July is "Independence from Hasbro" Month

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Fenris-77 said:
2023 has already been the Year of No Hasbro for me. Might be closer to 2 years, I don't remember the last time I bought a 5E supplement for my kids.
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They have lost my wife as a customer. She wants to get into a game, and has me looking around for her (she knows I have my fingers into way more places that she does) but doesn't want to learn a bunch of rules. She strongly falls into do cool stuff but doesn't care so much about the rules which basically leaves her in D&D adjacent (so OSR to Pathfinder). Her one irrevocable demand is no Hasbro / WOTC games because of their recent behavior.
 
UnplayedRanger said:
Play what you want to play, and don’t play what you don’t want to play. Pretty simple. I play and support a variety of games from publishers, indie or otherwise.
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For me it's even simpler; just play what you want. I don't see myself as a "supporter" of anything. It's one of the reasons I don't do Kickstarters.
 
Tommy Brownell said:
Thank God that *checks notes* someone I've never heard of told me to boycott WotC.

The contrarian in me wants to get caught up on 5e in July, but I'll probably just keep on playing Savage Worlds instead.
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You didn't watch the video. He's not calling for customers boycott D&D 5e for a month, he's calling for fellow D&D YouTubers to showcase other companies' games to expose their audiences to greater variety for a month. He's saying that given the missteps WotC has been making, maybe it's time to introduce the 5e-only gamers to other alternatives they might not know about - like Savage Worlds, for instance.
 
UnplayedRanger said:
Play what you want to play, and don’t play what you don’t want to play. Pretty simple. I play and support a variety of games from publishers, indie or otherwise.

But hey, I actually like 5e. It’s fine. It’s not the only game I wanna play. But it’s fine. It’s superhero fantasy, and it does it well imo. As long as my friends and I get enjoyment out of it, I’ll keep playing it and buying the books I wanna buy.
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I thought it was a good game for running their canned adventures, but found some issues when I tried to use it for a hex crawl that led to me dropping it altogether. I absolutely advocate buying and playing whatever you like.
Psychopomp said:
You didn't watch the video. He's not calling for customers boycott D&D 5e for a month, he's calling for fellow D&D YouTubers to showcase other companies' games to expose their audiences to greater variety for a month. He's saying that given the missteps WotC has been making, maybe it's time to introduce the 5e-only gamers to other alternatives they might not know about - like Savage Worlds, for instance.
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I did not. I don’t think I’ve ever not regretted sitting through an RPG YouTuber’s videos, so I just stopped clicking.

So good for him. I used my blog to raise awareness of non D&D games for many years. That said, I suspect that someone named Professor Dungeonmaster won’t have much luck converting his target audience to anything but a D&D retro clone.
 
A month just like any other. I mean I bought radiant citadel because Mimi Mondal is a sci fi writer and I support my own: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mimi_Mondal everyone should buy her stuff too. Though last itch I had to play D&D I grabbed my Holmes of the shelf, I know everyone likes the jillion character options, I am just a cranky old man though.
 
robertsconley said:
Maybe but a Hasbro free hobby is no longer an implausible outcome.
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I don't think it's even a question of the hobby abandoning Hasbro. Hasbro wants to abandon the hobby. They value the brand name and want it to be an online subscription platform with microtransactions. Whether they succeed at this or not, ten years from now, I don't expect Hasbro's D&D to be making anything we would recognize as TTRPG products.

Psychopomp said:
You didn't watch the video. He's not calling for customers boycott D&D 5e for a month, he's calling for fellow D&D YouTubers to showcase other companies' games to expose their audiences to greater variety for a month. He's saying that given the missteps WotC has been making, maybe it's time to introduce the 5e-only gamers to other alternatives they might not know about - like Savage Worlds, for instance.
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If it were calling for a boycott, I wouldn't want discussion of the video at the Pub. Organizing a boycotts is a political act. I'm completely fine with people refusing to buy WotC products and giving reasons for why they aren't, but once you cross the line into pushing everyone into not buying them, things get ugly.
 
Baulderstone said:
I don't think it's even a question of the hobby abandoning Hasbro. Hasbro wants to abandon the hobby. They value the brand name and want it to be an online subscription platform with microtransactions. Whether they succeed at this or not, ten years from now, I don't expect Hasbro's D&D to be making anything we would recognize as TTRPG products.
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I concur. As it stands now there are independents with a larger stable of writers and creatives involved than Hasbro has.
 
