Another push towards digital/video game D&D?
(Source: https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2023/06/you-cant-buy-physical-only-dd-books-from-wotc-anymore.html)
Yes, and a justification for the price hike.
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
I don't know, its a RPG, we can play at hobby shops and homes and steal everything we want from WotC and they can do NOTHING about it NOTHING. WotC exists on the goodwill of its player base. If 20% of their player base goes elsewhere to get 6E content for free and distributes its to their players and the players teach it to their players, then WotC has problems. Every group I get, I play old content, not 5E, but use 5E rules to ease them in. I use concepts from other OSR games in the game. I have them buy dice and minies from the hobby shop as a suggestion but that's it, I never suggest a dime go to WotC. Until WotC goes back to writing a game and not a political novel, I'm done with Wizards of the Communists.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 27, 2023, 06:01:19 PM
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
I don't know, its a RPG, we can play at hobby shops and homes and steal everything we want from WotC and they can do NOTHING about it NOTHING. WotC exists on the goodwill of its player base. If 20% of their player base goes elsewhere to get 6E content for free and distributes its to their players and the players teach it to their players, then WotC has problems. Every group I get, I play old content, not 5E, but use 5E rules to ease them in. I use concepts from other OSR games in the game. I have them buy dice and minies from the hobby shop as a suggestion but that's it, I never suggest a dime go to WotC. Until WotC goes back to writing a game and not a political novel, I'm done with Wizards of the Communists.
There are some good things even about 5E. But I'm with you. Not a damned penny to WotC.
Quote from: Ghostmaker on June 27, 2023, 06:22:44 PM
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 27, 2023, 06:01:19 PM
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
I don't know, its a RPG, we can play at hobby shops and homes and steal everything we want from WotC and they can do NOTHING about it NOTHING. WotC exists on the goodwill of its player base. If 20% of their player base goes elsewhere to get 6E content for free and distributes its to their players and the players teach it to their players, then WotC has problems. Every group I get, I play old content, not 5E, but use 5E rules to ease them in. I use concepts from other OSR games in the game. I have them buy dice and minies from the hobby shop as a suggestion but that's it, I never suggest a dime go to WotC. Until WotC goes back to writing a game and not a political novel, I'm done with Wizards of the Communists.
There are some good things even about 5E. But I'm with you. Not a damned penny to WotC.
Greetings!
That's right, Ghostmaker! ;D I agree. I have been a fan of 5E forever. In recent times though?
5E is still a good system--I own most of the books, and have played and GM'd the system for years now.
However, indeed. Fuck WOTC.
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
On May 1st of this year Hasbro's stock jumped from $51 to about $62 solely on their announcement that D&D is now part of the "digital gaming" market. This took the market cap of Hasbro from $7 billion to over $8 billion. Meaning that Hasbro stockholders made over a billion dollars just by telling tabletop gamers to get lost.
While I don't particularly agree, as Hasbro hasn't proven their ability to tap into the digital gaming market just yet, RPGers that prefer face-to-face gaming need to understand just how unimportant we are.
Quote from: hedgehobbit on June 27, 2023, 06:47:04 PM
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
On May 1st of this year Hasbro's stock jumped from $51 to about $62 solely on their announcement that D&D is now part of the "digital gaming" market. This took the market cap of Hasbro from $7 billion to over $8 billion. Meaning that Hasbro stockholders made over a billion dollars just by telling tabletop gamers to get lost.
While I don't particularly agree, as Hasbro hasn't proven their ability to tap into the digital gaming market just yet, RPGers that prefer face-to-face gaming need to understand just how unimportant we are.
Agreed.
Still, I suspect this is similar to other edition shifts. They take the older edition print rulebook off the market first. Then after a little while, the company introduces the new edition rulebook. Even with the focus on digital, I think they still want to keep themselves on Amazon and in bookstores for visibility.
Quote from: hedgehobbit on June 27, 2023, 06:47:04 PM
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
On May 1st of this year Hasbro's stock jumped from $51 to about $62 solely on their announcement that D&D is now part of the "digital gaming" market. This took the market cap of Hasbro from $7 billion to over $8 billion. Meaning that Hasbro stockholders made over a billion dollars just by telling tabletop gamers to get lost.
While I don't particularly agree, as Hasbro hasn't proven their ability to tap into the digital gaming market just yet, RPGers that prefer face-to-face gaming need to understand just how unimportant we are.
As long as Grand Wizards of the KKKoast takes all the SparkleTrolls with them to the digital only walled garden with microtransactions up the wazoo I'll call this a win-win: They make money and stop infecting our hobby with their woke wankery.
