I've played D+D for a very long time, and I'm concerned about your corporate well being. I never miss a product. I buy copies of stuff for all my friends once a year to keep the game running. Despite my volatile mouth, I'm a very good customer.
I just saw the first adventure from Dungeon #154, and I was pretty darned upset by it.
Why, may you ask?
It's the last month of 3.5. Wizards has conducted a negative campaign against itself for close to a year now.
For a year, the customer base been forced to listen to some of the most insulting arguments ever leveled at it. There's a right way and a wrong way to approach people, and Wizards chose the wrong way.
Closing out 3.5's gaming career with an adventure titled "Attack of the Straw Men" is just rude. It's nasty, only cements an opinion of Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro as a company, and the inner symbolism targeting the people who play 3.5 now and like it isn't particularly flattering.
I spent a couple days away from the boards thinking about giving 4th edition a serious chance right away.
Sure enough, I returned, and Wizards harpooned that in seconds.
In the future, Wizards of the Coast, please think through your marketing campaigns before you publish things. This is almost as bad as the old days when Hero System published Wings of the Valkyrie and had to pull it. (As cool as an adventure as it was, I completely understand why they did it.)
In the future, please carefully consider the timing of your product releases vis a vis your customer base. This thinly veiled insult did not go unnoticed.
Thank you,
Michael Satran
So my comment was that it should be the other way around. Their reasoning for all the FR 4e changes are, to me at least, pretty weak. Strawman arguements if you will. *Shrug* It was funny in my head. I donated red blood cells right before I posted that so I was a bit woozy. Sorry.
All they really have to do is stop and go to the balcony and look at the big picture before they title stuff.
It's the same reason J.K. Rowling never wrote a book titled "Harry Potter and his Twelve Inch Shvantz." It's guaranteed to be rude. Granted, I think the comment was well veiled, but it still doesn't excuse the usage.
Gamers are a fairly intelligent crowd. SOMEONE will notice.
The thing is, Ren, that all it would have taken was five seconds of "Hey, wait a minute, we can't say this."
All they really have to do is stop and go to the balcony and look at the big picture before they title stuff.
It's the same reason J.K. Rowling never wrote a book titled "Harry Potter and his Twelve Inch Shvantz." It's guaranteed to be rude. Granted, I think the comment was well veiled, but it still doesn't excuse the usage.
Gamers are a fairly intelligent crowd. SOMEONE will notice.
I am going to agree with Ren. You are reading too much into the title and the adventure. When I first read the title, I immediately thought of an old made for TV movie produced by Walt Disney called, Night of the Scarecrow. (I didn’t think the writers was doing a cheap knock off of the movie) I confess I don’t know much about the Mystrar setting but I do know WoTC has better things to do than insult the player base aka their source of lively hood. Its my humble opinion that you must be stopped!:P
By the way does this mean I fall into the not so fairly intelligent crowd; since I didn’t notice the WoTC hidden in-depth meaning secret enigma title message code? Maybe I should have sent my UPC codes off to TSR for the decoder ring.
Saw the pic and never bothered to look any further. The Epic / Destiny stuff is a nice treat though.
I prefer the Elmore painting with the scarecrow guardian and the witch. Google it. You will like it, I promise.
oops forgote to say:
msatran must be stopped!
-Didn't TSR/WotC do the same thing with their last 'official' Grayhawk product? Something about Drider-Man...?
Was he just your average day kid who was bitten by a radioactive Drider?
*sings off key*
Drider-Man, Drider-Man, radioactive Drider-Man
Was he just your average day kid who was bitten by a radioactive Drider?
-He might just have been. Crazy Underdark Faerzress'...
Honestly Mike, I think you are reading too much into this. I don't think this adventure was meant as a thinly veiled insult, but rather was the result of not thinking through the possible connotations that many could read into it. Then again, maybe I'm wrong and you are right. Still, I don't get the entire irritated-with-customers vibe from the company at the moment.
They're not showing any kind of vibe at all towards their customers, irritated/ not iriritated, nothing. Right now, it seems to be:
"Busniness is business. Gotta consolidate all the outstanding licenses and IP, transition the mags online, not to mention D&DI tools need development, re-design the website, oh . . . and get 4e launched in time. Busy, busy, busy!"
The image of WotC seems to have changed from "we're gamers just like you" (as when they first bought TSR and *saved* the D&D brand) into a less chummy, more traditional and efficient business.
I don't necessarily blame them, but as msatran notes: "Gamers are a fairly intelligent crowd. SOMEONE will notice." I also caught the Straw Men referrence in the latest Dungeon adventure, but I just
.Eh, maybe I'm just over-reacting, being too negative ;).
Obviously, that pumpkin-man is just a person wearing a costume! Not scary, not scary at all!:P
*Scooby-Do music playing on the background*
*Scooby-Do music playing on the background*
...And he would've kidnapped the Sandy Claws and gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for those meddling kids! :D
...And he would've kidnapped the Sandy Claws and gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for those meddling kids! :D
Lol, Scooby-Doo and Nightmare before Christmas? Win.
I didn't know weather to laugh or puke when Bats said "To the Mystery Machine!"
Anyhow, Scooby, Jack the P-King, and FR - how can it get any cooler?
Add Vin Diesal, maybe?
Anyhow, I was unaware of this adventure, but I'll have to go check it out. I don't know that I would have caught any 'hidden meaning' now that its already been pointed out. I tend to think it was just stupidity, not hostility... like the title of the now-infamous Zhent headless Horseman - I'm fairly certain they don't put a whole lot of thought into these things.