JB, author of the awesome B/X Blackrazor blog, calls me to task for making unsupported arguments yesterday. So here are my attempts to answer him:
Okay, so...my
understanding is that 5E has a LOT of fans, including a large proportion that
played some prior version of D&D (including many folks who, at one time,
might have been classified as "old school" or "old edition"
gamers). When you say you think MOST 5E fans are going to LOVE 5.5 you have to
be a bit more explicit: what specifically is it you think is going to appeal to
"most" 5E fans? What's the draw? The anime/storytelling thing? I
don't get the sense that that's the reason "most" folks play 5E.
Gotta' give me more as an explanation for your
conclusion.
First of all, let me say that there is a lot of guesswork
going on here. However, it’s not
completely groundless. My first source
comes from WotC. That said, WotC isn’t
exactly an uninterested observer and has all sorts of (mainly financial) reasons
to shade this data. And I’m fairly
certain some of it has come from very unscientific public surveys.
With those caveats aside, let’s look at the data we do
have. We’ll start with this infographic
published by WotC back in ’21.
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Ok, assuming most of us started playing around age 10 (4th
or 5th grade in the US), that means people who started playing with
TSR-era D&D at most make up 27% of their current players. Even if we say only half of those played before
3rd edition, that gives us better than 1-in-10 grognards amongst 5e’s
fans. That’s nothing to sneeze at, but
it also means at least 70% (and it’s more likely closer to 80%) of people playing
D&D missed the TSR era simply by being born too late.
Of course, just because they missed it doesn’t mean they’ve
never experienced it. Thanks to the OSR,
it’s not impossible that they have had a taste of OSR play. So, how are people playing D&D?
And here, I’m really gasping: a Reddit poll. In this particular poll, Wild Beyond the Witchlight
came in first, an adventure notorious for being so light on combat you can
actually finish it without spilling a drop of blood. Also in the top 10 are the investigation-heavy
Dragonheist and the atmosphere-heavy Curse of Strahd.
Of course, you can also counter that the “hard core”
(kinda-sorta but not really) hex crawl Tomb of Annihilation came in 2nd
and the chock-full-of-TSR-goodness Ghosts of Saltmarsh came in 4th. I can counter that WotC doubled down with Strixhaven,
but then you can counter that WotC has published a lot more Stormgiants and
Frostmaidens than Strixhavens.
My final datapoint is the popularity of CriticalRole. People keep linking D&D’s
success to Critical Role’s. I have no
idea how correct they are; after the collapse of what had been the “conventional
wisdom” of RPG.net over the past 20 years, I’m hesitant to lean too heavily on the
new conventional wisdom. That said,
having seen the lines (and the money-generating power) of Critical Role and
Acquisitions, Inc., I’m not going to believe that these streaming games haven’t
had an effect on how people play the game.
None of these are silver bullets, just a collection of
data points that nudge me towards believing that the build-your-own-furry
combined with a build-your-own-background-based-on-your-eight-page-backstory is
something that will please most D&D players these days.
But just because it’s a scientific wild-ass guess doesn’t
stop it from still being a wild-assed guess.
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6 comments:
I feel the need to point out that conclusions based on data that lacks any clear fundamental evidence, even when those conclusions dance additional non-evidentiary numbers between words, are just another form of opinion. I fail to see how any of this demonstrates anything about what "most" 5e players are, what their motivations are, what they'll do in the future or exactly what this post was meant to resolve.
@ Trollsmyth:
I appreciate you taking the time to write this all up. I did check out the links and sources you're using and I had an additional comment or two...just haven't had the time to write it.
The fantasy genre today isn't what it was when I was a kid. Or we were. That's it. That's it in a nutshell. People can rage and scream and moan about it all they want, but even Harry Potter is getting to be old hat. The whole environment is different around entertainment, up to and including the stories. I read a LOT of fantasy. There is very, very good fantasy being put out today. But it's not the same sort as it was (and ours wasn't like the fantasy of 30-40 years earlier, either!), and people who grow up with it have different expectations.
Nathan Irving: Can you suggest some titles and give us an idea of what the popular fantasy today is like? There are a handful of current authors I read (Buehlman, Crawford, Wexler), but I'm not sure how popular they are and if they'd fit in to what you're talking about.
Okay.
Okay.
27% of players being "TSR-era" originators can't really be conflated with "grognards;" there was a lot of folks brought into the game post-'89 who were taught VERY different sensibilities as far WHAT D&D is/was.
The actual number of people PLAYING D&D versus people buying/owning books and/or subscribing to D&D-catered services...well, I imagine that's a tough one to chart. Frankly, I'm curious about how WotC put the numbers together for that infographic, as is. Facebook data? D&D Beyond subscriptions? Informal polling? Just what constitutes the "D&D Community" for Hasbro's POV?
The Reddit poll is a non-starter for me. For a number of reasons.
As for Critical Role, etc.:
I don't think there can be any disputing that the popularity of that program (and it IS popular) has a direct link to the surging popularity of what is the CURRENT edition of D&D (as that is what is played and promoted by the actors). I believe that if you'd written
"I think most of the fans of CRITICAL ROLE are going to love it."
I'd have less quibble than with the idea that 'most fans of 5E' are going to love the new edition.
SO...while I see how you're formulating your conclusions, my own conclusion is much the same as it was: that this is just another way for the company that makes the world's most popular RPG to sucker people into buying another round of core rule books. Maybe they'll be giving folks what they want, maybe they won't, maybe they're pandering to the squeakiest of wheels, or maybe they're just pulling stuff out of their ass...who knows?
I think that this is (as it has been with most D&D press releases of the last 9 years) simply hype and propaganda with the POINT of drumming up sales. It's not all that substantive, it's not impactful, it's not really "news." It's flash and publicity aimed at squeezing dollars out of the rubes.
Ah, well.
JB: And my only counter to that is that it's not necessary. According to both WotC and ICv2, sales have been up nearly a third every year for the past three, I believe. Sales are already good, and this only threatens to harm them. First, people will hold off on buying, waiting for the new versions, and if the new version sucks, people won't buy at all. And, so far at least, I'm not seeing anything in the new rules intended to ease digital integration, like we did with 4e.
And that said, we're both experienced enough with corporate culture to know that just because something is a bad idea doesn't mean management won't be excited and enthusiastic to do it. ;D
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