Golden Age Of TTRPGs Over, MCDM Doesn't Get The Message While Raising $4 Million, AI Art Scrapes MTG - TTRPG News 1/4/2024

The new year starts off with some blazing hot news! The beginning of a new time period is often seen as a chance to consider the future, and boy is there a lot to consider this week. 2023 saw faith in WotC's D&D waver more than ever, calling into question the health of the brand and the viability of competitors. In particular, author Ben Riggs is declaring the Golden Age of TTRPGs dead and gone. As if to answer the challenge, MCDM closed out their crowdfunding campaign with massive support. All the while, Midjourney is in the hot seat for allegedly taking MTG card art. 

So-Called “Golden Age” Of TTRPGs Is Over According to D&D Historian

Ben Riggs, author of Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons & Dragons, posted a long thread detailing why he believes the Golden Age of TTRPGs is dead. He states that the 2010s were a boon for the industry thanks to wider mainstream appeal by way of Stranger Things and Critical Role. More new players meant more chances for third-party publishers to sell their 5E content. It also gave indies a better chance to find their audience. 

However, the WotC OGL issue of last year splintered the hobby. Riggs concludes that the fracturing of the major audience into followers of D&D’s upcoming revamp, Critical Role’s TTRPGs, MCDM supporters, and more will weaken the overall industry as no one game will command enough attention to be profitable in the long term. 

Responses to Riggs' declaration have been mostly negative. Many argue that more competition is a good thing for the industry. Others celebrate the possible future where D&D is not the dominant game. Overall the thread is sparking a lot of conversation, and the people at Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast should be paying attention. 

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MCDM RPG Crosses The Finish Line With Over $4 Million Raised 

The MCDM BackerKit campaign is 9 hours away from closing as of this writing, and has raised $4.3 Million. The initial goal was $800,000. The campaign will end on a massive success, being the most successful BackerKit project of all time. 

What is the takeaway, besides that people have a lot of faith in the MCDM team? It does seem to prove Ben Riggs wrong at first glance, as consumers are still very ready to throw money at this hobby. And not just any system, but one that charges more in order to pay better wages. However, the game itself isn’t set to come until next year, with a playtest set for mid 2024, so there is the question of how long the hype can sustain itself.

MidJourney Allegedly Caught Using Magic Card Art To Train AI

New evidence in a lawsuit against MidJourney seems to catch the CEO admitting to using copyrighted Magic: The Gathering Art for AI training. The case sees independent artists suing MidJourney, Stability AI, and DeviantArt for the supposed use of their work in MidJourney’s image generator. This new piece of evidence, as reported by DiceBreaker, is a list of thousands of artists that the plaintiff claims was used to feed the AI for test sequences.

In addition, one artist presented screenshots that are allegedly from the MidJourney Discord server where CEO Eric Holz says “You might find it amusing to hear that early on we would just render out huge swaths of MTG cards as test sequences.”

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That's it for this week! Hope you feel more informed after reading, and may your dice be kind!