Crowdsourcing/Ransom as an answer to pirating?

[harpy]

One problem I see in the evolution of the RPG market is that over time I assume that the ratio of digital material compared to print material will eventually lean heavily on digital material, and print material will take up a smaller niche portion of consumption. Right now tablets are still fairly expensive but give it enough years and the price of a tablet will drop to levels where they will be ubiquitous. Further, there is going to be a demographics shift as younger consumers will enter the market from a background where digital consumption is the norm.

At a certain point (perhaps five years, more likely ten years from now) I'd expect that getting paid through printed material will have shrunk to the point where charging for digital material will be essential if costs are to be recouped and incentives gained to create more material.

What I'm wondering about is if the market will be able to adjust to a ransom model through crowdsourcing as a standard method of getting creators paid for their work?

There are a few dynamics at play here:

Will the market accept funding not only production costs but also development costs? That is, not only are elements such as artwork, layout, editing and the like being paid for, but also paying for the time to design, write and playtest the product? This would require higher funding goals to factor in these costs.

Will the market accept that only a portion of the consumers will pay for the product and the rest of the market will get the product for free?

Would some kind of standard formula be able to emerge that the market could accept for creator compensation? That is, something like a cent-per-word cost that would try and capture the development costs of the creator?

[Grod_The_Giant]

Kickstarter has certainly worked well for some projects-- FATE Core made almost a hundred and fifty times what it asked.

[Rhynn]

I think you may be underestimating the popularity of digital RPG material, but you may also be underestimating the profitability of completely digital media. A lot of people, weirdly enough, are willing to pay for things they could get for free, if it's easy to pay and they like the material. (I know both I and my friends buy things we have gotten or could get for free.)

Some (many?) smaller publishers already sell mainly or exclusively digital material, and judging by their continued existence, I think they're at least breaking even.

Crowdsourcing is new, and especially for RPGs, it has IMO not proven itself yet. There have been some pretty notorious RPG crowdsourcing failures (not as in they failed to meet and exceed their goal, but as in the author failed to deliver). Depending on how projects do in the near future, the popularity of crowdsourcing might fall or rise.


Will the market accept funding not only production costs but also development costs? That is, not only are elements such as artwork, layout, editing and the like being paid for, but also paying for the time to design, write and playtest the product? This would require higher funding goals to factor in these costs.

Well, Dwimmermount (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/autarch/dwimmermount) raised money mainly for paying the author for his time, so yeah. Of course, the author then stopped work, recently vanished, and the money's probably run out by now, so if he does come back to it, he'll have to finish it "for nothing."


Will the market accept that only a portion of the consumers will pay for the product and the rest of the market will get the product for free?

I think that's already been accepted. It's already the case for movies and music, and neither industry's profits are suffering. There's definitely a case to be made that piracy does not genuinely harm profits to a great degree, and that the exposure it gives may benefit the publishers. Whether this is ultimately the case is unclear.

[ArcturusV]

Well, I think mostly unclear based on how you interpret Copyright Math. Supposedly piracy is worse than ever. But the industries claiming to be most effective by it are continually posting record profits above and beyond what would be just market inflation.

So there's an intuitive gap in logic there. But it seems the one thing that does impact profits is usually overt attempts to combat piracy. Least in the layman view here as I have discovered facts and figures for it.

So I don't think it's quite as big a problem as it's made out to be. I think it mostly impacts secondary resale markets. As most piracy I see people do in life is not about what is new and fresh out of the box, but usually about getting a hold of something that's old, no longer being printed, and not on most store shelves.

e.g.: Most people don't pirate DnD 4th Edition, but instead 3.5 material which you cannot find anymore outside of secondary markets (In my simple observations). And even then there are some digital distributors who still make money off that secondary market.

[Rhynn]

So I don't think it's quite as big a problem as it's made out to be. I think it mostly impacts secondary resale markets. As most piracy I see people do in life is not about what is new and fresh out of the box, but usually about getting a hold of something that's old, no longer being printed, and not on most store shelves.

e.g.: Most people don't pirate DnD 4th Edition, but instead 3.5 material which you cannot find anymore outside of secondary markets (In my simple observations). And even then there are some digital distributors who still make money off that secondary market.

