Hey again ^_^
People on theRPGsite are wanking really hard about Next but the 4e fanbase on RPG.net was crying delicious tears, so what are the odds it's going to be a success :?
Also if it tanks do you guys have something suitably derogatory to call them lined up ;3
Is D&D Next going to flop?
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Doesn't the name already tell us our reaction? "D&D? ...next!"
Come see Sprockets & Serials
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
EXPLOSIVE RUNES!
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rasmuswagner
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Well what would you consider success?
Don't think D&D Next is good enough to convert people from their current favourite edition. Honestly, I think the game looks rather bad.
They'll get some sales just because it is the new D&D edition, but probably less of those then they got for 4e (since that was a disappointment for many and those that liked 4e probably aren't all that interested in next).
But I don't know what kind of marketing campaign they'll have. And great marketing can sell shitty games.
For example the unprecedented year-long playtest is awesome from a marketing standpoint.
If they want D&D N to be a success they can't rely on their game at all, since it'll hinder its possible success but solely need to focus on their marketing and getting new blood into the genre.
Don't think D&D Next is good enough to convert people from their current favourite edition. Honestly, I think the game looks rather bad.
They'll get some sales just because it is the new D&D edition, but probably less of those then they got for 4e (since that was a disappointment for many and those that liked 4e probably aren't all that interested in next).
But I don't know what kind of marketing campaign they'll have. And great marketing can sell shitty games.
For example the unprecedented year-long playtest is awesome from a marketing standpoint.
If they want D&D N to be a success they can't rely on their game at all, since it'll hinder its possible success but solely need to focus on their marketing and getting new blood into the genre.
Gary Gygax wrote:The player’s path to role-playing mastery begins with a thorough understanding of the rules of the game
Bigode wrote:I wouldn't normally make that blanket of a suggestion, but you seem to deserve it: scroll through the entire forum, read anything that looks interesting in term of design experience, then come back.
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Username17
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Well, I would be surprised if it didn't have a little bit of life in it. There's very little buzz, and what they've released has looked really bad. No one seems to like it, and there are no good ideas in there. The methodology is beyond suspect and into "cannot possibly work". In particular, the whole idea of deferring math until the end is something that literally cannot end well.
That being said, it's still a new edition of Dungeons & Dragons. It will take a while for bad word of mouth to actually bury the thing. In particular, it's going to have a big sell through right at the beginning when a bunch of people who don't know anyone who has read it and hated it are going to buy it because it's D&D and it's new. Also, just like Pathfinder and 4e, they are going to pull some print run shenanigans in order to "sell out their print run".
It's going to take a couple of months probably before we will be able to see that 5e is failing. The lag time on sales figures and the difficulty of getting them is going to leave a bitter core of 5e partisans refusing to believe that their newest favoritist edition is in hard financial shape for quite some time. Remember that 4vengers were continuing to refuse to admit that 4e had failed even after the edition had been canceled, the lead had been fired every year for three years running, and multiple independent sources had confirmed that they were getting their ass handed to them by some dude's house rules for the previous edition.
Almost certainly the new edition is going to outsell Pathfinder in its month of release. I mean, for fuck's sake we're talking about three core books for a brand new edition going up against whatever tail products Paizo comes up with for that month (Genasi of Golarion or whatever the fuck). If they have some actual products backing it up, we could expect it to outsell Pathfinder for a couple of months straight on "newness" alone. Probably during that period, Pundit and Benoist are going to be doing endzone dances and claiming that they've finally killed the 3tards and 4rries. This will be a very annoying time to be on the internet.
But yeah, 5e is going down. They have spent 3 years fucking around, and the only thing they've come up with is that people would rather have a working set of rules than not. But since they haven't spent this time actually making a set of working rules, they're rather up shit creek at this point. Mike Mearls has never designed something functional to completion in his entire fucking life. Everything he has ever made has been halfassed and unfinished. Everything. I am totally at a loss as to how he keeps holding a job when better men than he have repeatedly been fired for fuckups he was part of. Him being lead on this project has been the black spot of death since before they even put numbers on a page. And now that they have put down some numbers, it's obvious he hasn't learned a thing.
While 4e was still a thing, the lead for D&D got sacked every single year. There is no reason to believe that 5e will do much better. Hopefully, this will finally rid gaming of the millstone that is Mike Mearls.
