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With 5E now under Community Commons, WotC is now "just" another 5E publisher -- here's how they can still dominate
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<blockquote data-quote="Benjamin Olson" data-source="post: 8922326" data-attributes="member: 6988941"><p>5e in some form is here to stay for a long, long time. It has a massive install base and is a nostalgic touchstone for a massive number of people who came into the hobby during the 5e age. The SRD being released to creative commons (and other editions not getting such treatment) makes in <em>the</em> version of D&D that can actually belong to everybody (legally, not just in their hearts), and the soil upon which D&D as folk tradition (or what have you) can most readily flower.</p><p></p><p>It had occurred to me before that in the coming 5e clone age "5e compatible" will certainly be more abstracted from its historical relationship with the particular brand of 5e compatible games called "D&D". In that hypothetical clone market of broadly compatible game materials, the compatibility-oriented OneD&D is <em>more like</em> a comparable competing product to, say, Level Up, or the little heartbreakers many of us are hard at work on right now, than it was without this Creative Commons-ing of the SRD. <em>In some ways</em>, WotC is just another cloner now (so long as they try to make editions that are broadly 5e compatible).</p><p></p><p>I got in a tiff with someone in another thread over whether one could call their 5e compatible product "compatible with D&D" rather than just "5e compatible", and whether I was right or wrong on my interpretation of trademark law in saying it was risky to do so, I stand by my core point: in the coming clone age, it is likely you won't particularly want to. "5e compatible" will tell customers everything they need to know (within the market of people interested in 5e-derived products). Mentioning "Dungeons and Dragons" on your product is just giving a competitor free advertising.</p><p></p><p>But, while I am excited about the 5e clone age, I think the truth is that the dynamic that would have powered one or more unusually successful clones to being serious rivals to WotC's official clone, OneD&D, was everyone being furious at WotC and looking to move elsewhere, and that has <em>mostly</em> subsided (though I still think far fewer people are taking transitioning to OneD&D for granted, publishers are looking to have less D&D-centric product lines, and most heavily D&D-oriented youtubers or what-have-you will vary their content more from here on out). Now it's entirely possible WotC will figure out a new way to absolutely alienate everyone in the next couple years (as long as the same buffoons who orchestrated OGL-gate remain in charge I'd say its as likely as not, but I think there will be some departures soon). It's also possible OneD&D is a massively divisive product that turns an unusual number of people to reject the name-brand clone in favor of one or more upstarts, but since I think the fundamental source of its near-inevitable mediocrity is that it is a "play everything safe, mitigate all risks, design by committee" product, while I think it will be less of a success than WotC assume it will, the chances of being a complete flop are pretty negligible.</p><p></p><p>So WotC really becoming "just another 5e cloner" in an actual market way seems pretty unlikely based on the current status quo and known factors. In the world of 5e compatible products there is not really an obvious in-road for someone else to create a rival as far as "big tent, heroic high fantasy" (or however you want to define D&D's sub-genre) goes that is likely to be a serious threat to WotC's market dominance. At present it seems like the best opportunities for a clone product to distinguish itself is to either be a different genre or sub-genre, or else to support a very different style of play that some significant portion of 5e customers yearn for.</p><p></p><p>But, the future is full of unknowns. WotC might well figure out a new way to put all their brand loyalty and goodwill on top of a massive fire and watch it burn, in which case the WotC as just another 5e cloner scenario becomes much more likely. Or someone else may just create the perfect 5e-derived game that, somehow, through sheer superiority as a product, overcomes all the built in advantages WotC has.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Benjamin Olson, post: 8922326, member: 6988941"] 5e in some form is here to stay for a long, long time. It has a massive install base and is a nostalgic touchstone for a massive number of people who came into the hobby during the 5e age. The SRD being released to creative commons (and other editions not getting such treatment) makes in [I]the[/I] version of D&D that can actually belong to everybody (legally, not just in their hearts), and the soil upon which D&D as folk tradition (or what have you) can most readily flower. It had occurred to me before that in the coming 5e clone age "5e compatible" will certainly be more abstracted from its historical relationship with the particular brand of 5e compatible games called "D&D". In that hypothetical clone market of broadly compatible game materials, the compatibility-oriented OneD&D is [I]more like[/I] a comparable competing product to, say, Level Up, or the little heartbreakers many of us are hard at work on right now, than it was without this Creative Commons-ing of the SRD. [I]In some ways[/I], WotC is just another cloner now (so long as they try to make editions that are broadly 5e compatible). I got in a tiff with someone in another thread over whether one could call their 5e compatible product "compatible with D&D" rather than just "5e compatible", and whether I was right or wrong on my interpretation of trademark law in saying it was risky to do so, I stand by my core point: in the coming clone age, it is likely you won't particularly want to. "5e compatible" will tell customers everything they need to know (within the market of people interested in 5e-derived products). Mentioning "Dungeons and Dragons" on your product is just giving a competitor free advertising. But, while I am excited about the 5e clone age, I think the truth is that the dynamic that would have powered one or more unusually successful clones to being serious rivals to WotC's official clone, OneD&D, was everyone being furious at WotC and looking to move elsewhere, and that has [I]mostly[/I] subsided (though I still think far fewer people are taking transitioning to OneD&D for granted, publishers are looking to have less D&D-centric product lines, and most heavily D&D-oriented youtubers or what-have-you will vary their content more from here on out). Now it's entirely possible WotC will figure out a new way to absolutely alienate everyone in the next couple years (as long as the same buffoons who orchestrated OGL-gate remain in charge I'd say its as likely as not, but I think there will be some departures soon). It's also possible OneD&D is a massively divisive product that turns an unusual number of people to reject the name-brand clone in favor of one or more upstarts, but since I think the fundamental source of its near-inevitable mediocrity is that it is a "play everything safe, mitigate all risks, design by committee" product, while I think it will be less of a success than WotC assume it will, the chances of being a complete flop are pretty negligible. So WotC really becoming "just another 5e cloner" in an actual market way seems pretty unlikely based on the current status quo and known factors. In the world of 5e compatible products there is not really an obvious in-road for someone else to create a rival as far as "big tent, heroic high fantasy" (or however you want to define D&D's sub-genre) goes that is likely to be a serious threat to WotC's market dominance. At present it seems like the best opportunities for a clone product to distinguish itself is to either be a different genre or sub-genre, or else to support a very different style of play that some significant portion of 5e customers yearn for. But, the future is full of unknowns. WotC might well figure out a new way to put all their brand loyalty and goodwill on top of a massive fire and watch it burn, in which case the WotC as just another 5e cloner scenario becomes much more likely. Or someone else may just create the perfect 5e-derived game that, somehow, through sheer superiority as a product, overcomes all the built in advantages WotC has. [/QUOTE]
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