Will 2011 be the last year of Wizards D&D?

[Zhou Yu]

Sadly for us, D&D is nowhere near the size of any of Hasbro's core toy lines. Yes, that includes Nerf, Transformers, and even My Little Pony. I've read a lot of analysis of the company (which is doing extremely well) and there was not a peep about anything RPG related, neither the upcoming Neverwinter Game, the Essentials Launch, etc. Nothing. Therefore it's so small that analysts don't consider it affecting their bottom line.

just saying... and if the price was right...anyone would sell. It's all about how much.

Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast are still DIFFERENT companies. WotC is simply OWNED by Hasbro. or a subsidary.

Either way, the reason why only Hasbro stuff was listed in the Hasbro releases is because Hasbro only has to peddle Hasbro products.

WotC products gets peddled by WotC, not by its parent company.


And OP, of course D&D is ending in 2011. That's why we only know a lot of the releases for the first six months of next year. Obviously that means they're not interested in D&D whatsoever, and will give it up next summer! I mean, if they can't plan everything out forever, that means it's done!

 

[WalterKovacs]

Sadly for us, D&D is nowhere near the size of any of Hasbro's core toy lines. Yes, that includes Nerf, Transformers, and even My Little Pony. I've read a lot of analysis of the company (which is doing extremely well) and there was not a peep about anything RPG related, neither the upcoming Neverwinter Game, the Essentials Launch, etc. Nothing. Therefore it's so small that analysts don't consider it affecting their bottom line.

just saying... and if the price was right...anyone would sell. It's all about how much.

Does it even include any information on Magic in that analysis? It would probably be better to analyze DnD's place within Wizards more so than Hasbro as a whole, since odds are that Wizards as a whole is only a small part of Hasbro's line. And if nothing else, MTG's IP is arguably not as strong as DnD's (there has yet to be a MTG movie or cartoon, and much fewer video games based on the MTG liscense, etc). The whole Wizard's division is targetting a niche market compared to most of the rest of what Hasbro does, so they obviously have different goals.

 

[Shemeska]

(how much effort are they spending on VTT? Have you even seen the most recent 4E maptools frameworks? Beaten to the market by years and for free).

Less than they spent on the VTT the first time around. That said, it looks like WotC purchased the framework for their VTT mk2 from another company, gametableonline. Anyone I knew internally has long since resigned or been fired, so I can't confirm it, but its been bandied about in a few places online.

 

[Grabuto138]

Does it even include any information on Magic in that analysis? It would probably be better to analyze DnD's place within Wizards more so than Hasbro as a whole, since odds are that Wizards as a whole is only a small part of Hasbro's line. And if nothing else, MTG's IP is arguably not as strong as DnD's (there has yet to be a MTG movie or cartoon, and much fewer video games based on the MTG liscense, etc). The whole Wizard's division is targetting a niche market compared to most of the rest of what Hasbro does, so they obviously have different goals.

I have to concur with renau1g. The analysis I have read DOES include references to Magic. But as far as I can tell Dungeons and Dragons is a complete nonissue for investors. I suspect, it it is only my opinion, that Hasbro bought WOTC for Magic and a vague hope of somehow monetizing the D&D brand through film, cartoons, toys etc. So long as it is not a meaningful money/administrative drain I'd bet they are happy to just mark time.

 

[I'm A Banana]

But now we've ran into a problem. The internet is the best way to distribute errata, periodical contact, and books. It's perfect for rpgs. It's also incredibly easy to copy and distribute unauthorized copies. Everything you put up on a web server is subject to unauthorized copying. As a result of that, their paralyzed with fear. Wizards keeps running around trying to figure out how to handle it, and rather than simply pick a method and live with it, they keep seesawing.

Their use of the internet went from prescient, ahead-of-its-time, and bold in 2000 (SRD! OGL!) to cutting their nose to spite their face in 2010 (CB, DDI, PDF's). At this rate, they will be back to 1980 by 2020, so 6e is clearly going to be a MUD.

Hyperbolic doomsdaying aside (ha!), I really think WotC will be cool with D&D for quite a while. If Essentials serves a similar business function as 3.5 ("sales are lagging, we need to boost them, lets re-write the rules!"), though, I wouldn't be surprised to see a 5e sooner than later, though I'd imagine it would be very close in design to 4e the sooner it is. And it might not even be called "5e." And it might just be a board game.

At any rate, there will be something with the D&D name that involves killing things and taking their stuff and leveling up. That's a really broad requirement, though, and whatever it might be might not be something that's lots of fun for me. But heck, I'm a spoiled American consumer. I've got millions of people begging me to give them my chump change. If D&D ain't gonna do it anymore, I'll play Pathfinder or fire up some Diablo.

If D&D wants to keep doing it, one of the things I might consider is giving a pink slip to whatever suit has been running the electronic side of things into the muck over some bogeyman fear of piracy and hiring someone who groks the idea that your weak-sauce IP is worthless if no one wants to play your game of make-believe.

Anyway, I'm pretty confident in the immediate future of 4e. 2011, they'll be fine. 2012, 2013...well, we'll see what they look like on the other side of this econopocalypse. 5 years might not be too short for an edition's lifetime.

 

[Infernal Teddy]

What most people online don't seem to get is that most D&D Players just DON'T SEEM TO CARE about DDI. Just as most D&D Players never sign up to any forums.

 

[wedgeski]

Jeez get over it Merric. Your posts are mutating from must-reads into bin fodder.

 

[DracoSuave]

Profitable game is profitable.

Everything else is Fear and Loathing.

 

[Cyronax]

Anyway, I'm pretty confident in the immediate future of 4e. 2011, they'll be fine. 2012, 2013...well, we'll see what they look like on the other side of this econopocalypse. 5 years might not be too short for an edition's lifetime.

The nearly decade long lifespans of D&D's various editions are really more of an outlier in the general RPG industry. That can probably be attributed to name recognition, quality of the product, and D&D first-in-the-industry status.

I wouldn't be surprised by newer editions coming much sooner or a constantly evolving business model (more emphasis on boardgames and less on dense rulebooks).

 

[avin]

Finally is DDI. I assume that you meant the character builder, since that's the only place that they really have messed up... for all of a month.

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

Lack of quality on Dungeon and Dragon has skyrocketed.

More than a year without templates for monsters in MB, not counting all the bugs...

CB "delays".

CB online FIASCO and soon to happen MB online fiasco.

VTT canned.

DDI has a lot of merits but saying that there was just a single problem isn't true at all.