Quote from: GeekyBugle on June 27, 2023, 08:34:58 PM
Quote from: hedgehobbit on June 27, 2023, 06:47:04 PM
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
On May 1st of this year Hasbro's stock jumped from $51 to about $62 solely on their announcement that D&D is now part of the "digital gaming" market. This took the market cap of Hasbro from $7 billion to over $8 billion. Meaning that Hasbro stockholders made over a billion dollars just by telling tabletop gamers to get lost.
While I don't particularly agree, as Hasbro hasn't proven their ability to tap into the digital gaming market just yet, RPGers that prefer face-to-face gaming need to understand just how unimportant we are.
As long as Grand Wizards of the KKKoast takes all the SparkleTrolls with them to the digital only walled garden with microtransactions up the wazoo I'll call this a win-win: They make money and stop infecting our hobby with their woke wankery.
So far, WotC has shrunk its headcount by 15% this year. Lets hope they continue to bleed headcount. They continue to get downrated by Bank of America has ranked Hasbro to underperform and other reviewers have them at hold at best. This is based on people looking at the financials, not people buying their games.
Look at their adventurers league, they don't check for DM's that pedophiles. When you go to their D&D Beyond, you see kids listing their age as 12 online interacting with adult men going to their chat rooms and WotC does nothing to stop it. Hasbro already got burned for using pedo judges for MTG. Now with the current cultural backlash against leftard fucks grooming children, the company is wide open. All it takes is one bad story and WotC is in the limelight for it, as being the second time they supported a pedo. I frankly wouldn't be surprised if they have paid authors that are pedos and will get busted on line propositioning. Back in the early 2000's, Hasbros put out a MMO My Little Pony aimed at girls and they had a lot and I mean a lot of men over 40 playing that that game, not appropriate and they didn't age gate that game that was shut down after a year.
With how WotC is running its business and being unable to match the changing culture, they are primed for a scandal.
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
Please, yes!!!
Ha! I predicted this!
I dropped a video about this a few hours ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUOpZb_TfGY
Quote from: RPGPundit on June 28, 2023, 12:18:57 AM
Ha! I predicted this!
Who could have foreseen this?!? :o
(actually, I think a lot of people in this board did ;D)
Quote from: hedgehobbit on June 27, 2023, 06:47:04 PM
Quote from: Exploderwizard on June 27, 2023, 05:55:06 PM
.....And the sound of crickets chirping loudly was heard. After jacking up prices and telling the vast majority of their player base to kindly fuck off it will be interesting to see the sales numbers. Will WOTC become the Bud Lite of RPGs?
On May 1st of this year Hasbro's stock jumped from $51 to about $62 solely on their announcement that D&D is now part of the "digital gaming" market. This took the market cap of Hasbro from $7 billion to over $8 billion. Meaning that Hasbro stockholders made over a billion dollars just by telling tabletop gamers to get lost.
While I don't particularly agree, as Hasbro hasn't proven their ability to tap into the digital gaming market just yet, RPGers that prefer face-to-face gaming need to understand just how unimportant we are.
WOTC better hope that Hasbro invests most of that in producing digital products that are not complete crap. Given their track record and inability to learn from past mistakes I see a complete and utter fail on the horizon. Stocks often jump based on announcements. They only stay up if the product follow through lives up to the hype. 6E hasn't hit the market yet.
D&D is starting a death spiral. They hired censors to proof read their content. The censors have to justify their jobs, so they will find content to censor that never should have censored in the first place which makes the content non-sensical. The censors at D&D just removed the word tribal from their books. Imagine reading this: "There was a savage hearty tribe typal of goblins." What the fuck are they writing about? D&D is international with spanish, german, french, italian, japanese translations. Congrats Seattle Language Specialists (censors), now they have to come up with a word that works in those languages and that the locals will understand. They can't use the word "tribal" in their books to describe "typal" because in the Seattle Language its racists. Welcome to language disjunction 101. Going digital isn't going to them, its going to make it worse. I run games in English with foreign nationals digitally and having to explain to them the shit Wotc puts in modules when they use made newspeak words isn't going to help. Digital or Paper, it doesn't help when D&D isn't writing using terms that people speak.
This is a nothingburger.
This is happening because WotC is tired of customer service complaints about not getting a pdf with their order, and having to explain to a pissed off customer that they bought physical only.
Even among players who prefer to play exclusively with physical copies, the majority of people want a pdf copy with their physical purchase.
