Quote from: The Traveller;645736I started a thread on this before, what the business needs to do is rebrand, because
a) roleplaying as a title has already been massively subverted by computer games, take a straw poll of people walking down the street and ask what they think a roleplaying game is; I guarantee that 99% of them will come out with some variation on "World of Warcraft".

Even saying "Dungeons and Dragons" is no good, people already think they know what that is and have decided either they don't want to play it or can get a better experience from WoW.

The industry needs a new name.

b) The core strength of RPGs, the manifestation of spontaneous imagination in a form that many people can interact with has been utterly ignored by the industry. World of Warcraft can't do this, no computer game can (until we have fully functional holodecks which are centuries off at best). Magic the Gathering can't do it, monopoly, poker, basketball, none of these can do it. They can't compete on this playing field.

This core strength and message need to be attached to the new title, which then has to be aggressively marketed, shaking off any perceived previous stigmas in the process.

This is how you renew the industry, in as many words.


I'm in the same boat for the most part, but neither of us are the target market. The target market should be non roleplayers as that represents a market many many times larger than dedicated roleplayers.

But when games like The One Ring, or Marvel Heroic Roleplay can't break into that market what can? Like I said the only thing I can think of is a fully endorsed and licenced Harry Potter RPG sold via the Pottermore Web site and that simply is not gign to happen so ...

I am in an interesting position currently as my new game group are all novices, students that have never played RPGs before. They heard about tabletop RPGs and had to go to a meetup site to find players because they didn't think they had the nous to just read a book and get their mates playing.  So there is a market there. smewhere I suppose its just about tapping it. Interestingly enough when I polled them on what they wanted in a game the one thing they all agreed on was nothing with elves, dwarves or hobbits.  I think they woudl have gone for a S&S feel, probably cyberpunk, space opera with a touch of British misery tourism is what they got after an early rennaissance  fanatasy game to kick off experience with the system.

Quote from: Spinachcat;645634Except that Kickstarters only talk to the already converted. Zero brand new gamers and very few, if any, lapsed gamers are trolling Kickstarter looking for interesting new RPG games.

Potential gamers don't even know the hobby exists.

True but Kickstarter isn't just a gaming company and sends e-mail notices and has links to related projects so at least there's some cross pollination.

But, my contention is that the Kickstarter is making it possible for new games and products to reach the market.  It's giving the established companies a much needed kick in the ass.  That money they didn't believe was out there in the marketplace is flowing and they ain't getting a dime of it because they're rigid old fools who've refused to make a proper point of entry game for decades.  Or in Steve Jackson's case, never.

The biggest obstacle to new players is the sheer depth of the games themselves.  Sure you can pick up the D&D Essentials red box but it's good for what?  Two or three sessions top?  Really if you were going to do a set like that, which only covers a single level, why on earth start at first level?  A level that's pretty universally seen as the weakest point of the game.  Hand out tenth level characters and matching challenges.

Quote from: jibbajibba;645741But when games like The One Ring, or Marvel Heroic Roleplay can't break into that market what can? Like I said the only thing I can think of is a fully endorsed and licenced Harry Potter RPG sold via the Pottermore Web site and that simply is not gign to happen so ...

Both of these games are horrible points of entry that are focussed on narrative structure and a deep understanding of what roleplaying games are and how they really work.  You pretty much have to have had the "the numbers are immaterial and irrelevant and pointless" epithany before they even begin to make a bit of sense.  They are the equivilant of studying the works of Dante in depth from a historical and cultural lense before you can read "The Cat In The Hat."  In my experience 99% of gamers never reach the realization that made up numbers are made up numbers no matter how you made them up.

You are pointing to doctoral thesis' and saying that they're great Learn to Read With Dick and Jane material.

D&D's core rules can fit on a doublesided eight and a half by eleven sheet of paper if you move the stats and spells onto cards and remove all the discussion of what it represents and special cases and decision making.

eg. Combat
On your turn you can:
Cast a Spell, Charge, Move twice, or Move and attack.
To cast a spell follow the instructions on the spell card and discard it.

To move, move your figure a number of squares equal to their movement rate.

