No Dice <Nerd Rage>

[Mistwell]

Of course, if the argument really is that the revenue is not sufficient and that the accounting costs are somehow prohibitive, but they are truly interested in recovering goodwill of lapsed fans, then an alternative would be to just make them free downloads with the other previous edition materials available here -

Previous Edition Dungeons & Dragons Downloads

Problem solved for everyone.

Honest question: If they did that (and just that), would it recover YOUR goodwill towards WOTC?

I suspect the answer is no, and you have additional issues with WOTC, but you feel it would be a step in the right direction. Please correct me if I am wrong.

And, from what I can tell, most people who have a big problem with the PDF issue have other big problems with other things WOTC has done, and their goodwill will not be recovered simply by offering PDFs of older products (even if they are free).

Which is why I think some fans have been written off by WOTC, for being viewed as unpleasable (which may not be an accurate conclusion by WOTC, but I suspect it's one that some folks at WOTC did draw). If you have one major issue with WOTC, that can be fixed. If you have twenty major issues, that probably cannot be fixed. I think there is a perception (which may not be accurate) that some people have twenty major issues, and the PDF issue is just one of those twenty.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Thsi might be applicable if they were starting their company up from scratch but these are practices already in place and the additional revenue stream would not cause huge changes or adjustments to need to be made.

As someone who has to deal with ongoing Sarbanes-Oxley issues in accounting I must disagree with you. A portion of the external auditor's scope is attributed to making sure the accounting for that segment of the business continues to follow the policies and practices put in place. SOX is not a matter of set-up and forget, it costs public corporations alot of money in audit fees every year.

Regardless, the main point isn't the details, because none of us will ever know those. The point is that the decision on PDFs was more likly a business decision based on cost-benefit ratios. It was less likely a personal decision made to snub the fans of older editions.

 

[Umbran]

I'm not going to buy that simply because it's a business, WotC's decisions can't be questioned or contradicted, nor do I believe that doing so requires a PHD and 5 years of industry experience.

Correct - questioning their decisions doesn't take a PhD an 5+ years of experience. What real questioning requires is something we don't have - data. I think of it this way: arguing against their policy should require the same sort of support I'd want a company to have to enact the policy. If they pulled it out of their collective corporate butts, without any numbers to back it up, we'd call them stupid, right? How are we smarter to do the same thing?

When we don't like something, it is very easy to come up with plausible arguments for why that something is either stupid or evil. But without data to back that up, it's still just a speculation.

You are, of course, free to act upon your speculations as you see fit.

 

[mudbunny]

Gee, wiz, that sure sounds like alot! But not really. This sounds like a tiny fraction of the effort it takes to produce even one physical copy of a book.

The steps are probably the exact same as those required for physical products. Thus, for each additional .pdf product you put out, someone has to check all of those numbers. As the number of .pdf products goes up that require the numbers to be checked and entered into the database, the time it takes *also* goes up. And time = money. No we don't know whether the .pdf sales were at a level where the revenue that they brought in was at a level that was profitable. My suspicions is that it was not, as a result of the scale of D&D pdfs that were for sale. Even if a book sold no copies, it is still an entry that had to be done. In addition, we don't know what sort of cut or fee was being changed to WotC to put their books up on the various pdf reseller sites. Was it at a level where the revenue from the pdfs wasn't covering that cost?

There is a lot of information out there that we simply don't have, and to make absolute statements based on the extremely limited info that we do have is the height of folly.

The front end costs of selling older editions material have already been payed. The books have been produced, the PDFs have been made. And even with 4th edition, the books are printer proofs before they are hard copies.

The pdfs that are provided to the printer may not be the same as are required/desired for direct sale. And I have seen printer proofs (before the release of 4E, there were printer proofs of the 4E PHB, DMG and MM floating out there. ) and they are *not* the same format (layout, etc) as the pdfs that were available for legitimate purchase.

