Quote from: two_fishes;445130Seriously, let me get this straight. Although companies would appear to make much more money by doing "overhaul" editions that change their game in large ways, what they altruistically ought to do is consistently release "micro" editions with few changes to the game. Even though the companies that follow the latter business model are small and struggle to survive and the companies that follow the former business model are large and make enough money to support a large staff, the former ought to change their model to the latter because it is the right thing to do. Is this the argument that is being put forward?

I would think the viability of the overhaul model is related to the size of the company and popularity of the game. With smaller publishers like us, I think the danger of alienating your core audience is more of a risk, than a company like wizards that can expect high volume sales for new editions. Still the gaming community now seems pretty split between those who made the jump to 4E and those that stuck with 3E/Pathfinder/d20. I think the key is to know who your customers are and who you are appealing to when you make a new edition that is a large break from the previous one.

Quote from: Daedalus;445126I disagree.  I think the OGL did a lot of damage to the hobby.  The market got flooded with crap that was using the D20 system when it wasnt a good fit.

This damaged the industry by turning hobbyists who would buy anything produced (which is good for the industry) into hobbyists who, having been burned by a lot of bad product, became far more selective in what they purchased (making it harder for the industry to make money). I don't see how it damaged the hobby, in fact, one could probably make a case that making hobbyist be more selective in what they purchased/used might have even been a major benefit for the hobby.

Quote from: RandallS;445135This damaged the industry by turning hobbyists who would buy anything produced (which is good for the industry) into hobbyists who, having been burned by a lot of bad product, became far more selective in what they purchased (making it harder for the industry to make money). I don't see how it damaged the hobby, in fact, one could probably make a case that making hobbyist be more selective in what they purchased/used might have even been a major benefit for the hobby.

For me, it wasn't the third party products that made me more selective (I kind of liked the fact that there was always a book for something, even if the quality was all over the map). It was the official splat books put out by wizards. My reasons were pretty simple. I felt they overcomplicated the game and busted the mechanics. Plus, they declined in quality IMO over time. In the end, I was buying books only to keep up with my players. It ended up being easier to stick only to the core books (DMG, PHB and MM) and save everyone some cash.

Quote from: Seanchai;445097Naw. It's the Character Builder.

Seanchai

I think you're right about the character builder, but it's not really a "no", more an "also".

Quote from: two_fishes;445074Ah, so the ideal RPG company success story, in your mind, is to be a tiny, struggling entity barely scraping by. Gotcha.

I see this attitude on too many RPG forums.  Creepy.

Quote from: misterguignol;445133Exactly.  The open license did two things that were bad for business:

1) The core product you need to play the game?  99% available for free on the Internet.  That had to cut into sales of the PHB, DMG, and MM.

2) Opened the floodgates for a deluge of absolutely crappy 3rd party books.  Yes, there were diamonds in the rough, but I cannot fathom how anyone pines for the days of shelves stocked with a multitude of poorly designed and executed d20 books.  Hell, even WotC had trouble with quality control in-house; 3rd party publishers were often much, much worse.

Exactly.   I don't know about your local FLGS's but the D20 bubble has burst and there are still usold D20 product on their shelves.  They tried doing a big sale and that got rid of a bunch of it but not all of it

Quote from: Daedalus;445126I disagree.  I think the OGL did a lot of damage to the hobby.  The market got flooded with crap that was using the D20 system when it wasnt a good fit.

I guess freedom sucks? Without a company telling people what is good they have to think for themselves.

I know my answer is snarky but every time I see a comment like this I roll my eyes. Yes the d20 glut was messy and that what happens in a situation where there was artificial scarcity for a popular product or pastime. The same thing will result when the Disney, Marvel, DC, etc, etc copyrights run out. Anybody who had an idea will pitch and with publishing technology the way it is now, people will be able to get it.

But eventually the glut passes as people work it out of their system.  And what happens afterward is anybody guess but much of it will be interesting and entertaining to various audiences.  And none it would be possible without the creative freedom of being under a open license or the public domain.

For example Alan Moore and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. While I don't particularly care for it myself it is great that he was able to take all those 19th century fiction heroes and make an interesting story out of it.

With RPG we are going to continue to see all kinds of stuff produce that we would never see thanks to the OGL.

Just pondering...

If the failure in quality in the d20 glut can be attributed to 3PP... what can the failure in quality (especially in the e-zines) right now in 4e material be attributed to?

Quote from: estar;445150I guess freedom sucks? Without a company telling people what is good they have to think for themselves.