-Username17
That being said, it's still a new edition of Dungeons & Dragons. It will take a while for bad word of mouth to actually bury the thing. In particular, it's going to have a big sell through right at the beginning when a bunch of people who don't know anyone who has read it and hated it are going to buy it because it's D&D and it's new. Also, just like Pathfinder and 4e, they are going to pull some print run shenanigans in order to "sell out their print run".
It's going to take a couple of months probably before we will be able to see that 5e is failing. The lag time on sales figures and the difficulty of getting them is going to leave a bitter core of 5e partisans refusing to believe that their newest favoritist edition is in hard financial shape for quite some time. Remember that 4vengers were continuing to refuse to admit that 4e had failed even after the edition had been canceled, the lead had been fired every year for three years running, and multiple independent sources had confirmed that they were getting their ass handed to them by some dude's house rules for the previous edition.
Almost certainly the new edition is going to outsell Pathfinder in its month of release. I mean, for fuck's sake we're talking about three core books for a brand new edition going up against whatever tail products Paizo comes up with for that month (Genasi of Golarion or whatever the fuck). If they have some actual products backing it up, we could expect it to outsell Pathfinder for a couple of months straight on "newness" alone. Probably during that period, Pundit and Benoist are going to be doing endzone dances and claiming that they've finally killed the 3tards and 4rries. This will be a very annoying time to be on the internet.
But yeah, 5e is going down. They have spent 3 years fucking around, and the only thing they've come up with is that people would rather have a working set of rules than not. But since they haven't spent this time actually making a set of working rules, they're rather up shit creek at this point. Mike Mearls has never designed something functional to completion in his entire fucking life. Everything he has ever made has been halfassed and unfinished. Everything. I am totally at a loss as to how he keeps holding a job when better men than he have repeatedly been fired for fuckups he was part of. Him being lead on this project has been the black spot of death since before they even put numbers on a page. And now that they have put down some numbers, it's obvious he hasn't learned a thing.
While 4e was still a thing, the lead for D&D got sacked every single year. There is no reason to believe that 5e will do much better. Hopefully, this will finally rid gaming of the millstone that is Mike Mearls.
-Username17
HahahagamerGoyf wrote:
[...] the 4e fanbase on RPG.net was crying delicious tears [...]
Have you checked out the DDN review thread?
Phlebotinum : fleh-bot-ih-nuhm • A glossary of RPG/Dennizen terminology • Favorite replies: [1]
nockermensch wrote:Advantage will lead to dicepools in D&D. Remember, you read this here first!
Re: Is D&D Next going to flop?
Depends how you want to define success. I don't even know what the goals of the project are, beyond 'Get paychecks from Hasbro.'gamerGoyf wrote:Hey again ^_^
People on theRPGsite are wanking really hard about Next but the 4e fanbase on RPG.net was crying delicious tears, so what are the odds it's going to be a success
Also if it tanks do you guys have something suitably derogatory to call them lined up ;3
Can it sell more copies than 4e? Possibly, even without fanboys claiming that hundreds of thousands = millions.
Mostly, though, I can't tell how many people actually give two flying fucks about it; or D&D (or off-shoots) in general. Or how WotC plans to make people care enough to buy things. Are they going to push their Hot Fantasy Setting? Well, they pretty much gutted that with 4e. A Hot New Computer Game? Well, they just finished a 4e mmo, and it actually proved that 4e isn't even all that good for that (which continues to be hilarious).
Are they going to unify the fanbase? Fuck, no. That is split into completely irreconcilable camps, to the point that actual bribes will probably not bring it back together. Next will more than likely make that worse. The only thing that can save it is literally pulling the plug on the 4e 'net resources, and Paizo utterly botching the inevitable PF 2.0.
I kinda think that the sales of D&D Next are going to rely heavily on the consumer version of a pity fuck.
They really need to start pulling some art assets out of their asses, as people have spent the last year associating it with bland, flavorless text.
Last edited by Voss on Thu Sep 05, 2013 8:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
What about their argument that allot of pathfinder players will be attracted to 5e's simplicity along with the "untapped well" of players that are intrested in D&D but turnned off by complexity/char-op culture of 3e and 4e :?FrankTrollman wrote:But yeah, 5e is going down. They have spent 3 years fucking around, and the only thing they've come up with is that people would rather have a working set of rules than not. But since they haven't spent this time actually making a set of working rules, they're rather up shit creek at this point. Mike Mearls has never designed something functional to completion in his entire fucking life. Everything he has ever made has been halfassed and unfinished. Everything. I am totally at a loss as to how he keeps holding a job when better men than he have repeatedly been fired for fuckups he was part of. Him being lead on this project has been the black spot of death since before they even put numbers on a page. And now that they have put down some numbers, it's obvious he hasn't learned a thing.
