D&D General Is D&D Beyond Exclusivity Bad for D&D?

[Reynard]

A couple of questions, if I may.

1. If you can download D&D Beyond content and save it to your computer or print it for personal use, then I don’t see how you can lose access to the content if Beyond goes? So this isn’t about not having access to the content right? It’s about the format you want it in?

2. How is this any different to me buying an exclusive module on any other VTT that I don’t own; up front, Roll20 for instance? I can download the individual components and save them to my computer. But it won’t be arranged in the way I’m used to vireing
It?

3. If I own a paid upfront VTT like Foundry that can never be taken off my computer, I can still lose access to product if it isn’t kept up to date and I wish to continue using the latest version of Foundry. Sure I can not upgrade but then I’m missing out on other product I want.

4. Fundamentally is this any different to a non-backwards compatible edition change? Sure you have the raw data, but without someone to play it with it’s kinda worthless.

It isn't that Beyond is bad, it is that exclusivity to a subscription format is bad.

 

[AlViking]

It isn't that Beyond is bad, it is that exclusivity to a subscription format is bad.

If I want to watch a TV show, at one point I had to tune into a specific broadcaster, subscribe to a specific cable channel. Now of course I subscribe to a specific streaming service. For some shows I could also get a hard copy on DVD.

Are TV shows also nefarious walled gardens?

 

[bsss]

1. If you can download D&D Beyond content and save it to your computer or print it for personal use, then I don’t see how you can lose access to the content if Beyond goes? So this isn’t about not having access to the content right? It’s about the format you want it in?

WotC would argue that you are not allowed to per the terms of service, and they have the absolute right in those terms of service to remove your access to Beyond if you made a "derivative" work of the contents of the service. This is of course crap in a reasonable understanding of using the data you have access to, but the point is that whether or not you "can" download and keep a copy is not up to you. Your access to the content is beholden to their agreement that they get to interpret, and you'd have to make your case in your defense. It's infinitesimally unlikely that they'd cut you off just for saving a page to PDF, of course, but worth pointing out that you are paying solely for the right to access the content through their service, and downloading it for personal use is not an established option in the terms --- you don't "own" access to the content or any copies.

3. If I own a paid upfront VTT like Foundry that can never be taken off my computer, I can still lose access to product if it isn’t kept up to date and I wish to continue using the latest version of Foundry. Sure I can not upgrade but then I’m missing out on other product I want.

Nobody guarantees that any version of an application can open any past or future instance of its files, either, but you don't even get the option of finding out if the product is locked behind a service and you don't have the program locally. This question points out the risks in general of relying on services you don't have source access to (unlike Foundry VTT).

4. Fundamentally is this any different to a non-backwards compatible edition change? Sure you have the raw data, but without someone to play it with it’s kinda worthless.

Of course it's different, because it's a completely different thing to have access to something and to use it one particular way.

 

[Reynard]

If I want to watch a TV show, at one point I had to tune into a specific broadcaster, subscribe to a specific cable channel. Now of course I subscribe to a specific streaming service. For some shows I could also get a hard copy on DVD.

Are TV shows also nefarious walled gardens?

I have never used the term "walled garden" in this discussion.

This may come as a surprise, but D&D is not a TV show. You don't interact with it in any way like you do a TV show. So that seems like a strawman in the offing and is probably not worth arguing about.

If WotC decides that they want to make sure that official D&D stuff is only available through Beyond, that is bad. So far, they have only done that with a few items, but there is no reason to believe that if it works for them, they won't lean more heavily into that strategy.

Look, I get it: folks that like and use Beyond are fine because it does not affect them if certain material is only available on Beyond. But I would suggest that is a myopic attitude and doesn't counter the argument that beyond exclusivity is bad at all.

 

[VashVet]

If you can download D&D Beyond content and save it to your computer or print it for personal use, then I don’t see how you can lose access to the content if Beyond goes? So this isn’t about not having access to the content right? It’s about the format you want it in?

To be fair, that’s a big consideration. PDF is the de facto standard so by not providing that when it comes to being able to keep your own digital copy means they aren’t even meeting the standard bar.

 

[AlViking]

I have never used the term "walled garden" in this discussion.

This may come as a surprise, but D&D is not a TV show. You don't interact with it in any way like you do a TV show. So that seems like a strawman in the offing and is probably not worth arguing about.

TV shows are another form of entertainment.

If WotC decides that they want to make sure that official D&D stuff is only available through Beyond, that is bad. So far, they have only done that with a few items, but there is no reason to believe that if it works for them, they won't lean more heavily into that strategy.

Even if they did decide to limit access to the books or the rules to DDB, they can't do anything about the Creative Commons.

Look, I get it: folks that like and use Beyond are fine because it does not affect them if certain material is only available on Beyond. But I would suggest that is a myopic attitude and doesn't counter the argument that beyond exclusivity is bad at all.

DDB in no way has limited the options we have to access the rules before the site was created. The only thing it does is add another convenient method to access the rules for those who want it. I am only slightly more worried about that happening than I am about an invasion by alien lizardmen that may or may not be from Mars. It could happen but I see no reason to believe it will happen. I don't waste time worrying about hypotheticals when there is no evidence or reason to believe it will ever happen.

 

[AlViking]

To be fair, that’s a big consideration. PDF is the de facto standard so by not providing that when it comes to being able to keep your own digital copy means they aren’t even meeting the standard bar.

Sounds like "Because my favorite color of car is blue and most companies provide blue cars, blue is the de facto standard for cars." There is no standard other than what the companies decide to provide.

 

[Reynard]

TV shows are another form of entertainment.

Of an entirely different order.

Even if they did decide to limit access to the books or the rules to DDB, they can't do anything about the Creative Commons.

"D&D" is not in the Creative Commons. The 5E SRD is.

DDB in no way has limited the options we have to access the rules before the site was created. The only thing it does is add another convenient method to access the rules for those who want it. I am only slightly more worried about that happening than I am about an invasion by alien lizardmen that may or may not be from Mars. It could happen but I see no reason to believe it will happen. I don't waste time worrying about hypotheticals when there is no evidence or reason to believe it will ever happen.

We are having this discussion because there are literally Beyond exclusive materials already.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Look, I get it: folks that like and use Beyond are fine because it does not affect them if certain material is only available on Beyond. But I would suggest that is a myopic attitude and doesn't counter the argument that beyond exclusivity is bad at all.

I agree that the argument is a valid one, and that some people can and should make it (because that's the only likely way there's ever a chance that the situation could change.)

But from a practical standpoint I personally do not believe the argument is going to result in anything tangible any time soon... and in the interim there will be any number of other things that will come up that will also bother people, and this argument will eventually fall by the wayside. That's usually how these things go-- the annoyance is going to be a short term bother because other annoyances will take it's place.

 

[VashVet]

Sounds like "Because my favorite color of car is blue and most companies provide blue cars, blue is the de facto standard for cars." There is no standard other than what the companies decide to provide.

Okay, well, standards exist for a reason otherwise everyone would be looking for a gas station with the right size fuel pump that fit their car.

I think D&D Beyond’s service is valuable in and of itself. Its purpose is not to provide a digital copy of D&D products that you can keep forever the same way you keep the books, but if it’s going to be proposed that it does do this, then it should at least meet the standard by which digital books have been published for the past couple of decades.