To attack with a melee weapon you must be in an adjacent square to your target.  To attack with a missile weapon you must be within the number of squares listed for its range and not be blocked by characters, monsters, walls or doors.

Roll the twenty-sided dice and add the bonus for the attack you used, if the roll is greater than the monster's armor class you hit and roll your attack's damage as shown on your card.  If the monster runs out of Hit Points it dies.

Yes it reduces D&D to a board game.  The problem with 4e as a point of entry is that it isn't enough of a board game.

Yes I'd like to see a D&D starter that was completely self contained to tenth level.  But I'd like the starting point in the box to be:

Each player picks a character card and figure.  Shuffle the monster cards and dungeon tiles and place the dungeon entry at the edge of the play area.  Place the characters at the dungeon entry and move them into the first room.  They can search for secret doors or hidden treasures, when the first character leaves the first room, flip the first dungeon tile and arange it so it ties into the exit they have left.

Quote from: S'mon;645702What did they do to push 4e to non-gamers? Genuine question, I really have no idea what if any marketing there was to non-gamers?

TV and magazine ads and putting a beginner box in Target, to name what I can remember off the top of my head. Clearly not enough if you presume that there's a significant well of untapped RPGers out there- but who else could shell out even that amount of marketing cash these days?

Quote from: David Johansen;645746Both of these games are horrible points of entry that are focussed on narrative structure and a deep understanding of what roleplaying games are and how they really work.  You pretty much have to have had the "the numbers are immaterial and irrelevant and pointless" epithany before they even begin to make a bit of sense.  They are the equivilant of studying the works of Dante in depth from a historical and cultural lense before you can read "The Cat In The Hat."  In my experience 99% of gamers never reach the realization that made up numbers are made up numbers no matter how you made them up.

All true but irrelevant.
the point isn't that the games are overly complex or whatever the point is that there was no out reach to the massive fan base for the Lord of the Rings movies or the Avengers in either case both games maerkets solely to gamers. Now that might be because they jsut din;t think of it  but I suspect its because they did their amrket research and realised there was no point.

Quote from: jibbajibba;645756All true but irrelevant.
the point isn't that the games are overly complex or whatever the point is that there was no out reach to the massive fan base for the Lord of the Rings movies or the Avengers in either case both games maerkets solely to gamers. Now that might be because they jsut din;t think of it  but I suspect its because they did their amrket research and realised there was no point.

That's like saying that the absence of a bridge across a deep gorge and river is irrelevant to a tourist brouchure for a remote city.

It isn't complexity or simplicity that's the main issue for Marvel Heroic Roleplaying and The One Ring.  They're both reasonably simple, it's just the concept they start with is too far removed for most people.

If you start with something familiar that looks and feels like a board game that becomes your bridge and you don't end up with a bunch of people standing on the edge of the gorge holding their brochures and looking confused and angry.

That said it would be nice to have them in bookstores right next to the books but I'm not sure how you talk the book stores into it.

Quote from: David Johansen;645763It isn't complexity or simplicity that's the main issue for Marvel Heroic Roleplaying and The One Ring.  They're both reasonably simple, it's just the concept they start with is too far removed for most people.

The problem is that, from a mass market standpoint, they suck. They are overcomplicated, they are edgy to some faction of the RPG crowd for the sake of being "edgy", and in fact all they end up accomplishing is make the principles of role playing unclear, weird, and compare themselves to other media most people would rather be doing or enjoying for their own sakes, instead of playing some lame replacement for them (e.g. RPGs as emulators of other media instead of their own thing FAIL. Hard).

Propose to people to play a Narrative/novel-emulator game and most of them will prefer to just read a book. If they want to put in the effort, they will WRITE one. Not play some emulator instead that leads nowhere.

Tell people about RPGs and play them for their own sakes, and then you'll see people getting more curious. That's why D&D, for all its "immaturity" or "vanilla-esque fantasy" or whatever the fuck the buzzword of D&D-bashing is this week, actually wins at this game. Or at least it did, before its custodians lost their way in Forge la-la-land.

Quote from: David Johansen;645746Yes it reduces D&D to a board game.  The problem with 4e as a point of entry is that it isn't enough of a board game.

