WotC Hasbro Bets Big on D&D

During today's 'Hasbro Fireside Chat', Hasbro's Chris Cocks, chief executive officer, and Cynthia Williams, president of Wizards of the Coast and Digital Gaming mentioned D&D, and about betting big on its name. This was in addition to the Magic: The Gathering discussion they held on the same call.

The following are rough notes on what they said.

D&D Beyond

• Leaning heavily on D&D Beyond
• 13 million registered users
• Give them more ways to express their fandom
• Hired 350 people last year
• Low attrition

What’s next for D&D

• Never been more popular
• Brand under-monetized
• Excited about D&D Beyond possibilities
• Empower accessibility and development of the user base.
• Data driven insight
• Window into how players are playing
• Companion app on their phone
• Start future monetization starting with D&D Beyond
• DMs are 20% of the audience but lions share of purchases
• Digital game recurrent spending for post sale revenue.
• Speed of digital can expand, yearly book model to include current digital style models.
• Reach highly engaged multigenerational fans.
• Dungeons and Dragons has recognition, 10 out of 10
• Cultural phenomenon right now.
• DND strategy is a broad four quadrant strategy
• Like Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings or Marvel
• New books and accessories, licensed game stuff, and D&D Beyond
• Huge hopes for D&D

What is success for the D&D Movie

• First big light up oppourtunity for 4th quadrant
• Significant marketing
• They think it’ll have significant box office
• It has second most viewed trailer at Paramount, only eclipsed by Transformers
• Will be licensed video games, some on movies
• Then follow up other media, TV, other movies, etc.
• Bullish on D&D.

 

[OB1]

IA big gap I see is a lack of a contemporary face for the game. I'm pretty sure that Drizz't is still the most famous face in the game outside of streaming after all these years. We could use a fresh band of unlikely heroes for people to daydream about.

I'd say we have a pretty popular bunch of unlikely heroes that are the new contemporary face for the game.

HOLY HELL!

Wow. 350 people is AAA developer levels of staff. Now obviously we don't know how those staff are arrayed, but WotC's "3D VTT by 2024" plans just got a whole lot more plausible, because as I said before, they're kind of doing 60% of an AAA game, and couple 350 people do that in two years? Certainly not impossible.

This on the other hand will 100% end in tears.

Yeah, if you look on their Linkedin jobs page, it certainly looks like they are gearing up for a AAA level game. Likely tied to the VTT.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think that's just the way of the business world now, much to my chagrin. We're seeing subscription type services everywhere, replacing things that were previously purchased one-time.

I think it reaches a breaking point for a lot of people though. I am at the point where I am looking to decrease, not increase my subscription services. I just can't afford all those monthly or annual fees anymore. I'll keep the basics, for example I use Word and Adobe enough, but I am not going to do a subscription for an RPG or a new streaming service.

 

[Professor Murder]

• Brand under-monetized

This literally fills me with dread.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I think it reaches a breaking point for a lot of people though. I am at the point where I am looking to decrease, not increase my subscription services. I just can't afford all those monthly or annual fees anymore. I'll keep the basics, for example I use Word and Adobe enough, but I am not going to do a subscription for an RPG or a new streaming service.

I hear you. I mean, just look at Patreon. I have a lot of people I want to support, but there are just so many...and it adds up.

 

[Dausuul]

I'm already getting nickled and dimed on silly things like word programs on my computer. The good thing about RPGs was you bought them, and that was the transaction. Hopefully this doesn't signal a shift to making it a purely subscription service or something.

That's why we have the OGL. Even if they don't release an SRD for 1D&D, it would not be hard to make a knockoff using the 5E SRD.

If Wizards were to quit making physical books, someone else would leap in, which is one of many reasons Wizards isn't going to quit making physical books.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

If Wizards were to quit making physical books, someone else would leap in, which is one of many reasons Wizards isn't going to quit making physical books.

I agree that they won't quit making them, but I do think we're going to see a shift over the next decade or so where physical books are increasingly a "luxury product" or a "lifestyle product", rather than being intended for practical use. In particular I suspect we may well see an increased tempo and significant of errata (patches, really) which will increasingly invalidate physical books just as it did in the 4E era.

But because they're a lifestyle product, people will keep buying them. I mean, if you go to the houses of a lot of people our age, and a bit younger, you often see D&D stuff displayed in a way that's to draw attention, rather than hidden away in some nerdy "den" or whatever. That's been the case a bit since at least the '90s but it's been getting more and more the case.

I could easily envision a scenario where D&D rulebooks were more like coffee-table books, in say, the round of publications for the edition after 1D&D (which will likely be in 2032-2034).

 

[Cadence]

I'm not a huge fan of paying for products I already own in new forms... but as a DM I've really liked my subscription making it so my players (both adult ones and teen ones) can add characters to my campaigns in DNDBeyond and get access to all of the supplements I've bought so that they have those options.

That's true for both in person and online. For online, having them all be able to use the dice roller on there has been really nice too.

As far as the books, my son loves having the paper copies, and I greatly prefer them for in person play.

 

[Clint_L]

Micro-transations are already a thing on D&D Beyond.

Wow. 20%? So for every 1 DM there's 5 players, not 10. That does not track. Maybe they're basing this off something they have, like D&D Beyond data that doesn't actually include the whole fan base.

1. Yeah, micro-transactions are already a good thing on DnDBeyond - they let you buy just the content that you want. Don't need the whole Wildemount Guide but really want the new Echo Knight sub-class? Just buy it for a dollar or two. As a consumer, I like having the option to not pay extra for stuff I don't need.

2. Doesn't track with what? Your anecdotal experience? Versus their 13 million accounts plus reams of survey data? One in five is a bit less than I see at our D&D Club, where I would say it is more like one in three.

 

[Cadence]

1. Yeah, micro-transactions are already a good thing on DnDBeyond - they let you buy just the content that you want. Don't need the whole Wildemount Guide but really want the new Echo Knight sub-class? Just buy it for a dollar or two. As a consumer, I like having the option to not pay extra for stuff I don't need.

I have really, really, really liked being able to buy the various races/species/schmorphs/whatever that way!

 

[Erdric Dragin]

Miss the days when it wasn't so popular, we had awesome products and editions like 1e and advancing to 2e and 3e.

Then everything went to crap with 4e and 5e. Forever gone are those days.

Sure wish I can wake up one day and see a new 3.5e book for sale, but I'm living in the wrong reality for that.

If multiverses exist, I sure hope in one of them I own D&D and I enforce supporting ALL the editions with new content. (although it probably woulda never made 4e or 5e that's for sure)