Community Survey, what should be stressed? - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Community Survey, what should be stressed?

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
risner
Jun 15, 2009 22:11:03 WotC just posted a survey for 4E D&D.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4dnd/survey

In 3E/3.5E, WotC never published enough Errata. I don't really see the 4E getting better treatment (I've seen a lot of debated points in 4E games that as of yet are unresolved.)

Should we stress Errata during the survey?
Is there some other pressing issue more dire than Errata?
#2
SwordDisciple
Jun 15, 2009 22:36:24 Yes Errata is needed as they never get it right the first time..

Possibly dropping 4e and returning to 3.5e?
#3
risner
Jun 15, 2009 23:03:20
Possibly dropping 4e and returning to 3.5e?

That is never going to happen. There are far too many 4E players that have no intention to ever even try 3.5E to even consider that a good idea.

I run a lot of 4E games, as well as run/play 3.5E games. The audience for the two games are vastly different.

I'd like to limit this thread to "what should be pressing issues for the survey" and stray away from any version war discussion or anything unrelated to the survey.
#4
Chaos_Redefined
Jun 15, 2009 23:20:52 How about, sure, keep 4e going, but get some support for 3.5 still. We are still here, we do still exist.
#5
sofawall
Jun 15, 2009 23:22:24 Why are you posting here? To get responses from people who know what went wrong before, in an attempt to prevent it happening again?

Good on you.
#6
SwordDisciple
Jun 15, 2009 23:50:38
Why are you posting here? To get responses from people who know what went wrong before, in an attempt to prevent it happening again?

Good on you.

I must say I have to agree. We know there are things about 3.5e that went wrong. We all know they didn't really proof-read much of the material that came out, otherwise they wouldn't have had to keep using errata.

They won't drop 4e for 3.5e but Chaos_Redefined has it right - continue support for those who wish to remain playing 3.5e until they release a far superior and non-4e like edition. Alot of those who continue to play 3.5e don't want to play 4e because there is a good base with 3.5e - it just had to be re-worked correctly rather than dropped.

To be frank, I wont play 4e. I have no suggestions for 4e. But thanks for the opportunity to put my thoughts forward Risner
#7
sublime-sage
Jun 16, 2009 0:28:19 I want more 3.5 books. I would like to see a add-on to the ToB. I know people don't like the ToB but a book with more classes, stances, and manuvers. Also a Tome Of Magic add on.
#8
dr_rocktopus
Jun 16, 2009 0:37:40 Errata.
#9
xakypshalorn
Jun 16, 2009 0:48:40 I have a thought. Bring back "the customer is always right" instead of treating us like dirt with all the crap they keep throwing at us in terms of service and lawsuits.

(Can you believe there was an online discussion once where they were considering making the sale of used WotC books illegal?)
#10
dr_rocktopus
Jun 16, 2009 1:42:23 All I want is a commitment, in writing, in front of the whole community, to follow through. I want errata for every fourth ed book, updated every six months in a comprehensive fashion and readily available to anyone who's curious.

It's good enough for us Magic players, why can't we get it as DnDers?
#11
risner
Jun 16, 2009 4:16:57
I want more 3.5 books. I would like to see a add-on to the ToB. I know people don't like the ToB but a book with more classes, stances, and manuvers. Also a Tome Of Magic add on.

Sadly that isn't ever going to happen, and it something that we shouldn't be asking them to do.

It's good enough for us Magic players, why can't we get it as DnDers?

That is the curious nugget, they know how to do this on magic but not on D&D. What is it about Magic that they feel the need to keep good errata updates that isn't duplicated in D&D?

Is it that in magic a "book" is 40 words and in D&D a book is 200+ pages with many different features inside?

For that matter, is Errata the ONLY improvement to the game?

Are there any other improvements that would be equal or better?

As for why I put it in this thread, in the 3.5 section, I don't see their behaviour all that different and the majority of people in 4e are new players (at least the 30-40 real life 4e players I know only 1 has ever played 3.5 games.) I figure the 3.5 crowd has had more time to mull over what it is they are doing that could be done better.
#12
poignant123
Jun 16, 2009 6:42:57 Not just errata, GOOD errata, not fail errata like the Tome of Battle.
#13
hogarth
Jun 16, 2009 7:51:12
That is the curious nugget, they know how to do this on magic but not on D&D. What is it about Magic that they feel the need to keep good errata updates that isn't duplicated in D&D?