Yes I'd like to see a D&D starter that was completely self contained to tenth level.  But I'd like the starting point in the box to be:

Each player picks a character card and figure.  Shuffle the monster cards and dungeon tiles and place the dungeon entry at the edge of the play area.  Place the characters at the dungeon entry and move them into the first room.  They can search for secret doors or hidden treasures, when the first character leaves the first room, flip the first dungeon tile and arange it so it ties into the exit they have left.

Fuck no. Exactly the wrong thinking I describe in action, but applied to board games instead of comics or novels. Fuck. No.

Quote from: Spinachcat;645638Non-gamers
Lapsed gamers

Wonder how many non-gamers and/or lapsed gamers, looked into D&D and found out very quickly that they couldn't stand the other gamers who showed up at the first few games they played, and subsequently didn't come back.

When I use to play at gaming stores (for 4E Encounters and some game-day type events), there were some new and/or casual players which showed up, but who stopped coming back after a week or two.  In one case I later came across one such player (who didn't come back to the game) at a nearby mall, where they mentioned that they couldn't stand being around two particular other players.  As far as they were concerned, it was pointless playing the game further with two individuals they didn't like.

Quote from: Benoist;645765The problem is that, from a mass market standpoint, they suck. They are overcomplicated, they are edgy to some faction of the RPG crowd for the sake of being "edgy", and in fact all they end up accomplishing is make the principles of role playing unclear, weird, and compare themselves to other media most people would rather be doing or enjoying for their own sakes, instead of playing some lame replacement for them (e.g. RPGs as emulators of other media instead of their own thing fail. Hard).

Propose to people to play a Narrative/novel-emulator game and most of them will prefer to just read a book. If they want to put in the effort they will write one. Not play some emulator instead that leads nowhere.

Tell people about RPGs and play them for their own sakes, and then you'll see people getting more curious. That's why D&D, for all its "immaturity" or "vanilla-esque fantasy" or whatever the fuck the buzzword of D&D-bashing is this week, actually wins at this game.

Very possibly true bit the real issue is no one outside the RPG hobby is even aware of them at all.
So you have 2 ips with an RPG cross over potential both huge in popular media both with new active games but no attempt to even reach out outside the established gamer market.

Quote from: David Johansen;645746Yes it reduces D&D to a board game.  The problem with 4e as a point of entry is that it isn't enough of a board game.

Yes I'd like to see a D&D starter that was completely self contained to tenth level.  But I'd like the starting point in the box to be:

Each player picks a character card and figure.  Shuffle the monster cards and dungeon tiles and place the dungeon entry at the edge of the play area.  Place the characters at the dungeon entry and move them into the first room.  They can search for secret doors or hidden treasures, when the first character leaves the first room, flip the first dungeon tile and arange it so it ties into the exit they have left.

Wotc made a bunch of products like this. Castle Ravenloft, Legend of Drizzt, Wrath ofAshardalon to name a few. Paizo did a beautiful intro box to Pathfinder. Games Workshop has also created board games of this kind in the past, Heroquest and Warhammer Quest. FFG has released the second edition of this kind of game, Descent: Journey in the Dark.

The market has more than enough Dungeon Crawl board games. D&D does not need any more of that. What D&D needs is a platform able to let it insert in its marketing all the new fantasy fads and so to be able to reach to geeks and nerds out there. For example, right now it is zombie apocalypse/survival so it needs to be able to be marketed as a fantasy roleplaying game of sword & sorcery zombie survival amongst others things. But first of all it must develop a versatile and suitable game system for that sort of thing without any unnecessary baggage like minis and grids (competing for time is one of the most important realities of today's entertainment market). These gimmicks should be additional products to explore for already established clients, not the other way around.

D&D could and should easily dominate the roleplaying, dungeon board game, and fantasy wargame markets with a single product.  It can and should be all things to all people.  It's that capacity that made it a giant.  It's that division and fracturing that has prevented other rpgs from knocking it out of the top spot.  It presents a broad and expansive experience that can mould itself to the needs of the individual group.

I suggest a simple board game with a map tile and cards system and one page of rules as a bridge.  The gap between this and actually roleplaying is more like a shallow creek than a gorge with a raging river.

