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adzling

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« Reply #45 on: <09-16-20/1139:07> »
The point is that those people weren't going to buy SR6 ever, regardless of what the rules were.  Literally anything they didn't love is an excuse not to buy.  Those people aren't customers anymore.  Their money was never available, so the product shouldn't be made to cater to them.

The above does not ring true to me.

Far more people are playing 5e than 4 or any single prior version and all of those people were candidates to purchase 6e.

I know that was true at our table.

Until it became clear how bad 6e was.

jim1701

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« Reply #46 on: <09-16-20/1303:54> »
Why is it strange that people who bought the book are more likely to like it or have complicated feelings about it?

It's not strange at all.  The key point is that far fewer people who bought the book disliked it.  Most people would take "liked" to mean that they liked everything about it and "its complicated" to mean that there are things they liked and things they disliked.  Both are more positive than the "disliked" option.

I would have to disagree with the assertion that far fewer people who bought the book disliked it.  Everything is relative as they say and a nine percent shift at the bottom of the percentile range is not something I'd see as very encouraging. A failing grade is still a failing grade even if it's a slightly better failing grade.  This is somewhat subjective of course but sitting at the bottom of the ladder you'd expect better performance when the audience is actually familiar with the work.  The higher up the ladder you move the harder is is to improve so a nine percent shift from say 81% to 90% would be much more significant. 

I bought a copy of 6e and played it with my players, way back before errata came out. They didn't like it, so they didn't buy their own copies of it. Why would they buy it if they preferred the 5e rules to the 6e rules? You could claim (Without any context whatsoever) that maybe I did something wrong as a GM, but I prefer 6e to 5e, personally. And maybe I didn't read the rules right, or maybe I should've waited months for the errata to come out before playing it. But I doubt I'm the only person who tried out 6e with their group before everyone had a copy of the CRB.

Running the release version of a game you weren't ready for and poisoning your group isn't a great way to go about things, no.
Yet nearly every company does this with their products so there must be something to it despite the criticism. If the product is seen as quality work that may need patching/errata based on customer feedback and customers have confidence that the company will follow thru then the model works.  If the product is not seen as quality work and/or customers do not have confidence the company will follow thru on patches/errata then it doesn't really matter what the reality is. 

In this regard I have personal experience though it's not in the gaming industry.  I used to work for a software company that put out a very popular product.  It was very robust and did a lot of stuff that its customers liked and despite not being a large company in many ways we were considered a industry leader. 

But the software had its share of bugs and over the years management prioritized adding new features over bug fixes.  This did eventually change but the damage had been done.  No matter how much effort we put into improving quality customer surveys kept telling us they no longer had confidence in the quality of our product.  This even impacted our new products which were built from the ground up with a zero bug policy.  In the end the company had to rebrand entirely.  The old software was retired and the new software was renamed along with the company. 

What I see here is a loss of confidence in the company.  That is certainly my position.  As Ob has already said you really need a comprehensive survey of Shadowrun customers to get a really good look at how customers overall view CGL but I still think this one tells us there is a need to improve before they reach a point of no return.  What steps they need to take is up to them but at some point that perception of failure will be out of their control regardless of what they do.  At that point Shadowrun will live only in previous editions, CGL will have to try and rebrand themselves or the IP gets transferred to a new company that isn't saddled with a bad reputation (deserved or not.)

Or are you treating "complicated" the same as "liking"?

See above.
I'm on the backside of the half century mark and I can't remember anyone ever in my entire life saying "It's complicated" in a good way.  In my experience "It's complicated" means "it" is bad but the person saying it's complicated doesn't want it to be bad or at least wishes it were something other than what it is.  This is also very subjective but I'd love to meet the person who says "it's complicated" and is also happy with whatever "it" is. 

Even if we look at it that way, you're still left with 42% of the people who bought your product disliking it. A product isn't an election, you want as many people to enjoy it as possible. Certainly, you can't please everyone, but if almost half of your players don't like the game? There's a problem.

