D&D 4E 4E DnD Insider Moving; No Longer Available To New Subscribers

I don't know it that was already the case, but they no longer accept new subscribers.

Edit: My post doesn't make much sense, now that the OP has been promoted to news and edited to include more information.

 

[darjr]

I have a ddi account, but I lost the password and username and haven't logged in for two years, but it just renewed and charged me... argh.

I have asked and gotten a refund from wotc when I cancelled. That was a while ago, but I imagine they'll do the same here.

 

[Manchu2]

Do you have a good email / phone number for that? I am stationed in Italy and don't have all of my files to track down the info. thanks,

 

[Nikosandros]

The main reason I still keep a DDI subscription is not the builder (I agree, the CBloader hack is better. Specially because I can add house rules via xml edit), but the Compendium. That one is absurdly valuable when you scratch your head and want to see if there is a "undead elite brute that resist cold" or something like that. Or checking for a feat that "modifies Cleave" or "give something else to use your opportunity actions" or "synergizes with high Wisdom".

The magazines were cool when they were being released. The Compendium is the real gold of DDI after the system was done.

I stopped my subscription some time ago, since I haven't played 4e in a while, but since I'd like to play it in the future, I'd pay for a legal off-line CB and Compendium.

 

[darjr]

Do you have a good email / phone number for that? I am stationed in Italy and don't have all of my files to track down the info. thanks,

Here is the phone number.
tel:+1-800-324-6496

And here is the customer support link.
http://wizards.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2303

I used the customer support page and filled out a support for that turned into a short email exchange.

 

[RedSiegfried]

I don't understand why they would want to allow current subscribers to renew and not allow new subscribers to start up.

Only thing I can think of is that they may want to announce the departure of the new tools soon, to happen sometime over the next 18 months, for example, and they want to stop taking on new users, but preventing current subscribers from renewing right now would cut off people immediately whose subscriptions are due to expire before they can make their announcement, which would be bad all around. Instead, if they want to phase the tools out, it makes more sense to make sure everyone who is a current subscriber gets the use of the tools for the full term of the subscription so there are no refunds that have to be given.

I don't know any of this to be a fact, it's just supposition. But if I were going to ramp down an online service, this is how I'd do it - make sure everyone gets their full subscription's worth.

I'm also going to be crossing my fingers that WoTC has heard the community and will either make an offline version of the 4e tools either free or available for a one-time purchase price.

 

[MwaO]

I don't understand why they would want to allow current subscribers to renew and not allow new subscribers to start up.

Only thing I can think of is that they may want to announce the departure of the new tools soon, to happen sometime over the next 18 months, for example, and they want to stop taking on new users, but preventing current subscribers from renewing right now would cut off people immediately whose subscriptions are due to expire before they can make their announcement, which would be bad all around. Instead, if they want to phase the tools out, it makes more sense to make sure everyone who is a current subscriber gets the use of the tools for the full term of the subscription so there are no refunds that have to be given.

There's two other possibilities:
Dragon/Dungeon magazines are being sold for $2.99 each online. Hard to compete with 'all of them for the one month sub'
They may be getting a better deal now that Digital River doesn't need to manage new subscriptions, just take credit card info for old ones. Setting up that info is usually the expensive part, especially when people might subscribe for a month just to get all the old content...

 

[RedSiegfried]

Or, to think positively, they could simply be changing from Digital River to another company.

One can hope.

 

[darjr]

It reads to me that the stop on new subscribers was supposed to be temporary. Though I suppose it could also be an open ended statement. Still it seems like the wording intends the new subscriber issue is temporary.

 

[Benji]

I don't understand why they would want to allow current subscribers to renew and not allow new subscribers to start up.

If you keep paying them for 4e material they don't mind, but they're going to want new players and therefore subscribers to be playing 5th.

Given evidence that points to people paying subscriptions for character builder once for a whole group rather than buy multiple handbooks, is there any motivation or wizards to build a fifth ed version?

 

[delericho]

Given evidence that points to people paying subscriptions for character builder once for a whole group rather than buy multiple handbooks, is there any motivation or wizards to build a fifth ed version?

~80k subscribers at $6 a month (at the cheapest option) would seem a pretty decent motivation.