I suggest it because in my experience most new players look at the big fat rulebook and sigh.  They might look through it at the pictures.  But the sheer scope of it is just too daunting.

Don't get me wrong, a person who knows how to play can be the best bridge but they can also be the bridge with panels that fall out of the bottom and a spiked roof that drops on the poor fools who trusted the bastard.

I don't think that the whole game should be boardgamized or unplayable without miniatures.  Just the very tip of the point of entry.  I prefer real world ranges and movement rates to inches but chopping off the miniatures aspect is also a mistake.  D&D needs to embrace the whole breadth, width, and height of the fantasy gaming experience and stop pidgeonholing or scapegoating people with different preferences.

Quote from: Spinachcat;645576We are in what may be a unique lull in the RPG industry. WotC is dead in the water until 5e comes out. Pathfinder is no longer the shiny new thing. 5e probably won't ship until GenCon 2014. WoD is on life support. Neither WotC nor Paizo are doing any real marketing, outreach or advertising.

The situation is tailor made for a new fresh RPG (or refreshed old favorite) to make a big splash and grab some momentum before 5e shows up. This is the moment for some company to seize the day.

So why hasn't any 2nd tier (or 3rd) company taken the initiative?

Do Numenera and 13th Age not count?

Really, the people who *write* games are attempting this, but the companies that produce and distribute them are not. Maybe it's because the writers feel they can get more out of a smaller company or self-publishing. Maybe companies like GURPS rely on an audience built up and maintained over decades and they don't want to rock the boat.

Quote from: David Johansen;645776D&D could and should easily dominate the roleplaying, dungeon board game, and fantasy wargame markets with a single product.  It can and should be all things to all people.  It's that capacity that made it a giant.  It's that division and fracturing that has prevented other rpgs from knocking it out of the top spot.  It presents a broad and expansive experience that can mould itself to the needs of the individual group.

I suggest a simple board game with a map tile and cards system and one page of rules as a bridge.  The gap between this and actually roleplaying is more like a shallow creek than a gorge with a raging river.

I suggest it because in my experience most new players look at the big fat rulebook and sigh.  They might look through it at the pictures.  But the sheer scope of it is just too daunting.

Don't get me wrong, a person who knows how to play can be the best bridge but they can also be the bridge with panels that fall out of the bottom and a spiked roof that drops on the poor fools who trusted the bastard.

I don't think that the whole game should be boardgamized or unplayable without miniatures.  Just the very tip of the point of entry.  I prefer real world ranges and movement rates to inches but chopping off the miniatures aspect is also a mistake.  D&D needs to embrace the whole breadth, width, and height of the fantasy gaming experience and stop pidgeonholing or scapegoating people with different preferences.

You fail to realize that this is already out there. It already exists. You asked for ten levels. The matter with presenting to the market ten valuable game levels is not about the rules of the ten levels but rather about the scenarios. But these scenarios need to showcase tabletop roleplaying and not board game play. Thus they kind of need a different game system platform than the one you suggest.

Quote from: David Johansen;645776D&D could and should easily dominate the roleplaying, dungeon board game, and fantasy wargame markets with a single product.

It's been tried and it FAILS. Precisely because of what I just talked about. Or to put it in the words I edited in above: "Fuck no. Exactly the wrong thinking I describe in action, but applied to board games instead of comics or novels. Fuck. No." AFAIC.

Bullshit

The only edition that comes close to doing it is First Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.

It has naval combat rules, siege rules, stats for men and monsters that ignore weapon type and fix it to a die type for faster play.  Hundreds of one hit dice creatures appearing in a single encounter.

The current D&D board games don't use the actual rules of the game, they're a stripped down and modified subset.  What I'm talking about is more like the old PaceSetter boxed sets which had a short pamphlet to allow people to start playing in minutes including an adventure location map and pregenerated characters and two full rule books for advanced play.  Add a nice campaign supplement with some adventures and a massive batch of plastic figures (well, in a perfect world lead but ah well...) and you've got my perfect starter set.

I laugh at the supposedly old school players who like to forget that all the early versions of D&D purported to be for use with miniature figures.