Maybe, maybe not.  Depends on the audience you're going for.

I have to think that a successful business model for a rpg company has two accomplish two things to be successful, a) retain as much of the existing customer base as possible and b) expand the customer base by appealing to new players. 

If almost half don't like the new edition that is a problem for part A and I'd have to go look at the survey again to see if there was a question as to if the respondents were new to Shadowrun with 6e but if experienced GM's are having a hard time selling the merits of the game to new players then that's a problem with part B. 

Yes, it's fair to say that more people are playing 5e or earlier than they are 6e. Again- if a game isn't enjoyable to someone, is that really on the player or is it on the designer? And ultimately, does it matter? Loss of sales is still loss of sales. Why should I play a game I don't like?

I'd wager that more people are playing SR4A than SR6 - and wouldn't be surprised if more people are playing SR4A than SR5.  Some people are still playing earlier versions than SR4A, which have some of the worst rules ever within a popular RPG franchise.

The point is that those people weren't going to buy SR6 ever, regardless of what the rules were.  Literally anything they didn't love is an excuse not to buy.  Those people aren't customers anymore.  Their money was never available, so the product shouldn't be made to cater to them.

I'd have to say that while it is true that some players may have a preferred edition to any RPG (D&D stopped at 2nd Ed AD&D in my view) but that if you are executing a successful plan then most fans of the system will buy at least some of the new edition materials because they are fans.

If a company is losing more than half their existing customer base as you allude to when you say more players are staying with 4A rather than move on to 6E I can't see a way to spin this as a good thing.  I also don't agree that those customers are permanently lost at least not all of them.  What they need to do to right this ship (if anything) is something that CGL will have to decide for themselves.  All past, present and potential customers can do if they are not happy with the current state of affairs is wait and see. 

Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #47 on: <09-16-20/1436:23> »

I'd wager that more people are playing SR4A than SR6 - and wouldn't be suprised if more people are playing SR4A than SR5.  Some people are still playing earlier versions than SR4A, which have some of the worst rules ever within a popular RPG franchise.

The point is that those people weren't going to buy SR6 ever, regardless of what the rules were.  Literally anything they didn't love is an excuse not to buy.  Those people aren't customers anymore.  Their money was never available, so the product shouldn't be made to cater to them.

SR 1e-3e still have better rules than 6e.

SITZKRIEG

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« Reply #48 on: <09-16-20/1639:53> »
Nope! And if I asked folks to put in an email or something like that, or made them aware that I was tracking their IP, I would get under-reporting on piracy. (Similarly, it would be unethical to track users without telling them, especially when I'm asking them about something like piracy.) There's also no good way to make that perfect- changing IPs is trivial, and emails can be made for free or faked. Perhaps there's a google login feature, but that would certainly get me under-reporting on piracy if their answers are tied to an account.

So it's a debate between what's more likely:
* Someone doesn't want to associate their IP or email with piracy, and therefore gives me erroneous data
* Someone decides to take a survey multiple times in order to bias the data... in an unofficial survey that nobody at CGL is involved in or cares about. I don't see the payoff beyond trolling? Maybe?

The first one seemed like a definite occurrence, the second one seemed less likely. So, I didn't track survey-takers.

Thanks for running the survey and analyzing/posting the results.  Sorry I missed the survey but I never go to reddit and only swing by dumpshock every week or two.  I'm here every day or two (sometimes three) but I rarely go further than the recent post header since I figured it would give me the two or three active threads for the day.  Did you post this over on the various Shadowrun facebook groups as well?

I'm normally pro-consumer/anti-tracking to extent that I can without professional knowledge but I'd be fine with IP tracking as long as there was a notice at the beginning of the survey that it would only be used to prevent spam results and a promise to delete the data after the survey was closed and those repeats thrown out.  As for asking about piracy, I wouldn't.  You can accomplish the same thing with a general question asking if they formed their opinion about the edition via alternative means like borrowing a friend's or a store copy meant for sharing, playing a demo game of the full rules (or the starter set), watching/reading detailed reviews or breakdowns, etc.  As long as it's a catch all phrase without recrimination, I don't think you'll scare anyone off.  It should work as long as you don't need a detailed breakdown of those alternative methods.

