Matt Colville weighs in.

[TheSword]

The trouble is that the VTT appears to be designed to create a gacha game not to function as a useful GM tool It doesn't matter when they launch it or how much testing & feedback they get because Zynga's farmville will never be sim earth & their cityville will never be sim city. Simply calling it a VTT won't make it useful in that role if it lacks a competitive featureset.

I have more faith in WotC than that.

I think they will try and put out a great product for DMs and players because that’s what their business is. I have no reason to think they would sacrifice a good product for a lousy product that costs more. I really don’t mind paying more for 3d tokens if I can switch it to regular uploadable 2D token mode as well.

Aside from some editorial choices about product in the last two years, I’m pretty supportive of what WotC has done product wise in the last 10 years. I think they’ve been overwhelming trying to make the best game they can. (Even when it’s not been to my taste)

One D&D seems to be trying to continue in the same vein. I don’t have a reason to think they would do differently with their VTT. So because Im a glass half full kind of guy I’m gonna go with that until I can see some actual stuff that says otherwise.

 

[Nikosandros]

When WotC did that silly "don't tell anybody about this" survey for a VTT a couple years ago, they were floating a free to play model: qll the rules for free, aesthwtics cost money.

In that video they proposed a subscription to get access to the full rules.

 

[lvl20dm]

That's why I made the off-hand comment about youtubers. Ahem.

I don't want to go down that road, but let's say that ... to put it one way ... he is not a journalist, and one of his claims that was bandied about as gospel was immediately and correctly shot down (and was, for that matter, laughably incorrect to start with).

Again, there was a demonstrably false document a while ago ... something someone admitted that they made up. I find it remarkable that someone would have a "senior source" confirm a fact that was in a forged document. Especially when those same "senior source(s)" have previously provided false information.

Seems remarkably convenient. Again, this is strictly about the continued repetition of $30/month. It's a number that seems to have taken hold despite it originating in a fake document.

The faked slide was also specifically about D&D Beyond. We don't know what their VTT plans are, but that subscription number is coming from that hoax.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

The faked slide was also specifically about D&D Beyond. We don't know what their VTT plans are, but that subscription number is coming from that hoax.

Yep. Again, I have no doubt that Hasbro is trying to, as they say, "Monetize the s***" out of D&D. Primarily because ... they've said that! To investors!

I just think it's at least somewhat important to try and avoid repeating claims that are, at best, highly dubious, and at worse, knowingly fraudulent.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

If you want a VTT woth all extras freebies and so on. Let people pay 30$ per month.

This is nothing to what you can spend on other hobbies per month and free to p(l)ay games.
I also would not mind having a VTT that actually allows you to set up a dungeon with OneD&D creatures and play it vs an AI for test reasons. I actually think, that would be quite cool.

This all is totally ok, if it is just an option among many. That is the crux of it.

If WotC actually can make me pay that much by offering me something* that is worth 30bucks per month, I won't wine.

A good measure would be: does it save me so much time and nerves preparing for my sessions, that I can instead work half an hour more per week on my job, I'd come out net positive.

 

[overgeeked]

The faked slide was also specifically about D&D Beyond. We don't know what their VTT plans are, but that subscription number is coming from that hoax.

Sort of. The number first came up because of that faked slide. Since then it’s been confirmed by several people who’ve been almost 100% spot on with all their leaked info and news. But, importantly it’s not in relation to D&D Beyond. It’s about the new VTT.

So there’s also a bit of a technically true aspect to this. Beyond is not going to have a $30/month sub. The leak is that the new VTT will have a $30/month sub. Beyond and the VTT are two different things. They will almost certainly be integrated, but they are separate and distinct things.

So when D&D Beyond says they won’t have a $30/month sub they’re not lying. But that’s not what the leak was about. It’s about the new VTT.

 

[lvl20dm]

Sort of. The number first came up because of that faked slide. Since then it’s been confirmed by several people who’ve been almost 100% spot on with all their leaked info and news. But, importantly it’s not in relation to D&D Beyond. It’s about the new VTT.

So there’s also a bit of a technically true aspect to this. Beyond is not going to have a $30/month sub. The leak is that the new VTT will have a $30/month sub. Beyond and the VTT are two different things. They will almost certainly be integrated, but they are separate and distinct things.

So when D&D Beyond says they won’t have a $30/month sub they’re not lying. But that’s not what the leak was about. It’s about the new VTT.

So the $30 sub number is a coincidence? Weird.

If the WotC VTT is a $30 sub then it would need to be really, really nice. And even then, many people just wouldn't be able to afford (or justify) it.

 

[Bedrockgames]

He didn’t have to, his entire premise relies on the assumption that kids are idiots.

I don't think it does. It just relies on the pretty common sense idea that people will understand something based on the media they encounter it in. It isn't a statement about young people's intelligence. He just seems to be under the impression that WOTC is banking on people coming into the hobby through VTT and video games and understanding the game through those experiences (which is going to be very different, especially in terms of WOTCs ability to directly control what players and GMs are able to do in the game for example). There have been plenty of times where I first encountered a property in a medium outside its original form and that distorted my impression of it (not because I am an idiot, but because that was my limited experience with those properties). Personally I think it is far from a foregone conclusion that WOTC will succeed here, and I think they have more of an uphill climb than they realize (because ultimately this is a game built around playing around a table, even a virtual one, with your friends, and WOTC can never truly control that). But I do think he is correctly intuiting their thinking here.

I think where Colville is coming from is a concern that WOTC believes they don't need the people currently playing the game to achieve their aims with the brand, that they can transition to a new audience because of D&D's broader cache in the culture. What they probably realized is while D&D has a lot more recognition and interest in the culture because of Stranger Things and other developments, a lot of people who are interested in it, probably lose interest when they sit down to play (some don't, but I think it is probably a fair bet that many do, and this is something I have seen over the years where people like the idea of D&D but when they experience what it actually is, they often become less interested). But if they can change D&D to have more appeal to that large number of people who like the brand but don't necessarily like the game, that seems to be the calculation Colville is guessing at.

D&D as a hobby takes a degree of investment and dedication. I do get the sense that they are attempting to make D&D something that can appeal to a less devoted audience that is considerably larger than the core group of fans who regularly play the game. And maybe they see the fans as an impediment to that

 

[J.Quondam]

For those who know about video game development:
I don't know much about that industry and I don't recall exactly when WotC hired all those devs. But it seems like their timeline would be rushed even for an experienced studio.
Is it realistic that WotC could have their new VTT up and solidly running - worth paying a sub for - by the end of 2024?

 

[overgeeked]

So the $30 sub number is a coincidence? Weird.

The person who made the fake slide thought it would be obviously absurd, wildly over-the-top, and therefore hilarious. That it also happens to be the exact number picked by WotC for their top-tier subscription to their VTT is a cosmic irony to be sure.

If the WotC VTT is a $30 sub then it would need to be really, really nice.

The leaks suggest it would be access to the full library of 5E/OneD&D content, all books, all modules, all supplements, etc. It would also include the full VTT and monthly "loot drops" that would amount to new bits of rules, adventures, etc.

Even with all that it still sounds utterly ridiculous to me.

And even then, many people just wouldn't be able to afford (or justify) it.

Exactly. That's partially the point. WotC wants to make more money. A lot of people playing these games simply cannot afford to. Which is why so many players don't buy all the books and only, if they can, buy the PHB. That's why sharing books has always been a common thing. Why photocopying books was a common thing. Why pages in old official books were printed in blue...to prevent old-school photocopiers from working on those pages. And why sharing PDFs is so common today. It's an expensive hobby that is really attractive to people with more imagination than money.