D&D General Elon Musk Wants To Know 'How Much Is Hasbro?'

Following the richest man in the world's attack on Wizards of the Coast for two paragraphs in the 500-page celebration of D&D, The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons 1970-1977, Elon Musk--who bought Twitter not that long ago--wants to know how much D&D's owner Hasbro would cost.

After the public sharing on Twitter of Jason Tondro's (who wrote the book’s foreword) private Facebook posts, Musk replied "How much is Hasbro?"

Hasbro's estimated capitalization is currently $8.71 billion, with $3.95 billion of debt.

It was on 21st December 2017 when Musk similarly enquired "How much is it?" before proceeding to make a bid for Twitter. He later tried to back out of the deal, but was forced to buy the platform for $44 billion in June 2022. Current estimates by investment firm Fidelity put the platform at a value 80% less than when he bought it, with a worth of only about $9.4 billion.

 

[MGibster]

*I started in 1981 and I didn't even meet my first female gamer until 1992, but I try to stay away from anecdotal experience on things like this, because a lot of the grognards making that claim like to say "I had a female in my group, so it was totally inclusive!"

I started around 1988 and didn't have my first black player until 2018. But I jumped in with both feet. Half that group was gay and there were two white dudes. The only difference I noticed is that our stupid jokes had a queer bent to them, but otherwise everything was pretty much the same. Seeing a girl at the hobby store in the late 80s and early 90s was occasion enough to notice, seeing a black person was rare as hen's teeth. Things have changed and women aren't such a rare sight as they once were. The clientele is still overwhelmingly white, but seeing a black person at the hobby store isn't quite so remarkable as it once was.

I'm not too worried about Musk buying Hasbro. I just don't think he'll pull the trigger here. I'm not too sure he can.

 

[Mistwell]

This is truth. I work for a major corporation. Just last week on a call discussing impending layoffs, I said, "This seems like a very poor idea, especially when the incoming administration has said they want to cut H1-B visas (half of our technology business group is here on an H1-B visa--hundreds of people). What's going to happen if you layoff 15% of the people and then lose 50%?"

The answer? "I didn't think of that. I don't think senior leadership has as well."

And when I said, "We laid off people to save $100,000 in salary costs which led to the project going $1 million over budget because we lost that expertise and no one could do the work as efficient or in the same time frame. How does that make sense?"

The answer? "Honestly, there are senior managers who won't give that information to the board."

So yeah, you're on it. I've long said that corporate leadership only cares about short term cost custs because they will leave and get a golden parachute anyway, so long term planning doesn't get considered. It's maddening.

I've seen countless cycles of layoffs followed quietly by re-hiring the same number of employees shortly after the layoff. Sometimes including the people just laid off, sometimes making those same people consultants at a slightly higher hourly rate. Chasing quarterly reports is such a broken way to do things.

 

[occam]

Twitter is fine. It's stable and profitable after years of not being. Twitter could go down to 1 user if they still turned enough profit. Random metrics don't make any kind of case, but I do get it. I don't particularly like him either. I wouldn't want him to buy DnD. This idea that he's a bad buisness man though, is a cope of epic proportions.

What about this looks stable to you?

Also, while Musk has declined to report profit numbers since the acquisition, it's pretty widely acknowledged that despite massive cost-cutting, between steeply declining revenue and huge loan paybacks, Twitter/X has likely still not achieved profitability. Do you have data demonstrating otherwise?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Also, while Musk has declined to report profit numbers since the acquisition, it's pretty widely acknowledged that despite massive cost-cutting, between steeply declining revenue and huge loan payback, Twitter/X has likely still not achieved profitability. Do you have data demonstrating otherwise?

His on-stage temper tantrums and suing former advertisers also suggest that things aren't going great.

 

[Remathilis]

If he does what he did at SpaceX, he'll "officially" be the creator of Dungeons & Dragons. People have actually come to believe that legal fiction with SpaceX, after all.

In honesty, I don't think he could pull this off. What he would do is fire the current team, get a budding 3rd party development team to come in and create 6th edition with all the "woke" removed, AI and digital elements added, and then Musk would take the credit for "reinventing" D&D.

 

[Remathilis]

maybe he will shovel enough money so they can finally fix the Ranger...

Prepare for the Cyber-Ranger.

 

[Remathilis]

I started around 1988 and didn't have my first black player until 2018. But I jumped in with both feet. Half that group was gay and there were two white dudes. The only difference I noticed is that our stupid jokes had a queer bent to them, but otherwise everything was pretty much the same. Seeing a girl at the hobby store in the late 80s and early 90s was occasion enough to notice, seeing a black person was rare as hen's teeth. Things have changed and women aren't such a rare sight as they once were. The clientele is still overwhelmingly white, but seeing a black person at the hobby store isn't quite so remarkable as it once was.

I'm not too worried about Musk buying Hasbro. I just don't think he'll pull the trigger here. I'm not too sure he can.

The issue would be that if Musk acquired it to "de-woke-ify it" those people who aren't Musk's target audience would begin to feel less safe and probably leave the hobby.

 

[Some Dude]

There's also the possibility that a Musk-owned D&D would bring some of the worst creators and influencers on board.

 

[OptionalRule]

What about this looks stable to you?


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Also, while Musk has declined to report profit numbers since the acquisition, it's pretty widely acknowledged that despite massive cost-cutting, between steeply declining revenue and huge loan paybacks, Twitter/X has likely still not achieved profitability. Do you have data demonstrating otherwise?

Thanks random dude in the internet. You've totally debunked me and proven Elon is a bad business man. I can't wait for an IPO from a financial genius like you and stand corrected by your blue line chart

 

[Remathilis]

There's also the possibility that a Musk-owned D&D would bring some of the worst creators and influencers on board.

Absolutely.