Seriously. Good luck finding physical copies of 70s RPG books - but so long as one exists and the right person gets a hold of it, they can scan it and distribute it online (quite probably in violation of copyright)-

This impacts publishers precisely not at all. The smart thing for them to do, though, is what WotC finally did - digital re-releases of all that old material. That way, people who want that old material can buy it, which is usually more convenient (convenience is the biggest factor in combating piracy - if you make it difficult to get or use your legal for-sale material, some people who would have bought it will pirate it instead). So digital re-releases most likely eats away at piracy, rather than encouraging it.

There's been this silly idea that releasing PDFs makes piracy "easier." Piracy of print books is already so ridiculously easy the effect is nil. For one person's work in scanning a book, thousands of people get it for free. The time investment per copy is next to nil, so it doesn't make any real difference if it was already a PDF.

Edit: Convenience also (or even primarily) includes "convenience of use." People will pirate games that have obtrusive DRM (sometimes after buying it, just so they don't have to deal with the DRM). For PDFs, a clean, OCR document with good resolution, no tilted pages, no folded pages, no dark edges, no scan overlap, etc. is pretty important, and it's easiest to deliver with official PDF releases.

One thing I haven't seen yet is updating your actual PDF book with errata etc., and offering that free to people who bought the original (easiest through online stores like DriveThruRPG etc., where purchases are recorded on accounts). That is the kind of "buyer bonus" that really makes online purchasing better than pirating. It will also make pirated copies LESS convenient, because pirates cannot be certain they've got the latest version with all the errata and updates.

[Grinner]

Seriously. Good luck finding physical copies of 70s RPG books - but so long as one exists and the right person gets a hold of it, they can scan it and distribute it online (quite probably in violation of copyright)-

That's precisely what they don't want you to do, though. As Greg Kostikyan put it, "So one of the most annoying aspects of roleplaying games is that people can buy your rules and play for decades, with dozens of other people, and never pay you a dime ever again. I mean, one lousy rule book gives them man-years of entertainment, and all I get is a lousy 5% of $6.95, ..."

The tabletop RPG industry doesn't have the greatest profit margins, unlike drugs pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and Magic: The Gathering. In order for the RPG companies to stay afloat, their products must be consumed. If the product has any sort of longevity, that becomes problematic.


One thing I haven't seen yet is updating your actual PDF book with errata etc., and offering that free to people who bought the original (easiest through online stores like DriveThruRPG etc., where purchases are recorded on accounts). That is the kind of "buyer bonus" that really makes online purchasing better than pirating. It will also make pirated copies LESS convenient, because pirates cannot be certain they've got the latest version with all the errata and updates.

I think White Wolf did this with Geist: The Sin-Eaters. If you sent in a photograph of your book, they'd send you a pdf of the revised version. I'm not sure if the offer is still available, however...

[Bogardan_Mage]

That's precisely what they don't want you to do, though. As Greg Kostikyan put it, "So one of the most annoying aspects of roleplaying games is that people can buy your rules and play for decades, with dozens of other people, and never pay you a dime ever again. I mean, one lousy rule book gives them man-years of entertainment, and all I get is a lousy 5% of $6.95, ..."

The tabletop RPG industry doesn't have the greatest profit margins, unlike drugs pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and Magic: The Gathering. In order for the RPG companies to stay afloat, their products must be consumed. If the product has any sort of longevity, that becomes problematic.
But that's a red herring. If the company is no longer selling the product then it doesn't matter who pirates it. They knew they'd no longer be making money off the product when they stopped selling it, they can't then cry foul that people are consuming their product without paying the second-party retailers. Either way the original publisher isn't getting a cent. If they want to make money off this product they have to actually sell it. It's not rocket science.

[mjlush]

Right now tablets are still fairly expensive but give it enough years and the price of a tablet will drop to levels where they will be ubiquitous.

