D&D 5E Why Forums Should Be Ignored By Game Developers

[ArchfiendBobbie]

I think the forums can be helpful. They can give you an idea of what rules are confusing and what ones are popular, as well as overall game popularity.

But designing a game? That's where I think they can get some bad data and sink their edition. Especially if the community is heavily divided and part of it has an agenda.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

What they can gain out of forums or other online interaction with players is insights and ideas they may not have thought of. Does anyone remember at that panel where Chris Perkins was taking questions a couple years ago and someone got him thinking that a way to give Greyhawk a focus to make it something they could put product out for could be to focus on Iuz? You could see the thoughts running through his head.

Any designer is going to get ideas by exposure to other ideas. Of course you have to know how to best use whatever ideas you get, but that's why they have had a lot of surveys for 5e. And I'm pretty sure all that theorycrafting we do isn't a complete waste. I mean, that can save them from doing a lot of grunt work

 

[Caliburn101]

Twitter is infamous for online harassment. It's the poster child.

That's why Trump likes it eh?

 

[wedgeski]

I think the sensible approach is to appreciate forums for what they are: echo chambers for those invested at a level way beyond the average consumer. I don't think that makes them useless, far from it, but their value depends somewhat on how much those uber-consumers contribute to the growth of the hobby. If everyone who posted on this forum brought ten new players a year to the game, you'd better believe WotC would be paying us a lot of attention. If, on the other hand, we're entrenched, just buy everything anyway, and play with the same people we've had around the table for twenty years..? Maybe not worth worrying about.

I see enough excitement around the Yawning Portal, for example, to think that we're not all a bunch of jaded cynics. But even if the entire population of ENW hated the idea of a classic adventure retread, our views might be entirely inconsequential next to the majority of the player base for whom those classics might be all-new material...or something even better: the chance to participate in something they keep hearing about but never, until now, had the opportunity to experience.

 

[Morrus]

That's why Trump likes it eh?

No politics on EN World, please.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

Forums have their place but they tend to be echo chambers magnifying the extremes.

 

[Morrus]

Forums have their place but they tend to be echo chambers magnifying the extremes.

I think they're the opposite. In a forum you get exposed to views contrary to your own; on Facebook, for example, you are in an echo chamber of your own making - you only see things posted by people like you. Same with Twitter, generally, unless you get dogpiled for something, at which point all you're seeing is abuse. The two big issues of most social media is (a) abuse/harassment and (b) echo-chamberism.

Which is why I think WotC moving only to social media is a mistake - they're cutting out a lot of points of view they would otherwise see.

Out of the various social media, Twitter and Facebook are best for quick responses, and forums are best for long and varied responses.

 

[jasper]

The assumed 2 short rest thing is not in the core rules but we all know it due to the hivemind. IIRC it came form one of the game developers on a twitter post. .....
Never hear of this until YOUR post. I been back on the forums since last July.

edit to add
Forums do become echo chambers as mention above. What I hope is the game designers do the following.
They lump the pro/cons into two groups and toss out the rabid fanboys posts. Review the remaining for good content. And then look at the odd posts to see if they have a real insight between the two groups.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

I think they're the opposite. In a forum you get exposed to views contrary to your own; on Facebook, for example, you are in an echo chamber of your own making - you only see things posted by people like you. Same with Twitter, generally, unless you get dogpiled for something, at which point all you're seeing is abuse. The two big issues of most social media is (a) abuse/harassment and (b) echo-chamberism.

Which is why I think WotC moving only to social media is a mistake - they're cutting out a lot of points of view they would otherwise see.

Out of the various social media, Twitter and Facebook are best for quick responses, and forums are best for long and varied responses.

There's truth in this. But the sheer number of Simulcrum-bending threads sort of shows my point. However there are many other threads of sheer delight and notion that make forums fresh for me.

 

[Gundark]

Looking at the top of the page, there are 1,300 people online right now, here at ENWorld. So of the million D&D players worldwide, roughly 0.13% are posting here. That's a pretty small sample size, and it makes it pretty easy for one or two nonrepresentative voices to skew the conversation.

Actually, there are psychological studies out there that make inferences about the population with smaller samples sizes.

I think that the mistake that the OP is making is maybe thinking that forum posters have different gaming tastes from non forum posters. While it may be true...there is no evidence to say either way.

I know that you're not JUST talking about WotC/D&D here but, WotC has the resources to take data from places other than forums, conventions, online surveys, explorers league. I don't think they made their design decisions based on just forum chatter