Inspired by the scientific method, a guy named William, and the letter 'M'.

And hold your horses, it's not what you think.

There is no denying that D&D is the most popular, profitable, and available RPG in the world today. After decades of competition, it still reigns supreme. Now I'm sure I'm not the only one who is curious to know WHY, but asking about the reasons FOR its success always seems to end up in the mire of personal taste disguised as fact and justified by anything but.

So I want to list the reasons that have NOTHING to do with the success of D&D.

I'll Start...





It's not the rules.

This should make all you 'Swine' hating folks very happy, as it basically shows that the endeavors of the Forge ARE a based on a flawed premise and are a load of crap. But before we get started, exactly how many (often incompatible) changes have there been? Let's see, there was D&D, AD&D, AD&D 2nd ed, Skills & Powers, D&D 3.0, and D&D 3.5. Did I miss any?

First, the market is not buying games based on older D&D rulesets, such as C&C and Hackmaster, in anywhere near the numbers we see with any current edition of D&D. In fact, the market tends to actually STOP buying books based on older editions once a new one emerges, and even the minor change from 3.0 to 3.5 caused a massive disregard of books based on 3.0.

Second, there have been arguably (even on theRPGsite) better rulesets put out in the meantime, such as D20 Modern, Perfect20, True20, Core Elements, Passages, Star Wars Saga, etc. Yet most players still stick with D&D, in whatever version it may currently be.





See? Simple.

So what else couldn't it be? And no cheating by saying it couldn't be Martians using mind control rays and stuff. We're looking at legitimate reasons it COULD be, but probably isn't. Feel free to use personal experience and market research in your assessments, as that's really all we have to go by.

Quote from: chaosvoyagerIt's not the rules.

This should make all you 'Swine' hating folks very happy, as it basically shows that the endeavors of the Forge ARE a based on a flawed premise and are a load of crap. But before we get started, exactly how many (often incompatible) changes have there been? Let's see, there was D&D, AD&D, AD&D 2nd ed, Skills & Powers, D&D 3.0, and D&D 3.5. Did I miss any?

First, the market is not buying games based on older D&D rulesets, such as C&C and Hackmaster, in anywhere near the numbers we see with any current edition of D&D. In fact, the market tends to actually STOP buying books based on older editions once a new one emerges, and even the minor change from 3.0 to 3.5 caused a massive disregard of books based on 3.0.

Second, there have been arguably (even on theRPGsite) better rulesets put out in the meantime, such as D20 Modern, Perfect20, True20, Core Elements, Passages, Star Wars Saga, etc. Yet most players still stick with D&D, in whatever version it may currently be.

I'll start off by disagreeing with your first post.  To make it up, later I'll try to think of my own example of something it can't be.

You can dislike what D&D does, but it is an amazingly complicated game made of many complicated parts interacting with each other in complicated ways -- and not only is it playable, it's good.

It's an incredible feat of design, and I think that it's a large part of its appeal.  There's a certain type of person who enjoys fiddly, tinkery games.  It's also hard as hell to design a game like that without ending up a Rifts-like mess.  For that type of player, Dungeons & Dragons is best-in-class.

I must admit, I am pretty confused by the thread name. Still, here are few ideas that just crossed my mind.

1) Kind of gestalt - that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Maybe analyse just parts of it (rules) can not explain it, because the key is hidden in some unique combination of the parts it consist of. Now what the parts are there actually?

2) Shifts in culture, fashion, customer demands. Watch some old movies. They are ... so slow in pace ... some old books are almost unreadable. Continuous progress in culture impact RPG hobby as well. The demand of the players 30 yrs. ago might be different than today. D&D might just reflect these changes well, and adapt to them quickly enough.

3) Ryan Dancey thingie - network externalities.

4) Martians using mind control rays.

5) All of the above together.

Feel free to develop the ideas.

The rules definitely have a lot to do with D&D's current success. The reason I know this is because if the rules looked like AD&D 2nd Edition, or say.. any of a myriad other games, I wouldn't be a fan.

The rules do have a lot with D&D's success, but D&D is also a pseudo-setting, it's own blend of fantasy. Not quite Tolkien, not quite Howard, not quite Leiber but a healthy mix of all three.

This is partly why the game has been dominant even when the rules weren't quite as strong (2nd edition). Of course the other reason is that most people ignored the dumb shit about second edition, since they already owned one of the greatest RPGs of all time in most cases (AD&D or D&D).

As for why D&D isn't the most successful RPG, that's a very weird thread concept, cause 90% market share was success last I looked.

