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Message: <blockquote data-quote="haakon1" data-source="post: 4294141" data-attributes="member: 25619">I would be happier if 4e were never produced.  I would be happier with fewer, higher quality splatbooks from WOTC for 3e.How would I make profit in that model?  Net income is Revenue minus expenses.  You could manage it by having fewer staff and producing less, by charging more for fewer products, and by having subscription models or pay-to-OGL models instead of churn models.WOTC's business staff are busy chasing the old, tired D&D profit model (ship more books), but missed the WOW profit model (subscriptions) and the game console profit model (pay-to-sell 3rd party).The difference between 1996 TSR and 2008 WOTC is that TSR tried to raise revenue by shipping a lot of different settings and non-core products (DragonDice), expanding the offering rather than churning the same product with a new hat.  WOTC is trying to raise revenue by shipping a lot of new core books and splatbooks with new hats (like Malibu Stacey . . . it's a Simpson's thing) . . . to me, it looks like the same goal of trying to up net income by squeezing the D&D revenue stream for more.  Definitely more fun as a company than squeezing costs to the same effect, but I'm not sure if higher revenue from gamers can be sustained.The real bet here is probably that D&D can break out of the 30-something geeks who played in the 1980s ghetto and get a lot more players -- if it can, higher revenue and much higher profit can be sustained.  The Rouse is a daring man and believes in D&D, you gotta give him props for that.Edit: Actually, they DID try to do pay-to-sell 3rd party for 4e, but they backed off.  I guess the 3rd parties wouldn't agree to pay to produce for 4e, since they could continue to produce for free for 3e?  I bet WOTC will try to re-introduce pay-to-sell once 4e becomes popular (which it will, with 55% of the fan base here supporting it from day 1, and many others eventually to follow).</blockquote>

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