Baulderstone said:
The irony being that these kind of fuckups are what they actually teach people at business schools these days.
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One thing I've noticed among some wannabe-entrepreneurs and high level managers is a form of exceptionalism where - despite all overwhelming evidence to the contrary - this cockamamie bullshit strategy will work for them.
 
I'm still waiting for Hasbro WotC evoking the nerd equivalent of Storming of the Bastille. :clown: "... and much soda was spilled that day. :brokenheart:"
 
unless they lose substantial profits or lots of fans suddenly decide to stop playing 5E they boycott won’t do much imo.

imo most gamers don’t care or will simply ‍♂️ and continue playing. Learning a new system requires both will and an investment many gamers are simply not willing to do or in large enough numbers.
 
Thinking about what I’ve purchased from Hasbro this century it was surprisingly little:
  • that D&D art book from about 5 years ago (which I believe was actually released by someone else under license)
  • a dozen or so POD copies of old TSR books from DriveThruRPG
  • copies of a half dozen or so mainstream board/party games (Jenga, Yahtzee, Connect Four, etc)

And I’m pretty sure that’s it. I don’t think I’ve bought any toys from them - maybe a couple as gifts for my nieces and nephews, but I don’t even think so.

Given that, I suppose it’s no wonder they’re not targeting me as a customer (but part of me feels like they’re leaving my money on the table - that they absolutely could have more of it if they released more stuff I was actually interested in - I still buy a fair amount of games and tchotchkes, it’s just all stuff that’s made by other companies)
 
When it comes to casual gamers, they don't even necessarily know what is D&D and what isn't. When new people ask me to run D&D for them, I pull a Sanka and run DCC and tell them it's D&D. After they have tried DCC, 5E is a disappointment.
 
Toadmaster said:
They have lost my wife as a customer. She wants to get into a game, and has me looking around for her (she knows I have my fingers into way more places that she does) but doesn't want to learn a bunch of rules. She strongly falls into do cool stuff but doesn't care so much about the rules which basically leaves her in D&D adjacent (so OSR to Pathfinder). Her one irrevocable demand is no Hasbro / WOTC games because of their recent behavior.
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She needs High Valor, it's all about cool stuff! :grin:
 
JAMUMU said:
One thing I've noticed among some wannabe-entrepreneurs and high level managers is a form of exceptionalism where - despite all overwhelming evidence to the contrary - this cockamamie bullshit strategy will work for them.
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At least ten years ago they were showing "The Smartest Guys in the Room" about Enron, one of my final projects was a presentation, with power point about Kickstarter: "Unlimited Growth, a New Hybrid of Creative Finance, and Marketing". Totally exciting as it sounds.
 
dragoner said:
At least ten years ago they were showing "The Smartest Guys in the Room" about Enron, one of my final projects was a presentation, with power point about Kickstarter: "Unlimited Growth, a New Hybrid of Creative Finance, and Marketing". Totally exciting as it sounds.
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"Unlimited Growth! For The Low, Low Cost Of One Planet!"
 
JAMUMU said:
"Unlimited Growth! For The Low, Low Cost Of One Planet!"
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They are all just about how many buzzwords one can jam into a title. Saving the planet should be public policy, I mean that is why we have public policy for things like that ...
 
dragoner said:
They are all just about how many buzzwords one can jam into a title. Saving the planet should be public policy, I mean that is why we have public policy for things like that ...
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I listen in to my housemate's corporate call meetings. And all I can say is you wish. It's all in discussed in the super-secret-back-room, which is to say that it doesn't exist.

But you know what does exist? Drugs. Alright alright alright.
 
JAMUMU said:
I listen in to my housemate's corporate call meetings. And all I can say is you wish. It's all in discussed in the super-secret-back-room, which is to say that it doesn't exist.

But you know what does exist? Drugs. Alright alright alright.
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Like the song says, "everything is gonna burn, we'll all take turns" ...
 
Psychopomp said:
You didn't watch the video. He's not calling for customers boycott D&D 5e for a month, he's calling for fellow D&D YouTubers to showcase other companies' games to expose their audiences to greater variety for a month. He's saying that given the missteps WotC has been making, maybe it's time to introduce the 5e-only gamers to other alternatives they might not know about - like Savage Worlds, for instance.
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I don't watch these videos on principle, these dorks don't deserve the clicks they're grifting so hard for in the first place. Watching them just rewards them and 90% of what I've seen is public masturbation.

