WotC's Nathan Stewart: "Story, Story, Story"; and IS D&D a Tabletop Game?

Forbes spoke to WotC's Brand Director & Executive Producer for Dungeons & Dragons, who talked about the 5th Edition launch and his vision for D&D's future. The interview is fairly interesting - it confirms or repeats some information we already know, and also delves a little into the topic of D&D as a wider brand, rather than as a tabletop roleplaying game.

In the interview, he reiterates previous statements that this is the biggest D&D launch ever, in terms of both money and units sold.

[lq]We are story, story, story. The story drives everything.[/lq]

He repeats WoTC's emphasis on storylines, confirming the 1-2 stories per year philosphy. "We are story, story, story. The story drives everything. The need for new rules, the new races, new classes is just based on what’s going to really make this adventure, this story, this kind kind of theme happen." He goes on to say that "We’re not interested in putting out more books for books’ sake... there’s zero plans for a Player’s Handbook 2 any time on the horizon."

As for settings, he confirms that "we’re going to stay in the Forgotten Realms for the foreseeable future." That'll disappoint some folks, I'm sure, but it is their biggest setting, commercially.

Stewart is not "a hundred percent comfortable" with the status of digital tools because he felt like "we took a great step backwards."

[lq]Dungeons and Dragons stopped being a tabletop game years or decades ago. [/lq]

His thoughts on D&D's identity are interesting, too. He mentions that "Dungeons and Dragons stopped being a tabletop game years or decades ago". I'm not sure what that means. His view for the future of the brand includes video games, movies, action figures, and more: "This is no secret for anyone here, but the big thing I want to see is just a triple-A RPG video game. I want to see Baldur’s Gate 3, I want to see a huge open-world RPG. I would love movies about Dungeons and Dragons, or better yet, serialized entertainment where we’re doing seasons of D&D stories and things like Forgotten Realms action figures… of course I’d love that, I’m the biggest geek there is. But at the end of the day, the game’s what we’re missing in the portfolio."

You can read the full interview here.

 

[pemerton]

So why not do it like previous editions and still print 4e books? I mean according to you 4e was profitable if not highly profitable. Why not make and sell books like they did before to finance R&D? Could it be that 4e was not profitable?

It tells us a lot. That working on and printing those books would have been a greater loss than not making them.

Are you talking about writing new books? Who was going to do that, given the staff were working on the new edition. And why would they do that, given that they'd concluded that 4e was not going to achieve their commercial goals into the future?

Are you talking about printing new runs of existing 4e books? My general impression is that the market for one edition tends to wane when there is a public playtest of a new edition being undertaken. Not printing new books presumably did give time for a reasonable amount of existing stock in the distribution chain to flow through.

The main income from 4e during the playtest would have been DDI, I imagine in the neighbourhood of modest single-digit millions per year. Call it 18 months at $5 per month for 50,000 subscribers and you get $4.5 million.

That's enough to pay in the neighbourhood of 15 salaries + oncosts for two years (figuring $150,000 per head).

 

[Wicht]

The movies are "truer" to the classic comics than the current comics are themselves because the movies, all of them, are relatively young. Iron Man has had five movie adventures so far? A bit too soon for him to be going through major character changes on the silver screen.

Eh, they are planning on doing Captain America: Civil War in which Iron Man is the bad guy and the Captain, in the comics, is killed.

I can't really say I am looking forward to it, unless they change the ending and have Iron Man come to his senses before Captain America gets killed.

 

[Kramodlog]

Are you talking about writing new books? Who was going to do that, given the staff were working on the new edition.

They keep producing new books of the current edition when working on Essentials, 4e, 3e and 2e. 5e is the only edition that saw a complete stop on the production of new books "to develop the new edition".

It speaks volumes on 4e financial success.

And why would they do that, given that they'd concluded that 4e was not going to achieve their commercial goals into the future?

According to you, finance the R&D of 5e.

 

[pemerton]

According to you, finance the R&D of 5e.

Huh? If WotC has decided that the way forward is not with 4e, and they are devoting their team to developing 5e, (i) why would they publish books for a system which they've decided won't make a commercially adequate return, and (ii) who would write them?

I sketched out some back-of-the-envelope figures for DDI. Do you think they're wrong?

 

[Relax]

Wouldn't Pathfinder outselling D&D 4e be a pretty strong indication that 4e was a failure? Or do I not understand how the word "failure" is being used?

 

[Morrus]

Wouldn't Pathfinder outselling D&D 4e be a pretty strong indication that 4e was a failure? Or do I not understand how the word "failure" is being used?

I think you misunderstand the word 'failure'. If not being #1 is failing, then there are 7 billion failures in this world. You included! This website isn't a failure because Google is bigger than it.

Two games can succeed. Ten games can. Heck, if the market supports it, a thousand games can.

 

[Relax]

I think you misunderstand the word 'failure'. If not being #1 is failing, then there are 7 billion failures in this world. You included! This website isn't a failure because Google is bigger than it.

Two games can succeed. Ten games can. Heck, if the market supports it, a thousand games can.

Well, I did ask if I was misunderstanding how the word "failure" was being used. On the other hand, D&D was the #1 RPG for, well, forever, until Pathfinder began outselling 4e. One could argue that in that respect, 4e was a failure.

The thing is I like 4e, but it didn't really work out too well...

 

[billd91]

I think you misunderstand the word 'failure'. If not being #1 is failing, then there are 7 billion failures in this world. You included! This website isn't a failure because Google is bigger than it.

Two games can succeed. Ten games can. Heck, if the market supports it, a thousand games can.

As people have pointed out, there are different definitions of success. Bringing in more revenue than cost might mean success. But loss of market share may mean failure even if that first criteria is true.

 

[Wicht]

As people have pointed out, there are different definitions of success. Bringing in more revenue than cost might mean success. But loss of market share may mean failure even if that first criteria is true.

Yes. One really needs to agree on a preset field of success/failure before having these discussions. Or at least, when talking about success, be specific as to what you are addressing with your assessment.

Pemerton may define success as creating a game that he enjoyed.
Morrus may look at success as turning a profit.
Relax may think success is defined by outshining all the competition. (Just picking names out of the conversation; not assigning actual opinions.)

4e was obviously initially successful in being published and sold. It was successful, one would assume, in turning something of a profit, at least at first.

It was not successful in issuing in a version of D&D that was liked by an overwhelming majority of the consumer base nor was it successful in retaining its market lead. It was also not successful in its staying power and the handwriting was on the wall for it after only 2-3 years.

So depending on what you are looking for, you could argue that 4e was successful, or you could argue it was not successful and on either hand you would be able to be right.

 

[Wicht]

I sketched out some back-of-the-envelope figures for DDI. Do you think they're wrong?

I really have no idea what the profit of DDI was.

But I understand, correct me if I am wrong, that they are shutting it down for 5e.

I do have to wonder, if DDI was such an easy money maker for WotC, with millions basically just pouring in, why turn the spicket off?