Tablets are pretty cheap even now, the thing that there lacking is a good pdf reader.

I don't know if you have tried to use a pdf as a reference guide. I have and the experience sucks... even with a computer with keyboard and mouse its cumbersome to flip between sections. On a tablet you also have the choice of viewing the page in portrait with small font or landscape where the font is readable but you can only see 1/3rd of the page.

[Grinner]

But that's a red herring. If the company is no longer selling the product then it doesn't matter who pirates it. They knew they'd no longer be making money off the product when they stopped selling it, they can't then cry foul that people are consuming their product without paying the second-party retailers. Either way the original publisher isn't getting a cent. If they want to make money off this product they have to actually sell it. It's not rocket science.

The point I was trying to make is that if people are buying the company's old products and deriving just as much entertainment from them, then there will come a point where the company will begin competing with itself. Their new products will have to be sold alongside their old products, and each successive edition could be reasonably expected to produce less and less profit.

The logic is speculative, but it does also merit consideration.

Edit: As for piracy, the basic logic is the same. If people play it and don't pay the company a dime, then the company will not be able to sustain itself. The company's primary goal is to sustain itself, producing further profits.

Frankly, the whole idea of tabletop RPGs doesn't lend itself well to industrialization.

[Bogardan_Mage]

The point I was trying to make is that if people are buying the company's old products and deriving just as much entertainment from them, then there will come a point where the company will begin competing with itself. Their new products will have to be sold alongside their old products, and each successive edition could be reasonably expected to produce less and less profit.

The logic is speculative, but it does also merit consideration.

Edit: As for piracy, the basic logic is the same. If people play it and don't pay the company a dime, then the company will not be able to sustain itself. The company's primary goal is to sustain itself, producing further profits.

Frankly, the whole idea of tabletop RPGs doesn't lend itself well to industrialization.
Well, yes, but none of that is the pirates' fault. Those same problems exist whether or not anyone is pirating, especially if the alternative is would-be pirates buying the same products on the secondary market. I feel that if there was a simple solution then it would already be happening, precisely because this kind of thing is not linked to some recent rise in piracy.

[TBFProgrammer]

Frankly, the whole idea of tabletop RPGs doesn't lend itself well to industrialization.

There's that, and then there's the fact that the internet does not play nice with industrialization. Of course, with the vast amounts of home-brew floating around out there, tabletop RPGs could really be said to be transitioning nicely into an open-source product.

Basically, entertainment is moving back to something you produce for fun, with the really good people getting paid for live performances* and everyone else doing it in their spare time. The whole idea that you should be able to monetize every bit of "content" you put out is spectacularly out of whack with what the market can bear now that every producer has distribution capability, so this is only natural.


*I have seen a story about a DM being supported by their players, though not sure whether it is just an urban legend or not.

[Rhynn]

IMO the answer is more simple black-and-white books/PDFs (more than adequate for the job; who cares about the look if the content is good?), less full-color "flashy" WotC style books with illustrations on every other page. Lower the production costs, focus on content. And you have to remember that RPGs started out as labors of love, anyway - D&D's brief fling with mass popularity in the 80s was almost certainly an aberration, and unlikely to be repeated, especially now that we've got computer games and MMORPGs.

[elliott20]

But that's a red herring. If the company is no longer selling the product then it doesn't matter who pirates it. They knew they'd no longer be making money off the product when they stopped selling it, they can't then cry foul that people are consuming their product without paying the second-party retailers. Either way the original publisher isn't getting a cent. If they want to make money off this product they have to actually sell it. It's not rocket science.

That's actually not true. Legally speaking, the cost of NOT defending your copyright is that you are giving consent to the pirates to do what they want with it. Believe me, a lot of companies don't want to be THAT company that sends nasty C&D letters to prospective consumers. However, if you don't defend your copyright, it denotes consent, which means when you really DO need to defend your copyright, they have a legal precedent to use against you in court. It's the reason why Rich will let people read OOTS for free, but the moment you start copying his comics into file and start spreading it around, he will get upset. The reason is because if Rich doesn't defend that territory, it will cause even MORE legal trouble for him later when someone tries to actually make money off of it.

