I see we're discussing 4e #dnd a lot in 2021! Here's my opinion of what caused the relative failure of the edition:

1. The presentation - I think the #1 problem was one of perception regarding how powers were presented at launch.

The graphic design of the power stat block was unfamiliar and resembled video game manuals to some folks (and remember MMORPGs were viewed as an existential threat to TTRPGS in some quarters), and while they were concise, they were basically technical jargon.

At launch, classes in the PHB basically had the same power progression. The graphic design and jargon contributed to an impression of sameness between the classes, which fed into the perception problems. #dnd

Powers weren't the same, but you had to first understand the jargon and then realize how they interacted with each other and the class traits to produce a unique play experience for each class.

Also, there were so, so many of them (and so, so many feats too).

4e's release schedule did no one any favors here, as we were quickly buried under a deluge of options. Many people felt that the digital tools, especially the character builder, were required to play!

By the time these issues started getting addressed with the Essentials books, it was probably too late. Essentials offered classes of roughly equal power with different power progressions, complexity scale, and simpler choice points.

I honestly think that an Essentials-type launch would've probably gone over better, especially since it included more of a reliance on natural language.

On a personal note, I enjoyed the Essentials classes a lot. I felt they were streamlined but still gave me a bunch of choices. The best part is that I could dip into the previous books if I wanted to introduce more complexity into my character.

This perception problem was compounded by what I now think was the #2 problem - the pre-launch marketing campaign went over like a lead balloon with a large amount of folks. The initial GenCon video set the tone on the Internet.

The marketing campaign poked fun at a lot of the issues found in previous editions, problems that people had long identified as being problems. IMO, it was your typical, late 90s, 2000s type of slightly ironic humor, but man, did people not view it that way!

I think here we see some of the earliest examples of the phenomena of people substituting their fandom for their identity on the Internet, and they were pissed - and very vocal about it. The slight mocking tone set people off.

The marketing campaign continued for that for a while before WotC pulled back a bit, but by then it was too late. Vocal detractors on the Internet took the attacks on their edition so personally, and it poisoned a lot of the discussion on the Internet.

No amount of previews or articles on earlier influencer sites like AIC could counter the edition wars that started consuming online D&D communities.

My expertise isn't in marketing so I'm not sure how they could've successfully marketed something that looked and sounded different to many folks, but apparently light mocking wasn't the way to go. However, it did give us the gnome video, and for that, I'll always be thankful.

Here's the Gnome Video BTW:

And here's the first part of the Gen Con video that launched the edition war:

So while the marketing alienated a very vocal group, it also sort of over-promised, such as for mechanical innovations like skill challenges, but especially the digital tools.

So that get's into my #3 reason - the edition was released too soon and the mechanics suffered for it. We were promised fluid, exciting combat and a skill challenge system that would codify out-of-combat activities.

Unfortunately, the math behind monsters, some aspects of character progression, and skill challenges were serious of whack. You could definitely have exciting combat, but it could also descend into what quickly became known as the "grind."

Eventually, monster math was fixed - in stages. Templates that changed creatures to Elite status were largely abandoned and monster actions were improved for MM2, but the math itself wasn't fixed until MM3.

BTW, the key to the monster math issue was that hit points were too high, attacks didn't do enough damage, sometimes defenses were too high, and Elite/Solo monsters were seriously disadvantaged by the action economy.

In any case, large swaths of classic monsters were "broken" out of the box until the release of the Monster Vault (great book btw). How well, these monsters worked largely depended on your DM's skill.

Now skill challenges were too prone to failure given the formulas in the original 4e DMG. They were revised in the DMG2 and then they had Mike Mearls do an entire series of online articles trying to explicate them, but I don't think anyone was really satisified with the results.

Personally, I liked what I heard about skill challenges during the pre-launch marketing campaign, but the end results were decidedly mixed even after multiple revisions.

The key difference was the success to failure rations, but how it went from use any skill if you could justify it, to a pre-determined list of skills that would be applicable to the situation. It from open-ended to prescribed.

success to failure ratios...in any case, they were initially presented would result in failures more than intended.

And finally, character to hit progression was fixed via feat - in the PHB2. Thus, the concept of a "feat tax" was reinforced.