It isn't a PDF, its an online copy requiring you to use D&D Beyond. And the search in D&D Beyond is notoriously crappy. Meanwhile with a PDF, you can search and find what you want from the book you have easily.
I think I have officially become a grognard. I don't understand why someone would pay that much for this stuff. And look - I only play online nowadays, and 99% of the RPGs I read (and write) are PDFs. I appreciate the possibility of quickly searching for the digital image of a monster and showing it to my players. But I see no fun in looking at a digital grid for hours. I'd rather play Dark souls, Diablo or Darkest Dungeon. Or some D&D videogame (although the last one I remember enjoying is Eye of the Beholder...)
I also don't want to play a crunchy game and let the computer deal with the math for me. On the contrary, I want to play a game so simple that every player can understand every part of the game and make informed decisions.
Well, I can see one exception - I'd enjoy having a dungeon map with "fog of war" effects. But constantly looking at the grid (and virtual minis) would ruin immersion for me. And the best games I've played, even online, where more talking than looking at grids and sheets.
(After writing this little rant, I have realized I don't even know what D&D beyond does, except making my character sheet for me. I'm assuming it also does grids)
EDIT: okay, did some research and the graphics in the VTT do look nice. Unfortunately, there is no way I'm getting this new WotC stuff and I'm utterly disinterested in 6e. Might try roll20 with a grid someday.
Quote from: Eric Diaz on June 28, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
I think I have officially become a grognard. I don't understand why someone would pay that much for this stuff. And look - I only play online nowadays, and 99% of the RPGs I read (and write) are PDFs. I appreciate the possibility of quickly searching for the digital image of a monster and showing it to my players. But I see no fun in looking at a digital grid for hours. I'd rather play Dark souls, Diablo or Darkest Dungeon. Or some D&D videogame (although the last one I remember enjoying is Eye of the Beholder...)
I also don't want to play a crunchy game and let the computer deal with the math for me. On the contrary, I want to play a game so simple that every player can understand every part of the game and make informed decisions.
Well, I can see one exception - I'd enjoy having a dungeon map with "fog of war" effects. But constantly looking at the grid (and virtual minis) would ruin immersion for me. And the best games I've played, even online, where more talking than looking at grids and sheets.
(After writing this little rant, I have realized I don't even know what D&D beyond does, except making my character sheet for me. I'm assuming it also does grids)
EDIT: okay, did some research and the graphics in the VTT do look nice. Unfortunately, there is no way I'm getting this new WotC stuff and I'm utterly disinterested in 6e. Might try roll20 with a grid someday.
IIRC you can make the grid invisible, not snap the minis to it and deactivate other grid related effects.
I have already stopped buying WOTC products and after talking to my group, none of them are interested in moving to 6e so I think they are going to lose a bunch of people buying their books. The people in my group actually have all of the books or a lot of the books, they aren't the freeloaders who just buy maybe a PHB and that's it.
Stupid move and I knew this is what they were going for. I will just run 5e and work towards moving fully to the OSR.
I don't buy books from a company that hates me
Quote from: GhostNinja on June 28, 2023, 01:24:41 PM
I have already stopped buying WOTC products and after talking to my group, none of them are interested in moving to 6e so I think they are going to lose a bunch of people buying their books. The people in my group actually have all of the books or a lot of the books, they aren't the freeloaders who just buy maybe a PHB and that's it.
Stupid move and I knew this is what they were going for. I will just run 5e and work towards moving fully to the OSR.
I don't buy books from a company that hates me
The thing is, its a RPG with the DM writing the rules. You can take everything from 6E, implement what you chose to implement and WotC gets no revenue from it. It's what I've been doing with my group for the last three years now.
Quote from: Corolinth on June 28, 2023, 08:38:49 AM
This is a nothingburger.
This is happening because WotC is tired of customer service complaints about not getting a pdf with their order, and having to explain to a pissed off customer that they bought physical only.
Even among players who prefer to play exclusively with physical copies, the majority of people want a pdf copy with their physical purchase.
It's not a Nothingburger, and they're not PDFs, the digital copies are useless outside of D&DB, and fully open to WotC deciding that for ESG reasons they "have to" change content, remove content, or shit if they don't
like you, then take the books
from you. Now, you might think that's insane sounding, and you might hate Jeremy Hambly, but the fact is, WotC removed ALL of his digitally purchased MTG cards from him - and that was a good few years back.
Soon, WotC will move to "Oh, well, Digital outsells books anyway, haha we don't sell books but you can still buy them at..." and then they'll assfuck the FLGS'es, and only "certain partners" will have them - Amazon, B&N, etc., who in turn will be pressured to adopt the digital only copies.