Unlike Rich though, publishers are not giving out their content for free, and THEN selling the book for those who just want to have a copy. They have a legacy business model that is built on the idea of retail and people "owning" a copy. They can't just turn around and give it all away and hope people will spring for the book like Rich does with OOTS. Doing so would require a drastic change in their business model and frankly will shrink their distribution.

They certainly can transition to that, but that takes a lot of time and a lot of resources. Also, let's not forget the other parties that will get impacted by this who might have a reason to stop them from doing so. i.e. contract printers and other copyright holders.

Having said that, you know what they CAN do right now to make that transition? If I were Hasbro, I would take the older edition books. (read: the ones that are not being sold anymore and are no longer giving out any contribution margins) and release them ALL... for free in PDF format.

Why? Because of brand equity.

There are a LOT of people out there who do not play 4E. I'm one of them. Chances are good I won't touch 5E either, or any edition beyond that. I don't have the time, nor the energy to learn new systems. But I still know 3.5E like the back of my hand, and I will pull out 2E every so often.

D&D has very strong brand equity. But with each new edition, it erodes and the last generation of customers are ultimately lost as a result.

Releasing all of the older books for free is basically a low-cost good will move that can genuinely strengthen their relationships with old customers.

And then here's the hat trick... start selling the old edition books again. Oh, don't invest a huge print shop operation like they do with their flagships. That would be crazy since the demand won't be there. But sell it at a premium. Not TOO high of a premium, mind you. Just enough to cover the additional unit cost due to smaller volume. These guys have 30 years of distribution data to work with, I'm sure they can probably pin down the demand for their older books within 5% margin of error.

Why would this work? Because people like having books. Books might not be the dominant way of consuming media for long, but it will still be viable for some years to come. Not everyone enjoys flipping through .pdf formats. For those who WANT to have a book, they will gladly pay for one. Considering that people who do this are generally older players (who tend to have more disposable income anyway), this is a viable way of retaining additional people.

The truth is, not everyone is going to want to convert to 4E. Sure, you can try, but a lot of us won't. The consumer behavior doesn't pan out. So why fight it? Why not just put a little bit of resources behind supporting the older editions? It doesn't even need to be much. A 50K USD hosting server, maybe 100K worth of wages to pay people to scan the books into acceptable .pdf formats, some legal people to step in and change the legal docs to reflect new terms and usage, and BAM, instant ability to control the way older consumers use the game while still retaining them as potential customers in the future.

In many ways, D&D *IS* the RPG industry. It's the 800 lb gorilla of roleplaying. So it is almost upon D&D's own shoulders to keep the industry afloat.

[Bogardan_Mage]

That's actually not true. Legally speaking, the cost of NOT defending your copyright is that you are giving consent to the pirates to do what they want with it. Believe me, a lot of companies don't want to be THAT company that sends nasty C&D letters to prospective consumers. However, if you don't defend your copyright, it denotes consent, which means when you really DO need to defend your copyright, they have a legal precedent to use against you in court. It's the reason why Rich will let people read OOTS for free, but the moment you start copying his comics into file and start spreading it around, he will get upset. The reason is because if Rich doesn't defend that territory, it will cause even MORE legal trouble for him later when someone tries to actually make money off of it.

Unlike Rich though, publishers are not giving out their content for free, and THEN selling the book for those who just want to have a copy. They have a legacy business model that is built on the idea of retail and people "owning" a copy. They can't just turn around and give it all away and hope people will spring for the book like Rich does with OOTS. Doing so would require a drastic change in their business model and frankly will shrink their distribution.
I stand by what I said. The problem is not piracy, it's publishers not making available the products that consumers demand. The nonsensical legalities involved in why that's a problem are irrelevant. The solution, as you stated despite your objections, is to make such products available. Of course, now Grinner's going to complain that the publishers will be competing against themselves because somehow it's also the pirates' fault that the publishers failed to anticipate market demand in their new product. That's also irrelevant.

