"Not as Bad as it Looks" is Still Bad
So Pathfinder has apparently
tied with D&D for sales to hobby stores.
On the one hand, this information is pretty dubious. Its almost certain that WoTC doesn't sell most of its product via traditional hobby markets anymore, and you know, its highly possible even Pathfinder doesn't. If anything, these stats say a lot about the irrelevance of the hobby shop as a vehicle these days.
On the other hand, it STILL means that in polled areas, people who came in to buy RPG books still bought as much Pathfinder as they did D&D, and that has to be a scary-as-shit reality for WoTC, even if it isn't a real tie in the bigger scheme of things.
And yes the "tie" is only in the increasingly-small increasingly-irrelevant area of "Hobby Stores", but that doesn't matter! What does matter is that D&D was never tied there before. That it represents a still-significant area, in which D&D is now failing.
Its like if you were to say that Ma Kettle's Burger Shack has tied McDonalds for sales, but only in New York and Miami. While by no means signifying "game over", as some would like it to seem here, it DOES in fact mean McDonald's is facing a serious problem and have clearly fucked up in some big ways to get even to that point.
Likewise WoTC: if Pathfinder really has tied them in the hobby stores, it means that they're having some serious problems. They can still have overwhelming superiority of sales in the rest of the market and yet be facing serious problems. For starters, that nothing like this would ever have happened back in the 3e glory days.
Because, let's face it: if D&D 4e was a better game and WoTC a better company, there's no way that anyone would get even close to them. The mere fact of that closeness is a sign that WoTC is doing things wrong.
RPGPundit
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Comments (4)
And Dresden Files fifth? Beating out White Wolf et. al. ?
Either:
A. The survey has some serious methodological errors.
B. Or the RPG industry is really really really really really hurting is Evil Hat (an awesome but really small company) is ranking that high.
Well, White Wolf hasn't released anything of note this year, that I can recall. But yes, I do have some doubts about the methodology, particularly beyond the question of the top two spots.
Perhaps the error that WOTC made was the OGL? Never before has D&D basically had to face "itself" in the marketplace in the way that it has to face Pathfinder, a re-incarnation of its prior system. If 3.0/3.5 had to compete in the marketplace (at the time) with a well marketed, updated 2.0 I wonder how it would have fared? I well remember a great deal of internet wailing an gnashing when 3.0 came out. And as you've pointed out, this is apparently only reflective of brick and mortar hobby stores - and via interview, which is problematic at best.
-FB
Oh I think it would have done very well; 3.0 ended up being a well-loved system (despite misgivings beforehand by people who were afraid it'd end up being the M:tG RPG), versus 2.x which was a loathed version of the game by that time. And WoTC's corporate policy at that time was incredibly open, dynamic and friendly, vs. the old "We'll Tell Gamers What They Like"/"they sue regularly" mentality of TSR, which is ironically what WoTC today is much closer in behaviour to.