Quote from: James J SkachSure J - well, at least, you could go there, register, and tell me how I'm doing.  It's up and running, I'm just playing with the design to get it how I want it - modifying the skin as it were.

The first skin is meant to look like 3rd Edition books.

The next skin I'll work on will look like...maybe d20 Modern or something.

That way, no matter d20 you are playing, you can have th forum look like the one you like.

So if you're ok with the dust of my minor renovations - it's //www.d20haven.com - that's the relatively blank homepage but has a menu bar with a link to the forums (or you can just go directly to //www.d20haven.com/forums)

thanks for asking J!

Yeah, I went ahead and registered, and even made a shortcut thingy on my Opera toolbar so I won't forget about it.

You'll be dropping us a line when it's up and running, right?

The clouds, I like that.

Dave Noonan. What a guy.

At least it's not a Blue Bolt.

I think that people will buy the game or not buy the game, their decision will have far more to do with how they feel about the game than how they feel about WoTC. They can afford to be assholes at this point, it wont hurt them- not even a little bit. As a matter of fact, it will probably lead to more sales in the long run, as blog entries like this keep people thinking about 4e; reposting blog entries like this gets people who weren't thinking about 4e thinking about 4e. Being a nice guy might get you noticed, but being an asshole is surfire. The more people that notice, the more people thinking/knowing about the game. And at the end of the day, it's the game that sells the game not the public face of the company that created it.
I worked at a SF bookstore when WoTC introduced MTG. People came in and talked about how much of a racket the game was, how much of rip off it was to buy all the cards, and how the people at wizards were greedy assholes- and then they would buy a metric assload magic cards.

Holy crap, I agree with J Arcane!

And the Pundit may be on to something suggesting that there is some insecurity there about the product.  They are on far shakier ground than they were with the introduction of 3e.

Is it possible to fail your e-diplomacy roll when you are on the reciving end?


I mean, maybe I'm a freak, but I just don't see what you guys see when you read all that.  Maybe it helps that 'David Noonan' is a name I've only heard twice now, or maybe I'm just not in a mood to get pissed about anything right now.

So: Guys says: fourth edition is coming. You can get happy. Hey, its coming. You can get mad:Hey it's coming. You can not care: hey it's coming.

This is something hugely condescending? Insulting?  What???

Or are allayouse spoiled manchildren used to getting your own way alla time that when someone says 'hey bucko, the world don't spin on your dime' you gotta take it as harshing on your high?

WTF?

:confused:

In other news, in about twenty billion years the sun is gonna burn out and the earth is gonna die.  And there ain't a damn thing you can do about it no matter how you slice the cheese.

Yes, but it could also be that 4e is coming and nobody gives a shit because there are so many other options out there and 3.5 is working great for most folks anyways.  What's annoying about it is the underlying assumption that the very power and ubiquity of 4e makes it an utterly inevitable choice.  The coming of 4e is decidedly not comparable to the burning out of the sun, even relative to the hobby.  It's more like a big meteor shower or solar eclipse, maybe.

Quote from: walkerpYes, but it could also be that 4e is coming and nobody gives a shit because there are so many other options out there and 3.5 is working great for most folks anyways.  What's annoying about it is the underlying assumption that the very power and ubiquity of 4e makes it an utterly inevitable choice.  The coming of 4e is decidedly not comparable to the burning out of the sun, even relative to the hobby.  It's more like a big meteor shower or solar eclipse, maybe.

See: I don't see where he says or even implies that 'you must buy it when it comes out'... to use your words 'utterly inevitable choice'.

Sure, he expresses disappointment that some people won't be buying it. Why wouldn't he? He undoubtedly is somewhat proud of his work.

The point is that no matter how you feel about it (and for some reason I really want to 'go canadian' and say aboot.... have no idea why).. it IS coming out.

And this is condescending?

You don't like the sun burning out as further examples of inevitability? Fine, your mama is gonna make some vegetables for dinner, wailing and gnashing the teeth ain't gonna stop that neither.  And if, by chance, you happen to like vegetables? Well, I doubt that's why she's a'cookin' them.

I think it's just the tone of it, that it should matter at all.  But you're right, if you read it straight out, it could come off as just being very factual and not condescending at all.  But a company in Wizards' position has to be very careful about not appearing arrogant.  The nerd audience is unforgiving.

QuoteAnd this is condescending?

No, what's condescending is the attitude of "we don't care what the fuck you like or don't like about 4e, we're gonna do whatever the fuck we want, and there's nothing you ignorant peons can do about it."

He's essentially saying "We don't care about you, we don't care what you want, so just shut the fuck up and take it."

This is not a healthy attitude to take towards your customers.

Quote from: walkerpYes, but it could also be that 4e is coming and nobody gives a shit because there are so many other options out there and 3.5 is working great for most folks anyways.

Walker, buddy... there's a lot of "could bes" in this world but you can bet your ass that "nobody giving a shit about 4e" is most certainly not one of them.

3.0 edition was working great for most folks and they still sold a shitload of 3.5 books with little efforts and minimal repackaging.

4th edition is very likely going to be a success (by this industry's standards anyway) because a lot of people actually do give a shit.

Shit... I sure said "shit" a lot of times, here

As for the sentiment expressed in this thread: I didn't get the impression Noonan was insulting. He's merely saying that 4th edition is coming and people can hop onboard or not. That's being straight with people. Plus, people overestimate the effect of PR in this industry. The customer-base is pretty hardcore and from personal experience, most of them don't care.

Dave Noonan could tell every gamer that they can go fuck themselves and WotC would still sell 4e like hotcakes. Heck, Justin Achilli used to throw all sorts of assertions concerning his customer-base and guess what? The WoD was still selling a lot of books.

Unless you're a small fish (independant company) where you can make "pity-sales" and false swap sales (you buy my product, I'll buy yours) it actually doesn't matter one bit.

That's the painful truth of it.

Yeah...Folks think employee blogs are the shit, and they can be - until something like this happens. Personally, I'd only allow an official company blog, one overseen by the PR department.

Seanchai

Quote from: walkerpI think it's just the tone of it, that it should matter at all.  But you're right, if you read it straight out, it could come off as just being very factual and not condescending at all.  But a company in Wizards' position has to be very careful about not appearing arrogant.  The nerd audience is unforgiving.

I'm sorry, but you're dead wrong here. They can be King Assholes of the Universe and they will still own the market. You and I might not like them, but you and I weren't going to buy their products anyway- but were we into D&D, really into D&D, I really doubt that anything short of the execs at Wizards going on a baby killing spree would stop us from buying the new edition. And, really, if I've learned anything from Star Trek and Star Wars it's that the nerd audience might harbor long term anger in their hearts but they usually fairly quick to forgive with their wallets.

It is certainly true that you can ride out shitty standards and poor customer service and still be a collossal success, look at Dell and Walmart.  It can also very nearly destroy you, look what has happened to SOE and Star Wars Galaxies.  

Is that really something we want to see happen to the biggest RPG company there is?