What untapped well?
No, really.
What well? Most people interested in playing D&D won't be turned off by having stuff like 'rules'.
5e is going to crash SO HARD.
No, really.
What well? Most people interested in playing D&D won't be turned off by having stuff like 'rules'.
5e is going to crash SO HARD.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
They exist, but they've long jumped into games like FATE or innumerable indie publishers. And people who've already touched that are very likely to turn their nose at anything with the D&D brand. Hell, Numenera is likely going to take away potential customers since one man with a kickstarter can do more in less time than a corporate-sponsored team...Maxus wrote:What untapped well?
No, really.
What well? Most people interested in playing D&D won't be turned off by having stuff like 'rules'.
Come see Sprockets & Serials
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
EXPLOSIVE RUNES!
I'd don't really think that Paizo can botch anything. They've decided to stick to the most popular edition of DnD AND sold the public on the idea that minor changes for the sake of changes are a new edition.
That's the perfect business model. Latching onto something successful and making minor changes as substitutions for improvements is how most companies work. See Apple, the generic drug business, the movie industry, etc.
That's the perfect business model. Latching onto something successful and making minor changes as substitutions for improvements is how most companies work. See Apple, the generic drug business, the movie industry, etc.
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Username17
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What evidence is there that Pathfinder players want simplicity? If they wanted simplicity, they'd play core only. Hell, they'd play 3.5. Pathfinder players want a dizzying array of minor options. We know this because they have the choice to play straight out of the SRD and have chosen to play Pathfinder instead.gamerGoyf wrote:
What about their argument that allot of pathfinder players will be attracted to 5e's simplicity along with the "untapped well" of players that are intrested in D&D but turnned off by complexity/char-op culture of 3e and 4e
Pundit and company live in a fantasy world where they believe that people actually don't like all the fiddly bits in D&D. But the truth is that they obviously do like those things, because they keep buying them for actual money. The market has spoken: people like fiddly dials to personalize their characters.
Now, you can argue, and I have argued, that 3e's "prestige class" system does not give a good return in accessible options for the amount of page count it requires. You fill a book with prestige classes, and there's still only one or two things your character actually qualifies for and thus only one or two real options. That sucks. But you're never going to get anywhere telling the players that you're outright reducing the options because they [Jack Nicholson]can't handle the options[/Jack Nicholson]. 4e started tanking before word of mouth even panned it for sucking monkey ball hair - simply on the grounds that it only offered 8 character classes on launch.
Even fucking Mike Mearls noticed that people don't like having their fucking toys taken away. He called it the "Gnome Paradox", where it turns out that an option used by only 5% of players is actually used by a quarter or more of groups, so taking even "rare" options away from players will alienate a quite sizable portion of the fanbase.
Any new edition that launches with less than 15 core classes might as well come with the lead designer's "looking for work" blog post printed in the back. People will accept that a new edition doesn't have everything that an edition with several years and dozens of books under its belt has in it. But they are never going to be happy about it. They want their stuff. And if they don't see a good faith effort to get their stuff moved into the new edition, they won't convert to the new edition. Full fucking stop.
There are certainly places you could streamline 3e or Pathfinder. That shouldn't even be a question. But taking peoples' toys away purely in the name of dumbing it down making it simpler? Yeah, no one is going to fucking go for that. They never have in the past, and I have no idea why anyone would think they would in the future.
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RadiantPhoenix
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phlapjackage
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gamerGoyf, maybe you can decide for yourself if it's going to flop. This is the only info you need.
http://www.twitch.tv/wotc_dnd/b/443283943
http://www.twitch.tv/wotc_dnd/b/443283943
Koumei: and if I wanted that, I'd take some mescaline and run into the park after watching a documentary about wasps.
PhoneLobster: DM : Mr Monkey doesn't like it. Eldritch : Mr Monkey can do what he is god damn told.
MGuy: The point is to normalize 'my' point of view. How the fuck do you think civil rights occurred? You think things got this way because people sat down and fucking waited for public opinion to change?
