Wizards of the Coast Says That China Tariffs Will Have Minimal Impact on D&D

Official Dungeons & Dragons products should largely be unaffected by the ongoing US/China trade war. During today's Hasbro earnings call, Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks said that the only Wizards of the Coast products manufactured and shipped from China are the D&D boxed sets. While this means that the upcoming Heroes of the Borderland Starter Set could have a higher price than usual (Wizards has made no price announcement as of yet), it does confirm that Dungeons & Dragons will largely be unimpacted by the ongoing trade war between the US and China.

Due to the large print runs, Wizards usually taps domestic or continental printers for its various D&D products. English language D&D books (at least the ones on my shelf) all have "Printed in the USA" in the credits page.

The wider board game publishing industry has been hit hard by the ongoing US/China tariff war, with products manufactured in China receiving a 145% tariff upon entry into the United States. Several publishers with RPG products, including CMON, have announced layoffs and changes to manufacturing plans as a result of the tariffs.

 

[Cergorach]

Down here in Mississippi, there's Leaf Paper Mill not too far from where I live, so I have a feeling the South US could be used (Louisiana to Alabama, up to Tennessee). The question would be sustainability and cost difference mostly.

Does Leaf Paper Mill have the capacity to handle all the paper for the printing that's not happening in China anymore? No.

Could they expand, probably. But where do those trees come from? Where do those machines come from? And where does the qualified personnel come from to operate the additional machines?

Would they want to expand? No. Because expanding at the moment is risky, because when the tariffs go down or disappear suddenly they are left holding the bag. Also more demand with less capacity means higher prices across the board. Adding more capacity decreases the prices. These companies are not philanthropic institutions, if they can make significantly more money without any additional investments, and with zero risks, they would be crazy not to.

 

[wizard71]

View attachment 403401

Official Dungeons & Dragons products should largely be unaffected by the ongoing US/China trade war. During today's Hasbro earnings call, Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks said that the only Wizards of the Coast products manufactured and shipped from China are the D&D boxed sets. While this means that the upcoming Heroes of the Borderland Starter Set could have a higher price than usual (Wizards has made no price announcement as of yet), it does confirm that Dungeons & Dragons will largely be unimpacted by the ongoing trade war between the US and China.

Due to the large print runs, Wizards usually taps domestic or continental printers for its various D&D products. English language D&D books (at least the ones on my shelf) all have "Printed in the USA" in the credits page.

The wider board game publishing industry has been hit hard by the ongoing US/China tariff war, with products manufactured in China receiving a 145% tariff upon entry into the United States. Several publishers with RPG products, including CMON, have announced layoffs and changes to manufacturing plans as a result of the tariffs.

 

[wizard71]

That makes sense. Much of D&D traffic is on D&D Beyond and they were tinkering with game rules for DM Guide and Monster Manual weeks before launch. You can’t do that if you have a massive print run overseas due to logistical reasons. I find it a bit amusing that all of the WOTC haters complaining about greed are howling about the tariffs impact as it’s destroying their thin margins. For some reason, now I should care about their profits when they blasted WOTC for the exact same thing.

 

[Maccwar]

So I'm in the UK and I have noted that my books from 4e* through the premium reprints and as far as Phandelver and beyond were all printed in the USA but my 2024 core books were all printed in Belgium. Did the 2024 books get printed in multiple locations or are the 2024 books in the USA also printed in Europe?

* although some of the 4e Essentials line was printed in China. Looks like these were the books which came in the boxed sets like the dungeon masters book and the monster vault

 

[Parmandur]

So I'm in the UK and I have noted that my books from 4e* through the premium reprints and as far as Phandelver and beyond were all printed in the USA but my 2024 core books were all printed in Belgium. Did the 2024 books get printed in multiple locations or are the 2024 books in the USA also printed in Europe?

* although some of the 4e Essential was printed in China. Looks like these were the books which came in the boxed sets like the dungeon masters book and the monster vault

My 2024 books were printed in the USA.

I imagine that the European print runs being bigger made more local printing logistically desirable this go around.

 

[tetrasodium]

Not relevant to the discussion at hand. As far as the hobby, the community, and the industry are concerned, Hasbro is the megacorp.

No. Megacorp is a wildly different scale. Mega corps own companies like Hasbro. I used to work with one at a (huge) company I worked at... We had multiple data centers on multiple continents and significant amounts of Internet backbone stuff. Some of our OEM customers were literally every US telecom reselling our services to their customers... You knew that our parent company was a Megacorp because there was actual debate and an act of Congress required for them to buy the company I worked for...

Edit: since single points are being questioned for meeting the bar in isolation with a totally different industry... My point is the fact that Megacorp is a construction of fiction and gaming and the bar is checking enough boxes rather than any single box. Hasbro might have a box or two checked, but it's far from being a Megacorp.

 

[doctorhook]

So I'm in the UK and I have noted that my books from 4e* through the premium reprints and as far as Phandelver and beyond were all printed in the USA but my 2024 core books were all printed in Belgium. Did the 2024 books get printed in multiple locations or are the 2024 books in the USA also printed in Europe?

* although some of the 4e Essentials line was printed in China. Looks like these were the books which came in the boxed sets like the dungeon masters book and the monster vault

For whatever it’s worth, I recall a few years back that some Magic: The Gathering collectors were arguing about which packs of cards were better, because even in the same set, even the same types of packs, some were printed and packaged in China and others Belgium and others in USA. Same products, but fulfilled from multiple printers in multiple countries, with extremely slight differences in quality. I could be misremembering the details, but the point was that WotC was using multiple printers around the world to fulfill demand for its products, even just in the North American market.

 

[Scribe]

For whatever it’s worth, I recall a few years back that some Magic: The Gathering collectors were arguing about which packs of cards were better, because even in the same set, even the same types of packs, some were printed and packaged in China and others Belgium and others in USA. Same products, but fulfilled from multiple printers in multiple countries, with extremely slight differences in quality. I could be misremembering the details, but the point was that WotC was using multiple printers around the world to fulfill demand for its products, even just in the North American market.

I dont think it was China. Its Japan.

(Japan > EU > USA for print quality is what it used to be.)

 

[doctorhook]

You knew that our parent company was a Megacorp because there was actual debate and an act of Congress required for them to buy the company I worked for...

Not disagreeing with your general point that Hasbro isn’t truly “mega” compared to some companies. But strictly speaking, the quoted argument isn’t proof of a company’s size, it’s a function of the company’s role. I think lots of countries have laws to require political approval for the sale or purchase of businesses in key industries (military production and banking are just two that spring to mind). A business doesn’t need to be gigantic to be strategically important.

Anyway, this whole convo whether Hasbro is a megacorp or not is moot. It’s a “megacorp” relative to everything else in this very niche industry of TTRPG publishing, and it’s also entirely irrelevant whether the term is appropriate or not. Someone used the term, maybe it wasn’t quite accurate, but that was never the point anyway, just that Hasbro is the only large company in this industry. “But it’s not large enough to be mega” doesn’t really matter here.

 

[billd91]

So I'm in the UK and I have noted that my books from 4e* through the premium reprints and as far as Phandelver and beyond were all printed in the USA but my 2024 core books were all printed in Belgium. Did the 2024 books get printed in multiple locations or are the 2024 books in the USA also printed in Europe?

They got printed in multiple locations. My were printed in the USA.