[Rhynn]

That's actually not true. Legally speaking, the cost of NOT defending your copyright is that you are giving consent to the pirates to do what they want with it. Believe me, a lot of companies don't want to be THAT company that sends nasty C&D letters to prospective consumers. However, if you don't defend your copyright, it denotes consent, which means when you really DO need to defend your copyright, they have a legal precedent to use against you in court. It's the reason why Rich will let people read OOTS for free, but the moment you start copying his comics into file and start spreading it around, he will get upset. The reason is because if Rich doesn't defend that territory, it will cause even MORE legal trouble for him later when someone tries to actually make money off of it.

I think you might be thinking about trademarks, there.

Anyway, all that would require proving that company X was aware of specific infringement Y and chose not to act on it. Good luck there. A ton of piracy goes unaddressed constantly, and hasn't caused anyone's copyright to lapse that I've ever heard of.

[Grinner]

I stand by what I said. The problem is not piracy, it's publishers not making available the products that consumers demand. The nonsensical legalities involved in why that's a problem are irrelevant. The solution, as you stated despite your objections, is to make such products available. Of course, now Grinner's going to complain that the publishers will be competing against themselves because somehow it's also the pirates' fault that the publishers failed to anticipate market demand in their new product. That's also irrelevant.

Actually, I was going to note how they screw themselves either way.

You're being a bit defensive. :smallconfused:

Edit: And dismissive. Very dismissive.

[Bogardan_Mage]

Actually, I was going to note how they screw themselves either way.

You're being a bit defensive. :smallconfused:

Edit: And dismissive. Very dismissive.
My apologies? That was kind of my way of pointing out to Elliot that you'd already dismissed his solution, I'm not trying to be defensive or dismissive.

[Stubbazubba]

I don't think Grinner was saying that what he brought up in his first post was ever the pirates' fault. He said it was an inherent part of the medium that creates problems even without piracy, and that piracy just exacerbates it. You reacted as if he attributed the inherent issue to piracy, which he did not, he just brought up a related issue that overlaps with the piracy issue.

[Bogardan_Mage]

I don't think Grinner was saying that what he brought up in his first post was ever the pirates' fault. He said it was an inherent part of the medium that creates problems even without piracy, and that piracy just exacerbates it. You reacted as if he attributed the inherent issue to piracy, which he did not, he just brought up a related issue that overlaps with the piracy issue.
Yeah, I see that now (although I'd still argue that piracy does not exacerbate it, it's quantitatively equivalent to other likely outcomes [i.e. publisher gets no money for thing they're not selling])

[Stubbazubba]

That's precisely what they don't want you to do, though. As Greg Kostikyan put it, "So one of the most annoying aspects of roleplaying games is that people can buy your rules and play for decades, with dozens of other people, and never pay you a dime ever again. I mean, one lousy rule book gives them man-years of entertainment, and all I get is a lousy 5% of $6.95, ..."

The tabletop RPG industry doesn't have the greatest profit margins, unlike drugs pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and Magic: The Gathering. In order for the RPG companies to stay afloat, their products must be consumed. If the product has any sort of longevity, that becomes problematic.

Which is why WotC and others wanted splatbooks to be a major source of income, and then is always attempting to draw new blood into the market, because RPGs is a very easy market to saturate for someone on Hasbro's scale.

The question, then, is how does one make money off of an RPG that's already saturated? Splatbooks is one answer, but you get diminishing returns on that after a certain point.

My suggestion would be to just make a new RPG, and yes, sell it alongside the old one. The only reason everyone bought Pathfinder after 4e came out was because they couldn't keep buying 3.5. At least, that's my theory. WotC bought into the idea that to convince people to buy 4e they couldn't let 3.5 continue to be an option. And in terms of market share and such, I can see why they would think that, but honestly, by this point in time it's obvious that gamers collect dozens, and dozens, and dozens, of games. KS proves it, DTRPG proves it, photos of whole rooms filled with personal collections; gamers buy RPGs that they seldom or never play, like pc gamers have Steam folders that they could play each one for 1 hour and not finish before the heat death of the universe.