PhoneLobster: DM : Mr Monkey doesn't like it. Eldritch : Mr Monkey can do what he is god damn told.
MGuy: The point is to normalize 'my' point of view. How the fuck do you think civil rights occurred? You think things got this way because people sat down and fucking waited for public opinion to change?
I'm sure there are tons of Pathfinder players who're very happy playing simple, core-rule-only, sword-and-board fighters and blaster mages, Final Destination. They may even outnumber the crunch-loving players (they certainly did in most of my gaming groups, at least.)FrankTrollman wrote:What evidence is there that Pathfinder players want simplicity? If they wanted simplicity, they'd play core only. Hell, they'd play 3.5. Pathfinder players want a dizzying array of minor options. We know this because they have the choice to play straight out of the SRD and have chosen to play Pathfinder instead.
It doesn't fucking matter, because they're players, not customers. By definition, they buy, at most, one book (and let's be honest - the immense majority of them don't even buy the one.)
Targetting this market isn't a "sell-the-Wii-to-the-elderly" strategy, it's a "sell-skis-to-paraplegics" strategy. In other words, WotC's business unit has been afflicted by Mearlsitis Failplex.
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Lago PARANOIA
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But he's the head game designer, not some random TTRPG gaming nerd. And he wasn't just being a moron in a generic way like how we put up with stoners and guys who don't know the rules too well. He was being deliberately disruptive to the narrative, didn't put in any effort into his character, and was forcing the DM to metagame in order to prevent a campaign-derailing fight in the opening scene. And not in just some private scene, but in the actual advertising example that's supposed to convince other people to Buy His Shit.Voss wrote:Actually, I've met too many stereotypes that actually behave like that over years to feel all that comfortable with that video as evidence of a flop. Way too many D&D players are simplistic fuck-wits just like Mearls.
Given those circumstances, how can you have much faith in his addition to a hobby?
Last edited by Lago PARANOIA on Fri Sep 06, 2013 2:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
They can't really afford to keep Next simple ... the 4e optimization culture is what made the character builder a subscription seller and those subscriptions were huge money.
Last edited by MfA on Fri Sep 06, 2013 2:44 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Neon Sequitur
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Lago PARANOIA wrote:But he's the head game designer, not some random TTRPG gaming nerd. And he wasn't just being a moron in a generic way like how we put up with stoners and guys who don't know the rules too well. He was being deliberately disruptive to the narrative, didn't put in any effort into his character, and was forcing the DM to metagame in order to prevent a campaign-derailing fight in the opening scene. And not in just some private scene, but in the actual advertising example that's supposed to convince other people to Buy His Shit.Voss wrote:Actually, I've met too many stereotypes that actually behave like that over years to feel all that comfortable with that video as evidence of a flop. Way too many D&D players are simplistic fuck-wits just like Mearls.
Given those circumstances, how can you have much faith in his addition to a hobby?
Eh? I don't have faith in his addition to the game. I just think his public behavior in that video will actually attract more shitheads than it drives away people with standards. Partly because people with standards have been watching the playtest docs and were unlikely to buy in anyway.
Dumb people still have money, and a tendency to throw that money at dumb things; and he was standing in as an avatar for all those stupid fucks.
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Cyberzombie
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They actually had some decent ideas with D&DN. The concept of a modular game with interchangeable systems is a good idea. Anyone with half a brain should realize that you're never going to get the OSR crowd, the 3E crowd and the 4E fans playing at the same table. You might be able to get them all to play the same edition if you make it modular enough. The one common feature of D&D is that almost everyone house rules it to some degree. Building on that feature makes perfect sense and should improve the quality of the game.
Bounded accuracy is also a good idea, in concept anyway. One of the biggest problems with 3E/4E is that monsters had a very narrow level range where they were usable. 4E especially you really felt this problem because you had 30 levels in all and a very small range of monsters you could actually use. 4E tried to remedy it with the minion system, which just sucked ass. Setting up the math so low level monsters don't become obsolete as quickly is a good goal.
Unfortunately, Mearls is too much of a hack to properly design any of this stuff. The math of bounded accuracy doesn't work, and we have yet to see a single modular component in any of the playtest packets (all 10+ of them). The packets don't even have multi-classing yet. And even the most diehard fan isn't buying into the "we will fix the math last, trust us" bullshit.