0B

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« Reply #49 on: <09-16-20/2046:24> »
Why is it strange that people who bought the book are more likely to like it or have complicated feelings about it?

It's not strange at all.  The key point is that far fewer people who bought the book disliked it.  Most people would take "liked" to mean that they liked everything about it and "its complicated" to mean that there are things they liked and things they disliked.  Both are more positive than the "disliked" option.

I would have to disagree with the assertion that far fewer people who bought the book disliked it.  Everything is relative as they say and a nine percent shift at the bottom of the percentile range is not something I'd see as very encouraging. A failing grade is still a failing grade even if it's a slightly better failing grade.  This is somewhat subjective of course but sitting at the bottom of the ladder you'd expect better performance when the audience is actually familiar with the work.  The higher up the ladder you move the harder is is to improve so a nine percent shift from say 81% to 90% would be much more significant. 

It's a shift from total population of 69% disliking it to 42% disliking it. That sort of shift is significant.

However, a shift from total population of 11% liking it to 19% liking it may be close to double, but isn't far more. It's still only 7 people out of 36, compared to 8 out of 77.

When we look at it this way, however, we can see that 87.5% of the people who did like the book bought it. It says absolutely nothing about the character of people who didn't buy it- whether they "didn't give it a shot" or "are brainwashed by social media" etc etc.

The other thing is: nothing measures cause and effect here. topcat is trying to interpret this as "because they bought the book, they liked the edition," rather than "because they liked the edition, they bought the book." Chances are, both of these statements may be true for different people. It's also possible you'll get "because they bought the book, they disliked the edition," but less likely that you'll get "because they disliked the edition, they bought the book."

There's nothing to support whether any of the above statements is true for all buyers, most buyers, or even some buyers.

You cannot determine what "It's complicated" means- everyone who took the survey could have had a different meaning for what "It's complicated" means, and that's my fault as the survey designer. I should have done a 1-5 scale or just left it at yes/no. If someone selected "It's complicated," all that means is that they preferred that choice to "yes" or "no."

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Running the release version of a game you weren't ready for and poisoning your group isn't a great way to go about things, no.

Ah yes- the assumption that I wasn't ready, based on nothing. If only I had called that... Still, it seems like you're saying that people shouldn't expect to play TTRPGs at release. (Or maybe it's just me? If so, please give me any feedback you have on my GMing style.) I disagree.

I had no issues running Dungeons & Dragons 4e at release. Sure, we ended up going back to 3.5e after a few months, just due to taste, but the rules were laid out clearly. We did not have to wait for errata. D&D 4e was significantly different from 3.5e, so it was a similar situation. I didn't have any issues running 5e at release, either, but that was within experience of a few other editions as well. We didn't have to wait for errata on that one, either.

It's not a big ask to want a game playable at release, and it's not a bad assumption to think that a game you purchased is playable.

Thanks for running the survey and analyzing/posting the results.  Sorry I missed the survey but I never go to reddit and only swing by dumpshock every week or two.  I'm here every day or two (sometimes three) but I rarely go further than the recent post header since I figured it would give me the two or three active threads for the day.  Did you post this over on the various Shadowrun facebook groups as well?

No worries! The next survey will be, I'm having a peer look at some of my questions before I send it out so that it's more clear next time.

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I'm normally pro-consumer/anti-tracking to extent that I can without professional knowledge but I'd be fine with IP tracking as long as there was a notice at the beginning of the survey that it would only be used to prevent spam results and a promise to delete the data after the survey was closed and those repeats thrown out.  As for asking about piracy, I wouldn't.  You can accomplish the same thing with a general question asking if they formed their opinion about the edition via alternative means like borrowing a friend's or a store copy meant for sharing, playing a demo game of the full rules (or the starter set), watching/reading detailed reviews or breakdowns, etc.  As long as it's a catch all phrase without recrimination, I don't think you'll scare anyone off.  It should work as long as you don't need a detailed breakdown of those alternative methods.

