Sunday, June 1, 2008

More 4e News.

According to several websites as well as the Wizards of the Coast message boards, copies of D&D 4e are already circulating. Buy.com apparently broke the street date and released the books nearly two weeks early. Wizards of the Coast, fans who didn't pre-order from Buy.com and many brick and mortar game store owners are very upset. To make matters worse there has apparently been a leak at WoTC or the printer because advance copies the books have been popping up on numerous file sharing and bit torrent sites.
There have been unofficial comments from insiders saying that WoTC is more upset by the early release of the hard copies than the digital copies as they expect the downloaded copies to actually drive up sales. Many game shop owners are infuriated by both copies making their way into the public's hands because they have a hard enough time competing with online stores as it is. This is especially true since you can pre-order the books online for around $56 while retail price is over $100.

Given recent events, and the apparent changes in how gamers feel about the new edition I think that 4e will be a success. 4e may be just the thing that the rpg industy needs to pick up some steam. If we are lucky we may be on the verge of a new renaissance in table top gaming.

3 comments:

Ken Newquist said...

My group is slowly warming to 4E. They still remain highly skeptical, but most are willing to give it a try. The single biggest problem we face is that there really isn't a conversion path for going from 3E to 4E; they're very different rules, with a very different feel.

Our group's been adventuring in Greyhawk for going on 12 years, and no one wants to give up that kind of campaign history just to stay current with D&D. Yet, as the rules stand now, upgrading Greyhawk to 4E would be a hell of a lot of work (as witnessed by Wizards' decision to skip the Forgotten Realms timeline forward 100 years to avoid exactly the sort of issues we'd be dealing with).

We'll see how things go. For the playtest, we're going to run a self-contained campaign set in ancient Greyhawk, during the age of the lich-lord Vecna, and see how things go.

Geek Gazette said...

The group I am currently playing with is a bit apprehensive with converting too. Our campaign hasn't been running that long, but they like where it is going and are attached to their characters, which is a new experience.
they like the idea of playing 4e, but don't want to give up what they have just yet. I've considered running stand alone 4e games, but keeping the 3e game going until they feel comfortable with changing.
I think once someone gets to play a tiefling warlock or dragonborn warlord they may change their tune.

Geek Gazette said...

BTW, good to see you on my site.