Appz. Yo.

[Empath Negative]

And many do not like the rental business model and won't support it. How many? At this point, there are no hard numbers.


Didn't set a timetable.

Let's just look at lithium. The world's #1 producer of lithium is China. AIR, they account for 28% of known reserves. Things go south, politically speaking, and lithium skyrockets.

Suddenly the phone contract you like so much now spikes 15%...as does the price of everything you own that uses rechargeable batteries. What may be affordable individually may be too expensive in the aggregate.

And as bad as that could be, the ripples from a permanent spike in oil would be worse. An entry-level smartphone might cost as much as a top of the line tablet. Fold that into a rental contract and something in the typical budget will have to give.

So your argument requires the effective collapse of global capitalism the world over due to scarcity of resources?

Really?

I mean... really?


You know, we might just run out of trees too... should the world be engulfed in flames it'll be hard to buy any D&D books when there are no trees. Or people to write them.

See how that argument works?

You present a scarcity of lithium, I rebut with a scarcity of trees.


It's ridiculous either way.


Back from la la land, I'm pretty comfortable with the assertion there will be a huge push for Wizards to make us all go digital, or at least take the first bite...


In other news, millions have died today. We have no hard numbers but they may be virtually every single dungeons and dragons player on the planet save those who log into Enworld. But again, we have no hard numbers.

 

[Chairman7w]

Good post!

These games are social affairs. Your phone is not. Neither is a tablet, nor a computer, nor any other electronic device.

My table will always be a table where friends get together and socialize over a game that they all enjoy - not, sit around and text each-other.

What you espouse is that everyone play World of Warcraft - it's a different animal, and I used to play that too. But it's not a face-to-face social event at the table.

And it matters not who builds what, the RPG industry is niche, and just because you build it, does not mean that they will come.

Regardless - if that is how you envision your table to play, then you are free to enjoy it.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

So your argument requires the effective collapse of global capitalism the world over due to scarcity of resources?

No. Just an unwillingness to sell materials at a price to make consumer goods viable. It has happened before.

Valuable industrial materials such as rubber, titanium, helium, certain kinds of steel and others have, on occasion, been so rare or access restricted- even in times of peace- that alternatives had to be found. In some cases countries resorted to outright theft to obtain them.

And in those times, consumer products made using those materials were either extremely expensive or withdrawn from the market.

As for running out of trees...if that happens, it's moot, since we will all be dead. The same can't be said of running out of lithium or petroleum.

Edit: had to take a puppy break.

And capitalism can actually make the problem worse. Price is determined by the intersection of the supply and demand curves. So far, i've only discussed supply.

On the demand side, increased speculation due to scarcity can lead to ridiculous price effects- there is no real scarcity reason for gold to trade higher than platinum, and yet, this year, it did. This could happen with any or all of the more expensive materials used in the tech sector.

Add in the status effect of the latest & greatest tech, and you get a certain thing they call price inflexibility. A lot of people point to that as one of the reasons why Apple's computer products seem to be pricier than similar PCs, but it really shows up in "luxury" goods.

If smartphones get too pricey, the cheaper phones will enjoy a resurgence...and you'll see fewer people upgrading every time they renew their contract. As sales volumes decline, per-unit and/or service contract prices will rise if the companies want to maintain profit margins.

 

[falcarrion]

I don't see DnD going totally digital. Nor do I want it to. For some people paper and pen is just fine. But I love using my ipad in gaming. It is a tool that I can use in any version of DnD. I have pdfs of character sheets for first ed that I played in the early eighties to pdfs of current games. theres nothing like loading my characters in the cloud and down loading what I need. And if it isn't in the cloud storage. I can get it off my computer at home and load it into the cloud. I have ran Herolab on my computer thru my ipad and created a character faster and more accurate then someone using just pen and paper.
so once again pen and paper is fine. If that is what you want. But take the time and actually look at what you can do digitaly.

 

[WhimsyTheFae]

Back from la la land, I'm pretty comfortable with the assertion there will be a huge push for Wizards to make us all go digital, or at least take the first bite...

I'm still a bit fuzzy on this part. How exactly do they "make us all go digital"?

I expect a bit of hyperbole is involved with your assertation, but I want to make sure, rather than assume.

EDIT: My assumption is that "us" = players of the newest version of D&D and only the newest version of D&D, but I want to make sure. If your definition of "us" would be much broader than that, I find your position to be ridiculous.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Every market that has adopted this business method has become more profitable by it. Gaming, music, software... it's only a matter of time before Wizards wises up.

Seems to me the music industry is hardly stable right now and has only managed to survive by dint of sheer momentum and FIGHTING technology tooth and nail that is trying to rip it apart as opposed to embracing it as they should have done in the first place.


---
I am here: http://tapatalk.com/map.php?pzcmqs

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

To be fair- and speaking for artists, not labels- the industry probably would have a less of a "schizophrenic" relationship with tech were it not for piracy. These days, even artists with their own labels are feeling the pinch.

 

[BriarMonkey]

In addition to all the other possibilities of economy, there is one very basic fact being left out by the assumptions of the OP.

Not everyone has a PC nor high-speed internet access.

I know plenty of people who only have a PC at work. They don't buy into the need for these machines just for browsing the interwebs. And, their phones are - gasp - basic phones.

And they are gamers. But they are also people who have lives and are outdoors-y, not technophiles.

So, just to raise a buck, does this mean that the game companies must necessarily ignore these people and push them out of the market? I won't even begin to guess if this is a lot of people or not, but we all know what making assumptions gets ya.

So to the OP's point, there is a place for tools, but to make a place only for pure digitalism is to ignore your market.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Good point. Hell- I'm a city dude in the Entertainment biz...and I don't own a smartphone. (And my iPad2 and iPod Touch require wifi access.)

And I've personally interacted here and at my other 2 fave forums- giuitar player & ultimate guitar- with people with 56k modems still. Not because of their being unable or unwilling to upgrade, but because they live in areas rural enough that 56k is the best available.

 

[Umbran]

I'm still a bit fuzzy on this part. How exactly do they "make us all go digital"?

Presumably, by ceasing production of print (and easily printable) versions of the product.

It seems to me this ignores one very simple fact - software doesn't grow on trees. Developing a game in this way has pretty much all the costs developing a print game, plus the costs of developing and testing code.

While one can imagine that D&D itself, backed by Hasbro's bank accounts, could go this route, the bulk of games out there are brought to us by small, even tiny companies. They barely have the resources to do a traditional print game, much less the extra cost of software development.