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(Seems like ENWorld has been slowed down a bit by this tonight, too!)
When I got the Paizo email, I thought about going to pick up a few of the older PDFs I'd wanted to get someday. But I can't say that I feel like giving WotC any money right now (sorry, Paizo, I'm sure I'll buy something from you soon. ).
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Quote:
Originally Posted by joethelawyer
I hope Scott Rouse is somewhere with a big bottle of Jack. He's gonna need it. He must feel like the Secret Service guy who was tasked with keeping President Clinton out of trouble with women.
Man, I need more XP to give out! This is Golden!
__________________ Mark "El Mahdi" Armstrong - Semper Operor Verus
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To be fair, from the comments it seems the straw that broke the camels back was the people who "properly paid for the product" and then put it up in some sort of file sharing.
No, there's nothing fair about it.
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Still, WotC probably won't "get it" unless there is an active boycott.
To some extent, Wizards have provided their own boycott. (There will be no sales of PDFs!) They're already stopping a revenue stream.
However, I think Wizards understood the problems with piracy when 4e was released. I remember illegal pdf copies of the 4E rulebooks being available several days before I even got my copies of the books on the official release day. I've seen D&D miniatures on-sale on ebay before they are even released.
The amount of illegal stealing and piracy of Wizards products is terrifying, and to expect them to do nothing about it is foolish.
This solution? Oh, I hate it. Hate it, hate it, hate it.
I'm very glad to see that they are taking legal action against some of the pirates, but this can't be all of them. And so, we lose a great resource. I hope that Wizards can get the pdfs back some day soon, but I'm pessimistic enough about the world to not expect it for a few years.
NOTE: I haven't purchased any WotC PDFs, and nor have I read the contracts on RPGNow or DriveThru RPG. Consider this entire post a question, not a comment.
I'm a little confused by how people can lose access to additional downloads that were included when they bought a product.
If I were arguing this -- and see the disclaimer above, namely that I don't know the specific terms of the purchase agreement -- I'd argue that by purchasing WotC Book.pdf with the understanding that I may download it multiple times, I'm actually purchasing X copies of WotC Book.pdf, along with the service of the PDF distributor providing file space for those extra copies as backups.
Would this be shot down by any specific terms in the contract?
(As an aside, I think it's really, really sweet of WotC to drive customers away to other RPG companies, on what's becoming a semi-regular basis. It shows an admirable willingness to share the RPG market. Kudos, WotC! Ignore these folks telling you it was a bad move ... they just don't understand your corporate altruism.)
__________________ Jeff Wilder, San Francisco Bay Area If your sig is longer than your posts, your sig is too
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Im sorry but if the Music/Movie industry couldn't stop pirating what makes little peon Hasbro think they have much of a chance?? I think wizards is ran by a bunch of dumbasses who obviously don't know how to conduct business. The stupid move only makes people want to pirate more.
I think they're cutting their nose off to spite their face.
They want to stop (or slow down) people from pirating their books, so what do they do? they stop selling PDFS at online retail outlets.
Yeah, good idea. Just throw away the money you were getting from all those sales (maybe not much comparatively, but money's money, after all) so that you can try and prevent something you never had a chance of preventing anyhow.
OH and as an extra-added bonus, you piss your customer base off in the process!
My only hope in this whole debacle is that Paizo makes trillions of dollars tonight in .pdf sales and is able to buy all D&D material rights and licenses from WOTC and we never have to deal with a Hasbro big corporate BS again. Imagine that? Dungeons and Dragons under a company run by gamers again?
Right. Because PDF sales through Paizo don't drive a WotC revenue stream.
I find your argument unpersuasive, Jtlawyer.
__________________ ENworld OAF (Old-school Admirer of 4th edition)
You know, I've thought of the part that's more insane then the multiple people agreeing with this - it's that they gave no freaking warning whatsoever.
Just out of the damn blue, "Oh hey, pdfs are banned after tonight."
WOW GUYS! THANKS FOR THE HEADS UP!
__________________ Psionics are too sci-fi, not like the traditional method of spell casting that has existed only in D&D, involves research, laboratory work, and formulas, and was cribbed directly from a series of science fiction novels. I mean, come on, calling forth the power to alter the world from your own center of will? That's not magical in the slightest! Not at all like my wizard's spell "Telepathy!"
It seems as if WotC is following the advice of the RIAA and TSR to the letter. Alienation of their supporters seems to be the number one priority for the past 8 months or so, despite the best efforts of people like Scott and...well, I'd say Linae, but she was let go... and Dave, but... he was let go, too... and Randy, but...
It's just REALLY hard to support a company who is dead-set on negative PR like that.
__________________ "Conversely, I'm amazed at the number of people queueing up to tell people that don't like 4e that they are wrong. Why can't people just agree to disagree, and get on with actually playing the game?" --Delericho
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If there's five dragons, they're standard monsters.