I'll poke around in google forms to see if I can do IP tracking, but I might not be able to on a free account

Reaver

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« Reply #50 on: <09-16-20/2210:17> »
I would take "it's complicated" to mean there are things they both like and dislike.
However  we don't kniw what that is.

Also, keep in mind, this is only those that chose to answer the survey, and is a small selection at that. 77 respondants isn't even 5% of the book sales, let alone playerbase
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0B

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« Reply #51 on: <09-16-20/2252:44> »
The accuracy of a sample size is not based on what percent of the population is taken, the math for this is more complex. If you take a true random sampling of 1,000, out of a population of 100,000,000, the confidence level will vary based on the rate and what level of confidence you want.

Let's say you have a total population of 8 billion. You take a random sampling of 1,000 people- this is a fraction of a percent of the total population. From your sample, you end up with 50% of respondents being male, and 50% being female.

I use an online calculator to do this, but based on our sample of 1,000 people, we can have-

99% confidence that between 45.92% and  54.08% of the total population is male.
95% confidence that between 46.90% and 53.10% of the total population is male.
90% confidence that between 47.40% and 52.60% of the total population is male.
50% confidence that between 48.93% and 51.07% of the total population is male.


The confidence level means that if you were to take the survey many times (assuming true random sampling), X% of the confidence intervals would contain your true population. 95% is pretty standard, 99% usually has too wide an interval to be practical, and 90% or lower is just too unreliable.

It's true that this isn't a true random sampling. It's also true that this measures 3 specific online communities. It does NOT measure playerbase.

Now, let's say you have a total population of 10,000. You take a random sampling of 50 people- this is half a percent of the total population. Let's say you end up with 46% of respondents being male, and 54% being female.

Now, these are our levels:

99% confidence that between 27.89% and 64.11% of the population is male.
95% confidence that between 32.22% and 59.78% of the population is male.
90% confidence that between 34.43% and 57.57% of the population is male.
50% confidence that between 41.26% and 50.74% of the population is male.


So, now we can see that with a smaller sample size, the confidence levels are larger, even when the sample size is a larger percentage of the total population. However, the confidence levels are still mathematically accurate. They are wider because it is less precise with the smaller sample size, but a 95% confidence level with the sample of 50 is exactly as likely to contain the true proportion as the 95% confidence level with the sample of 1000.

So, if we find that 8 people out of 77 (Or, 10.39%) say they like something, and we assume a worst-case total population of 60,000, we can apply this to our population on /r/shadowrun, the official forums, and dumpshock:

99% confidence that between 1.44% and 19.34% of the population likes SR 6e.
95% confidence that between 3.58% and 17.20% of the population likes SR 6e.
90% confidence that between 4.67% and 16.11% of the population likes SR 6e.
50% confidence that between 8.05% and 12.73% of the population likes SR 6e.


Is this helpful at all? Is there a better way that I can explain why this works? OpenStax has an intro to stats book that explains confidence intervals more in-depth than I can.
« Last Edit: <09-16-20/2306:24> by 0B »

Marcus

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« Reply #52 on: <09-17-20/0015:04> »


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I bought a copy of 6e and played it with my players, way back before errata came out. They didn't like it, so they didn't buy their own copies of it. Why would they buy it if they preferred the 5e rules to the 6e rules? You could claim (Without any context whatsoever) that maybe I did something wrong as a GM, but I prefer 6e to 5e, personally. And maybe I didn't read the rules right, or maybe I should've waited months for the errata to come out before playing it. But I doubt I'm the only person who tried out 6e with their group before everyone had a copy of the CRB.

Running the release version of a game you weren't ready for and poisoning your group isn't a great way to go about things, no.