Don't act like it won't happen, either. Don't even pretend to lie and act like it won't. Because it will.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 01:30:12 PM
The thing is, its a RPG with the DM writing the rules. You can take everything from 6E, implement what you chose to implement and WotC gets no revenue from it. It's what I've been doing with my group for the last three years now.
For me, 5th edition was only OK to me and 6th edition just gives the same information and has just become WOKE.
OSR products give me D&D like I remember it. I can run 5e until my books fall apart and there are just so many other options.
I think WOTC is making a mistake but it's their mistake and doesn't affect me anymore.
Quote from: GhostNinja on June 28, 2023, 01:44:42 PM
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 01:30:12 PM
The thing is, its a RPG with the DM writing the rules. You can take everything from 6E, implement what you chose to implement and WotC gets no revenue from it. It's what I've been doing with my group for the last three years now.
For me, 5th edition was only OK to me and 6th edition just gives the same information and has just become WOKE.
OSR products give me D&D like I remember it. I can run 5e until my books fall apart and there are just so many other options.
I think WOTC is making a mistake but it's their mistake and doesn't affect me anymore.
The rules from 6E, not the content. I offer the 6E sorcerer and the 6E warlock by default because it fixes issues with the class. The warlock as written is unplayable in any campaign with a basis in reality. Casting Eldritch Blast as your main attack and having less spells than a retarded syphillitic familiar with the assumption that gee you'll just take a short rest every hour, its no where near good game design. The warlock was made for 5 room dungeons with two encounters, a puzzle, a trap and a reveal room, that's it. It is why for the most part people use locks as dips not main players characters. The 6E sorc was made a half caster with medium armor, like the artificer but actually useful to game play abilities. The 6E sorcerer was just given more spells, which I was already doing in the first place and that's the only thing I take from 6E for sorc.
Quote from: GeekyBugle on June 28, 2023, 12:00:29 PM
IIRC you can make the grid invisible, not snap the minis to it and deactivate other grid related effects.
I generally find that a lot better, unless I'm playing a heavily grid based game like 4e D&D.
Quote from: thedungeondelver on June 28, 2023, 01:44:00 PM
Quote from: Corolinth on June 28, 2023, 08:38:49 AM
This is a nothingburger.
This is happening because WotC is tired of customer service complaints about not getting a pdf with their order, and having to explain to a pissed off customer that they bought physical only.
Even among players who prefer to play exclusively with physical copies, the majority of people want a pdf copy with their physical purchase.
It's not a Nothingburger, and they're not PDFs, the digital copies are useless outside of D&DB, and fully open to WotC deciding that for ESG reasons they "have to" change content, remove content, or shit if they don't like you, then take the books from you.
Quote from: thedungeondelver on June 28, 2023, 01:44:00 PM
Soon, WotC will move to "Oh, well, Digital outsells books anyway, haha we don't sell books but you can still buy them at..." and then they'll assfuck the FLGS'es, and only "certain partners" will have them - Amazon, B&N, etc., who in turn will be pressured to adopt the digital only copies.
Wait. So as I understand it -- one can still buy physical books alone from their different marketers (FLGS, Barnes & Noble, etc.), and one can still buy physical books direct from their website, but now they always bundle in D&DBeyond access along with the physical book when you order directly from them. Is that right?
If so, my apologies - I had misunderstood earlier.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 01:53:58 PM
Quote from: GhostNinja on June 28, 2023, 01:44:42 PM
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 01:30:12 PM
The thing is, its a RPG with the DM writing the rules. You can take everything from 6E, implement what you chose to implement and WotC gets no revenue from it. It's what I've been doing with my group for the last three years now.
For me, 5th edition was only OK to me and 6th edition just gives the same information and has just become WOKE.
OSR products give me D&D like I remember it. I can run 5e until my books fall apart and there are just so many other options.
I think WOTC is making a mistake but it's their mistake and doesn't affect me anymore.
The rules from 6E, not the content. I offer the 6E sorcerer and the 6E warlock by default because it fixes issues with the class. The warlock as written is unplayable in any campaign with a basis in reality. Casting Eldritch Blast as your main attack and having less spells than a retarded syphillitic familiar with the assumption that gee you'll just take a short rest every hour, its no where near good game design. The warlock was made for 5 room dungeons with two encounters, a puzzle, a trap and a reveal room, that's it. It is why for the most part people use locks as dips not main players characters. The 6E sorc was made a half caster with medium armor, like the artificer but actually useful to game play abilities. The 6E sorcerer was just given more spells, which I was already doing in the first place and that's the only thing I take from 6E for sorc.