Because tournament play requires errata to keep things balanced, whereas RPGs can be more loosey-goosey.
#14
dr_rocktopus
Jun 16, 2009 7:59:00 Can be, but should not be.
I play both, very extensively.
#15
casualgatherer
Jun 16, 2009 9:12:55 Ultimately, the reason Magic has an errata released for every set is that Magic has gotten in the habit of doing it, while DND has gotten in the habit of doing it only once people start raising a kurfuffle(YES!) about it. Badly. Either way, a better maintained 4ed errata would be wonderful.
#16
ninjarabbit
Jun 16, 2009 9:21:01 Flat out better customer service, specifically treating customers with more respect.
#17
Treantmonklvl20
Jun 16, 2009 11:54:17 WotC has done all they will do for 3.5. I don't really care what they do for 4e since I've given up on 4e.

Now, we need to bug Paizo about what we want for 3.5, since they are the ones who are still publishing new material for 3.5 (Under the "Pathfinder" revised 3.5 system).
#18
PlzBreakMyCampaign
Jun 16, 2009 12:17:35
Should we stress Errata during the survey?
Is there some other pressing issue more dire than Errata?

Really?

This board (generally) could care less about helping 4e do better because the pressing issue is that there is no backwards compatibility. It would be like Sony saying screw all you PS2 people, I have a new version out.

Did Sony do that? No. Does Sony have still have customers? Yes. If WotC really cared they would KEEP UP 3.5 support, at the minimum. As it stands now, its like the company forgot 3.5e still exists.
#19
ninjarabbit
Jun 16, 2009 13:57:37
Really?

This board (generally) could care less about helping 4e do better because the pressing issue is that there is no backwards compatibility. It would be like Sony saying screw all you PS2 people, I have a new version out.

Did Sony do that? No. Does Sony have still have customers? Yes. If WotC really cared they would KEEP UP 3.5 support, at the minimum. As it stands now, its like the company forgot 3.5e still exists.

The PS2 sells almost as well as the PS3, so it's in Sony's best interests to provide at least minimal support for the PS2.

It would be nice for Wizards to give at least minimal support to 3.5 and probably smart too. Right now Wizards is giving me the message that they will drop support of 4.0 as soon as 4.5 or 5.0 come out and that doesn't give me much confidence as a consumer.
#20
darth_versity
Jun 16, 2009 14:08:20 Personaly, I couldn't care less what happens to 4e. My group played only 1 4e game and of the 6 of us only 1 person enjoyed, and even he thought 3.5 was still better.

I know there are plenty of 4e players, but i'm not all that interested in paying a lot of money for books that will be dropped when they decide to move on to 5e.
#21
lormador
Jun 16, 2009 21:46:22
It's good enough for us Magic players, why can't we get it as DnDers?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic far more lucrative than DnD? Both in terms of profit margin and raw sales.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has had this conversation with the local game store owner, and observed the sales volume generated by the local DnD groups coming in to play vs. the Magic draft tournament.

The Phoenix UnCon 2007 was far smaller than the 2007 Grand Prix held there, for example.

From this perspective, support for a product like 3.5 would undermine the entire 4th edition market they are trying to generate. New editions are the lifeblood of the game in the sense that they are the only real source of revenue. If they simply continued to develop 3.5 in greater detail, books would become ever more specialized, diluting the market appeal of each one.

It is in the financial interest of the publisher to keep us around without offending us, gradually drawing us into the new editions by force of all the people who play exclusively 4th edition. It would be easier if 4th was better, but in the end it doesn't really matter. The risk I think they are running, is that since 3.5 as an update came out so quickly after 3rd edition, and 4th edition so soon after that, a lot of players will hold out for 5th edition if they continue in the hobby at all.
#22
curufin
Jun 16, 2009 22:20:46 More tentacle!

Wait...there's a 4th edition? Ok. How about actually fixing later print runs of books to include errata. How about releasing all of the codex books when you release the new rules update instead of trickling them out over 2 years? Oops, wrong game.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic far more lucrative than DnD? Both in terms of profit margin and raw sales.

It helps that the "core" of Magic changes every two years or so. Competitive play requires you to constantly update your collection. You also have a lot of magic buyers who just sell off the rares to make money and never actually play the game. The system is built around a model specifically designed to make more money.
#23
dr_rocktopus
Jun 17, 2009 1:18:42
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic far more lucrative than DnD? Both in terms of profit margin and raw sales.

