D&D General Hey, are we all cool with having to buy the same book twice, or what?

[Var]

I've re-bought a few books on Roll20. But I can't say I'm happy about it.

Didn't buy any for myself, but gifted like 3 of them to our friend who usually DMs, since the guy has a family and kids.... and was about to manually enter every statblock for his campaign instead.
Just giving Roll20 the money for Monstermanual, Xanathar, Volo and Mordekainen seemed more reasonable compared to the amount of work he was gonna put into just the stuff required for the first 5 sessions.

The features you get are nice, easy automated levelups (although we had to redo characters from scratch at lvl3 since they broke after purchasing the books for new Subclasses), drag and drop spells, etc.
But he also pays for a Roll20 Subscription so...

 

[Parmandur]

I'm not. It's the only real conclusion to draw. It's strange how they sell PDFs of their older editions for which there is no DDB or VTT integration. Easily accessible official PDFs would make those services less appealing.

But sure, go ahead and take the word of a corporation (Hasbro market capitalization of over 9 billion ) that they are looking out for our collective best interest.

Nathan Stewart is a human being, not a corporation. I hate using PDFs, whereas D&D Beyond has a top of the line UX design (don't use it, but game recognize game). His explanation is legitimate.

 

[Parmandur]

O-Okay?

I mean, we're talking about whether it's "cool" or not to do business in this way. Nobody is talking about buying a controlling interest in the company, sitting on the board and changing policy.

Like, complaining about things that aren't in our power to change is basically 99% of all forum posting.

The answer is, yes, it's cool.

 

[Hoffmand]

It's been three years since D&D Beyond launched and I see many people, here and elsewhere, gladly pay for the physical copy of a release and then again for the virtual copy.

There are companies 1/100th the size of WotC that will gladly provide a virtual copy of the physical book you bought for free, and have been doing it for years (Not to mention they're generally normal PDFs that aren't tied to a service).

My question is this: is the consensus that this is fine and normal and the other publishers are wrong or should we be banging a drum about how this is a anti-consumer practice?

If they are making more money not providing the pdf for free it would be logical to continue doing so. It’s that simple. It would be stupid to do otherwise.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

I bought both. Until February, I used the physical books for my D&D tabletop games and to prepare my adventures. I enjoy the tactile experience of having the book itself in front of me. It's the way I've done it for decades, and by George, that's the way it was always going to be.

But since we went under lock-down, we switched to Roll20. Of course, I didn't need to get digital copies of the books, I could have spent I-don't-know-how-many hours inputting all of the various monsters, class features, and maps into Roll20 by myself on my own time. But having the digital books made switching to a VTT format a lot smoother and easier on my players. Especially on such short notice.

(I was pleasantly surprised to discover that all of the maps that were included in the books, like the monster lairs in Volo's Guide to Monsters, or the temple maps in Xanathar's Guide, were already rigged for dynamic lighting and all of the creature tokens had been created and fully-set up.)

I'm not saying that my circumstances are everyone's circumstances, but that's why this Moogle bought both formats. I can't say I enjoyed the price, but I'm satisfied with both products for different reasons.

That's fair, but of course Roll20 isn't just a PDF like the OP is saying.

So this is my process, and I'm curious as to whether this is unethical (maybe it is);

• First a buy a hardcopy of a book (always preferable as reading full books online gives me a headache after awhile)
• Then, if I am using roll20 for an online game, I'll buy things like stablocks for whatever I need to search quickly in front of me (extra $ to buy, but supports a platform I use)
• If I use a map on Roll20, I search up the PDF of a copy I've bought, and spend the time myself to create a map with tools like Snipping Tool.

Wondering if that last part is unethical... I don't think it is, at's it's not very different from scanning the page from the copy I own and just using that instead (it just saves me a little time of having to scan and stuff, printers suck).

 

[LordEntrails]

Sure it is.

When I buy a PDF from Drivethru and download it, it's mine forever.

When you buy a book on Beyond or one of those other VTTs it's yours as long as they find it worth their while to exist.

You used to own a thing forever, now you don't. Who benefits? The consumer?

You're wrong, again.

When you buy a book on Fantasy Grounds it gets downloaded to your computer. Yes it's encrypted, but it can't be taken away from you and since FG runs local on your computer, even if the company goes out of business, you can still run FG and access everything you bought.

With DDB you can download as well, but I don't know the details. Your concern is true for Roll20 (and one reason I don't use them), but that's it.

 

[happyhermit]

...
The only reason they don't also offer PDFs normally is because of the licensing agreements they signed.

Eh... You do know that 5e was out for a long time without PDFs before any of those licenses existed? I mean clearly they are trying to take us for all we're worth, what with quickly putting out an SRD and a free digital version of the game.

Anyways the nerd rage train you seem to be looking for left the station a while back, but you didn't really miss much.

 

[thom_likes_gaming]

Yes.

paizo provides free PDFs for books bought on Amazon? Since when?

 

[Parmandur]

That's fair, but of course Roll20 isn't just a PDF like the OP is saying.

So this is my process, and I'm curious as to whether this is unethical (maybe it is);

• First a buy a hardcopy of a book (always preferable as reading full books online gives me a headache after awhile)
• Then, if I am using roll20 for an online game, I'll buy things like stablocks for whatever I need to search quickly in front of me (extra $ to buy, but supports a platform I use)
• If I use a map on Roll20, I search up the PDF of a copy I've bought, and spend the time myself to create a map with tools like Snipping Tool.

Wondering if that last part is unethical... I don't think it is, at's it's not very different from scanning the page from the copy I own and just using that instead (it just saves me a little time of having to scan and stuff, printers suck).

Point 3 is slightly iffy, since it encourages and covers for definitely unethical behavior: I'd say use Genius Scan or another equivalent, printers not needed to make a PDF for personal use in 2020.

Alternatively, WotC usually has provisions that allow the artist, such as Mike Schley, to sell clean PDFs for that purpose.

 

[TwoSix]

I'm not. It's the only real conclusion to draw. It's strange how they sell PDFs of their older editions for which there is no DDB or VTT integration. Easily accessible official PDFs would make those services less appealing.

But sure, go ahead and take the word of a corporation (Hasbro market capitalization of over 9 billion ) that they are looking out for our collective best interest.

It's not 2000 anymore; we've mostly moved past reflexive cynicism and disdain for corporate practices. Considering the median age of forum posters here is over 40, I'm sure that more than a few of us are employed by soulless corporate entities.

Obviously, WotC could have made PDFs of their products salable, their choice not to is certainly not charity. It was a decision to increase the value of their partnership with developers who offered online versions of the rules bundled with electronic tools. But as far as egregious corporate decisions go, this doesn't even register as any kind of moral affront.