WotC was wrong; they could've kept 3.5 up and released 4e as Dungeon Tactics or something (heck, releasing it as a separate game would have allowed them to ignore legacy issues they didn't want to deal with), and it would have worked just fine, and everyone would have bought it, and played it back and forth, alternating with their D&D game. And then WotC makes another game, maybe a social drama game about high court politics in the same setting, and releases that. People would buy it. So long as these are spaced out enough and seen as different games, (oh, and good enough), everyone will buy a copy, and the money keeps rolling in.

When the market for one game becomes saturated, you switch production models and go for digital only or premium POD. Are you competing with yourself? No. This is a luxury good, and having more options is almost always appealing, if the price is right.

How do splatbooks fit in with this? Well, you can always Kickstart one, paying for it before you release. When you no longer find it profitable to keep up a full-time team on the title, open the license up to third-party creators to take it and make their own, and let them do the legwork while you enjoy more long-tail sales of your old books.

At this point you have multiple games engaging the same customer base, each with a small but overlapping community that keeps it going while you get to count the revenue streams. When they get too thin, maybe have a PDF sale or kickstart a Gold Edition core book or something. And always be working on something new. Because, seriously, they will buy it.

[elliott20]

Which is why WotC and others wanted splatbooks to be a major source of income, and then is always attempting to draw new blood into the market, because RPGs is a very easy market to saturate for someone on Hasbro's scale.

The question, then, is how does one make money off of an RPG that's already saturated? Splatbooks is one answer, but you get diminishing returns on that after a certain point.

My suggestion would be to just make a new RPG, and yes, sell it alongside the old one. The only reason everyone bought Pathfinder after 4e came out was because they couldn't keep buying 3.5. At least, that's my theory. WotC bought into the idea that to convince people to buy 4e they couldn't let 3.5 continue to be an option. And in terms of market share and such, I can see why they would think that, but honestly, by this point in time it's obvious that gamers collect dozens, and dozens, and dozens, of games. KS proves it, DTRPG proves it, photos of whole rooms filled with personal collections; gamers buy RPGs that they seldom or never play, like pc gamers have Steam folders that they could play each one for 1 hour and not finish before the heat death of the universe.

WotC was wrong; they could've kept 3.5 up and released 4e as Dungeon Tactics or something (heck, releasing it as a separate game would have allowed them to ignore legacy issues they didn't want to deal with), and it would have worked just fine, and everyone would have bought it, and played it back and forth, alternating with their D&D game. And then WotC makes another game, maybe a social drama game about high court politics in the same setting, and releases that. People would buy it. So long as these are spaced out enough and seen as different games, (oh, and good enough), everyone will buy a copy, and the money keeps rolling in.

When the market for one game becomes saturated, you switch production models and go for digital only or premium POD. Are you competing with yourself? No. This is a luxury good, and having more options is almost always appealing, if the price is right.

How do splatbooks fit in with this? Well, you can always Kickstart one, paying for it before you release. When you no longer find it profitable to keep up a full-time team on the title, open the license up to third-party creators to take it and make their own, and let them do the legwork while you enjoy more long-tail sales of your old books.

At this point you have multiple games engaging the same customer base, each with a small but overlapping community that keeps it going while you get to count the revenue streams. When they get too thin, maybe have a PDF sale or kickstart a Gold Edition core book or something. And always be working on something new. Because, seriously, they will buy it.
This model rests on the assumption that product expansion = market expansion, which is not always the case. A new product, while does give the company a new product lifecycle extension, does not address the problem of RPG market saturation, which is happening with standard fare fantasy.

The RPG market is primarily, like you said, a luxury good market and it's a hobby industry. In these markets, they are generally sustain through high consumption individuals rather than say, mass market appeal. D&D is the first to try to shoot for mass market appeal, and even then seems to be met with considerable resistance.

