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<blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 7647965" data-attributes="member: 22424">Actually, yes.TSR was a pretty badly run business, running into serious problems on at least two occasions. The first of these was the mid-80s, due to some truly mind-bogglingly bad acquisitions. The result of that was the rushed production of some products, notably &quot;Unearthed Arcana&quot;. The second time, of course, was the tail end of 2nd Edition, and we all know how that turned out.Basically, the guys at TSR were pretty good at that 'game' stuff, but they sucked at the 'business' side.So, yeah, there's a distinct possibility that there wasn't anyone doing the &quot;$X by date Y&quot; calculation. Not that that's a good thing, of course.For me, the problem is not that Hasbro have somehow set out to kill D&amp;D. Of course they haven't - they just don't care.But the problem is that Hasbro have certain requirements of their brands (the $50M number), or they're just not worth their while. And they essentially never release IP once they own it, even though the only reason they own D&amp;D is that WotC owned it (basically, &quot;buy two CCGs, and get an RPG free!&quot;).The problem is that D&amp;D can't make those numbers. And so, sooner or later, it's going to get killed. Not because it's not profitable, and not because it's a bad product, but because the giant just doesn't care.The 4e designers talked about &quot;fixing the math&quot;. Sadly, it looks like the math had a big brother, and doesn't believe in level-appropriate challenges.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="delericho, post: 7647965, member: 22424"] Actually, yes. TSR was a pretty badly run business, running into serious problems on at least two occasions. The first of these was the mid-80s, due to some truly mind-bogglingly bad acquisitions. The result of that was the rushed production of some products, notably "Unearthed Arcana". The second time, of course, was the tail end of 2nd Edition, and we all know how that turned out. Basically, the guys at TSR were pretty good at that 'game' stuff, but they sucked at the 'business' side. So, yeah, there's a distinct possibility that there wasn't anyone doing the "$X by date Y" calculation. Not that that's a [i]good[/i] thing, of course. For me, the problem is not that Hasbro have somehow set out to kill D&D. Of course they haven't - they just don't care. But the problem is that Hasbro have certain requirements of their brands (the $50M number), or they're just not worth their while. And they essentially never release IP once they own it, even though the only reason they own D&D is that WotC owned it (basically, "buy two CCGs, and get an RPG free!"). The problem is that D&D [i]can't[/i] make those numbers. And so, sooner or later, it's going to get killed. Not because it's not profitable, and not because it's a bad product, but because the giant just doesn't care. The 4e designers talked about "fixing the math". Sadly, it looks like the math had a big brother, and doesn't believe in level-appropriate challenges. [/QUOTE]

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