D&D (2024) How D&D Beyond Will Handle Access To 2014 Rules

D&D Beyond has announced how the transition to the new 2024 edition will work on the platform, and how legacy access to the 2014 version of D&D will be implemented.

• You will still be able to access the 2014 Basic Rules and core rulebooks.
• You will still be able to make characters using the 2014 Player's Handbook.
• Existing home-brew content will not be impacted.
• These 2014 rules will be accessible and will be marked with a 'legacy' badge: classes, subclasses, species, backgrounds, feats, monsters.
• Tooltips will reflect the 2024 rules.
• Monster stat blocks will be updated to 2024.
• There will be terminology changes (Heroic Inspiration, Species, etc.)

D&D (2024) - Wizards of the Coast Backtracks on D&D Beyond and 2014 Content

Wizards of the Coast posted an overnight update stating that they are not going forward with previously released plans to require those wishing to use some 2014 content on D&D Beyond to use the Homebrew function to manually enter it. Instead, all the content including spells and magic items will...

www.enworld.org

 

[Zaukrie]

Over 1000 responses on DDB with most angry says it may not be that common.

I'm guessing those happy aren't going online to complain. I could be wrong.

 

[Remathilis]

S

I'm guessing those happy aren't going online to complain. I could be wrong.

There is an old saying about online ratings: people she more likely to leave negative comments than positive. People who are happy don't feel the urge to go and announce their happiness.

Look at the current situation with Star Wars: The Acolyte. The rage media raked that show over the coals for weeks, and when they announced it was cancelled, the people who liked it final stood up and voiced their support (too late by most accounts).

There are going to be people who do not care. There are going to be people who will convert day 1. These people aren't on the forums voicing their approval (and if they were, they would be shouted down by the opposition who definitely has an axe to grind).

And thus we don't exactly know how many people will be bothered by this other than the small minority who are angry and the smaller minority that are fine with it. How deep either side is can't be determined by any of us looking in.

 

[Juxtapozbliss]

It's interesting to hear people defending a corporate strategy that says: it's irrelevant if we piss off the most active dungeonmasters, those who engage in roleplaying forum, because a larger number, those who aren't as engaged, won't even care or notice this change we're making. So because it won't affect our bottom line to any significant degree, we're justified in clawing back content they already paid for. This point of view is not only ignorant from a public relations perspective, but it also declares that financial risk is more important than moral concerns. It's basically endorsing the standard corporate profit incentive where all that matters is the stock value and everything else is window dressing. Corporations will corporation, right? A lot of us have been on the fence for a while about sticking with WotC because it does such dumb corporate bull. This action is another one that will increase attrition and drive more dungeonmasters away to run other systems.

 

[Zaukrie]

It's interesting to hear people defending a corporate strategy that says: it's irrelevant if we piss off the most active dungeonmasters, those who engage in roleplaying forum, because a larger number, those who aren't as engaged, won't even care or notice this change we're making. So because it won't affect our bottom line to any significant degree, we're justified in clawing back content they already paid for. This point of view is not only ignorant from a public relations perspective, but it also declares that financial risk is more important than moral concerns. It's basically endorsing the standard corporate profit incentive where all that matters is the stock value and everything else is window dressing. Corporations will corporation, right? A lot of us have been on the fence for a while about sticking with WotC because it does such dumb corporate bull. This action is another one that will increase attrition and drive more dungeonmasters away to run other systems.

Not one person has said that it is irrelevant to piss off customers.

 

[Juxtapozbliss]

S

There is an old saying about online ratings: people she more likely to leave negative comments than positive. People who are happy don't feel the urge to go and announce their happiness.

Look at the current situation with Star Wars: The Acolyte. The rage media raked that show over the coals for weeks, and when they announced it was cancelled, the people who liked it final stood up and voiced their support (too late by most accounts).

There are going to be people who do not care. There are going to be people who will convert day 1. These people aren't on the forums voicing their approval (and if they were, they would be shouted down by the opposition who definitely has an axe to grind).

And thus we don't exactly know how many people will be bothered by this other than the small minority who are angry and the smaller minority that are fine with it. How deep either side is can't be determined by any of us looking in.

I'm guessing those happy aren't going online to complain. I could be wrong.

Not one person has said that it is irrelevant to piss off customers.

Disingenuous. "I'm guessing those happy aren't going to complain." "the small minority who are angry" These are clear statements that minority viewpoints aren't as important as unknown larger hypothetical unspoken masses. The complainers are less relevant because they are a minority. According to this premise. Thus it justifies doing something immoral (clawing back content). If that was not your intention then perhaps you can rephrase what your point is so I can understand it better.