So now we have a new, unfamiliar product with a group of vocal detractors and some problematic mechanics that would impact those who chose to play 4e.

So #4 would be the release schedule, which I mentioned before, and which would also come up during the market. Now the sure volume of releases could be overwhelming, especially when coupled with the Dragon and Dungeon magazines, but I'm thinking of something more specific.

That would be the decision to split formerly core options into multiple books. Want to play a gnome. Sorry, you need to wait until PHB2, Druid, the same. Frost giants, metallic dragons...MM2.

Unfair or not, this reinforced a perception that WotC wasn't releasing a complete game and that you'd be forced to buy multiple books to get the complete #dnd experience. More or less, it was probably because of space considerations due to powers.

And my god, the amount of sturm und drang released by the fact that the gnome appeared in the Monster Manual but not the PHB was ridiculous! But, hey, they video was funny...

Another source of friction was the inclusion of new racial options to the core experience like the tiefling (from 2e), eldarin (also from 2e, but different), dragonborn (from 3e). Why introduce these two new races when stuff like the gnome and half-orc were left out?

So I've mainly addressed presentation, marketing, and fundamental mechanics, so I'm finally getting to lore. 4e made significant changes to some of the legacy #dnd lore, but not as much as you'd think, which is why I rank it lower than other reasons.

Now, there's one huge exception - and that is what happened to the Forgotten Realms. The huge changes (too many to go into in a Twitter thread) alienated another segment of vocal fans.

Now, I overall have mixed feelings about the Realms and the Spellplague. I've long felt that FR was over developed and some of the simplification wrought by the edition change was warranted, but the scale of the changes was probably too much.

In any event, it looks the power that be largely agreed, because almost all of the 4e changes were undone by the Sundering, but I digress...

Now, I'm going to address the core legacy #dnd lore and 4e. 4e made a bunch of changes, but IMO, the core lore - mostly monster and cosmological - largely remained similar to prior editions and what changed wasn't super important.

The biggest difference was probably the abandonment of The Great Wheel and the introduction of the World Axis cosmology. That resulted in some monsters being sorted into different groups and others disappearing altogether.

For example, Devils and Demons had different backstories in 4e, but functionally remained similar and huge chunks of legacy material were reincorporated into them over the course of the edition.

Familiar #dnd races like orcs, goblins, and kobolds remained almost completely unchanged.

Were people upset by some of the lore changes. Definitely, especially Planescape fans, but not the extent you'd think. In fact, many of the 4e lore changes - like the reimagining of the Astral, Faerie, and Shadow planes - were popular enough to be carried forward into 5e.

Now, I'm getting to what I think is the #5 reason, and probably the most minor overall, which were new "gamist" mechanics. Such things as martial healing, damage on a miss, limited use powers, Come and Get It, etc.

Now, I think these are relatively minor because a lot of it was present in previous editions and in 5e, but it was definitely a point of contention, often because of point #1 - how they were presented.

They broke verisimilitude for a bunch of people, many of whom would accept at least some of these concepts when presented in a different way (though some, like damage on a miss on a martial attack are apparently a bridge too far)

I rank this kind of stuff at #5 because ultimately you embraced it, didn't care (it's me!), or used it to buttress your arguments regarding earlier issues.

And lastly (wow, I'm getting tired), some of the surrounding business decisions would come in at #6 for me, because a lot of it is inside baseball stuff, but many of it factored into the marketing and lore changes.

This would include such things as bringing Dragon and Dungeon magazines in house (creating 4e's largest competitor in the process), making the magazines digital, the GSL vs. OGL, ending other licenses, and winding down novels, especially Forgotten Realms ones.

OK, I think I've covered what I wanted to cover. Basically, a combination of issues served to strip more and more groups of players away from the game without replacing them, while a major competitor positioned itself in such a way to take advantage of the situation.

You can say a lot about Paizo and Pathfinder during this time, but I can't fault their marketing acumen by leveraging their previous licenses to launch their APs, the 3.5 Thrives slogan, and the PF playtest.

And that's it for now - if you made it this far, thank you for reading!

BTW, there was absolutely nothing in 4e that would prevent you from running it like older editions (philosophically that is). I did so as both a player and DM. #dnd