Quote from: Marleycat;526880I don't know his/her previous history beyond today...

Then you don't have the knowledge necessary to comment on a comparison of prior levels of bitterness to current levels for that particular person, do you?

It was not a generic comment about 4e fans.  I am referring just to SpinachCat.

If 5e can address some of the generally acknowledged problems of 3e (prep time, general top-heaviness & overflow of modifiers and modifier types, and yeah, spellcaster power) without totally throwing the baby out with the bathwater, it stands a good chance of peeling off a chunk of people who enjoyed 3e.

The thing about Pathfinder is that, whatever other improvements it brings to the table, it doesn't address that stuff much and it would be nice to see some other take on the D&D game.

I'd be happy to see a game that does some of what 3e does, and simplifies other stuff more towards the BECMI direction. I think there's room for a good game that can sit somewhere in the middle between 1e and 3e. I don't buy that the preferences of all D&D players are perfectly addressed by the existing editions of the game. That's just bloggers talking.

Whether they can make it commercially successful by their standards is a whole another question.

Quote from: Mistwell;5268715e seems to have made you much more bitter than ever before.

Its not a question of bitterness. It's a look at realities of the existing marketplace. Not the hopeful-to-exist marketplace.

When 3e was launched, it was WotC vs. White Wolf for market share. They were both selling extremely different games to often different audiences.

TSR was dead, the online AD&D community was in its infancy. The market was wide open for a strong fantasy game with the D&D name. Also, it was pre-WoW.

When 4e was launched, it was WotC vs. 3e vs. WoW. The market was flooded with D20 material and 1e/2e/3e had strong online communities. And WoW was the dominant fantasy game play experience, even for many RPGers.

When 5e launches, it will be WotC vs. Paizo vs. OSR vs. WoW. Unlike White Wolf, Paizo is selling the same genre as WotC. It's Class/Level/Fantasy vs. Class/Level/Fantasy for market share. Also take this into account: Paizo is a smarter, more agile and more aggressive company than WW was in 1999.

Regardless of how good 5e may be, I see serious trouble for WotC from a business perspective.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;526886Well, plenty of people played 3e.  And plenty of people play 4e.  Just like there will be plenty of people who will play 5e.

Except there aren't "plenty of people" left in the hobby. And there is a global recession which has seriously chopped into discretionary spending.

It is a common story that people bought 4e's core books, found the game "too different" from their current home game and then returned back to their previous edition. After being "burned" by WotC, it is quite likely that many groups will decide to skip spending $60-$100 to try a new edition and just keep playing whatever edition they currently play.

There is no economic data that says 2013-2014 will be notably better than 2012. Instead, the data is pointing to a decrease in consumer confidence and that spills over to discretionary spending.

Quote from: Spinachcat;526960When 3e was launched, it was WotC vs. White Wolf for market share. They were both selling extremely different games to often different audiences.

TSR was dead, the online AD&D community was in its infancy. The market was wide open for a strong fantasy game with the D&D name. Also, it was pre-WoW..

And yet, 3e was a radical shift from AD&D 2e, and if a lot of the same logic being used by 4e fans is true*, then 3e would have fallen on its face.  It didn't.  It went on to become one of the most popular editions.


*that being, "why are they doing such a major change when 2e is awesome and I love it, and it's like they're firing all their current customers in hoping on making up the difference in brand new ones which will never work......."

Quote from: Spinachcat;526960When 3e was launched, it was WotC vs. White Wolf for market share. They were both selling extremely different games to often different audiences.

TSR was dead, the online AD&D community was in its infancy. The market was wide open for a strong fantasy game with the D&D name. Also, it was pre-WoW.

At the time, how much of a factor were video games like Diablo and Everquest?

Quote from: Spinachcat;526960When 5e launches, it will be WotC vs. Paizo vs. OSR vs. WoW. Unlike White Wolf, Paizo is selling the same genre as WotC. It's Class/Level/Fantasy vs. Class/Level/Fantasy for market share. Also take this into account: Paizo is a smarter, more agile and more aggressive company than WW was in 1999.

 

 
(Sorry, that just reminded me so much of Populous).
 
