By Hasten; I mean that WOTC will cave in to pressure to go full Wokeness, in a Big Way soon.

By Delay; I mean that WOTC will leave the money machine alone, because 5th Edition is a proven profit maker.  Nobody wants to be blamed for another 4th Edition type flameout.

WOTC cares only about failure so one way or another they will fuck things up.

The fact that 5e continues to be chugging along despite their best efforts is testament to how freakishly solid the game is despite how off kilter some rules are and how WOTC has been trying to woke-ify it to death.

If going to 6e will kill off WOTC faster then WOTC will go for 6e because failure is the only option.

The real factor is if Hasbro tightens the dogs leash enough to stop them.

Hasten:
WOTC is a few personnel changes away from going full woke. It is an inevitable result of the local politics they came from, and that they now self select and filter all new hires through.

IMHO, 6e is inevitable. The prospect of a new edition at the 50th anniversary of D&D will prove irresistible. With the ongoing woke lore changes they are continuing to introduce they are setting things up to make a core book revision a necessity to consolidate all the "updated" lore.

The actual mechanical rules set will be largely irrelevant. It might actually be mechanically quite solid.

What will be important will be the woke lore and writing permeating the books.

If I was in charge of 6e I know exactly what design goals I would have. But they'd be oriented to trying to capitalize on the market that has been made by 5e. Not alienate half of it.

Delay:
Hasbro to only steps in when WOTC really screws up. Because they think that the people at WOTC are the market experts.

Which of course means that WOTC has free reign to shoot themselves in the foot.

Quote from: Jaeger on January 18, 2021, 04:43:49 AM
......The prospect of a new edition at the 50th anniversary of D&D will prove irresistible.....

This.

More of an issue for me (with absolutely no interest in 5th , 6th or 7th editions) is will "Full Woke" mean they cave to pressure to cull the back catalogue of stuff. Any money raised from sales of previous edition books and pdfs is basically free bonus for WOTC but I am sure that there is a point at which the $$ do not cover the constant bullshit about the sexist/ableist/ racist back catalogue.

Don't care.  As far as I'm concerned, WotC has already struck out and run out of innings.  I wouldn't buy a 6E even if it were God's gift to gaming.  Of course, that's easy to say when more likely it will be a train wreck.

I'd say neither. 6th ed will face the problem that it is competing largely against 5th edition which is pretty good and the sums of money people have already sunk in to 5th.

I would need something spectacular to warrant replacing my existing stuff and I haven't even spent that much.

I can see some kind of subscription model coming where you pay monthly for access to everything and then individually buy the physical bits you want.

Quote from: Altheus on January 18, 2021, 08:42:38 AM
I'd say neither. 6th ed will face the problem that it is competing largely against 5th edition which is pretty good and the sums of money people have already sunk in to 5th.

I would need something spectacular to warrant replacing my existing stuff and I haven't even spent that much.

I can see some kind of subscription model coming where you pay monthly for access to everything and then individually buy the physical bits you want.

Honestly, that's why I think that WotC will produce a "50th Anniversary Edition" of 5e (call it 5.5) that includes all of the changes, errata, new material, etc. in a few new books.  There are enough collectors out there that will pay money for it, even if they basically already have it.  Why split your base, when you can resell the same product?

Honestly, it's in my financial interests for WotC to go full woke for a 6e/50th Anniversary edition, so I really hope they do it.

My system will certainly be out by then and would definitely benefit from people looking for non-political alternatives that are still modern mid-crunch kitchen sink systems with non-random character creation and Big Damn Heroes style play (vs. most of the OSR systems which are generally lower crunch, use mostly classic races/classes, often use random chargen elements and typically focus on Zero-to-Hero style play).

Heck, if I nabbed even a fraction of 1% of disaffected WotC players after they released their woke edition I'd be in fantastic shape.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on January 18, 2021, 10:32:26 AMHonestly, that's why I think that WotC will produce a "50th Anniversary Edition" of 5e (call it 5.5) that includes all of the changes, errata, new material, etc. in a few new books.  There are enough collectors out there that will pay money for it, even if they basically already have it.  Why split your base, when you can resell the same product?

This sounds about right. Between the options of making a new edition a) 5e with cosmetic changes or b) another attempt at selling people on a totally different game called D&D (because it worked so well the last time), option "a" is the obvious choice. And "Special Anniversary Edition" is probably the best pitch for getting people to pay for a minor 5e update.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on January 18, 2021, 10:32:26 AM
...
Honestly, that's why I think that WotC will produce a "50th Anniversary Edition" of 5e (call it 5.5) that includes all of the changes, errata, new material, etc. in a few new books.  There are enough collectors out there that will pay money for it, even if they basically already have it.  Why split your base, when you can resell the same product?

This is also a perfectly viable way for WOTC to go. And probably an easier sell for them to wokeify the core book text.

IMHO it depends on what personnel changes happen at WOTC before the 50th anniversary comes up.

If things stay the same, a 5.woke 50th version seems the safe bet. But because it will be solidly 5e based the wokeification will have limits.

If there are a few significant personnel changes, I think they will find an excuse to really put their stamp on D&D, and a 6e will be irresistible to a more progressive leadership. They will not be able to help themselves from making D&D all rainbow happy joy joy all the time...

I think it will also be a 5.5 D&D update. The Tasha race rules will go into core. They will stop calling them races. Combat Wheelchair will be the PH just to scare the Nazi's off. The DMG will have a consent section. Monster Manual descriptions of sapient creatures will change.

It's a shame because the game really does need a 6th ed. All the levels after 10 are useless and the game really drops off in quality after level 4 and most players want to start at level 3.

Quote from: Jaeger on January 18, 2021, 04:43:49 AM
Hasten:
WOTC is a few personnel changes away from going full woke. It is an inevitable result of the local politics they came from, and that they now self select and filter all new hires through.

Delay.

WOTC going full woke means they will spend the majority of their time in Diversity and Awareness meetings, and less time working on actual RPGS.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on January 18, 2021, 03:24:51 PM
Delay.

WOTC going full woke means they will spend the majority of their time in Diversity and Awareness meetings, and less time working on actual RPGS.

Good one!  They announce the change, making people mad and hampering their sales on the end of 5E.  Then they miss the dates and/or roll out obviously unfinished work. 

I agree that 2024 will be a "50th anniversary edition" that will be a woke 5.5e.

Collectors will collect.
Wokesters will approve.
Cucked gamers will cuck ("but-but it's the only game my players will play!!!)

And it will make plenty of money.

As for my own predictions, the edition might even have a section denouncing Gary & Dave for not being woke and how "diverse" the fanbase is now. If it skips that section, it will instead feature "testimonials" from prominent wokesters who will effectively say the same thing.

Whatever happens, fuck WotC. The OSR rolls on just fine.

An overwhelming majority of current players and potential new players just don't care about this issue. Of those who do care, the number who LIKE it probably outnumber the people who dislike it, due to the wealth of players coming from younger generations and the dying off of older players (either literally or figuratively as they stay with a prior version of the game).