This statement is frankly offensive in my opinion. The 6e rules are what the 6e rules are. If exposure to the actual rules causes players not to like them, it's a problem with the rules, not the GM. Saying someone isn't ready to run something, is frankly a bazaar accusation. Especially considering the reality of the 6e rules. Topcat I think you owe oB and an apology.
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« Reply #53 on: <09-17-20/1235:37> »
The accuracy of a sample size is not based on what percent of the population is taken, the math for this is more complex. If you take a true random sampling of 1,000, out of a population of 100,000,000, the confidence level will vary based on the rate and what level of confidence you want.

Let's say you have a total population of 8 billion. You take a random sampling of 1,000 people- this is a fraction of a percent of the total population. From your sample, you end up with 50% of respondents being male, and 50% being female.

I use an online calculator to do this, but based on our sample of 1,000 people, we can have-

99% confidence that between 45.92% and  54.08% of the total population is male.
95% confidence that between 46.90% and 53.10% of the total population is male.
90% confidence that between 47.40% and 52.60% of the total population is male.
50% confidence that between 48.93% and 51.07% of the total population is male.


The confidence level means that if you were to take the survey many times (assuming true random sampling), X% of the confidence intervals would contain your true population. 95% is pretty standard, 99% usually has too wide an interval to be practical, and 90% or lower is just too unreliable.

It's true that this isn't a true random sampling. It's also true that this measures 3 specific online communities. It does NOT measure playerbase.

Now, let's say you have a total population of 10,000. You take a random sampling of 50 people- this is half a percent of the total population. Let's say you end up with 46% of respondents being male, and 54% being female.

Now, these are our levels:

99% confidence that between 27.89% and 64.11% of the population is male.
95% confidence that between 32.22% and 59.78% of the population is male.
90% confidence that between 34.43% and 57.57% of the population is male.
50% confidence that between 41.26% and 50.74% of the population is male.


So, now we can see that with a smaller sample size, the confidence levels are larger, even when the sample size is a larger percentage of the total population. However, the confidence levels are still mathematically accurate. They are wider because it is less precise with the smaller sample size, but a 95% confidence level with the sample of 50 is exactly as likely to contain the true proportion as the 95% confidence level with the sample of 1000.

So, if we find that 8 people out of 77 (Or, 10.39%) say they like something, and we assume a worst-case total population of 60,000, we can apply this to our population on /r/shadowrun, the official forums, and dumpshock:

99% confidence that between 1.44% and 19.34% of the population likes SR 6e.
95% confidence that between 3.58% and 17.20% of the population likes SR 6e.
90% confidence that between 4.67% and 16.11% of the population likes SR 6e.
50% confidence that between 8.05% and 12.73% of the population likes SR 6e.


Is this helpful at all? Is there a better way that I can explain why this works? OpenStax has an intro to stats book that explains confidence intervals more in-depth than I can.

This is true when you have a truly random sample size to survey. But problems of bias come in during execution. And the biggest issue is usually who or where you are polling from.

For example:

If I went to catholic Churches and handed out a poll asking if they supported Abortion, the responses would be overwhelmingly "No." But that result wouldn't reflect the true opinion of a country as Abortion is against the tenets of Catholicism.
If I asked the same question to Twitter, I would get an overwhelming response of "yes". And again this would not reflect the actual opinion of the a country as Twitter is overwhelmingly used by those with a political left leaning, and only fractionally by those of a Right political leaning.

However, If I was to call 10,000 random households and ask the question of "do you support Abortion?", the results would fall much more closely into the national average,and could be a good barometer for a Country. (Again, depending on other factors. Only Conducting the survey on Sundays could again skew the results)

A big one that came up in my Province 20 years ago was Welfare reform. LOTS of polling was done... All of it said "everyone" wanted an increase of the welfare state... Right up until election day.. And the party that made it an election issue was wiped out (and has never recovered).
Turns out, the polling firms had introduced a Bias in their polling. They conducted their polling Monday to Friday from 10am to noon, right when the vast majority of people are at work, and the only people who could answer the surveys were those who were already on Social Assistance, and they, had a natural self interest in seeing the social systems expanded that was not reflected in the rest of the population.