In a rather mature industry like these, generally the next logical step to happen is going to be a glut of imitators, followed by massive consolidations, using mergers and acquisitions as the primary growth.

What Hasbro needs to do is to not make ANOTHER game and ANOTHER set of books, but cross promote with other products. I'm certain a D&D toyline that is not focused on just being figurines can do well. Hasbro already has the distribution channels up, so really going that next would be the most natural step. Imagine being able to buy D&D toys (specifically, toys aimed at younger kids) at a Walmart or Target. Imagine a D&D phone app that is made so that you don't need to buy the books. These are all avenues that can be explored. But most likely, Hasbro would probably just start buying up licenses and start releasing Star Wars, 4th Edition style or some such.

[Stubbazubba]

This model rests on the assumption that product expansion = market expansion, which is not always the case. A new product, while does give the company a new product lifecycle extension, does not address the problem of RPG market saturation, which is happening with standard fare fantasy.

? I was specifically planning around a non-expanding market, actually. I think it's abundantly clear that gamers will buy many, many more games than they can actually play regularly. How many people own D&D 3.5/Pathfinder, 4e, Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard, Exalted, MERP, True20, Barbarians of Lemuria, The 13th Age, The One Ring, or any combination of 2-3 therein? I honestly think there's a significant portion of the market which will keep buying new games, in search of a better, or at least novel, fantasy experience. Then apply that to horror, sci-fi, cyberpunk, steampunk, etc. This market has an appetite for more entries in the same genre. I don't think we've reached the point of saturation, even for fantasy games; when 4e was released, people bought it, even though there were still multiple other D&D products available. When 5e is released, people will buy that (although not as many as would have if they hadn't tipped their disappointing hand with the playtest). And other genres are even more exploitable. Without ever even growing the market, you can keep pumping new games into what's there, and so long as it's more than just an incremental difference, I think enough people will buy it, even if they already own 6 fantasy systems. Because you're not satisfying a need; it's a luxury good. Super rich people own way more cars than they need to get anywhere; gamers own way more games than they can actually play long campaigns of. They will buy it to read it once, play it once, and then decide if they want to keep playing it or just put it on the shelf for reference.


What Hasbro needs to do is to not make ANOTHER game and ANOTHER set of books, but cross promote with other products. I'm certain a D&D toyline that is not focused on just being figurines can do well. Hasbro already has the distribution channels up, so really going that next would be the most natural step. Imagine being able to buy D&D toys (specifically, toys aimed at younger kids) at a Walmart or Target. Imagine a D&D phone app that is made so that you don't need to buy the books. These are all avenues that can be explored. But most likely, Hasbro would probably just start buying up licenses and start releasing Star Wars, 4th Edition style or some such.

I believe that was SAGA Edition.

Hasbro should be making a D&D movie, or a new cartoon, or something, I agree. A toyline would be great, either on its own or in concert with a movie. Novels, which they're already doing, is a non-insignificant revenue stream. Video games (is DDO still making money?) is another way to milk that license.

But none of that will keep the RPG industry up, the same way Avengers movies don't help Dark Horse comics. D&D toy sales or a D&D movie won't have much impact on White Wolf's bottom line, or anything else. I agree, a V:tM TV drama is well overdue, considering the recent popularity of vampire-related media (no, not just Twilight, but True Blood, Supernatural, Dresden Files). So if everyone tries to make their brand into a multi-media license, then sure, that'll help the companies, but the RPG industry itself is, I think, a different issue. I think the best thing to do for that is keep making new games, and don't hope to hit on a cash cow like D&D that'll make money in perpetuity.

[Grinner]

..I agree, a V:tM TV drama is well overdue, considering the recent popularity of vampire-related media (no, not just Twilight, but True Blood, Supernatural, Dresden Files).

Didn't they already make one?

[Stubbazubba]

Oh, so there was. Well, a better one, then. It's been over ten years, we can reboot.

[elliott20]

I guess this is where we differ. I personally think that the way to expand the RPG market is not just to make more products, but to do a better job converting more people into roleplayers. We all know that current crop of existing roleplayers will always continue to buy more than they can play, but I believe it can be even bigger as long as the games delivered to people suit their taste.

