That's How We Roll

In this episode, Fred and Chris discuss; Metatopia, what's interesting about Metatopia as a convention, the area the podcast is focused on, and trying to nail down a definition for what the Hobby Industry is exactly.

Show Notes

Peter Adkison

Shannon Appelcline - Designers and Dragons

Metatopia (Rob's take on Metatopia)

Divine Cow

Double Exposure (Dreamation, Dex Con, Metatopia)

Vincent (Vinny) Salzillo

Metatopia has innovative pricing. $20 for playtesters, $50 for designers.

Darren Watts

Indie Press Revolution (I.P.R.)

Ken Hite

Jennisodes (Recording of Ken Hite's design seminar.)

Kickstarter Bulletpoints from Metatopia

Joshua A.C. Newman

Shock

Elevator Pitching Basics

Elevator Pitching Advanced (Pitch why you do, how you do, then what you do.)

Deadly Fredly: Foot in the Door (Article about how to enter the hobby industry.)

Don't Rest your Head

Transparency

(Fantasy) Heartbreakers

It's this episode Chris and Fred talk to Peter Adkison about his time as the C.E.O. of Wizards of the Coast, which includes the time that period when WotC purchased TSR and acquired Dungeons and Dragons, among other things. This is a bit of a follow up on the last episode. It's very interesting and contains info I've never heard before. Show notes will be crazy.

Show Notes

Words in quotation are direct quotation. Word's not in quotation are my notes, to fill in or expand the quote.

Peter's credentials

1. Founder of Wizards of the Coast 1990

C.E.O. until 2001. (Peter says 2011 by accident, he meant 2001.)

During that time WotC; launched Magic: The Gathering, bought T.S.R., on day 2 after purchasing T.S.R. began developing 3rd Edition dungeons and Dragons, created the Open Gaming License and the D20 License, and was bought by Hasbro.

He was not involved in 3.5 or 4E D&D.

2. Bought Gen Con in 2002.

C.E.O. of Gen Con L.T.D. until present (Present equals Nov 2011, I can't predict the future.)

3. Cofounder of Hidden City Entertainment with Jasper Myfors in 2004

C.E.O until 2011

Hidden City licensced and created cards for Bella Sera. (Girls on horses.)

Peter on TSR being purchased for 25 million, and it's actual value.

25 million was roughly the amount of debt T.S.R. had acquired. Purchase price was actually higher.

"25 million was way way way more than it was worth." If you used the 1997 revenue to determine the value. If you used 1996 revenue, "it was right on the mark." By 1998, WotC had increased the value to the 30 to 35 million range.

Novels actually made up the larger share of revenue not games. It was "roughly 60 / 40 split."

The purchase was more for strategic purposes. "By us it was strategic in nature... by buying T.S.R., Wizards became clearly the top dog in the industry." It changed WotC's positioning "from the head of a category to the head of an industry."

This seems to pay off as they are purchased by Hasbro in 1998, and Peter reveals the D+D brand was at least 1/3 of how Hasbro valued the company. Wikipedia put's the purchase price of WotC by Hasbro at 325 million.

Peter on Hasbro.

Hasbro was hands off as far as managing WotC. Peter was told, "You will earn your way into integration through poor performance." Peter posits they were interested in WotC as their foot in hobby games. "Add it all up, it's as big as the mass market."

Peter on the OGL.

"The strategic vision behind it was, hey-- lets let other companies, frankly, do the part of the business that doesn't make money, and we'll just do the core books. I think that was a good strategy. The problem from Wizards perspective was that Wizards never really made good on the strategy. We kept... Wizards kept doing core books and kept doing companion settings. Whereas I think, Ryan Dancey, would say the original strategy was to cut the D&D team down to like half a dozen people. And that would have been painful. One of those painful decisions companies make, but might have been exactly the right strategy to do with the brand. That's kind of why it happened. I don't think anyone could forsee the repercussions of the Open Gaming License. The amazing response."

"... if we do go down this strategy it means we do have to charge more sharply into the downsizing of our internal staff. Maybe that realization would have said, well let's not do that. why should we do that when the company overall is highly profitable."

Peter on ideas that may have been left unexplored for growing the D&D brand.

"My vision for D&D, at the time, was doing an MMO. You know a big... do it ourselves... we're making tons of money. Take all the Pokemon money, or not all of it, but a big chunk of the Pokemon money, start a studio... and this was before World of Warcraft came along... and that's what we were real excited to do. and that's what we thought would be the biggest driver towards making Dungeons and Dragons as big, or bigger even, than Magic: The Gathering. We started a studio and had 30 people working on code and art."

Links: (to come.)

You thought it was podfaded? Season 3 Episode 01 is here to convince you otherwise. That's How We Roll is back with a vengeance. In this Episode Fred and Chris discuss what lead to the long hiatus, how they're planning to get back on track, and what they've been up to. They then dig into the main topic which is a discussion of Wizards of the Coast marketing, and brand strategy, for Dungeons and Dragons.

Show Notes

Race to Adventure

Lisa Stevens claims Pathfinder has surpassed D+D

D+D Essentials

DDI

Bill Slavicsek

Pathfinder prepainted minis, aka Pathfinder Battles.

Monte Cook

Fred's interview on the Jennisodes.

D+D's board games

Fantasy Flight Games

Gamma World

Star Frontiers

Top Secret

Ravenloft

Birthright

Brand Strategy

Open Gaming License

2011 Ennie Awards

Fate

Dresden Files RPG

Diana Jones Awards

D+D Experience

Chris mentions D+D worth $25 million? Best I could do was this fact. WotC acquired TSR and Five Rings Publishing Group for $25 million on April 10, 1997.

Brand Confusion

D+D Encounters

Hasbro stock price

Pathfinder Adventure Path

Fiasco

Hocus Focus (A Dresden Files playset for Fiasco)

Chris visits Fred in Maryland. We talk about Jeni's Ice Creams, The Dresden Files RPG, distribution, The Leverage RPG, Happy Birthday Robot, and the role confidence plays in marketing your games.