The thing that gets to me is who's even left at the company who does actual work?  It seems to me that everyone with actual D&D development skills has either wandered off or gotten canned at this point, leaving only a bunch of underpaid freelancers and diversity hires.  Is there a single big name developer left at WotC now?

Quote from: Valatar on December 16, 2023, 10:19:41 PM
The thing that gets to me is who's even left at the company who does actual work?  It seems to me that everyone with actual D&D development skills has either wandered off or gotten canned at this point, leaving only a bunch of underpaid freelancers and diversity hires.  Is there a single big name developer left at WotC now?

Dude, look, buy a good popcorn popper and a lot of grass fed butter.  Prep up for 2024, because when the shitfest known at 6E gets released, its going to be very entertaining and you'll want to have a lot of buttered popcorn available.

Quote from: Valatar on December 16, 2023, 10:19:41 PM
...leaving only a bunch of underpaid freelancers and diversity hires.  Is there a single big name developer left at WotC now?

Does a company that is not going to change their core books even need a large staff? Certainly for the virtual table-top but for the actual table top a handful of free lancers could probably handle things. At some point they'll probably franchise off the rights to create table top products to another company anyway so they can ignore it, but still get the consistent cashflow.

Quote from: Valatar on December 16, 2023, 10:19:41 PM
The thing that gets to me is who's even left at the company who does actual work?  It seems to me that everyone with actual D&D development skills has either wandered off or gotten canned at this point, leaving only a bunch of underpaid freelancers and diversity hires.  Is there a single big name developer left at WotC now?

They'll be fine, as long as they retain a single Australian man.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 16, 2023, 08:43:21 AM
...
Collapses like we're seeing tend to be avalanches; not much happens as the weight continues to grow, then suddenly it all starts to slide and just picks up speed as it descends.

Agreed.

People would point to the decline in Dr.Who ratings, and the apologists would just scramble and justify its current ratings as indicating somehow that Dr.Who was still "doing well".

The switch only really flipped in the last few seasons before the female doctor. By that time they had alienated enough of the audience by slow dripping the woke that they thought they needed to double-down on chasing the new stunning and brave one...

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 16, 2023, 08:43:21 AM
Hasbro and Disney have both passed the trigger point... their acceleration into oblivion is going to be much quicker than the build up that got them here.

Much of that build up was very sudden in the past ten years. (For D&D anyway)

I'm don't think that we will begin to see a real decline of D&D until at least a few years after 2024.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 16, 2023, 08:43:21 AM
Somehow I don't think Hasbro has enough cultural significance to be worth a hostile takeover as looks to be happening to Disney; It may not matter that Hasbro never willingly sells their IPs if they end up having to liquidate everything of value in a court-ordered bankruptcy.

A worthy dream, but unfortunately unlikely.

Filing for Bankruptcy is very unlikely to end Hasbro. Corporations really don't like to file because it usually involves changes at the top...

The likely result of Hasbro filing for bankruptcy is that they come to a deal with their creditors on their debt - do massive corporate restructuring, and emerge a leaner, more potentially profitable company.

At this point they will never let go of the golden goose (Wotc) that is currently keeping the whole ship afloat.

Quote from: Jaeger on December 14, 2023, 07:24:47 PM

Quote from: JeremyR on December 14, 2023, 03:40:54 PM
...
The other thing is that BG3 took what, 6 years and 200+ people to make. It's a one time sale for $60. No DLC. Apparently it sold like 20 million copies, so obviously it's profitable, but it doesn't seem like a great model for your product line, releasing one huge game every 5-6 years.

Correct.

The Microsoft suits were right about D&D (The DOMINANT RPG brand) being "under monetized".

Yet they really seem to have been dragging their feet on the whole "monetization" thing...


Lego makes medieval themed sets. WTF are there no D&D themed lego sets?

Critical Role has a 'totally not D&D' anime series on amazon. WTF is there no D&D animated series anywhere?

Hasbro makes toys? Yet D&D action figures tied into their non-existed animated series are nowhere to be seen.

BG3 was a big hit. But that license was signed for Six Years ago!

Where is the 'Forgotten Realms: Total War' computer wargame?

Where is the D&D themed version of the 'Gauntlet' dungeon multiplayer video game?

D&D themed 'Mortal Kombat' or 'Street Fighter' anyone?

BG3 should just be one of many products bringing home that licensing cheddar.

The truth is that Wotc is just utterly incompetent.

Unfortunately there is a D&D fighting game and its one of the worst ever made, and ravenloft branded for some reason. There was also a d&d game simlar to Gauntlet on the original Xbox but the name escapes me. Though D&D has had some great games in the past (Shadows over Mystara).

With a few exceptions, everything D&D related that WOTC or Hasbro has produced that is digital was a steaming pile of crap. So a decision to go full digital should be hilarious.