Kinda amazing that after all these years that Seth Skorkowsky remains the only rpg YTer I can stand.
 
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Toadmaster said:
They have lost my wife as a customer. She wants to get into a game, and has me looking around for her (she knows I have my fingers into way more places that she does) but doesn't want to learn a bunch of rules. She strongly falls into do cool stuff but doesn't care so much about the rules which basically leaves her in D&D adjacent (so OSR to Pathfinder). Her one irrevocable demand is no Hasbro / WOTC games because of their recent behavior.
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The whole thing burned me out on not just 5e but a good percentage of the OSR.

I'll still buy adventures but the days of me checking out yet another OSR ruleset are done. Really with Into the Unknown, Beyond the Wall and OSE I don't see the need for anymore OSR rulesets.
 
Voros said:
The whole thing burned me out on not just 5e but a good percentage of the OSR.

I'll still buy adventures but the days of me checking out yet another OSR ruleset are done. Really with Into the Unknown, Beyond the Wall and OSE I don't see the need for anymore OSR rulesets.
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The issue she has is simply she is not a rules junkie, so has little interest in learning new rules after new rules. She also doesn't have a lot of RPG experience and wants the classic "D&D" experience with classes etc.

She has played T&T, 3E and Pathfinder 1E. I'm putting most of my efforts into the simpler popular OSR games, DCC, OSE, Shadowdark (the last simply because it seems poised to be the new hotness for awhile). I'd be all over a Beyond the Wall / Grizzled Adventurers / Sunken Lands game, but this seems less likely.

The games I'd prefer just really are not her cup of tea and I have trouble getting excited for Pathfinder so OSR seems to be the most obvious common ground for us at this time. I have 5E simply because of its ubiquity, but thanks to Hasbro / WOTC shenanigans that is out the window for the foreseeable future (which honestly does not hurt my feelings as I like the vibe of many OSR games better anyway).
 
Degeneration roller said:
One of the few things I'm proud of in my gaming life is having never given WotC any money, I was gifted the slipcase set of 5e for my birthday by a friend, checked the books out and was really unimpressed, the only reason I didn't sell it is because it wouldn't be very polite towards my friend, fuck WotC.
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Exactly the same here, but the slipcase was gifted to me by a roleplaying guild I was an active member of for a few years, and it has seen table use quite a bit.
 
Voros said:
I don't watch these videos on principle, these dorks don't deserve the clicks they're grifting so hard for in the first place. Watching them just rewards them and 90% of what I've seen is public masturbation.

Kinda amazing that after all these years that Seth Skorkowsky remains the only rpg YTer I can stand.
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Personally, I think Professor Dungeonmaster has provided some of the best coverage and analysis of the issues at WotC, but if insulting things you've never watched makes you feel smart, go for it.
 
Baulderstone said:
Personally, I think Professor Dungeonmaster has provided some of the best coverage and analysis of the issues at WotC, but if insulting things you've never watched makes you feel smart, go for it.
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He also said he was going to stop making these click bait videos so he could concentrate on putting out gaming content and taking about his campaigns damn the numbers, I guess he changed his mind about not caring about the numbers.

Does anyone really need analysis of WotC anymore, at some point, like NuTSR, it is just an echo chamber. We know they are bad, let’s talk about something else.
 
For the record I like Professor DM and have found value in a number of his videos that actually feature gaming content. I still watch those.
 
sharps54 said:
He also said he was going to stop making these click bait videos so he could concentrate on putting out gaming content and taking about his campaigns damn the numbers, I guess he changed his mind about not caring about the numbers.

Does anyone really need analysis of WotC anymore, at some point, like NuTSR, it is just an echo chamber. We know they are bad, let’s talk about something else.
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You are aware what thread you chose to post in, aren't you?
 
Baulderstone said:
Personally, I think Professor Dungeonmaster has provided some of the best coverage and analysis of the issues at WotC, but if insulting things you've never watched makes you feel smart, go for it.
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Yes, he’s very good. Level-headed and fair. Not annoying like many people on YouTube.
 
sharps54 said:
We know they are bad, let’s talk about something else.
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I also know leaving roadside woodland to grow unchecked is bad, but there are millions of Joe Publics who complain every ime a tree is cut down so an ongoing education campaign is needed. Consumers are even more forgetful.
 
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