In your case, Its the people that visit the sites.

If the average person bought 6e and encountered NO ISSUES whatsoever with the product, they would not be on these forums, or Reddit or the Facebook page(?).

Thus, they never saw your poll to respond.

You only have to look at the topics that are being posted to see if you are going to have issues with Bias. In the case of Reddit and here (Don't use facebook, so I can check to see.. and Dumpshock has a same posting patterns as here). The overwhelming topic that gets posted are "Help" topics... meaning people that come here, dumpshock, and reddit are looking for answers to issues.

And if they are looking for answers to issues, chances are they completely happy with the product...


To get a truly random sample for your survey, you would need a mailing list from say DTRPG, then email out the questionnaire and compile the results.

At best, you have taken the temperature of those that visit those locations, but possibly not the actual customer base.



Basically, 
you are asking people who have most likely come here seeking help for a problem, if they have a problem with the product. I wonder if that could skew your results any :P
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Lormyr

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« Reply #54 on: <09-17-20/1329:44> »
If the average person bought 6e and encountered NO ISSUES whatsoever with the product, they would not be on these forums, or Reddit or the Facebook page(?).

Isn't this statement blatantly false though? For example, I joined the forums in like 2014, not because I had a problem, but just because I wanted to talk about shadowrun and my core group of nerds was not yet into it.
"TL:DR 6e's reduction of meaningful choices is akin to forcing everyone to wear training wheels. Now it's just becomes a bunch of toddlers riding around on tricycles they can't fall off of." - Adzling

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« Reply #55 on: <09-17-20/1358:55> »
If the average person bought 6e and encountered NO ISSUES whatsoever with the product, they would not be on these forums, or Reddit or the Facebook page(?).

Isn't this statement blatantly false though? For example, I joined the forums in like 2014, not because I had a problem, but just because I wanted to talk about shadowrun and my core group of nerds was not yet into it.

Is it?

The vast amount of threads are looking for rules clarification, reguardless of edition, followed by rules conflict resoulution. The same is true of dumpshock and reddit.

Fanfics and other works that just sing praises of SR (no matter the edition), are the minority.

Now this doesn't mean everyone here hates SR. On the contrary, it shows an investment in the material beyond the average buyer. But that investment doesn't mean its positive or negative....
For example, there are many people on these forums that are invested in SR, but have openly stated their non support, if not hatred and pulling of fiancial backing.

They are no longer "customers" but they are invested.
Mean while, "lil Johnny" buys every book, but never plays nor comes to the forums  or talks about the game.
He is a customer, but he's not invested in the game.
Ideally, you want both. But companies chase money.

Now Sure, you came here looking for "like minded" people, and I am sure that is the reason why many of the top posters are still here (Community is a wonderful thing). But for the vast amount of people, they show up, ask a question or 5, and never post again.
A rare few come here looking for ammo for use in a fight with their GM, throw a hissy fit when the answers don't match what they want to hear, and leave.
I think a quick look at post counts and members will tell you who is "invested" in the community, and who comes here for just answers. The number of people with over say, one hundred posts is fairly small...

Now, keep in mind I say that while not having purchased any 6e book yet...
Which is also the reason I didn't take the survey. I don't have a dog in the 6e race yet...
When 6e was announced, and released my table had just started a new campaign and voted to stick with 5e. That campaign continues.
The GM for the table I play at got the 6e CRB on release, and has decided it doesn't fit with our table, so we would not be changing editions  and so far, I have spent only an hour reading the book (his), so I don't have a full opinion yet.... so at best I am a potential customer...


It very well could be that 6e is Shadowrun's DnD4e.....
Or it could be the edition that makes SR go 'mainstream'...

The only thing we can say, is that it could have been received better. And ultimately, it will be consumers who determine what happens next for the franchise.
« Last Edit: <09-17-20/1417:40> by Reaver »
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adzling

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« Reply #56 on: <09-17-20/1700:16> »
Or it could be the edition that makes SR go 'mainstream'...