I always liked the 5e Warlock precisely because of its short rest recovery precisely because the DM of that campaign used the alternate recovery times of "short rest = 8 hours and long rest = 3 full days in a fully safe environment like a town."
My Celestial Warlock was the only thing keeping the party from a TPK at some points since I had healing spells that recovered on a short rest instead of needing 3 days in town to recover spells and nearly a full week to recover all your lost hit dice if you'd used more than half (which was nearly always).
Even in a regular game though it was the Warlock invocations that mattered way more than their spells (though the fact you always upcast your warlock spells to the highest level you've got was also handy)... Tome letting you snag extra cantrips from any class also provided a lot of extra utility. They're much closer in execution to a magically augmented rogue than to a wizard-style caster of spells.
Honestly, I've found the class designs for the fan produced Star Wars 5e (including their reworks of the fighter, monk, barbarian/berserker, and rogue/operative) far more innovative than anything WotC's done with the rules.
Quote from: thedungeondelver on June 28, 2023, 01:44:00 PM
It's not a Nothingburger, and they're not PDFs, the digital copies are useless outside of D&DB,
Agreed. I only buy print product and not .pdfs. Why? .pdfs are incomplete products that I have to print to make them useful to me. If a product does not have a print option then I will ignore it and find something else
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 01:53:58 PM
The rules from 6E, not the content. I offer the 6E sorcerer and the 6E warlock by default because it fixes issues with the class. The warlock as written is unplayable in any campaign with a basis in reality. Casting Eldritch Blast as your main attack and having less spells than a retarded syphillitic familiar with the assumption that gee you'll just take a short rest every hour, its no where near good game design. The warlock was made for 5 room dungeons with two encounters, a puzzle, a trap and a reveal room, that's it. It is why for the most part people use locks as dips not main players characters. The 6E sorc was made a half caster with medium armor, like the artificer but actually useful to game play abilities. The 6E sorcerer was just given more spells, which I was already doing in the first place and that's the only thing I take from 6E for sorc.
I may do this if the information become available but I won't do it if I have to pay WOTC a dime. Never again.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 08:51:06 AM
It isn't a PDF, its an online copy requiring you to use D&D Beyond. And the search in D&D Beyond is notoriously crappy. Meanwhile with a PDF, you can search and find what you want from the book you have easily.
Absolutely nothing about this refutes my point.
Okay, it's an online copy requiring D&D Beyond. Fantastic. They're still doing it because they got tired of customer service complaints from people who thought they got a D&D Beyond module with their physical book purchase. Most customers expect to get that with their physical book purchase. Because why the fuck wouldn't you get that included in your physical book purchase? Otherwise what's the point of buying from the WotC website in the first place?
There are reasonable complaints about the wokewashing of D&D (Radiant Citadel, for example), and then there's this. Not every business move is a an evil capitalist megacorporation conspiring with the CIA to put small time mom & pop stores out of business.
Quote from: Corolinth on June 28, 2023, 04:19:45 PM
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on June 28, 2023, 08:51:06 AM
It isn't a PDF, its an online copy requiring you to use D&D Beyond. And the search in D&D Beyond is notoriously crappy. Meanwhile with a PDF, you can search and find what you want from the book you have easily.
Absolutely nothing about this refutes my point.
Okay, it's an online copy requiring D&D Beyond. Fantastic. They're still doing it because they got tired of customer service complaints from people who thought they got a D&D Beyond module with their physical book purchase. Most customers expect to get that with their physical book purchase. Because why the fuck wouldn't you get that included in your physical book purchase? Otherwise what's the point of buying from the WotC website in the first place?
There are reasonable complaints about the wokewashing of D&D (Radiant Citadel, for example), and then there's this. Not every business move is a an evil capitalist megacorporation conspiring with the CIA to put small time mom & pop stores out of business.
Lets revisit this statement when WOTC releases post core book content for 6E shall we?
WRONG THREAD!
EDIT: Is there no capability to delete posts? That seems problematic.
I agree with Brad. Look how willingly a majority of video gamers just go along with shitty Battle Passes. These crept in here and there and are now ubiquitous in the industry. Every AAA company is trying to find some way to slip them into their games. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Hasbro/WotC is using the move to 6e to get their piece of that pie and a large majority of D&D players will follow along because that's just how people work- "I play D&D and this is what D&D is now so this is how I play."
Edit: Even though he deleted it, I still agree with him.