The only basis on which you could argue for D&D's failure would be aesthetic preferences, which you said you didn't want to get into. By cold hard numbers, D&D is the most successful RPG one could imagine.

It's the final fantasy of consoles, and the Oblivion of PCs, all rolled into one beast.

QuoteIt's the final fantasy of consoles, and the Oblivion of PCs, all rolled into one beast.

I would consider both of those comparisons rather derogatory.  

Quote from: chaosvoyagerIt's not the rules.

This should make all you 'Swine' hating folks very happy, as it basically shows that the endeavors of the Forge ARE a based on a flawed premise and are a load of crap. But before we get started, exactly how many (often incompatible) changes have there been? Let's see, there was D&D, AD&D, AD&D 2nd ed, Skills & Powers, D&D 3.0, and D&D 3.5. Did I miss any?

First, the market is not buying games based on older D&D rulesets, such as C&C and Hackmaster, in anywhere near the numbers we see with any current edition of D&D. In fact, the market tends to actually STOP buying books based on older editions once a new one emerges, and even the minor change from 3.0 to 3.5 caused a massive disregard of books based on 3.0.

Second, there have been arguably (even on theRPGsite) better rulesets put out in the meantime, such as D20 Modern, Perfect20, True20, Core Elements, Passages, Star Wars Saga, etc. Yet most players still stick with D&D, in whatever version it may currently be.

IOW, Ryan Dancey was right?

Ok... on second thought, and having better grokked the OP, I'll play, because this is a pet peeve of mine:

It's not because it was first

Yes, D&D was first, but it wasn't first in the "Kodak had a patent that lasted a couple of decades on the market leading camera and by the time that expired they had a SECOND generation camera patented, light years ahead of anything a competitor could make by reverse engineering their first camera".

That's where "being first" matters. When you're first for a LONG time (measured in decades).

D&D was first, in 1974.

But then:

Tunnels and Trolls in 1975.

Boot Hill in 1975.

Traveller in 1977.

Chivalry and Sorcery in 1977.

Gamma World in 1978.

Runequest in 1978.

Villains and Vigilantes in 1979.

Fantasy Trip 1980.

Basic Role Playing (generic form of RQ's BRP rules set) in 1980.

Rolemaster in 1980.

Champions 1981.

Call of Cthulhu in 1981.

In other words, a new, well-designed RPG (every one of those I mentioned has stood the test of time or been influential in some way) EVERY YEAR for the first decade of D&D's existence.

That's not running unopposed folks.

The overall "type" of Rules (or the "style" of the rules) has a HUGE amount to do with why its successful.

The proof of that is in the extreme care that game designers go to make each new edition keep the rules recognizeable in appearance to the old rules, to the point of keeping the "Sacred Cows": Levels, Classes, Hit Points, Ability Scores, Wizards memorizing Spells, Clerics Turn Undead, etc. etc.

So you could say that the Sacred Cows are a DIRECT part of D&D's success.

Now, as for why its "Not" Successful:

D&D Is Not Successful Because People are Ignorant

D&D fans really truly love playing D&D. It sucks for you if you believe D&D should be destroyed, I know. But the game's success is because its fans enjoy playing the game, have fun with it, and its rules meet their needs.  
Its not that they just haven't found out about your amazing Forge-game about Gay Cowboys Eating Pudding; or that they haven't understood how much more artistic it is to play a beret-wearing Vampire.
The average roleplayer will have gone into gaming stores. He'll have seen those other books there, and he will have rejected them.

The claim that a D&D player just hasn't been "exposed" to the "superior" games that will "educate" him in how to be a good little swine is bullshit. I mean, where the fuck do you think they've been getting their gaming books? Mars?!
They know all about there being other games, they just don't give a fuck. They're not interested. They're perfectly happy playing D&D, which is the most successful and most popular RPG in the world.
In short, D&D IS successful because your favourite game isn't as good as D&D. Sucks to be you.

RPGPundit

The main reason D&D is succesful is market share.  The market share is based on something certainly, their powerful legacy, good production values, consistent product support.  That legacy and market share could have been blundered when Wizards took over, but they did a good job of 3.5 of creating a relatively consistent ruleset (at least at the beginning) that maintained (as Pundit says) the things that were precious to the fans.  However, the biggest single factor is still established market share and that will endure for a long time even if they did start totally screwing it up.

Popularity has never been an indicator of quality and it certainly isn't in the case of D&D.

Quote from: RPGObjects_chuckThat's where "being first" matters. When you're first for a LONG time (measured in decades).

D&D was first, in 1974.