I'm actually playing Pathfinder currently (GM preference) as well as 3.5 occasionally and online. I'd totally go "hooray!" for a more streamlined Pathfinder - moreso than for 5E, as it happens. I'm still concerned about how much 4E influence will sneak into 5E.
 
(Also BTW, our group have never used miniatures with PF).

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;526983It went on to become one of the most popular editions.

Based on discussions I have read over the years, each edition of D&D has sold less than the previous one. 3e was no doubt a better seller than 4e, but 2e outsold 3e which was in turn outsold by 1e.

Of course, fans of any edition want to point to their edition's success based on the quality of the game itself. But I argue that D&D sales has less to do with the actual game than with the size of the available RPG audience.

Perhaps 5e will buck the trend and return to 3e level sales. Perhaps there is a large audience of 3ers who will abandon Paizo and OSRers who will abandon DIY and small press. Perhaps WotC will actually spend money on advertising and marketing this time.

We will see.

Quote from: ggroy;526986At the time, how much of a factor were video games like Diablo and Everquest?

They didn't call it Evercrack for nothing! But the success of WoW is on a staggering different level. Certainly the average internet speed of 1999 vs. 2008 vs. 2012 plays a big part.

A friend of mine has buddies at Blizzard and the in-house discussion about non-WoW games being developed isn't about how much money they will make, but "we can make Diablo III for the hell of it because WoW makes so much damn money."

Quote from: Spinachcat;527032..2e ... was ... outsold by 1e.

That would surprise me. I'd have thought that 2e was D&D's peak, in terms of sales.

I can easily believe, however, that 3/3.5e outsold 4e.

I expect that, having taken a bitchslapping over 4e, they'll make sure that 5e is up to scratch. Furthermore, I expect that they will plan for 5e to last much longer than 4e and it wouldn't suprise me if we saw the return of Basic and Advanced versions of the game.

Quote from: Spinachcat;527032Perhaps 5e will buck the trend and return to 3e level sales. "

I doubt it, but I think that has less to do with what edition it is, and more to do with I see less and less people doing face to face gaming at the game table than before.

I blame technology.

Quote from: Dodger;527037That would surprise me. I'd have thought that 2e was D&D's peak, in terms of sales.

I can easily believe, however, that 3/3.5e outsold 4e.

I expect that, having taken a bitchslapping over 4e, they'll make sure that 5e is up to scratch. Furthermore, I expect that they will plan for 5e to last much longer than 4e and it wouldn't suprise me if we saw the return of Basic and Advanced versions of the game.

3e was peak.

It's hard to compare sales of editions when some editions were out for much longer than others, but my understanding is that the release of 3ed was the biggest uptick of D&D sales since the old basic boxes caught fire in the early 80's.

Quote from: Spinachcat;527032Based on discussions I have read over the years, each edition of D&D has sold less than the previous one. 3e was no doubt a better seller than 4e, but 2e outsold 3e which was in turn outsold by 1e.

If you divide everything in to 1st/2nd/3rd/4th, I am 100% sure that 3rd outsold 2nd and 2nd outsold 1st.

Fuck alone knows where 4th is, I could easily believe anywhere from 2nd to 4th place.

Quote from: Dodger;527037That would surprise me. I'd have thought that 2e was D&D's peak, in terms of sales.

I have heard from some folks who were at TSR that the shift to 2e cut sales neatly in half.

They were printing and selling copies of the 1e Players Handbook and Unearthed arcana well into 2e's life.

I know it's indicative of nothing, but we didn't really get the point behind 2e* and I think that only one 2e phb made its way into the communal pile, whereas nearly all of us had copies of all the major 1e books.






*there was certainly an edition treadmill already, but it was completely lost on us for a variety of reasons: We missed the LBB's, played Holmes for a bit but moved quickly to 1e and ignored B/X and BECMI because they were for babies.

Quote from: Aos;527064*there was certainly an edition treadmill already, but it was completely lost on us for a variety of reasons:

Back in the day, we thought the "treadmill" was in the form of TSR cranking out tons of modules.

(I stopped playing rpg games altogether before 2E was released, and before tons of "Complete *" books and Forgotten Realms stuff was released).