Going by the merits of the game, D&DN is going to suck. It will still be more fun to play than 4E, because at the very least combats happen fast. Though that's not saying much.
But will it flop? A lot of that depends on accessibility and art quality. Pathfinder may not be all that great a game either, but it has high quality books and a fully loaded SRD that makes it easy to get players. Smart designers realize that in the modern rules-heavy RPG, it's just not feasable anymore to trade books around for a few minutes when creating characters at the DM's house. People need hours to pour through all the myriad options, and they need access to the material even if they don't own it, because not everyone is going to buy the books. When it comes to a toss-up between Shadowrun or Pathfinder, most people in the group are going to want to go with Pathfinder because of that SRD. And contrary to popular belief, Pathfinder still has good book sales despite giving away all their shit for free.
If the marketing of D&DN is smart, D&DN can fill that niche too. It has the D&D label on it and if it's accessible and the books look good, you'll get a lot of groups that will pick it just because of that, even if it is the inferior product. Even being a garbage rules set, they've got a shot. Have a fully loaded SRD, a good character generator and high-quality books with the D&D logo... It's going to sell based on pure accessibility.
D&D has never been about rules quality. Every edition has had elements that flat out suck that people have learned to ignore. Whether it's unplayable rogues in AD&D, Casters and Caddies in 3E or godawful long combats or skill challenges in 4E, fans of D&D are experts at turning a blind eye to rules problems in their favorite edition. D&D has never been about math or good design.
Bounded accuracy is also a good idea, in concept anyway. One of the biggest problems with 3E/4E is that monsters had a very narrow level range where they were usable. 4E especially you really felt this problem because you had 30 levels in all and a very small range of monsters you could actually use. 4E tried to remedy it with the minion system, which just sucked ass. Setting up the math so low level monsters don't become obsolete as quickly is a good goal.
Unfortunately, Mearls is too much of a hack to properly design any of this stuff. The math of bounded accuracy doesn't work, and we have yet to see a single modular component in any of the playtest packets (all 10+ of them). The packets don't even have multi-classing yet. And even the most diehard fan isn't buying into the "we will fix the math last, trust us" bullshit.
Going by the merits of the game, D&DN is going to suck. It will still be more fun to play than 4E, because at the very least combats happen fast. Though that's not saying much.
But will it flop? A lot of that depends on accessibility and art quality. Pathfinder may not be all that great a game either, but it has high quality books and a fully loaded SRD that makes it easy to get players. Smart designers realize that in the modern rules-heavy RPG, it's just not feasable anymore to trade books around for a few minutes when creating characters at the DM's house. People need hours to pour through all the myriad options, and they need access to the material even if they don't own it, because not everyone is going to buy the books. When it comes to a toss-up between Shadowrun or Pathfinder, most people in the group are going to want to go with Pathfinder because of that SRD. And contrary to popular belief, Pathfinder still has good book sales despite giving away all their shit for free.
If the marketing of D&DN is smart, D&DN can fill that niche too. It has the D&D label on it and if it's accessible and the books look good, you'll get a lot of groups that will pick it just because of that, even if it is the inferior product. Even being a garbage rules set, they've got a shot. Have a fully loaded SRD, a good character generator and high-quality books with the D&D logo... It's going to sell based on pure accessibility.
D&D has never been about rules quality. Every edition has had elements that flat out suck that people have learned to ignore. Whether it's unplayable rogues in AD&D, Casters and Caddies in 3E or godawful long combats or skill challenges in 4E, fans of D&D are experts at turning a blind eye to rules problems in their favorite edition. D&D has never been about math or good design.
Cyberzombie wrote:They actually had some decent ideas with D&DN. The concept of a modular game with interchangeable systems is a good idea. Anyone with half a brain should realize that you're never going to get the OSR crowd, the 3E crowd and the 4E fans playing at the same table. You might be able to get them all to play the same edition if you make it modular enough. The one common feature of D&D is that almost everyone house rules it to some degree. Building on that feature makes perfect sense and should improve the quality of the game.
Before you even get to trying to reconcile a player who wants to be a rogue with 1E initiative and 3E skills with another who wants to be a Wizard with 3E initiative but 2E NWP or some crap like that. How do you make monster manuals or write adventures for general consumption? Every new module you introduce pretty much adds an order of magnitude of complexity to the system.