D&D General Interview with D&D VP Jess Lanzillo on Comicbook.com

[Reynard]

The cost of printing a book is minimal. It may not be as profitable as digital, but it also doesn't really compete with digital either. People that get books are not suddenly going to switch to digital and it would hurt adoption of new players that may ultimately be digital customers.

Lamborghini's cars may well be more profitable per unit than their tractors, doesn't mean they don't make money off their tractors. Digital may or may not be more profitable than books but there's no reason to ignore a profitable market segment.

Maybe someday we won't have books any more, I know I prefer my Kindle. But a lot of people still like physical books, or both books and digital.

You keep responding to a thing I am not saying. I do not think books will go away. But I do think WotC will focus on digital as a revenue source -- primarily through subscriptions to beyond and the VTT (along with microtransactions for the latter).

I think the one thing WotC could do that would tell us what their plans are is if they created a beyond subscriber tier that gave you access to the library or some portion of it as long as you are subscribed. It is interesting that the new CEO is from MMOs, since this is a thing that MMOs do.

Doesn't change that I think it's an illogical and biased opinion based on what we know and what we've been told.

YouTube thumbnail headlines are 90% lies and you probably shouldn't let them overly worry you.

 

[DarkCrisis]

The cost of printing a book is minimal. It may not be as profitable as digital, but it also doesn't really compete with digital either. People that get books are not suddenly going to switch to digital and it would hurt adoption of new players that may ultimately be digital customers.

Lamborghini's cars may well be more profitable per unit than their tractors, doesn't mean they don't make money off their tractors. Digital may or may not be more profitable than books but there's no reason to ignore a profitable market segment.

Maybe someday we won't have books any more, I know I prefer my Kindle. But a lot of people still like physical books, or both books and digital.



Doesn't change that I think it's an illogical and biased opinion based on what we know and what we've been told.

You know what's funny is I probably would use DDB more if they gave me a digital copy for free with a physical purchase. Get me in the door WotC and I might spend money on your storefront. Heck just do it for the Core 3.

 

[Oofta]

People who play exclusively physical probably don't need to worry, unless the push to digital starts to affect the design/creative team in some way. But people who are in any sort of mixed groups, whether physical/digital or digital across different ecosystems will have different needs and concerns when it comes to wotc's digital plans.

Indeed, the physical/digital is a false dichotomy; the real (unanswered) question is how tightly wotc will look to control their digital ecosystem

First, "control their digital ecosystem" is not what people seem to be worried about. Second, what does that even mean? The dreaded MICROTRANSACTIONS which are somehow different from all the paraphernalia like terrain, minis and dice I've collected over the years? I'm actually dissapointed they stopped selling just parts of books since I don't use modules but occasionally bought items and monsters.

Is it the VTT? Again, that's totally optional and nothing they can force on anyone. It might be a nice tool for some people and if done right a good alternative to the VTTs we have now. If you don't want to use it, don't.

People keep raising the mysterious abstract fears, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of explanation for or justification of those fears. They have DDB and people subscribe to it which give them a known and relatively stable income stream. It works well for a lot of people because of how we can share products with everyone. For others it's not a great solution, but they can stick with books like we did for decades.

You keep responding to a thing I am not saying. I do not think books will go away. But I do think WotC will focus on digital as a revenue source -- primarily through subscriptions to beyond and the VTT (along with microtransactions for the latter).

See above. I don't see why this is an issue.

I think the one thing WotC could do that would tell us what their plans are is if they created a beyond subscriber tier that gave you access to the library or some portion of it as long as you are subscribed. It is interesting that the new CEO is from MMOs, since this is a thing that MMOs do.

I assume they're still figuring that out.

YouTube thumbnail headlines are 90% lies and you probably shouldn't let them overly worry you.

I ignore most of the videos and am no way worried about them. I just disagree with the conclusions.

 

[Lazybones]

I currently run three 5e campaigns, two in Fantasy Grounds and one in-person at a local game store. I do not have a DDB account. Most of my in-person players use it and one even uses it exclusively; he does not have a physical PHB (he's brand new to the hobby, brought in by BG3). He was able to send me a link to his character sheet that I was able to access without a subscription. I think this will become more common in the future.

I don't mind paying twice for the digital and print books; I see the digital and in-person experiences as fairly distinct and my $/hour cost is still insanely low for D&D; far lower than any of my other hobbies.

Like most I would be unhappy if WotC/Hasbro stopped producing physical books and/or added some kind of subscription requirement for digital access to playing D&D online. Neither seems likely in the immediate future (i.e., the next decade or so), especially since they have already licensed 2024 D&D to Fantasy Grounds. If they decided at some point to add a surcharge for accessing specific content in DDB or for using their VTT that would not impact me, since I don't plan on using either. What I've seen of their VTT suggests that it looks pretty, but it doesn't look super friendly to homebrew, especially in terms of building maps.

Things can always change, and if they did a 6th edition or something in ten years that mandated using their system to play, I would reassess my options then based on what they offer vs the cost. My understanding is that the licenses to Fantasy Grounds are irrevocable, so I can keep playing 5e/2024 using my lifetime Ultimate license until I died, as long as I could find interested players. Based on the number of people I see playing earlier editions or clones of them right now, I don't think that will be an issue.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Wooo, I was right there with you until this part.

WOTC, as a subsidiary of Hasbro, has a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders. They have no such responsibility to us.

I know there are people in WOTC who have the game and its players' best interests in their heart. Absolutely.

But the company is publicly traded corporation, not a non-profit or a government organization. If they can find a way to rent our imaginations back to us, they totally would and I think they're going to try. It's their legal responsibility.

I'm pretty sure all of that was sarcasm.

 

[Micah Sweet]

This last one is of concern to me, as that does seem to be a large part of the recent updates. I do like combat in the game, but I don't like it to be the main thrust of the game, nor for it to hog table time.

This last Sunday, just with 5E 2014 rules, we had a four-hour combat. While in the end it was a lot of fun, it isn't the norm and not something I'd want to face every time I sit at the table.

Combat has been the main thrust of the game mechanically since at least the start of the WotC era. You can always play otherwise, but the more current the rules the more rules you're ignoring when you do so.

 

[Reynard]

I ignore most of the videos and am no way worried about them. I just disagree with the conclusions.

My point is that the tumbnail is almost never the actual conclusion. They are attention grabbers and click-bait. But the content is usually less dire. Usually.

In other words, I think far fewer people actually believe WotC will eliminate print than you think.

 

[Oofta]

My point is that the tumbnail is almost never the actual conclusion. They are attention grabbers and click-bait. But the content is usually less dire. Usually.

In other words, I think far fewer people actually believe WotC will eliminate print than you think.

There have been plenty of people on these forums recently that seem to believe they'll be ending print. If books will still be available then I don't see why anyone who doesn't want to use WotC's digital tools would care one way or another.

EDIT: in addition if a thumbnail is declaring some hair on fire emergency, I'll probably never watch it.

 

[Reynard]

There have been plenty of people on these forums recently that seem to believe they'll be ending print. If books will still be available then I don't see why anyone who doesn't want to use WotC's digital tools would care one way or another.

Why does anyone care about 75% of the stuff we talk about here? people get all riled up whenever someone mentions Perception and Stealth, even though you can do whatever you want at your table. It's a discussion forum. We discuss.

 

[Oofta]

Why does anyone care about 75% of the stuff we talk about here? people get all riled up whenever someone mentions Perception and Stealth, even though you can do whatever you want at your table. It's a discussion forum. We discuss.

And I'm just trying to understand why WotC doing digital stuff matters if they also print the books.