If there's a dozen dragons, either most of them are minions or your DM is tired of the campaign.
--Lizard
Just out of the damn blue, "Oh hey, pdfs are banned after tonight."
WOW GUYS! THANKS FOR THE HEADS UP!
That's the source of about 70% of my anger. I don't like that they were pulled whatsoever, but pulled on only a few hours notice?
__________________ The purpose if good rules is to remove the necessity of GM fiat as much as is humanly possible.
Rules are required for role-play for the same reason as they are required for combat: to replace the skills of the player with those of the character.
I agree this is stupid. WOTC wants to punish me, and every other legal buyer of PDF's, for what pirate distributors are doing. This in absolutely no way is having any impact whatsoever on the thieves who like to illegally distribute illegal goods. If anything WOTC is increasing the demand for their product!
If governments cannot stop the flow of illegal drugs, even when they know exactly where it si coming from, how does WOTC think they are doing anything to stop pirating? All they have done is cut off legitimate and legal customers. All they are doing is taking away our legal options to have digital copies of our books.
So all WOTC is doing is screwing over their law abiding customers. All they are doing is increasing demand for illegal copies. All they are doing is being incredibly foolish and insulting to us, their legal customers.
The only sensible reason I can see for them doing this to prove how those 8 thieves definitely caused WOTC to lose revenue as a direct result of their piracy. Which is required for successful copyright lawsuits.
Still, even so I think this is an incredibly foolish and damaging move, to the point where I think they will regret doing this.
__________________ It is the spirit of the game, not the letter of the rules, which is important. NEVER hold to the letter written, nor allow some barracks room lawyer to force quotations from the rule book upon you, IF it goes against the obvious intent of the game. As you hew the line with respect to conformity to major systems and uniformity of play in general, also be certain the game is mastered by you and not by your players. Within the broad parameters give in the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Volumes, YOU are creator and final arbiter. By ordering things as they should be, the game as a WHOLE first, your CAMPAIGN next, and your participants thereafter, you will be playing Advanced Dungeons and Dragons as it was meant to be. May you find as much pleasure in so doing as the rest of us do.
Yes, sueing 6 people will make a difference. Just ask the RIAA, they've sued thousands and it sure has helped them.
__________________ Brain: Come Pinky! We must prepare for tomorrow night.
Pinky: Why? What are we going to do tomorrow night?
Brain: The same thing we do every night....TRY TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD!
(As an aside, I think it's really, really sweet of WotC to drive customers away to other RPG companies, on what's becoming a semi-regular basis. It shows an admirable willingness to share the RPG market. Kudos, WotC! Ignore these folks telling you it was a bad move ... they just don't understand your corporate altruism.)
Just when you think the bad decisions can't possibly keep coming...
You obviously have not spent enough time in a large corporation. Rule 137 of working in a large corporation: Never, EVER believe for a moment that your dumb boss can't make a dumber decision than the one he just made, because he ALWAYS can. It can ALWAYS get worse.
__________________
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I honestly think in the end the DDI won't survive just like every other online thing Wizards has tried. They can't even get their chat rooms up and running.
__________________
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Quote:
Originally Posted by joethelawyer I hope Scott Rouse is somewhere with a big bottle of Jack. He's gonna need it. He must feel like the Secret Service guy who was tasked with keeping President Clinton out of trouble with women.
Quote:
Originally Posted by El Mahdi
Man, I need more XP to give out! This is Golden!
All XP accepted. I'm so tired of being a second level goblin whatever-it-is.
__________________ ~Joe
If you like what I said, throw me some XP. I was a goblin sharpshooter for far too long.
If you're angry that you can't buy old TSR material, give WotC a month and they'll be selling to you again through the DDI.
Anyone think they'll try to somehow use this to promote DDI subscriptions?
That said, anyone else suspect that DDI sales aren't hitting expectations? Character visualizer, dungeon builder, and virtual game table all having had no news in months, getting on a year past when they were originally supposed to launch, and links to info on them getting removed from the DDI page?
__________________ "I can just see the 4e adventure anthology "Tale from the Limited Staircase"." - Ken Marable
If you're angry that you can't buy old TSR material, give WotC a month and they'll be selling to you again through the DDI.
If you're angry that you can't download your remaining 5 PDF copies, you should be pissed that RPGnow sold you a product that they can't deliver on.
Wizard is within its rights. RPGnow got caught with its pants down. Your bile is misdirected.
Hahahahaha, what.
Seriously.
What.
I can't think of a logical answer to this OR a snappy response. You're dead serious. You actually think that WotC has done nothing wrong here. I..am speechless.
__________________ Psionics are too sci-fi, not like the traditional method of spell casting that has existed only in D&D, involves research, laboratory work, and formulas, and was cribbed directly from a series of science fiction novels. I mean, come on, calling forth the power to alter the world from your own center of will? That's not magical in the slightest! Not at all like my wizard's spell "Telepathy!"
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