I think we would have seen some significant movement in sales by now if this was going to happen as it's been a year already.

I don't see any sign of that in the partial data available and the continued negative reception it receives in most knowledgable communities.

I would guess the vast majority of sales are made in the first year as older players transition to the new version.

That's just not happening afaik, quite the opposite.

So how long do we wait to declare 6e dead?

Another year of anemic sales (two years after release)?

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« Reply #57 on: <09-17-20/1808:18> »
Or it could be the edition that makes SR go 'mainstream'...

I think we would have seen some significant movement in sales by now if this was going to happen as it's been a year already.

I don't see any sign of that in the partial data available and the continued negative reception it receives in most knowledgable communities.

I would guess the vast majority of sales are made in the first year as older players transition to the new version.

That's just not happening afaik, quite the opposite.

So how long do we wait to declare 6e dead?

Another year of anemic sales (two years after release)?
You can declare it dead whenever you want. However, Catalyst is probably not going to agree with you.

Michael Chandra

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« Reply #58 on: <09-17-20/1816:23> »
You can declare it dead whenever you want. However, Catalyst is probably not going to agree with you.
I wish I could weigh in on this topic, but NDA so... :-X
How am I not part of the forum?? O_O I am both active and angry!

FastJack

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« Reply #59 on: <09-17-20/1818:39> »
If the average person bought 6e and encountered NO ISSUES whatsoever with the product, they would not be on these forums, or Reddit or the Facebook page(?).

Isn't this statement blatantly false though? For example, I joined the forums in like 2014, not because I had a problem, but just because I wanted to talk about shadowrun and my core group of nerds was not yet into it.

Is it?

The vast amount of threads are looking for rules clarification, reguardless of edition, followed by rules conflict resoulution. The same is true of dumpshock and reddit.

Fanfics and other works that just sing praises of SR (no matter the edition), are the minority.

Now this doesn't mean everyone here hates SR. On the contrary, it shows an investment in the material beyond the average buyer. But that investment doesn't mean its positive or negative....
For example, there are many people on these forums that are invested in SR, but have openly stated their non support, if not hatred and pulling of fiancial backing.

They are no longer "customers" but they are invested.
Mean while, "lil Johnny" buys every book, but never plays nor comes to the forums  or talks about the game.
He is a customer, but he's not invested in the game.
Ideally, you want both. But companies chase money.

Now Sure, you came here looking for "like minded" people, and I am sure that is the reason why many of the top posters are still here (Community is a wonderful thing). But for the vast amount of people, they show up, ask a question or 5, and never post again.
A rare few come here looking for ammo for use in a fight with their GM, throw a hissy fit when the answers don't match what they want to hear, and leave.
I think a quick look at post counts and members will tell you who is "invested" in the community, and who comes here for just answers. The number of people with over say, one hundred posts is fairly small...

Now, keep in mind I say that while not having purchased any 6e book yet...
Which is also the reason I didn't take the survey. I don't have a dog in the 6e race yet...
When 6e was announced, and released my table had just started a new campaign and voted to stick with 5e. That campaign continues.
The GM for the table I play at got the 6e CRB on release, and has decided it doesn't fit with our table, so we would not be changing editions  and so far, I have spent only an hour reading the book (his), so I don't have a full opinion yet.... so at best I am a potential customer...


It very well could be that 6e is Shadowrun's DnD4e.....
Or it could be the edition that makes SR go 'mainstream'...

The only thing we can say, is that it could have been received better. And ultimately, it will be consumers who determine what happens next for the franchise.

Membership on the forums goes like this: Out of the 7498 registered user (current count as of right now [before I start cleaning spammers]).

Between 100-200 people have over 1,000 posts. but only 29 of those have posted in the last 30 days.
There's over 700 people with over 100 posts, but only 75+ have posted in the last 30 days.
Over 1700 members have never posted at all, but I know from looking a logs, they are still active, spending time just reading.