It certainly is, but errata are not terribly difficult to do, particularly since they did the stupid sage columns effectively instead.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 risner Jun 15, 2009 22:11:03	WotC just posted a survey for 4E D&D. http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4dnd/survey In 3E/3.5E, WotC never published enough Errata. I don't really see the 4E getting better treatment (I've seen a lot of debated points in 4E games that as of yet are unresolved.) Should we stress Errata during the survey? Is there some other pressing issue more dire than Errata?
#2 SwordDisciple Jun 15, 2009 22:36:24	Yes Errata is needed as they never get it right the first time.. Possibly dropping 4e and returning to 3.5e?
#3 risner Jun 15, 2009 23:03:20	Possibly dropping 4e and returning to 3.5e? That is never going to happen. There are far too many 4E players that have no intention to ever even try 3.5E to even consider that a good idea. I run a lot of 4E games, as well as run/play 3.5E games. The audience for the two games are vastly different. I'd like to limit this thread to "what should be pressing issues for the survey" and stray away from any version war discussion or anything unrelated to the survey.
#4 Chaos_Redefined Jun 15, 2009 23:20:52	How about, sure, keep 4e going, but get some support for 3.5 still. We are still here, we do still exist.
#5 sofawall Jun 15, 2009 23:22:24	Why are you posting here? To get responses from people who know what went wrong before, in an attempt to prevent it happening again? Good on you.
#6 SwordDisciple Jun 15, 2009 23:50:38	Why are you posting here? To get responses from people who know what went wrong before, in an attempt to prevent it happening again? Good on you. I must say I have to agree. We know there are things about 3.5e that went wrong. We all know they didn't really proof-read much of the material that came out, otherwise they wouldn't have had to keep using errata. They won't drop 4e for 3.5e but Chaos_Redefined has it right - continue support for those who wish to remain playing 3.5e until they release a far superior and non-4e like edition. Alot of those who continue to play 3.5e don't want to play 4e because there is a good base with 3.5e - it just had to be re-worked correctly rather than dropped. To be frank, I wont play 4e. I have no suggestions for 4e. But thanks for the opportunity to put my thoughts forward Risner
#7 sublime-sage Jun 16, 2009 0:28:19	I want more 3.5 books. I would like to see a add-on to the ToB. I know people don't like the ToB but a book with more classes, stances, and manuvers. Also a Tome Of Magic add on.
#8 dr_rocktopus Jun 16, 2009 0:37:40	Errata.
#9 xakypshalorn Jun 16, 2009 0:48:40	I have a thought. Bring back "the customer is always right" instead of treating us like dirt with all the crap they keep throwing at us in terms of service and lawsuits. (Can you believe there was an online discussion once where they were considering making the sale of used WotC books illegal?)
#10 dr_rocktopus Jun 16, 2009 1:42:23	All I want is a commitment, in writing, in front of the whole community, to follow through. I want errata for every fourth ed book, updated every six months in a comprehensive fashion and readily available to anyone who's curious. It's good enough for us Magic players, why can't we get it as DnDers?
#11 risner Jun 16, 2009 4:16:57	I want more 3.5 books. I would like to see a add-on to the ToB. I know people don't like the ToB but a book with more classes, stances, and manuvers. Also a Tome Of Magic add on. Sadly that isn't ever going to happen, and it something that we shouldn't be asking them to do. It's good enough for us Magic players, why can't we get it as DnDers? That is the curious nugget, they know how to do this on magic but not on D&D. What is it about Magic that they feel the need to keep good errata updates that isn't duplicated in D&D? Is it that in magic a "book" is 40 words and in D&D a book is 200+ pages with many different features inside? For that matter, is Errata the ONLY improvement to the game? Are there any other improvements that would be equal or better? As for why I put it in this thread, in the 3.5 section, I don't see their behaviour all that different and the majority of people in 4e are new players (at least the 30-40 real life 4e players I know only 1 has ever played 3.5 games.) I figure the 3.5 crowd has had more time to mull over what it is they are doing that could be done better.
#12 poignant123 Jun 16, 2009 6:42:57	Not just errata, GOOD errata, not fail errata like the Tome of Battle.
#13 hogarth Jun 16, 2009 7:51:12	That is the curious nugget, they know how to do this on magic but not on D&D. What is it about Magic that they feel the need to keep good errata updates that isn't duplicated in D&D? Because tournament play requires errata to keep things balanced, whereas RPGs can be more loosey-goosey.
#14 dr_rocktopus Jun 16, 2009 7:59:00	Can be, but should not be. I play both, very extensively.
