The End of 4e D&D.

Doom · Post by **Doom** » Sun Sep 05, 2010 2:58 pm

But don't the vendors come back after a short period of time, with no memory of who killed them?

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Sun Sep 05, 2010 6:49 pm

DA wrote:anything that can be solved with a spreadsheet isn't a choice, its a research tax.

I really like this.

Ice9 · Post by **Ice9** » Sun Sep 05, 2010 10:06 pm

Since when does 4E have invincible vendors? I mean, the fact that they imply "most vendors have many level-appropriate items for sale" but also "you care about random drops" does indicate that looting vendors is not the norm, but there's nothing about why.

But how is this different than 3E? I mean, as regards item vendors, you can either say:
A) They are very powerful, or have really powerful guards, or have a very powerful, vengeful, and omnipresent organization backing them.
B) They don't actually have all those items themselves, they have access to a transportation system that delivers the items on request, only after payment is sent.
C) They don't have anything worth stealing. Which mean they don't have anything worth buying either.
D) The PCs aren't allowed to hassle them for metagame reasons.

It's kind of an awkward situation, but it's not really specific to 4E.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Mon Sep 06, 2010 12:16 am

Doom wrote:But don't the vendors come back after a short period of time, with no memory of who killed them?

Nope. The come back, but the delay can be long enough to be annoying if you just want to get on with your day.

And the memory of who killed them either A) doesn't matter(you killed an enemy's vendor. They will attack you on sight every time anyway), B) indirect enough that you can't be faulted (killing your own vendors requires something weird going on, such that the killing might as well have been accidental), or C) most definitely has reprecussions (killing a neutral vendor will quickly dump your reputation with that faction).

Saxony · Post by **Saxony** » Mon Sep 06, 2010 12:24 am

I echo licensing DnD for good computer games.

I think a large majority of DnD players have heard about DnD Online at some point. If it was actually good (better than WoW), a lot of money would go to Wizards of the Coast every month. The message I got was "Don't bother", so I didn't bother. If the message was instead "This is DnD but with computer graphics instead of your imagination", I might have tried it out.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Mon Sep 06, 2010 5:27 am

Dumbfucks who wrote Psionic Power wrote a monk PP that gives you +CON typed bonus damage on all of your melee attacks.

I wonder how long THAT will last. Multiclassing synergy isn't allowed anymore. It's like the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing.

TheFlatline · Post by **TheFlatline** » Mon Sep 06, 2010 6:04 am

Saxony wrote:I echo licensing DnD for good computer games.

I think a large majority of DnD players have heard about DnD Online at some point. If it was actually good (better than WoW), a lot of money would go to Wizards of the Coast every month. The message I got was "Don't bother", so I didn't bother. If the message was instead "This is DnD but with computer graphics instead of your imagination", I might have tried it out.

That's easy to say, but harder than f*ck to do in practice. Wizards doesn't have the warchest, nor does hasbro probably have the interest, to really look into pushing AAA D&D video games. They license out the title, and hope they get lucky.

Roy · Post by **Roy** » Mon Sep 06, 2010 1:25 pm

The funny thing is that if you reversed the abilities in 3.5 and in 4th you'd actually get things you care about.

Attack, do damage and move one square is still a lame ability. But when your enemy needs to full attack to do anything you care about it actually does have valid tactical applications.

Meanwhile things like Black Tentacles fit the supposed design goal of a tactical game a lot better than abilities that don't do anything you care about, or a whole lot at all.

Of course Fighters still fail, but what else is new?

Murtak · Post by **Murtak** » Mon Sep 06, 2010 3:51 pm

Saxony wrote:I echo licensing DnD for good computer games.

I think a large majority of DnD players have heard about DnD Online at some point. If it was actually good (better than WoW), a lot of money would go to Wizards of the Coast every month.

That's a tall order. I wouldn't be surprised if WoW made 10 or even 100 times more much money than everything with the DnD logo on it.

Saxony wrote:The message I got was "Don't bother", so I didn't bother. If the message was instead "This is DnD but with computer graphics instead of your imagination", I might have tried it out.

As many have pointed out already, what works for tabletop games does not work for computer games and vice versa. For example, griefing in all of it's forms is a major issue in all MMORPGs. In a pen and paper RPG you don't even think about it when designing the game.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 12:10 am

WoTC/TSR actually had a pretty decent computer game licensing arm... they gave us good stuff like the Gold Box series, the SSI games, Baldur's Gate, and Neverwinter Nights.

The problem is when WoTC decided to drop Bioware for D&D Online, probably because the new developer is more pliant and would give WoTC a bigger share of the cash. So Bioware ended up developing its own RPG franchises, which became huge hits that now dominate the Western RPG market.