But then:

Tunnels and Trolls in 1975.
Boot Hill in 1975.
Traveller in 1977.
Chivalry and Sorcery in 1977.
Gamma World in 1978.
Runequest in 1978.
Villains and Vigilantes in 1979.
Fantasy Trip 1980.
Basic Role Playing (generic form of RQ's BRP rules set) in 1980.
Rolemaster in 1980.
Champions 1981.
Call of Cthulhu in 1981.

In other words, a new, well-designed RPG (every one of those I mentioned has stood the test of time or been influential in some way) EVERY YEAR for the first decade of D&D's existence.

I'd argue that Gamma World and Boot Hill shouldn't be on the list because they were both TSR products, and TSR would have had to be idiots to try to directly compete with their own flagship product.

On the other hand, T&T, C&S, RQ, The Fantasy Trip and Rolemaster competed in the sort of fantasy genre that D&D synthesised and popularised, however, so those games in particular should be considered as important and highly direct competitors with D&D.

Quote from: RPGPunditThe average roleplayer will have gone into gaming stores. He'll have seen those other books there, and he will have rejected them.

You are assuming that there exists such a thing as a "perfect market".  In reality there are hundreds, possibly thousands of markets where an obviously superior product is ignored by consumers.  This isn't a criticism of D&D playing drones, it's just a reality of economics.  D&D might be the superior product.  But it might just be enjoying the benefits of market imperfections.  In the same way that VHS won over Betamax, or PCs outsell Macs.

Quote from: WarthurI'd argue that Gamma World and Boot Hill shouldn't be on the list because they were both TSR products, and TSR would have had to be idiots to try to directly compete with their own flagship product.

On the other hand, T&T, C&S, RQ, The Fantasy Trip and Rolemaster competed in the sort of fantasy genre that D&D synthesised and popularised, however, so those games in particular should be considered as important and highly direct competitors with D&D.

Except that, as all the other competing products proved, nothing compared to D&D. So Gamma World is as much competition for D&D as Traveler.

In other words, all the systems I listed were successful in carving out a relatively stable chunk of the 10% market share not controlled by D&D.

Still, if you eliminate those two, that brings the number of serious competitors "down" from 12 in 7 years to 10 in 7 years. Still around 2 successful RPGs every three years.

So again... D&D did not gain or hold its market share by being first.

Walkerp points out D&D is first cause it has most market share.

Well duh. That's what being dominant in a market means by definition.

But how did it get there? By being first? As I just demonstrated, no.

People will jump ship when a superior product comes along. Dark Age of Camelot wasn't able to dethrone Everquest, but World of Warcraft sure has.

And Everquest was first. And it's getting trounced. Being first (by ONE YEAR no less) doesn't allow you to handwave the fact that the game has had a 90% market share for 30 years.

Dancey was right about D&D.  That's the long and the short of it.  Blizzard took the same approach to World of Warcraft and replicated that success in the MMORPG market.  (You can count the serious contenders to WOW world-wide on one hand and have digits left over.)  Indeed, the "video-game" complaints about the current edition are actually the strengths of D&D and not its weaknesses.

Well here's this.

Most game designs set out to beat D&D, by doing the opposite of D&D.

This seems like the smart thing to do, for some reason. I've heard many people say "Compete with D&D? Hell no, we'll beat them by doing the opposite. So our game will have no miniatures, and it will emphasize a lot of play-acting for no rewards, rather than that tactical encounter stuff. And it won't use levels or hit points. That's strictly for kids. We've got to establish our niche!"

Ok, right? I've seen that plenty of times.

Then inevitably the audience never appears. Or if it does, it's a "niche" audience at best.  The reason is -- they did the opposite of what every one wanted. There's no wonder the audience wasn't swayed.

I can only think of one game designer who openly embraced everything great about D&D, and did it with a lot of talent. Kevin Siembieda.

Did Kevin Siembieda get an audience by doing this? I'd say he did. I'd also say he designed a game or two that was better than D&D back in the times of AD&D2nd edition, a few times over. I totally dropped AD&D2nd in favor of Palladium (and Earthdawn) during the 90s.  They were doing it better. It was the rules. These were better games. They were easier to manage campaigns with, and they more fun. Kevin hired good artists and writers.


...But now none of those guys can really complete with 3rd edition, or 3.5. I'm sorry, but it's true.

And out of the people that are left? Theyre stuck in that mindset that they've got to be better than D&D by doing the opposite of what the audience wants. I honestly don't believe Wizards is ruling the hobby because it's all that great (although I think it's pretty good, and I'm plenty happy). Wizards rules because everyone else is so fucking stupid and hidebound they don't even bother to figure out what anyone else wants.