#15 casualgatherer Jun 16, 2009 9:12:55	Ultimately, the reason Magic has an errata released for every set is that Magic has gotten in the habit of doing it, while DND has gotten in the habit of doing it only once people start raising a kurfuffle(YES!) about it. Badly. Either way, a better maintained 4ed errata would be wonderful.
#16 ninjarabbit Jun 16, 2009 9:21:01	Flat out better customer service, specifically treating customers with more respect.
#17 Treantmonklvl20 Jun 16, 2009 11:54:17	WotC has done all they will do for 3.5. I don't really care what they do for 4e since I've given up on 4e. Now, we need to bug Paizo about what we want for 3.5, since they are the ones who are still publishing new material for 3.5 (Under the "Pathfinder" revised 3.5 system).
#18 PlzBreakMyCampaign Jun 16, 2009 12:17:35	Should we stress Errata during the survey? Is there some other pressing issue more dire than Errata? Really? This board (generally) could care less about helping 4e do better because the pressing issue is that there is no backwards compatibility. It would be like Sony saying screw all you PS2 people, I have a new version out. Did Sony do that? No. Does Sony have still have customers? Yes. If WotC really cared they would KEEP UP 3.5 support, at the minimum. As it stands now, its like the company forgot 3.5e still exists.
#19 ninjarabbit Jun 16, 2009 13:57:37	Really? This board (generally) could care less about helping 4e do better because the pressing issue is that there is no backwards compatibility. It would be like Sony saying screw all you PS2 people, I have a new version out. Did Sony do that? No. Does Sony have still have customers? Yes. If WotC really cared they would KEEP UP 3.5 support, at the minimum. As it stands now, its like the company forgot 3.5e still exists. The PS2 sells almost as well as the PS3, so it's in Sony's best interests to provide at least minimal support for the PS2. It would be nice for Wizards to give at least minimal support to 3.5 and probably smart too. Right now Wizards is giving me the message that they will drop support of 4.0 as soon as 4.5 or 5.0 come out and that doesn't give me much confidence as a consumer.
#20 darth_versity Jun 16, 2009 14:08:20	Personaly, I couldn't care less what happens to 4e. My group played only 1 4e game and of the 6 of us only 1 person enjoyed, and even he thought 3.5 was still better. I know there are plenty of 4e players, but i'm not all that interested in paying a lot of money for books that will be dropped when they decide to move on to 5e.
#21 lormador Jun 16, 2009 21:46:22	It's good enough for us Magic players, why can't we get it as DnDers? Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic far more lucrative than DnD? Both in terms of profit margin and raw sales. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has had this conversation with the local game store owner, and observed the sales volume generated by the local DnD groups coming in to play vs. the Magic draft tournament. The Phoenix UnCon 2007 was far smaller than the 2007 Grand Prix held there, for example. From this perspective, support for a product like 3.5 would undermine the entire 4th edition market they are trying to generate. New editions are the lifeblood of the game in the sense that they are the only real source of revenue. If they simply continued to develop 3.5 in greater detail, books would become ever more specialized, diluting the market appeal of each one. It is in the financial interest of the publisher to keep us around without offending us, gradually drawing us into the new editions by force of all the people who play exclusively 4th edition. It would be easier if 4th was better, but in the end it doesn't really matter. The risk I think they are running, is that since 3.5 as an update came out so quickly after 3rd edition, and 4th edition so soon after that, a lot of players will hold out for 5th edition if they continue in the hobby at all.
#22 curufin Jun 16, 2009 22:20:46	More tentacle! Wait...there's a 4th edition? Ok. How about actually fixing later print runs of books to include errata. How about releasing all of the codex books when you release the new rules update instead of trickling them out over 2 years? Oops, wrong game. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic far more lucrative than DnD? Both in terms of profit margin and raw sales. It helps that the "core" of Magic changes every two years or so. Competitive play requires you to constantly update your collection. You also have a lot of magic buyers who just sell off the rares to make money and never actually play the game. The system is built around a model specifically designed to make more money.
#23 dr_rocktopus Jun 17, 2009 1:18:42	Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic far more lucrative than DnD? Both in terms of profit margin and raw sales. It certainly is, but errata are not terribly difficult to do, particularly since they did the stupid sage columns effectively instead.