I'm not going to buy that simply because it's a business, WotC's decisions can't be questioned or contradicted, nor do I believe that doing so requires a PHD and 5 years of industry experience. That's a double standard that doesn't apply to incensed customers, apparently.

No-one is saying that. What is being said is that there is not enough information to make anything resembling a guess, much less an informed opinion.

So, I'll just reiterate: I don't like what WotC has done and will not buy their product until their policies change.

And no-one is begrudging you that.

 

[Chrono22]

In the absence of evidence (numbers, as you put it), it falls to the observer to make his own conclusions. Unfortunately we don't live in a reality where doing nothing is a plausible course of action. Even inaction has a consequence.
Since WotC wasn't honest and forthright about why they did what they did, I'll assume that leaving us in the dark was better for their public image than the alternative.
Preemptive counter: piracy wasn't a legitimate reason. Millions of products are pirated every day without having their IP stripped, it's not a legitimate reason to pull PDFs. And anyway, the piracy would continue unabated regardless of the removal of the PDFs.

So, my choice is to boycott a company that isn't honest and engages in policies I disagree with. Is it a rational choice? Yes, I think so. My personal feelings aside, I think it's better in the long run to buy from a company that wants your goodwill and support.

 

[Tamlyn]

Umbran's suggestion about limited manpower is good, except that this isn't a case where WotC could do only one or the other.

Maybe. But you work for a business. Theoretically, you can do an infinite amount of whatever you do for said company. Realisitically, you reach a limit where can't handle any more and help in one form or another must be brought in.

The profit margin of PDF sales is higher than dead-tree copies. Period.

Maybe. It depends on the product price.

I have to assume their removal wasn't about the profit they might or might not have provided, it was some convoluted and stupid market strategy to prop DDI and the newest edition.

I'm assuming it probably was a market strategy decision. Look, I play 3.5 (simply the version I currently choose to play) and I brought in a new player about 6 months ago (Yay me, expanding the hobby). I obviously taught the new guy 3.5. I bought him a 3.5 PHB, etc... I know that eventually I will probably move to a newer edition and any guys I play with, new or old, will also move to some newer edition. If I stay with 3.5 it becomes more and more difficult for me to bring in new players to 3.5. Now, if I'm playing a current version it's much easier to bring people in (expand the hobby) to a version where books and support are more readily available. So, if older editions are available on PDF, then I never need to upgrade. I can simply have them buy the PDF and continue playing 3.5. Simply because the strategy they ascribe to is different than you or I agree with doesn't necessarily make it convoluted or stupid.

Um, it has what, a couple dozen salaried employees? At best? I may not run a business of such a size, but I am employed within one that dwarfs it. And yes, it's not a publishing company, but I think just waving your hands around and saying "it's a business!" is a copout. It's not like WotC is some mega-corp with inscrutable goals. It's a small publishing company.

Yes, but it is a small company that has to report to a large corporation. Which may make things infinitely more complicated.

Why stop selling old products in the first place? Why take the stance that old sales necessarily negatively effect new ones? Is there any evidence that Fallout 2 is stopping people from buying Fallout 3?.

That's absoutely true for a single consumer. But we're talking about groups of players who all need to agree to some extent what they're going to play. Of course, I'm assuming it's easier to get a group of people together to play Call of Duty than the original Wolfenstein 3D. It's much easier to get people together for a current game than something older. Especially if I'm trying to get multiple people to shell out limited entertainment dollars for the same thing. The larger the group, the easier it is to go with what currently is available.

I'm not going to buy that simply because it's a business, WotC's decisions can't be questioned or contradicted, nor do I believe that doing so requires a PHD and 5 years of industry experience. That's a double standard that doesn't apply to incensed customers, apparently.
So, I'll just reiterate: I don't like what WotC has done and will not buy their product until their policies change.

Fair enough. Power to you.

 

[Acmite]

So, my choice is to boycott a company that isn't honest and engages in policies I disagree with.

