In fairness to WotC - TSR was the company that did the most to put TSR out of business. They did some incredibly ill devised things, and Lorraine Williams (Booo! Hiss! Heat the tar and get the feathers!) openly despised her customers.



WotC is now making some of the same mistakes, including C&Ds against fan sites.

The Auld Grump

In my own shop, D&D is slowing down, and Pathfinder is selling at the steady rate it had been. We've definitely churned through lots of the Red Box, though.

4E hit big in my shop, and people were excited about it. We expected plenty of 3E players to stick with their chosen edition, and many did. Pathfinder sold to people who were sick of 3E but didn't want 4E. Used books sold to the 3E folks. And we will never sell our 2 used copies of Relics & Rituals, ever. 4E was the winner, and then something changed.

I like the Essentials products, but I think WotC really shot themselves in the foot with how Essentials was marketed. Resentment shot up right away from forum-goers and shop regulars (including owners/workers). The player's guides seriously confused the issue. People ended up asking things like 'is this a new edition? do I need this to play? What about this? can I use these books with everything else? where should I *really* start?' To top that confusion off? Most of Essentials was stuff we'd seen before. Ranger? Seen it. Oh, it's a new build? Well, ok, I guess. And this is sad, because keeping the core tiles sets in print with a lovely box to encase them is grand. The Rules Compendium is a good product. Monster Vault I like. The DM Kit I like.

I should point out that I'm saying these things NOT from a mechanics/play point of view but from a SALES point of view. The answers to the questions above are immaterial here - the point is that WotC failed to make sure customers and stores had them! Bad marketing transformed a good idea (a perennially in-print set of gateway products) into a very hard sell for many customers.

I can't say how Encounters is going in other stores, but in our store we have a robust group, many of which are new players. The adventures for Encounters have been maturing over time, taking cues from player feedback and becoming more flexible and more story oriented. I'm glad people have a chance to try playing an hour and a half session of D&D before deciding they can sit through 6 hours of it and experience 'the real game'. It also provides a vetting ground for new DMs. I'm really all for it.

What I think needs to happen to keep D&D a strong brand and to grow the player base is;
-Keep Encounters running! - this gets people finding new games and meeting new people, and especially playing some D&D
-Get some real Marketing! - seriously, the runup to Essentials was a clustercluck
-Get the Virtual Table Top up and running, but NOT A SECOND BEFORE it's polished and ready - I hate using Maptool, and I don't want to lay out 120$ to use another program that looks like it has a worthwhile UI. If WotC can deliver a user experience that works and isn't an hour of trying to connect to the DM's proxy server and failing, then that is worth a DDI subscription. Online gaming keeps people interested when they might otherwise lapse - you can schedule a game more easily, have amusing chats, roll some dicebots and noone cares if you showed up to game in skivvies.
(NB: Please don't give me technical advice on how to use Maptool in response to this)
-All the material WotC ostensibly made to bridge the Essentials/Old Core gap? Publish it through DDI.
-More DM Tools, More Customization - This is more user experience stuff on the digital end of D&D. Wedge open the Character Builder options a bit more, and help the DMs out a bit more.
-Go places where Girls are! Also, market smartly to Girls! - They're a growing demographic, so sell to them!

I definitely agree that RPG gaming has much, much more to compete with now in the running for entertainment spending. And it is a hobby where you are essentially buying and reading a textbook for fun. I love it, and it gives back to me what I put in, but I don't blame people for ignoring a hobby when what they want is a diversion.

PDF sales are great but I really don't think they're a gateway product. You can't really D&D demo online or discover a branded type of roleplaying through online mediums without any previous experience. A girl playing by post in a freeform Livejournal RP is going to stay there, and not discover D&D or Shock! or Dogs in the Vineyard PDFs on her own.

(phew! I remembered to copy this and paste it from the browser so the post didn't get eaten by a forum timeout! )

Yeah, True20 would be my choice for a generic game - simple system, easily customized.

Locally Pathfinder has been seeing steady growth, and everything else, especially 4e, has been shrinking. There is no store in town that is pushing Encounters - the local FLGS having stated outright that, no, they will not have them in the shop. Partly because they got burned by GW, but mostly because it just strikes them as antithetical to proper gaming. They want real games, not adventure McNuggets, thank you very much.

Now if WotC were to sponsor proper games/campaigns... maybe they would go with it, maybe not.

Ah well, Pathfinder seems to be doing okay, my own games have never been more full, so I guess RPGs aren't exactly dying... just down from the highs of 3.X. I am even going to get a short chance to play a little over the next few weeks, running the Devil himself as a wringer in the Ghoul Wood. I fully expect to corrupt half of them, starting with the paladin.... I intend to be helpful, courteous, and friendly... and to lead them down the broad, broad road.

The Auld Grump

As of lst night, there are 3 more D&D 4E players. But my daughters and I aren't going to be investing in a lot of books, just the ones we need (PH1, DMG1, MM1.) i can wing or invent the rest lol!