Going to Bioware and begging to take them back may be the only way to restart the trend of decent D&D games (although, ironically, despite its computer gamey roots pretty much no 4E video games have been released yet).

malak · Post by **malak** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 8:44 am

Zinegata wrote:Going to Bioware and begging to take them back may be the only way to restart the trend of decent D&D games (although, ironically, despite its computer gamey roots pretty much no 4E video games have been released yet).

Now why would Bioware possibly do that... they successfully transferred the fans of D&D CRPGs to Dragon Age, and with Mass Effect they have a sci-fi franchise. And with all the IP in-house, they will not have any of the problems they had with D&D regarding what they are allowed to do and what is setting-appropriate and all that shit.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 8:49 am

Because Bioware can just make one good game, cash in big, then farm out the sequels/expansions to its partner studios. Said partners earn Bioware more money without needing to expand their own development staff.

In short, follow the NWN model.

malak · Post by **malak** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 9:08 am

Zinegata wrote:Because Bioware can just make one good game, cash in big, then farm out the sequels/expansions to its partner studios. Said partners earn Bioware more money without needing to expand their own development staff.

In short, follow the NWN model.

They can do the same with Dragon Age, without having to pay any licensing fees.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 9:14 am

malak wrote:They can do the same with Dragon Age, without having to pay any licensing fees.

They can, but I get the sense that Bioware wants to keep all Dragon Age development in-house. Dragon Age's brand is currently very, very strong, and I'm sure Bioware wants to make sure every Dragon Age release is mega-hit material by doing the development and QA themselves.

If they farm it out to their partner studios, they run the risk of the partner making only a mediocre game, like the later NWN2 expansions.

Besides which, like I said - WoTC will have to beg. Meaning really, really good licensing terms for Bioware.

malak · Post by **malak** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 9:49 am

Zinegata wrote:They can, but I get the sense that Bioware wants to keep all Dragon Age development in-house. Dragon Age's brand is currently very, very strong, and I'm sure Bioware wants to make sure every Dragon Age release is mega-hit material by doing the development and QA themselves.

If they farm it out to their partner studios, they run the risk of the partner making only a mediocre game, like the later NWN2 expansions.

I'm not so sure I agree with that. Look at the crap the shovel out as DLC.

Also, the Betrayer and Zehir expansion packs to NWN2 were far better than the original game.

Zinegata wrote:Besides which, like I said - WoTC will have to beg. Meaning really, really good licensing terms for Bioware.

I'm not sure they could do that, even. Atari seems to have some nice terms on their D&D license...

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 10:09 am

Neither Betrayer nor Zehir sold very well. Betrayer generally earns good reviews, but Zehir was widely panned as "largely unfinished".

And yeah, the big problem would be the existing publishing agreement with Atari (and Bioware being with EA now). However, given that Atari hasn't really done anything D&D-related for a while, I'd certainly pull the plug on the Atari publishing deal and run to EA if I were WoTC. DDO isn't making money. Heck, they even moved to a free-to-play model last I heard.

malak · Post by **malak** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 10:21 am

Zinegata wrote:Neither Betrayer nor Zehir sold very well. Betrayer generally earns good reviews, but Zehir was widely panned as "largely unfinished".

Hm, yeah, I might be biased because Zehir was a return to old-school D&D and I liked it a lot.

Zinegata wrote:And yeah, the big problem would be the existing publishing agreement with Atari (and Bioware being with EA now). However, given that Atari hasn't really done anything D&D-related for a while, I'd certainly pull the plug on the Atari publishing deal and run to EA if I were WoTC. DDO isn't making money. Heck, they even moved to a free-to-play model last I heard.

DDO is making money since they switched to free-to-play, and Atari announced the hack and slash d&d-branded Neverwinter for 2011.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 12:56 pm

DDO's been winning awards since switching to free-to-play, but knowing the online gaming industry, the free-to-play model just doesn't make a lot of money due to the tiny number of people who actually make in-game purchases.

Ferret · Post by **Ferret** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 2:58 pm

Zinegata wrote:DDO's been winning awards since switching to free-to-play, but knowing the online gaming industry, the free-to-play model just doesn't make a lot of money due to the tiny number of people who actually make in-game purchases.

Zynga was valued at more than 5 -billion- based on it's microtransaction games.

Even runes of magic has more than a million players. If even only 2% of their players spend 5.00/month, that's like 1.2 million in revenue per year. Free to play doesn't make WoW levels of money, but nothing does except WoW at this point.

malak · Post by **malak** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 4:06 pm

Zinegata wrote:DDO's been winning awards since switching to free-to-play, but knowing the online gaming industry, the free-to-play model just doesn't make a lot of money due to the tiny number of people who actually make in-game purchases.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/2741 ... ercent.php

Roy · Post by **Roy** » Tue Sep 07, 2010 4:07 pm

Most of the reason why DDO is making money is because they rip their customers off.