The gateway to that, I think, is the transmedia approach. i.e. let's take the iconic Eberron setting, and convert a bunch of those into toys. Build awareness among the kids. Give the toys stats that the kids will wonder about. Make a computer game, maybe, that gives a bunch of lite setting stuff. One of the little perks of the game? You get an Eberron settings book (or PDF file), and some handy little notes in the bundle to go with the computer game. It's pretty much the pokemon playbook.

[Stubbazubba]

I guess this is where we differ. I personally think that the way to expand the RPG market is not just to make more products, but to do a better job converting more people into roleplayers. We all know that current crop of existing roleplayers will always continue to buy more than they can play, but I believe it can be even bigger as long as the games delivered to people suit their taste.

The gateway to that, I think, is the transmedia approach. i.e. let's take the iconic Eberron setting, and convert a bunch of those into toys. Build awareness among the kids. Give the toys stats that the kids will wonder about. Make a computer game, maybe, that gives a bunch of lite setting stuff. One of the little perks of the game? You get an Eberron settings book (or PDF file), and some handy little notes in the bundle to go with the computer game. It's pretty much the pokemon playbook.

Well, I'm certainly not saying don't do that, as I would love to buy my kids D&D action figures one day, or be excited to see a Pathfinder movie, or get hooked on a Netflix original TV show based on an RPG. But, in contrast to the Pokemon example, look at super hero movies and cartoons; these have been extremely popular lately, with no significant surge in comic book sales. So while going trans-media may strike gold for the original IPs out there, it also might not actually help TTRPGs themselves. But I certainly think the big dogs should try it. As for the rest of us hobby designers and small-scale operations, I think focusing on increasing output is a more incremental first step, at least to establish an IP.

I think we're just thinking in different terms; I'm thinking of all the very small publishers that have flooded the market recently, while I think you're thinking of major publishers.

[elliott20]

Well, I'm certainly not saying don't do that, as I would love to buy my kids D&D action figures one day, or be excited to see a Pathfinder movie, or get hooked on a Netflix original TV show based on an RPG. But, in contrast to the Pokemon example, look at super hero movies and cartoons; these have been extremely popular lately, with no significant surge in comic book sales. So while going trans-media may strike gold for the original IPs out there, it also might not actually help TTRPGs themselves. But I certainly think the big dogs should try it. As for the rest of us hobby designers and small-scale operations, I think focusing on increasing output is a more incremental first step, at least to establish an IP.

I think we're just thinking in different terms; I'm thinking of all the very small publishers that have flooded the market recently, while I think you're thinking of major publishers.
That is certainly true. I've been spending a lot of time practicing management consulting stuff lately so my mind is a little railroaded.

Having said that, I just realize that there is a reason that Hasbro has not done what I said earlier, and it's because of franchise mass appeal. Right now, Hasbro owns a bunch of settings that is oozing with possibilities, but no main cast to build the whole thing around.

Generally, when franchises are built, you do so by first building a cast, and then have the world be built around the cast. This is generally how games, TV, and other mediums work. TTRPGs function off of the PLAYERS filling the slot of the protagonist, and as such, all they have are a setting with some potential major characters to fill in. It's probably why the transmedia approach has been somewhat hit or miss with things like the D&D movie.

For smaller publishers, oh yeah, I totally agree with you there. You need to just get your product out. But the problem with being a TTRPG indie publisher is your market growth strategy. The market as of this moment is quite small and quite saturated. to succeed you really need to find ways to expand beyond just the traditional markets. We're seeing a lot of indie games popping up to serve different play styles, which can be drawn to represents industry segments. What a lot of these need right now is a clear idea on where they need to push. Fate has managed to isolate a corner of the market for themselves as a mid-tier stop between the indie/D&D ends of the pole, and that's good. That's pretty much how League of Legends managed to become a mainstream game.

All Fate needs is some more auxiliary items to be built around it and they can really blow up.