Quote from: RPGPundit;749508Never much seen the point of organized play, myself.

Done right it gets the word out. Gives a certain sense of community and continuity. Also can add incentive to host at cons. Which is good if conventions are your only venue for getting to play RPGs and you want a sense of progression or advancement.

If you didnt care about that then organized play was about useless.

For me the the RPGA was useless, something about it just never clicked with me. Whereas organized play was the only way I got to play Dragon Storm for 5 years. I think it helped that there wasnt any overarching organized plot to DS. You just showed up and played your character. The organization just allowed you to advance officially and for GMs to get some eventual goodies for hosting a game. Incentive goes a long way.

Organized play also plays a big part in making railroads the default model for adventures. It really does encourage a mode of play that's at odds with almost everything else WotC are trying to do with Next.

It still behooves them, I think, to have organised play, even if only as a marketing tool. It might be somewhat toxic, but they can avoid many of the problems with that by not confusing organised play with the game as a whole.

Quote from: Bobloblah;749576It still behooves them, I think, to have organised play, even if only as a marketing tool. It might be somewhat toxic, but they can avoid many of the problems with that by not confusing organised play with the game as a whole.

Agreed. But I think they should explicitly note the differences between organized play and home play in their materials. If they're going to take railroaded adventure written for organized play and then sell it for home play, they should provide non-railroad options for running the adventure. If they're going to use strict CRs for organized play, they need to provide tools like random tables to enable a more sandbox style for home play.

WotC are trying to please a bunch of constituencies with Next. They're going to have to figure out how to communicate the choices and modes of play to those different groups - not just the mechanics, but the different approaches to using published adventure and campaign content.

Yeah, that all makes sense to me. A lot of it just comes down to communicating these things explicitly.

Quote from: Bobloblah;749576It still behooves them, I think, to have organised play, even if only as a marketing tool. It might be somewhat toxic, but they can avoid many of the problems with that by not confusing organised play with the game as a whole.

Or doing the organized play without the overarching ongoing plots.

Stuff happens in no particular order or framework. If your character didnt participate then they might be able to play it later.

As opposed to

Stuff happens in a timeline progression. If your character didnt participate then they missed out and its over.

Quote from: Haffrung;749585Agreed. But I think they should explicitly note the differences between organized play and home play in their materials. If they're going to take railroaded adventure written for organized play and then sell it for home play, they should provide non-railroad options for running the adventure. If they're going to use strict CRs for organized play, they need to provide tools like random tables to enable a more sandbox style for home play.

WotC are trying to please a bunch of constituencies with Next. They're going to have to figure out how to communicate the choices and modes of play to those different groups - not just the mechanics, but the different approaches to using published adventure and campaign content.

Caves of Chaos and Isle of the Ape were two of the featured adventures in the playtest.  Hopefully that is the direction adventures will be made.

I can recognize the value of potentially creating community through organized play; I just think there can be better ways of creating community.

Quote from: robiswrong;748920I just have to question how successful it will be given my experiences of organized play - we'll just say I'd be very hesitant to make an open invite to my house

RPGA home play is about turning your home group into an ongoing LFR or PFS campaign with people you know. Prior to late Living Greyhawk era and Living Forgotten Realms, there was little home play of RPGA.

I only know of one home based RPGA DM who runs open sessions at his house. He's a bachelor and likes his fellow random LFR players enough to trust them sight unseen. Every other RPGA DM I know either only runs at FLGS and cons and/or has a home LFR campaign of well known friends and the occasional friend of a friend.  

Quote from: RPGPundit;749508Never much seen the point of organized play, myself.

It's about selling books.

People who actually play buy more stuff. Non-gamers aren't a great market, except the hardcore collectors who are a minority. Organized Play is a system that gets people off their computers and actually gaming at a table with built in incentives for purchasing more books.

Also, Organized Play / Encounters is designed to encourage friendships and thus a "keeping up with the Joneses" effect as people are more likely to make purchases that are valued by their social circle.

Well yeah, I can see the point of organized play from the companies' side.