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Dungeon Still MIA

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I confess, I'm confused. Dungeon and Dragon magazines should both be gems. Shifting to an online model should have been done in a way that would draw readers, especially former subscribers, into the new magazines. The first issues and the articles in them should have been chosen with care from favorite "old time" authors, as well as popular new ones. In a sense, with the first 'issue' (I'm hesitant to call it that, since the first issue of Dungeon has yet to be compiled into a pdf), Wizards of the Coast had indicated a willingness to succeed in this - they had fan favorite Nick Logue write an adventure and paired it with a remake of a classic for the first digital issue. I didn't really like the remake, but I respect that the effort was there. But so many other things that needed to happen just haven't materialized. For instance:

  • Campaign Workbook articles appear to be gone. This change by Paizo is one of the things that made Dungeon work for me. More mystifying is that many of these articles were predominantly reusable fluff, and thus could easily have been continued in a "rules lite" format.
  • No compilation pdf has appeared (or if it has the link must be in 3 point font somewhere hidden) - note that they HAVE managed one for the first issue of Dragon
  • There appear to be no letters to the editor. I confess, this was always a favorite of mine, especially when Dungeon published articles critical of its content and really fessed up to the reasons they were doing what they were doing. Sadly, Wizards doesn't seem to want us to know anything except that stuff we can't see is pretty cool and what we play now just really sucks. I am NOT a 4e doomsayer, but this attitude from Wizards almost makes me want to be.
  • No editorial AT ALL for issue #152.... okay, this would seem to me to be the time to make your direction known. I will not subscribe if I don't know that direction BEFORE I start having to pay for the magazine.

I'm really getting concerned. If the magazines don't stop completely sucking really soon, I may have to abandon Dungeons & Dragons Insider completely. I don't want to be the crazy conspiracy theorist, but some of the anti-4e crazies are beginning to make me think twice about even buying into the new core books. The dismal failure of the online mags to shine only reinforces that. I hope Chris manages to turn these publications around soon. Before people say that I'm being overly critical of the first issue... I should also point out that the current issue #153 also is lacking an editorial and only has a single adventure, a side-trek. This is not the level of content I expected from the magazines - nor is it the amount that Wizards implied when it first started talking about DDI publicly. I'm a fanboi, and I'm getting discouraged.

2 Comments

Dennis said:

I'm still hurting for a reason to migrate to 4e. Most of the changes that have thus far been revealed seem to be shit. I'm not even sure I'd go to 4e even if I didn't already have a shelf full of 3.5 supplements. Given that I do, there's just no chance unless they pull out something seriously impressive. A simplified planes cosmology and rust that heals just isn't going to to win me over.

I'll be happy to scarf on everyone's old 3.5 supplements on ebay, though. Anybody got a full FR collection they want to piss away because WotC decided it was high time they upgrade? Lemme know.

Brian said:

So far, WotC’s digital initiative has been an unmitigated disaster. They are not selling 4.0 very well. They’re selling D&D Insider with even less skill. Frankly, the entire situation has me scared spitless.

WotC’s digital initiative is an attempt to break free of the publish-or-perish trap the entire industry is mired in. Trying to squeeze a few more pennies out of your market every month, after they’ve bought everything they need to enjoy the game for the rest of their lives in your core rule books, is a losing game. A D&D Insider with a $10 US monthly fee would allow WotC to break free of that trap.

It’s clear that Dragon and Dungeon are not getting the resources they need at this critical time when they should be migrating the dead-tree audience over to the digital media. They’re not getting the word out about how the new edition of the game is going to knock everyone’s socks off. And nobody is being convinced that D&D Insider is going to be a vital part of their games in the future. So far, we’ve been promised a fancy version of OpenRPG, and we’ve seen an anemic Dragon and a shadow of Dungeon. If things don’t turn around soon, GenCon ’09 might open with the announcement that D&D is up on the auction block.

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