WotC Third party, DNDBeyond and potential bad side effects.

[mamba]

Well, then YOU go talk to SlyFlourish's friends and tell them that. It ain't ME you need to convince. It's their friends who are saying "Level Up is not the D&D we wish to play."

that is not what they said though, they said 'since it is not in DDB, we won't bother with it'

 

[SlyFlourish]

It isn't your job to help WotC run their business, but it isn't WotC's business to help you run your games either. They're not a public trust, acting as impartial caretakers of the founding legacy of TTRPGs, there to cultivate the success of the entire hobby without seeking their own success.

I completely agree. That doesn't mean we can't demand better services for our dollars. Why charge me $30 to rent an online license a book when I can spend $30 and buy a downloadable PDF from every other RPG publisher?
I was pretty clear to say that WOTC doesn't have (and probably legally can't have given they're a publicly traded company) the larger 5e hobby's best interests as its priority. That's not me bashing them – it's just true.
But we're customers and we can ask for things that help us build a stronger 5e hobby for us.

They are a business, and their business is making and selling D&D books.

I don't think thats true anymore. I think their business became getting people to subscribe and buy books on D&D Beyond. Don't forget the $146 million acquistion of D&D Beyond. That's a huge incentive to change the business. Also don't forget that three layers of management in the D&D Beyond chain are former Amazon and Microsoft executives.

 

[Blue]

WotC providing better value is not strongarming, even though their size alone gives them advantage, but ending the licensing deals with other VTTs, or making their conditions worse, would definitely qualify.

There are a lot of now closed independent bookstores that had to compete against Amazon that would disagree.

"Undercutting competitors" and "providing a better value" could be the same thing depending on how you spin it. If due to not being able to provide that "better value" (be it inexpensive customer reach, integration into the official character builder, existing API access to VTTs, whatever) other competitors do poorly and get out of the the business is what WotC wants. Regardless if it is categorized as strong-arming.

 

[Remathilis]

I get what you are saying but I would view 5E variants differently than say Pathfinder. But everyone is going to have to be more descriptive in what they are playing if they don't actually call the new books something distinct, as you can't even say 5E DnD, you will have to specify the year.

My guess is "the updated PHB" or "the newest PHB" will be used colloquially and '24 PHB will be used in print or more formal discussion. We've not yet seen the trade dress, so there might be something there as well (even if it's "the one with the fire giant" vs "the one with the dwarf" or something).

My point is "it's all rock and roll to me" might work for purposes of showing community, but there is a reason rock music had hundreds of subgenres, Pantera doesn't sound the same as Elvis.

 

[SlyFlourish]

Oh, one important thing.

WOTC has done some tremendously valuable work for improving the larger 5e hobby. First, is well known. They put the 5.1 SRD into the Creative Commons. This was huge. It gave much of the core concepts of D&D out into the world, meaning that not only can people write 5e compatible materials, but they can write D&D-style games with all the nomenclature and not worry about getting sued.

Less well known – they released the 5.1 SRD into four other languages beyond English: French, Spanish, Italian, and German. That is a lot of time and energy to help 5th edition creators all over the world build games in languages other than English.

Seriously, go download all those documents and save them on your hard drive.

This was fantastic. It's a huge deal and a far greater benefit than any of the issues of D&D Beyond I've been talking about.

Releasing 5e into ther CC created the larger 5e community in my mind. It was the moment 5e went from being WOTC's world we all lived in, into its own platform with WOTC as one of the supporters (granted, one that dwarfs the others by like three orders of magnitude).

I like to think that 5e is now like Linux. Sure there's Debian and CentOS and Ubuntu but it's all Linux under the hood. I think the same is true for 5e. There's D&D 2014, D&D 2024, A5e, Tales of the Valiant, C7D20 and others. We get to mix and match what we want to use from whatever system. I haven't touched a D&D 2014 Monster Manual in like two years.

 

[Alzrius]

Oh, one important thing.

WOTC has done some tremendously valuable work for improving the larger 5e hobby. First, is well known. They put the 5.1 SRD into the Creative Commons. This was huge. It gave much of the core concepts of D&D out into the world, meaning that not only can people write 5e compatible materials, but they can write D&D-style games with all the nomenclature and not worry about getting sued.

Less well known – they released the 5.1 SRD into four other languages beyond English: French, Spanish, Italian, and German. That is a lot of time and energy to help 5th edition creators all over the world build games in languages other than English.

This was fantastic. It's a huge deal and a far greater benefit than any of the issues of D&D Beyond I've been talking about.

Seriously, go download all those documents and save them on your hard drive.

I'll note that the non-English releases seem to be CC only; there aren't any OGL releases of them that I can find.

 

[bedir than]

I'll note that the non-English releases seem to be CC only; there aren't any OGL releases of them that I can find.

Yes, the non-English are available in the broadest license and only was done as a result of the pressures people like Alphastream and others put on the company to expand play outside of the Anglosphere.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I get what you are saying but I would view 5E variants differently than say Pathfinder. But everyone is going to have to be more descriptive in what they are playing if they don't actually call the new books something distinct, as you can't even say 5E DnD, you will have to specify the year.

That's on WotC for refusing to give different books different names.

 

[Alzrius]

Yes, the non-English are available in the broadest license and only was done as a result of the pressures people like Alphastream and others put on the company to expand play outside of the Anglosphere.

I wish they'd also released them under the OGL; as it stands right now, making them exclusive to Creative Commons means that they can't take advantage of any existing Open Game Content unless they use the English SRD (i.e. the only one available under the OGL).

 

[DEFCON 1]

that is not what they said though, they said 'since it is not in DDB, we won't bother with it'

Same difference.

They don't wish to play non-Beyond D&D. The precise reason for why that is the case does not matter to the conversation.

If X is on D&D Beyond, they're good. If X is not, they aren't. Define X however you'd like.