A +1 sword is not worth 50 cents. You can't walk five steps off the newbie island without a +1 sword hitting you in the head. Guess what sells for 50 cents in the cash shop? Just to give one example.

Even the things that are actually worth purchasing end up costing more than just subscribing for a month, and running those packs into the ground in that time. And just because something is out doesn't mean it's worth it. For the last few months they've been releasing nothing but more lowbie crap no one cares about, not even the F2Pers who have plenty of low level stuff already. They've also been getting massive amounts of PR aggro, for various reasons.

Most importantly though, their model is front loaded. Once you buy the good packs, you don't give them any more money. And guess what? That results in a lot of money now, and not very much later.

This means either one of two things:

1: DDO is intentionally going nova, to milk as much money as they can before they shut the servers down.

2: DDO is unintentionally going nova, as they'll find themselves getting less and less money (which might already be happening, given the gamebreaking bugs that have slipped by their testers... despite being reported, repeatedly) and so will have to shut the servers down.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Wed Sep 08, 2010 12:33 am

Ferret->

Knowing licensing costs, and server costs, $1.2M annually isn't gonna pay for all the bills. $1.2M in revenue may sound nice to an individual person, but in the online gaming industry that's "unprofitable". At best, they can break even in a couple of years.

Zynga however, is very valuable because of the sheer number of games they own. Microtransactions aren't gonna earn you much if you just have 1 game. But if you publish a lot (and most of these are cheap browser game), your profitability skyrockets. I personally think they're a bit overvalued, but I think their model is far more sustainable and certainly a profitable one - albeit their current spat with Facebook may change that.

malak wrote:
Zinegata wrote:DDO's been winning awards since switching to free-to-play, but knowing the online gaming industry, the free-to-play model just doesn't make a lot of money due to the tiny number of people who actually make in-game purchases.
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/2741 ... ercent.php

First of all, let me point out two extremely important points:

"Dungeons and Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited has gained over one million new players since its September 2009 launch "

Gaining over a million players sounds impressive, but this is one of the outright dishonest figures that most MMOs use. Players you gain do not necessarily stay. And the vast majority certainly don't pay.

Secondly...

"Turbine did not attach a dollar value to its revenue claims."

Five times more may sound impressive, but going from $200K a year to $1M is still shitty revenue that wouldn't be enough to cover the costs, especially given Turbine's existing deficits from the years when its was losing money.

Roy->

A frontloaded storefront system would certainly account for this "500% gain in revenue", and it is definitely a formula for suicide.

Roy · Post by **Roy** » Wed Sep 08, 2010 11:55 am

The easiest way to tell is to actually log on and play. If you go into a newbie area, yes you'll see a lot of people running around. Get off the newbie area and go into the low level area and you'll still see a lot of people.

Go into a high level area and you'll see about the same number of people you saw before.

Considering that the game is really only free until level 10, that's telling.

There are some new people at high levels, but the overall numbers have remained the same because a lot of people quit, for various reasons (another reason why microtransactions are good for the company and bad for the player, they already got theirs so they don't give a fuck). Whereas if you were still subscribing, you could send them a message by closing your wallet to them.

You might argue "Well, if you're microing it you need to buy new stuff!" This is true... if the new stuff is worthwhile.

But there hasn't been any new high level stuff this year. They released some very easy high level adventures last year, then they released some crappy mid level free quests also last year (there was also one high level quest at the same time, but they completely forgot to give any actual reason to run it, so no one does), then they went for level 5-10 stuff. Which the game already has plenty of.

But the most important thing to keep in mind here is that businesses are in the business of making money. A frontloaded system does make them money... in the short term. Of course in the long term it's not viable, but there's nothing stopping them from taking their cash, and then shutting the servers off before it gets unprofitable and they've gotten theirs. It would not be the first time that company has essentially abandoned an MMO. Of course this would leave a lot of people screwed and ticked off, but all of their actions indicate they don't give a damn what their paying customers think of them or their decisions.

I saw it coming and based my actions accordingly. Most did not, and some are still going on about how Premium (microtransaction) is an upgrade from VIP (monthly sub) as a result.

fliprushman · Post by **fliprushman** » Fri Sep 10, 2010 6:53 pm

In regards to DDO's frontloaded approach, this makes complete sense when you look at when Atari's license ends with the DnD brand. Since WotC is not happy with Atari, and Atari is glad to sit on their hands to hold onto the license until that time expires, Companies currently running under this license will be making a cash grab while they can.

Roy · Post by **Roy** » Fri Sep 10, 2010 6:58 pm

fliprushman wrote:In regards to DDO's frontloaded approach, this makes complete sense when you look at when Atari's license ends with the DnD brand. Since WotC is not happy with Atari, and Atari is glad to sit on their hands to hold onto the license until that time expires, Companies currently running under this license will be making a cash grab while they can.

Um, didn't they already lose in court over that because WB grabbed Turbine up which made them a lot harder to attack?