Revolutions are Always Verbose: Effecting Change in the TTRPG Industry

[Yora]

In the end, you got to put your money where your mouth is. Or in this case, not put your money.
Wagging fingers means nothing if you still buy their books and praise its content to other people who get encouraged to buy it.

Though I expect in a niche industry that does not fill a required need and competes with other industries for the same consumer money, it's probably going to do little to improve conditions in that sector. It's not like there's any rival competing with WotC and D&D for the top position. If D&D shrinks, it will be seen as simply a shrinking market and not a move of customers to competing companies that provide a comparable product under better conditions. And what we see in practice is claims of D&D only growing.
Deciding not to buy D&D books probably only helps your own sense of integrity, but I don't think it will put a single dollar into any creator's pocket.

 

[Umbran]

Nevertheless, imo the answer to the op seems to be a writers guild similar to Hollywood, or another sort of union.

I am skeptical that it would be helpful. Unions are useful when there's a massive power differential between employer and employee. The only place that's true is at WotC, but they are already likely the largest employer of full-time RPG creative staff with salaries and benefits.

Outside WotC, the vast majority of the RPG space is tenuous - the common question isn't how many millions of dollars of profit the company can squeeze out of the employees, it is whether the product will make any profit at all.

 

[Myrdin Potter]

You want the sweeping changes in 1? Move to Canada. Can still be underpaid writing RPG books but at least you will have healthcare.

I see these whines about how underpaid RPG staff are every year and I have been playing for 4 decades.

The fact is that it is a niche, the creative talent is fairly easy to come by, and there is only one huge winner with the occasional lottery ticket Kickstarter.

Every time I see a creator raise prices above market claiming “living wage”, I then see a product that does not sell.

There are a few companies that try over a long time. Raging Swan, for example, used Patreon to keep raising their word rate to freelancers.

The industry is not that big and the wages are not huge as well in writing the stories for computer games. Writing can be sourced globally. Really hard to raise wages there.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

You want the sweeping changes in 1? Move to Canada. Can still be underpaid writing RPG books but at least you will have healthcare.

I see these whines about how underpaid RPG staff are every year and I have been playing for 4 decades.

"Move to Canada." "I see these whines ..."

Okay then! Thank you for your input!

 

[dragoner]

Unions are useful when there's a massive power differential between employer and employee.

Something like the SAG, Screen Actors Guild, where the dues on the highest earners, helps to pay for healthcare for all members. Unions are helpful beyond simple wages.

 

[Myrdin Potter]

"Move to Canada." "I see these whines ..."

Okay then! Thank you for your input!

And ignore the points below?

Canada (I grew up there and live in an expensive area of the USA now) has a bunch of what you seem to be asking for in social support but still is not utopia for RPG companies.

Change USA drastically when there are living examples that show it does not help?

I don’t see the more socialist European countries being all that for living even middle class writing RPG.

As long as supply of product (and supply of talent) exceeds what the market will bear, prices will never be where you seem to hope they will be.

 

[Umbran]

3.
Agitating for the big players to make changes. You are correct- TikTok doesn't necessarily have writer's unions, but Hollywood does. The Avengers? Unionized. But not just the movies. Your TV shows too. There is an entire well-paid industry (not just the writers, but the entire industry ... ) based on this creative enterprise. Yeah, RPGs are not blockbuster movies. But D&D? D&D is owned by Hasbro. D&D is incredibly successful.

You are comparing elephants to mice, though.

And if Hasbro ups their game, other players will too.

I think you overestimate the profit margin for anyone outside of Hasbro/WotC.

 

[Umbran]

Something like the SAG, Screen Actors Guild, where the dues on the highest earners, helps to pay for healthcare for all members. Unions are helpful beyond simple wages.

How many "high earners" are there in RPGs?

You guys are talking about unionizing what is basically a cottage industry.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I think you overestimate the profit margin for anyone outside of Hasbro/WotC.

....interestingly enough, companies (such as Hasbro) are able to leverage the existing model that the rest of the industry uses to exact excess profits from D&D.

In other words, and I am quite sure you know this- Hasbro, despite having an incredibly profitable and successful brand both in and of itself and as a source for IP, continues to use the same model that the rest of the industry does, with a high reliance on free-lance artists and writers.

Which would be like Disney saying, "Hey, we know that these MCU movies make a lot of money, but people make TikTok for fun, why not just not pay our people? The Mouse needs to EAT!"

 

[MGibster]

2. Structural Change, Part 2: Changing the law (FLSA, for example) to prevent abuse of independent contractor status would also work. There is currently a push-pull regarding this, and related issues (use of unpaid intern work, being an example). This is an easy one- the retort that there are always people willing to work for free has been used to prevent all positive changes in the past that you currently take for granted, from the FLSA (minimum wage, overtime), to the FMLA (leave), to the standardized work week, to child labor laws.

I remember years ago that a few RPG companies had ambassador programs where they had volunteers demonstrate their products at conventions/hobby shops in exchange for free or discounted products. But a lot of those programs seem to have disappeared over the years. (It looks like Steve Jackson Games still has their Men in Black program.) I was under the impression that these programs disappeared, in part, because of concerns over establishing an employee/employer relationship between the company and program participants. Though perhaps there were other factors such as more effective means of getting word of their product out to the public with the advent of social media sites.

At work, I'm the jerk in HR who puts a stop to bringing aboard a contractor if we run into the risk of getting in trouble for a misclassification of an employee as an independent contractor. The Department of Labor did revise their fact sheet on how to determine the difference between a contractor and an employee back in 2008 based on what they call the following "significant" factors:

1. The extent to which the services rendered are an integral part of the principal's business.
2. The permanency of the relationship.
3. The amount of the alleged contractor's investment in facilities and equipment.
4. The nature and degree of control by the principal.
5. The alleged contractor's opportunities for profit and loss.
6. The amount of initiative, judgment, or foresight in open market competition with others required for the success of the claimed independent contractor.
7. The degree of independent business organization and operation.

What's notably absent from this list is mention of a formal employment agreement. i.e. You can establish an employee/employer relationship without entering into a formal agreement.