WOTC, when do we see a commercial for D&D on TV???

[Quasqueton]

They had the opportunity for the "Perfect Advertisement" with the Dungeons & Dragons movie. But . . . :-(

Quasqueton

 

[Rel]

What WOTC should do instead of launching an ad campaign is hire people to go out and teach people how to play D&D. They could go to hobby shops and to malls and such.

They've pretty much done this. Our own Belen Umeria is a (and I may not be getting the terminology exactly right) WOTC "Delegate". They send him all kinds of free product and in exchange he promotes D&D by running games at the local gaming store. I've seen the sorts of folks his games draw and I'd say that half to 2/3 are experienced gamers but it always seems like there is a fresh face or two in the bunch.

I know for a fact that this had led directly to sales for D&D as I was in one of the early games and afterwards a kid new to the game said, "What do I have to buy to play this game?" He walked out of the store that night with a brand new PHB.

Although WOTC isn't sending me any swag, I've run games at these same events and I've had new players in most of them. Just this past Sunday I ran the Sky Galleons of Mars game that I'm bringing to GenCon and I had one player who had only ever played a couple times and one guy who had never played a RPG in his life.

 

[satori01]

Which is really rather funny as BU quite often, vociferously, disapproves of D20 D&D.

 

[Rel]

Which is really rather funny as BU quite often, vociferously, disapproves of D20 D&D.

That is indeed true and I also note the irony. But I will say that many of the problems he seems to have with the system are non-issues for one shot games with pre-gen characters. Aside from that I'll let him speak for himself on the issue.

 

[Astos]

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/20050726x

Last year's Worldwide D&D Day actually got a lot of the card and minis players at the local game store to try D&D.

 

[francisca]

WIts about time we shrugged off this stigma that there is something wrong with D&D and that we shouldn't be as open talking about it as talking about our HALO game or how great the Carolina Panthers are or what a good episode of Hell's Kitchen that was or any other entertainment related topic. And following the same line of logic, there should be no reason we can't proudly wear our D&D t-shirts (the thread that got me started on this rant), or that WOTC can't make ads for it on TV. I want my Umber Hulk sitting on a Beholder, having a good ol' time, during prime time on the screen between Friends and Everybody Loves Raymond at 7:30pm dang it!

Sounds like you are looking for validation for your choice in hobbies. I don't think a TV commercial will give you that.

 

[smilinggm]

""When will the taboo end???"""

If we look at another game that took its sweet time to become sociably accectable, lets say POKER as our guide. Then I would hazard a guess that D&D will be wide spread and sociably accectable in about 100 to 150 years from now. This is just a guess though. Looking at the history of the game Poker which has been around for about 150 to 200 years now. And that for the most of that time poker was only played by crimanals and other low life's. Serious poker was only played in seedy bars and back roooms. It took time for poker to move from smoky back rooms to people's homes. Gradually it became an accectable socaial gathering and people started to have regular poker nights at there homes. Only now in the past fiew years has poker realy exploded. The World Wide Poker Tour has become huge. You can now turn on cable tv and start flipping chanels at most times of the day and you will find a poker game to watch. Texas Holdem has become the game to play. You can't go to most stores now and find poker chips and even poker tables, less than 10 years ago to find poker chips you had to hunt around to find a store that carried a good set.
I think that if you watch D&D and gaming in general over the long run the the social taboo will end. We just have to keep the game alive by teaching it to the next generation and wait. The Social Taboo's will end.

 

[Kugar]

So what you are saying is that we need the SciFi channel to do a mini-series based on the DnD open?

Kugar

 

[Dremmen]

So what you are saying is that we need the SciFi channel to do a mini-series based on the DnD open?

Kugar

A series based on the FR....mmm..drowy goodness...
Actually it'd probably be Eberron that would get picked if a series from DnD was to air, considering how hard that setting is being pushed. But if I was Mr.Moneybags and called the shots, a series based on Salvatore's work with drow would be what I'd put on TV.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Heck, how about the history channel? D&D is getting on in age and tracing it's routes via some of the legends and myths, not to mention the always popular J.R.R. Tolkieen, would be a good thing. Hekc, make it about role playing games in general.