Quote from: Valatar on December 16, 2023, 10:19:41 PM
The thing that gets to me is who's even left at the company who does actual work?  It seems to me that everyone with actual D&D development skills has either wandered off or gotten canned at this point, leaving only a bunch of underpaid freelancers and diversity hires.  Is there a single big name developer left at WotC now?

Here's a tweet, later deleted, from one of the guys at the studio that made Baldur's Gate



So, it does seem like they gutted the D&D management.

From what I am hearing WOTC is sending their physical product to discount places to get rid of it and from what it sounds whatever the next D&D is, its going to be .pdfs, and digital through the VTT.

It doesn't even sound like they are going to print books.  We have been hearing rumors about this and it has been talked about a great deal.  I guess we won't know for sure until the next D&D is released.

Quote from: GhostNinja on December 17, 2023, 04:12:36 PM
From what I am hearing WOTC is sending their physical product to discount places to get rid of it and from what it sounds whatever the next D&D is, its going to be .pdfs, and digital through the VTT.

It doesn't even sound like they are going to print books.  We have been hearing rumors about this and it has been talked about a great deal.  I guess we won't know for sure until the next D&D is released.

You will NOT get a PDF.  A PDF can't be censored when they decide that all character art needs to be black men in dress and they need to put a forward on the PDF decrying whiteness and promising to help punish all white children they can find.  It will be a subscription, you won't own any of it.  Hell they will probably negotiate a deal with the browser partners and Apple and Microsoft to prevent printing of the manuals as well.

Right now WotC is going after Millenials who don't have spend vs Gen X that does have spend.  Good luck Hasbro.

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on December 17, 2023, 04:22:18 PM
You will NOT get a PDF.  A PDF can't be censored when they decide that all character art needs to be black men in dress and they need to put a forward on the PDF decrying whiteness and promising to help punish all white children they can find.  It will be a subscription, you won't own any of it.  Hell they will probably negotiate a deal with the browser partners and Apple and Microsoft to prevent printing of the manuals as well.

Right now WotC is going after Millenials who don't have spend vs Gen X that does have spend.  Good luck Hasbro.

You are probably right.  Thank god I am already moving on from WOTC and making sure they do not get one more dollar from me.   It appears with their financial situations that a lot of people are doing the same.  I am working to get my 5e players to try a different system and sway money away from WOTC.   Of course if they go into the new model loke you think they are, then there will be nothing for them since even if I continue to run my 5e game it will still be in person.

Quote from: GhostNinja on December 17, 2023, 04:37:57 PM

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on December 17, 2023, 04:22:18 PM
You will NOT get a PDF.  A PDF can't be censored when they decide that all character art needs to be black men in dress and they need to put a forward on the PDF decrying whiteness and promising to help punish all white children they can find.  It will be a subscription, you won't own any of it.  Hell they will probably negotiate a deal with the browser partners and Apple and Microsoft to prevent printing of the manuals as well.

Right now WotC is going after Millenials who don't have spend vs Gen X that does have spend.  Good luck Hasbro.

You are probably right.  Thank god I am already moving on from WOTC and making sure they do not get one more dollar from me.   It appears with their financial situations that a lot of people are doing the same.  I am working to get my 5e players to try a different system and sway money away from WOTC.   Of course if they go into the new model loke you think they are, then there will be nothing for them since even if I continue to run my 5e game it will still be in person.

As much as I find Colvilles public political beliefs odious, he has put out some good ideas. 

His combat system is crap as described.  He's casualiing the game for character builds, it simply doesn't matter.  Just change your kit and you have a new subclass.  Your gear gives you hit points.  You always hit and do damage.  All of this is purified crap.  You will need a calculator and spreadsheets to run it.  And then we have Colville's lack of balancing, he really sucks at it.  So the encounter balance system will probably be a 1E character grind simulator rather than a system that can be used.

However, increasing the villains stats as the party takes rests, if a player does something great they get a triumph I think that can be applied to healing surge, and the players start to power up with more and more encounters rather than get weaker (I assume their hp's do go down), all of which means the players smurfing content and only attacking the boss when everything has been cleared.  Well his system builds in hard counters to it.  It's similar to what I do by adding NPC's or increasing monster capabilities if the party keeps dicking around to smurf the fight.

Unfortunately, its most likely going to be a 4E clone, because that seems to be Colville's favorite, uggh.

Quote from: GhostNinja on December 17, 2023, 04:12:36 PM

It doesn't even sound like they are going to print books.  We have been hearing rumors about this and it has been talked about a great deal.  I guess we won't know for sure until the next D&D is released.

Hmm, I wonder who it was who first predicted that, and has been saying it for over a year now? Three core books maybe, and perhaps one annual "special collector product", and the rest is all-in on the VTT.

RIP D&D. Your legacy will love on in the generic medieval fantasy genre you inspired.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 17, 2023, 06:58:59 PM
RIP D&D. Your legacy will love on in the generic medieval fantasy genre you inspired.

The IP is of worth.  What will happen is D&D will be sold off to another company that isn't ESG.  The ESG firms are going broke.