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WotC's Nathan Stewart: "Story, Story, Story"; and IS D&D a Tabletop Game?
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<blockquote data-quote="Trickster Spirit" data-source="post: 7667895" data-attributes="member: 6701829"><p>I have a theory about how they're planning to approach D&D this edition cycle. I can't claim it's 100% correct, but it tracks with everything they've been saying, and more importantly, with what they've been <em>doing</em> up to this point.</p><p></p><p>The most profitable part of selling D&D is always the initial core book sales, correct? Any other products will only ever sell a fraction as well. So even though they have to spend the same amount of money on writers, artists, editors and printing and distribution costs as they would for a core book print run, they'll only make a fraction of the profits on anything that's not a core book.</p><p></p><p>The last two editions bear this out. Both saw revisions halfway through their lifetime in an attempt to kickstarts sales again. Even though both games could have conceivably been supported for years to come, both were aborted in favor of launching a new edition entirely. This time around, I think they've decided there's a better way. </p><p></p><p>This time, I think they're in the business of selling the core books, and just the core books.</p><p></p><p>Think about it. They've already paid to have the core books made up and earned more than that back in profits, so any future profits they make off of them is basically free money. Now in the 3E and 4E days, they made their money off of ongoing core book sales <em>and</em> supplement sales, but probably not as much as they'd like, since the margin they'd make off of supplements was so much smaller than the core books'. So they're making less money without the supplements, but they're also spending less money producing the supplements. I expect they'll more than make up the difference in licensing agreements off of things like Sword Coast Legends or a D&D movie. Even if a D&D movie flops, they'll likely make more from Universal paying them once for the rights to make it than they would off of several years' worth of supplement sales.</p><p></p><p>I suspect the reason they're focusing so heavy on APs isn't because they think the APs are what the majority of existing gamers will buy, but because they're focusing on bringing in <em>new</em> gamers. Every D&D tie-in that connects with an audience exposes more people to the tabletop game, but most brand new groups won't know the first thing to do with their brand new set of core books. Buy "Princes of the Apocalypse" along with your DMG though and The APs serve to provide a canned, pre-written campaign to new DMs - they're only interested in AP sales inasmuch as the APs provide brand-new players with an on-ramp to the hobby.</p><p></p><p>If you're interested in a particular AP, Wizards will happily take your money, but we're not their target demographic, new players are. If you've already purchased the core books, the transaction is completed in their view. Milton Bradley doesn't make money off of Connect4 by selling perpetual rules expansions for the game to previous customers - they do it by selling an evergreen product and making modest but ongoing sales to new customers.</p><p></p><p>Things like the Player's Companion as a free PDF is really them just throwing their existing customers a bone. The focus is on acquiring new players, since everyone they can get to play the game and walk away having had a positive experience is far likelier to buy a ticket to the next D&D movie or video game. Which is where they'll <em>really</em> make their money.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Trickster Spirit, post: 7667895, member: 6701829"] I have a theory about how they're planning to approach D&D this edition cycle. I can't claim it's 100% correct, but it tracks with everything they've been saying, and more importantly, with what they've been [i]doing[/i] up to this point. The most profitable part of selling D&D is always the initial core book sales, correct? Any other products will only ever sell a fraction as well. So even though they have to spend the same amount of money on writers, artists, editors and printing and distribution costs as they would for a core book print run, they'll only make a fraction of the profits on anything that's not a core book. The last two editions bear this out. Both saw revisions halfway through their lifetime in an attempt to kickstarts sales again. Even though both games could have conceivably been supported for years to come, both were aborted in favor of launching a new edition entirely. This time around, I think they've decided there's a better way. This time, I think they're in the business of selling the core books, and just the core books. Think about it. They've already paid to have the core books made up and earned more than that back in profits, so any future profits they make off of them is basically free money. Now in the 3E and 4E days, they made their money off of ongoing core book sales [i]and[/i] supplement sales, but probably not as much as they'd like, since the margin they'd make off of supplements was so much smaller than the core books'. So they're making less money without the supplements, but they're also spending less money producing the supplements. I expect they'll more than make up the difference in licensing agreements off of things like Sword Coast Legends or a D&D movie. Even if a D&D movie flops, they'll likely make more from Universal paying them once for the rights to make it than they would off of several years' worth of supplement sales. I suspect the reason they're focusing so heavy on APs isn't because they think the APs are what the majority of existing gamers will buy, but because they're focusing on bringing in [i]new[/i] gamers. Every D&D tie-in that connects with an audience exposes more people to the tabletop game, but most brand new groups won't know the first thing to do with their brand new set of core books. Buy "Princes of the Apocalypse" along with your DMG though and The APs serve to provide a canned, pre-written campaign to new DMs - they're only interested in AP sales inasmuch as the APs provide brand-new players with an on-ramp to the hobby. If you're interested in a particular AP, Wizards will happily take your money, but we're not their target demographic, new players are. If you've already purchased the core books, the transaction is completed in their view. Milton Bradley doesn't make money off of Connect4 by selling perpetual rules expansions for the game to previous customers - they do it by selling an evergreen product and making modest but ongoing sales to new customers. Things like the Player's Companion as a free PDF is really them just throwing their existing customers a bone. The focus is on acquiring new players, since everyone they can get to play the game and walk away having had a positive experience is far likelier to buy a ticket to the next D&D movie or video game. Which is where they'll [i]really[/i] make their money. [/QUOTE]
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