I know my answer is snarky but every time I see a comment like this I roll my eyes. Yes the d20 glut was messy and that what happens in a situation where there was artificial scarcity for a popular product or pastime. The same thing will result when the Disney, Marvel, DC, etc, etc copyrights run out. Anybody who had an idea will pitch and with publishing technology the way it is now, people will be able to get it.

But eventually the glut passes as people work it out of their system.  And what happens afterward is anybody guess but much of it will be interesting and entertaining to various audiences.  And none it would be possible without the creative freedom of being under a open license or the public domain.

For example Alan Moore and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. While I don't particularly care for it myself it is great that he was able to take all those 19th century fiction heroes and make an interesting story out of it.

With RPG we are going to continue to see all kinds of stuff produce that we would never see thanks to the OGL.

I don't think the ogl was bad for the hobby, just for wizards. Also I think even the glut was good for the hobby in some ways. I can remember when I came back in C. 2000-2001, I was overwhelmed by the shelves worth of crazy d20 stuff. There was a definite feeling of energy in those days.

Quote from: misterguignol;445127...yeah, you didn't really need to even buy a PHB when you could reference an online SRD.  

But where I think the problem lay was with games that you didn't need the PHB, SRD, or anything like that because they were self-contained. Games such as Midnight and Mutants & Masterminds.

Seanchai

Quote from: Daedalus;445144Exactly.   I don't know about your local FLGS's but the D20 bubble has burst and there are still usold D20 product on their shelves.  They tried doing a big sale and that got rid of a bunch of it but not all of it

My FLGS still has boxes of this stuff. The owner brings it to the local cons. A couple months ago, I got a bunch of the Penumbra books (Atlas' d20 offerings) for cheap - I can't remember if they were a dollar or two dollars a piece.

Seanchai

Quote from: Aos;445160I don't think the ogl was bad for the hobby, just for wizards. Also I think even the glut was good for the hobby in some ways. I can remember when I came back in C. 2000-2001, I was overwhelmed by the shelves worth of crazy d20 stuff. There was a definite feeling of energy in those days.

I disagree, I think they sold way more PHBs then they would otherwise. Granted I also think 3.X would be a hit without the OGL but it would be an order of magnitude less.

The prospect of finally creating legitimate D&D material sucked in a lot of people. And more importantly most of them were the type that bring their friends in along for the  ride. So they had an impact far greater than their raw numbers would suggest.

Quote from: Seanchai;445169But where I think the problem lay was with games that you didn't need the PHB, SRD, or anything like that because they were self-contained. Games such as Midnight and Mutants & Masterminds.

And the number of players they had were drop in the bucket compared to those buying and using Wizard products and supplement. And most of them would not have been likely wizard customers anyway for various reasons.

But with everybody using the same core system, more or less, the chances of picking up a wizard product went up dramatically. Far more likely than if White Wolf or SJ Games (gurps) would been the #2 RPG.  The one point of the OGL was to expand the marketplace and reach of the d20 system that was under D&D.

The fact you could make your own RPG off of the d20 SRD was part of getting onboard in the first place. Sure there was idealism but also mistrust because of the stunts TSR pulled. Nobody was going to sink money into producing material if they thought Wizards could yank their business out from under them.  Even then many thought the OGL was a way for Wizards to steal everybody else idea for free.

The d20 glut was the result of a boom mentality. In the initial month anything 3PP for 3.X was gold and it piled on from there.  The nail in the coffin was the switch from 3.0 to 3.5. All the sudden all the 3.0 book were toxic as hell despite the small changes that were made to the system.

Quote from: Seanchai;445169But where I think the problem lay was with games that you didn't need the PHB, SRD, or anything like that because they were self-contained. Games such as Midnight and Mutants & Masterminds.

Seanchai

I think they're both shades of the same problem.

Quote from: estar;445176And the number of players they had were drop in the bucket compared to those buying and using Wizard products and supplement.

The number of people playing and purchasing all other games is a drop in the bucket.

Quote from: estar;445176And most of them would not have been likely wizard customers anyway for various reasons.

But with everybody using the same core system, more or less, the chances of picking up a wizard product went up dramatically.

It seems to me you're contradicting yourself here. If they're not going to be WotC customers, there's no reason for WotC to bother with d20. However, if this last statement of yours is the accurate one, the WotC has every reason to be concerned about losing sales.

Quote from: estar;445176The fact you could make your own RPG off of the d20 SRD was part of getting onboard in the first place.

Not from WotC's perspective. They wanted D&D adventures and supplements.

Seanchai