? If that's the case then what if you have a player who is crap at bluffing but wants to play a character who is great at bluffing (using the character as an aspirational figure). How do you manage that within roleplaying without having a skill or mechanic to replicate the bluff? Or would you use a GM ruling to block that player having that character?

Not, absolutely not. Bluff and Intimidate skills are probably close to the highlight of the feeble support that there is. The absolutely wacked thing in D&D is the assertion that "roleplaying" and combat are antithesis of each other. That all of asudden when the PC draws the sword they stop having their own personality. And the related idea that has grow that "roleplaying" cannot involve dice.

"Diplomacy is a continuation of war by other means"? Well I suggest that combat is the continuation of expressing a character's personality by other means.

The worst offending in D&D is the DMG section on XP. It is full of things that implicitly tell players to act without considering or inspiret of their character's motivation or personality. The key to making D&D more roleplaying friendly isn't there, or in the combat grid system, or particularly in the spells (though that is a place that could use some help). The fastest way is to replace the XP system with an alternative reward system, or at least convince your players to mostly ingore the XP system and the wacked advice in it.

For example it matters little, if not nothing why or how a first level character kills an Orc. It's still a 1/2CR measure of XP. Likewise choosing to not kill the Orc represents an opportunity for XP lost. There is an option for "roleplaying" XP bonus, but it is explicitly stipulated that it be limited to nigh insignificant at maximum.


P.S. I haven't found the time to try follow catch up to and follow the Miniatures & Roleplaying thread, but I've found that if anything Miniatures can actually help people bring their character to life in there mind.

 

[sullivan]

I have a different opinion about 1e/2e.

But hey, 1e was #1, and 2e was #1 for most of the time. I'm not sure that WW ever managed to surpass it, but given the absolute pathological premise that it's game running advise was based on, and that it seemed to get ahead more due to the incompetence of others (TSR), Vampire is probably a poor example of cream rising to the top.

 

[Reynard]

Certainly, my experience has been that the network in question is one of gamers, not D&D players. And i've found it much easier to keep the existing players and switch games, than to keep the existing game and switch players. IOW, most RPGs, despite differences in system, have more in common than they have differences, so the playerbase is roughly as large as all RPG players, rather than just those who have previously played whatever system you're playing. Yes, people have game preferences. But, in practice, their first choice seems to be to play an enjoyable game with people they enjoy gaming with, and the system is secondary (didn't even Diaglo play a D&D3E game at one point?). Just as the theory of network externalities claims. But, that therefore means that it doesn't matter which game they can find, so long as they can find a game.

This is merely anecdotal and doesn't have much bearing. As a counter, my experience has been that people will play a crappy D&D game before thye give a different system a try. They are D&D Players first and if D&D disappeared -- and their books vanished as well, they'd either frantically write down every rule they remembered, or just stop playing altogether.

I mean, if I had a nickle for every time I head "if we're gonna play fantasy, why don't we just play D&D' regardless of what the other system was. Example: a guy in our group wanted to run Fireborn, a game with which no one had experience or even an opinion. He actually bought PHBs for that game for every member of the group (they were on sale). You know what we're playing now?

Yup. D&D (Eberron).

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I mean, if I had a nickle for every time I head "if we're gonna play fantasy, why don't we just play D&D' regardless of what the other system was. Example: a guy in our group wanted to run Fireborn, a game with which no one had experience or even an opinion. He actually bought PHBs for that game for every member of the group (they were on sale). You know what we're playing now?

Yup. D&D (Eberron).

Feeling your pain, Bro, feeling your pain.

I have about 60+ RPGs on my shelf, and that's AFTER selling some at Half-Price books, and like I've said several times on these boards, D&D is all I get to play.

 

[Shining Dragon]

Dungeons and Dragons has the advantage of Brand Recognizability.

It was "the first".

It "suffered" from negative publicity such as BADD (Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons) which more than likely increased its popularity instead of discouraging people from playing it (what can I say - we gamers are a rebellious bunch of... rebels).

Then there are the players. Some who start with Dungeons and Dragons and "refuse" to try anything else (for various reasons such as not wanting to waste the money they've spent on D&D by playing other games). And when you can only find groups that don't want to try anything else you end up either joining the Cult of Dee And Dee or not playing anything at all.

Ultimately there are many and various reasons that all add up to Dungeons and Dragons being the most popular game.

 

[sullivan]

Feeling your pain, Bro, feeling your pain.

I have about 60+ RPGs on my shelf, and that's AFTER selling some at Half-Price books, and like I've said several times on these boards, D&D is all I get to play.

Just to satisfy my curiousity, of those how many are kissing cousins to D&D (roughly d20 based, with a mixture of other dice tossed in, examples being True20, C&C, Black Company)? How many are fairly different, but use a different dicing system like V:TM, Exalted, or Shadowrun, one of the Tri-Stats systems, etc. Then how many are really out there, fundementally different in mechanics. Like maybe Amber, Riddle of Steel (very different combat premise), etc.

P.S. For me, when one group was dragging their butt and hung up on D&D and kissing cousins, and I wanted to play some of the new Shadowrun I actually just went out and found another group.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Besides the PHB, I would also say that the Complete series has an unprecedented level of design quality for an RPG supplement. That an entire series is so well written and mechanically balanced is bizarre by the norms in this industry.

Your typical RPG supplement after the core book(s) is just a grabbag of neat ideas that have no been well thought through. It is normal for an RPG supplement has little or no playtesting. Consequently, it is pretty typical for 10-30% of the material in a supplement to be outright toxic to an ongoing campaign due to dire balance and power creep issues.

Maybe 5% of the Complete series is problematic, but the power creep is relatively modest and the problems areas are isolated and not too bad.

I did not feel that Sword & Fist and its siblings were significantly better than the industry norm. But WotC learned from its experience and followed on in 3.5 with a product that stands as unprecedented as the 3e PHB in terms of quality. (While not as good as the PHB, keep in mind what "par for the course" is in this context.)

 

[Scribble]

But hey, 1e was #1, and 2e was #1 for most of the time. I'm not sure that WW ever managed to surpass it, but given the absolute pathological premise that it's game running advise was based on, and that it seemed to get ahead more due to the incompetence of others (TSR), Vampire is probably a poor example of cream rising to the top.

You really think that's why vampire gained so much popularity? I dissagree...

My own choice (and my groups choice) to play the WOD games came after hearing about it from another gamer at a Hobby Shop game we played in. It had nothing to do with problems with 2E or anything to that nature... It just sounded pretty cool, and I think Vampires were en vogue at the time... Bram Stoker, Ann Rice... Vampires were just cool...