I'd also argue that the comparison to a TV show being taken off the air is not analogous. Those who aren't involved in posting to forums, who are less active, may also end up shocked to find spells changed under them because they were unaware this change was happening. If they don't read the forums, they would be caught off guard by the change. There is no way to know what percentage of the unspoken opinions in this case fall against or for this change. So the largest volume of non-posters may fall along equal lines thinking this is a bad change, we can't know.

 

[Daztur]

Disingenuous. "I'm guessing those happy aren't going to complain." "the small minority who are angry" These are clear statements that minority viewpoints aren't as important as unknown larger hypothetical unspoken masses. The complainers are less relevant because they are a minority. According to this premise. Thus it justifies doing something immoral (clawing back content). If that was not your intention then perhaps you can rephrase what your point is so I can understand it better.

I'd also argue that the comparison to a TV show being taken off the air is not analogous. Those who aren't involved in posting to forums, who are less active, may also end up shocked to find spells changed under them because they were unaware this change was happening. If they don't read the forums, they would be caught off guard by the change. There is no way to know what percentage of the unspoken opinions in this case fall against or for this change. So the largest volume of non-posters may fall along equal lines thinking this is a bad change, we can't know.

Well I think with both the TV show and 5.5e the amount of online shouting doesn't matter that much directly, but the number of viewers/the number of people cancelling paid D&D Beyond Subscriptions does and we just don't have access to those numbers so all we can do is guess relatively blindly. However, we DO know that the OGL firestorm was big enough to make WotC not only back down but they ended up making a bunch of things open content that hadn't been before. So we know that a bunch of people being angry online can cause a big enough headache for WotC to get a bunch of people to back down.

Also the demographics that are going to get pissed about these changes don't really align with people most pissed at the OGL stuff. The OGL stuff most pissed off grumpy old grognards since it didn't directly impact people's day to game game sessions. This stuff is going to be impacting relatively casual players the most and it will directly impact people's day to day sessions. Also it doesn't roll out til next month so I expect that the head will only increase then, while it's already the main issue (rather than 5.5e rules) on a lot of D&D social media.

 

[Clint_L]

It's interesting to hear people defending a corporate strategy that says: it's irrelevant if we piss off the most active dungeonmasters, those who engage in roleplaying forum, because a larger number, those who aren't as engaged, won't even care or notice this change we're making. So because it won't affect our bottom line to any significant degree, we're justified in clawing back content they already paid for.

How are they "clawing back content they already paid for"?

 

[Zaukrie]

Disingenuous. "I'm guessing those happy aren't going to complain." "the small minority who are angry" These are clear statements that minority viewpoints aren't as important as unknown larger hypothetical unspoken masses. The complainers are less relevant because they are a minority. According to this premise. Thus it justifies doing something immoral (clawing back content). If that was not your intention then perhaps you can rephrase what your point is so I can understand it better.

I'd also argue that the comparison to a TV show being taken off the air is not analogous. Those who aren't involved in posting to forums, who are less active, may also end up shocked to find spells changed under them because they were unaware this change was happening. If they don't read the forums, they would be caught off guard by the change. There is no way to know what percentage of the unspoken opinions in this case fall against or for this change. So the largest volume of non-posters may fall along equal lines thinking this is a bad change, we can't know.

The world isn't black and white. No one said any opinions didn't matter, that their opinion was irrelevant. No one. I'm sorry if I somehow even implied that.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Lots of folks on the DDB message boards are furious about this and quite a few are quitting their subscriptions too. It hasn’t built to the drama of the OGL fiasco, but it’s definitely a decision that is bad PR, is pissing off a lot of subscribers and shows how little they respect users of the site. We BOUGHT the 2014 spells. We BOUGHT the 2014 Players Handbook. And they are just saying, go homebrew those spells and items or soon they’ll be gone. They are revoking content WE PAID FOR. I don’t own the 2024 rules, they aren’t even released yet. How am I supposed to have a list of every spell and item changed? And they are off-loading on me hours of work to homebrew them? Thanks for dumping naughty word on me I didn’t expect.

You realize the information will still be there if you bought it previously, right? You aren't loosing anything other than tooltips and links. If you really need that 2014 version of the spell, keep the spell section of the 2014 PHB compendium (which, I repeat, will still be there unchanged, just marked as legacy) open in a separate tab, and the old spell will still be findable right there.

 

[mamba]

You aren't loosing anything other than tooltips and links. If you really need that 2014 version of the spell, keep the spell section of the 2014 PHB compendium

in other words you are losing any advantage DDB had over using a book…