Do you support child labour? Support for genocidal and harsh political regimes? What about slavery? Pollution?

I hope you don't support:

-clothing companies with factories/facilities in Africa and Asia
-shoe manufacturers
-Coca-Cola, etc

And I certainly hope you don't use any of the following products!

-Oil
-Gasoline
-Plastic
-Metal
-Wood

 

[Crothian]

Since WotC wasn't honest and forthright about why they did what they did, I'll assume that leaving us in the dark was better for their public image than the alternative.

How were they not honest with us? Are you expecting them to tell you the reasons behind of their actions or something?> Businesses don't do that. Heck, even the employees of most businesses rarely know the reasons behind decisions.

So, my choice is to boycott a company that isn't honest and engages in policies I disagree with. Is it a rational choice? Yes, I think so. My personal feelings aside, I think it's better in the long run to buy from a company that wants your goodwill and support.

I'm curious, why did it take this long to reach this? They stopped selling PDFs over a year ago. Are you a big customer of Wizards? Is this going to be a big boycott or just you stopping buying a few books a year?

 

[Umbran]

In the absence of evidence (numbers, as you put it), it falls to the observer to make his own conclusions.

That isn't true - one can reserve judgement.

Unfortunately we don't live in a reality where doing nothing is a plausible course of action. Even inaction has a consequence.

I am not at all sure that's as true as we'd like to believe. In a world where everyone had perfect data, and used that data with perfect intelligence, then every action, including inaction) would have a consequence. But in the real world, there's a great deal of noise that can make finding the signal from your individual choice impossible - and that's if the person on the end is even listening for it.

Since WotC wasn't honest and forthright about why they did what they did, I'll assume that leaving us in the dark was better for their public image than the alternative.

I don't think we have information demonstrating they were outright dishonest. They may have not said everything on their minds. But none of the other publishers are telling you everything about all their business decisions either, so that sort of lack of honestly is not specific to WotC.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Umbran's suggestion about limited manpower is good, except that this isn't a case where WotC could do only one or the other.

Huh? Has WotC developed a real-life Time-Turner or something? Every man-hour spent working on one thing is one man-hour lost from them working on something they might deem more profitable.

Um, it has what, a couple dozen salaried employees? At best? I may not run a business of such a size, but I am employed within one that dwarfs it. And yes, it's not a publishing company, but I think just waving your hands around and saying "it's a business!" is a copout. It's not like WotC is some mega-corp with inscrutable goals. It's a small publishing company.

Umm, now I'm getting really suspicious of these postings. WotC has a reported empolyee count of 388 currently according to their Linked-in buisness profile. That's a shade higher than a couple dozen.

Why stop selling old products in the first place? Why take the stance that old sales necessarily negatively effect new ones? Is there any evidence that Fallout 2 is stopping people from buying Fallout 3?

Fallout 2 is a game with Fallout 3 being the sequel, so it is safe to assume that the person playing Fallout 2 will likely purchase Fallout 3 later to continue playing the story. The same cannot be said for different versions of D&D. Now, add to that the fact that sales from Fallout 2 are likely at a discounted price (i.e. clearance) compared with Fallout 3, so they are not making as much money on it, and may be delaying a sale of Fallout 3, which may cost them additional money if the price point drops, or just because of the Time Cost of Money issue.

I'm not going to buy that simply because it's a business, WotC's decisions can't be questioned or contradicted, nor do I believe that doing so requires a PHD and 5 years of industry experience. That's a double standard that doesn't apply to incensed customers, apparently.
So, I'll just reiterate: I don't like what WotC has done and will not buy their product until their policies change.

You can question anything you want. You can contradict their decisions, but unless you have been in the board room with all the data in front of you, you cannot say that you know better than they do. Feel free to not buy any WotC products based upon how you feel, but don't think that everyone else will agree with you.

Personally I just don't care about their policies since none of them are illegal or unethical. I like D&D and am looking forward to the release of the Essentials line.