D&D General DDB style site for Older Editions

[Belen]

I was musing this morning about whether it would be possible to get a D&D Beyond style site for older editions. I am sure that WOTC would not allow it although if they were smart, then they would do it and incorporate it into DDB. They could make a lot of money by embracing all D&D players and editions into one site.

Alternatively, do you guys think that someone could strike a license deal to build a DDB editions site for character builders etc for older editions?

 

[Ringtail]

They could make a lot of money by embracing all D&D players and editions into one site.

Doubtful of this. It costs money to develop that stuff, and how many folks are going to buy it? The older the edition, the smaller the player base and its not getting any larger.

I also wonder how many folks who bought their 3rd edition books 20 years ago are going to be interested in paying for them again. 100? 500? 1000? That may be enough for a robust community on a forum, subreddit or discord but its hardly a marketable group.

Not that I'm not sympathetic, its just clear where hasbro's priorities are (profits).

 

[CellarHeroes]

My knee-jerk reaction when I read this was "Yeah, that would be cool".
Then I started thinking about it...what would this older edition DDB site do? I have been to DDB, but I don't understand what it's used for outside of the forums.

 

[darjr]

My knee-jerk reaction when I read this was "Yeah, that would be cool".
Then I started thinking about it...what would this older edition DDB site do? I have been to DDB, but I don't understand what it's used for outside of the forums.

I think a lot of its use is character sheets. Both for character creation and advancement and during play. The database in use in the character sheets being its killer app.

 

[Belen]

My knee-jerk reaction when I read this was "Yeah, that would be cool".
Then I started thinking about it...what would this older edition DDB site do? I have been to DDB, but I don't understand what it's used for outside of the forums.

It is a character creator, you can use it to build house ruled items. You can hook it into discord and run a game complete with dice rolls. It also serves as a database of all the books for 5e.

 

[Umbran]

Then I started thinking about it...what would this older edition DDB site do? I have been to DDB, but I don't understand what it's used for outside of the forums.

DDB has the best in class character sheet and character builder.

 

[Belen]

Doubtful of this. It costs money to develop that stuff, and how many folks are going to buy it? The older the edition, the smaller the player base and its not getting any larger.

I also wonder how many folks who bought their 3rd edition books 20 years ago are going to be interested in paying for them again. 100? 500? 1000? That may be enough for a robust community on a forum, subreddit or discord but its hardly a marketable group.

Not that I'm not sympathetic, its just clear where hasbro's priorities are (profits).

I think it depends on the price. If they were discounted in the same way at Drivethru or even steeper, then it could work.

Of course, you could just make it a straight sub only to access the content.

 

[Belen]

I also wonder how many folks who bought their 3rd edition books 20 years ago are going to be interested in paying for them again. 100? 500? 1000? That may be enough for a robust community on a forum, subreddit or discord but its hardly a marketable group.

This is where a Kickstarter could serve. Backers could get a free year of sub plus maybe the core rulebooks of their choice edition. The KS could well determine the potential profitability.

 

[Oofta]

Nice idea, I doubt it's financially justifiable. While 4E could be relatively simple bring back, previous editions are more complicated to code than a lot of people think. The basic stuff wouldn't be that difficult but all the weird exceptions and overrides from the 3E days? Back in the day I got it to sort-of work with a Microsoft Access application, but I also limited my logic to things we actually used. Then you have to account for all the TSR books like The Complete Book of Spoons or whatever other odd expansion they came up with. Then you get to OD&D where I'm not even sure Gygax knew what the rules were half the time. Ooh, and don't forget all that data entry you'll need to do, much of it by hand.

Toss in all of the house rules, modifications and tweaks people have done over the years? I just don't see it happening given just the cost of the infrastructure to support it. There may be a lot of people that play older editions, but even "a lot" is pretty small potatoes when most of them have been doing their own stuff for years. I mean, I like DDB but before it became a thing I just made an excel spreadsheet to create character sheets.

 

[Morrus]

My knee-jerk reaction when I read this was "Yeah, that would be cool".
Then I started thinking about it...what would this older edition DDB site do? I have been to DDB, but I don't understand what it's used for outside of the forums.

DDB is a character builder and rules compendium. The forum is incidental.