Cost of Core Books PDFs

[fenzer]

After reading through these comments, I believe the jury may be out a while on this one.

For everyone who took the time to read and respond to my original post, I thank you and feel a need to clarify a couple of things.

First and foremost, I am a capitalist. I want WotC to live long and prosper and if they can do that by setting prices like they have, more power to them. As has been said, the market will dictate the price.

Second, and this is my personal preference, a digital copy, or a hard copy of a digital copy, jdrakeh , will never replace the original. For much the same reason I sent away for the deluxe box to hold the director's editions of the Lord of the Rings movies, I perceive value in the ownership of the actual product. And much like Monte's Ptolus masterpiece, the production value and tactile satisfaction that come from owning the actual product will, for me, always trump a digital copy.

Third, I use pdfs all the time both in preparation for my games and at the table itself. But, for me, it is a copy, a knockoff, if you will, of the original despite its benefits. And I am not interested in paying top dollar for a knock off.

Lastly, I was disappointed. I had held out hope of acquiring a digital copy with the purchase of the hard copy. I would have been happy to pay $40 a book had it included a digital copy. Or buy the bundle for $120 and receive digital copies of all three books.

In short, my response was given more from my heart than my brain. I understand both sides but only time will tell if WotC made the right choice here.

(Edit Note: I miss spelled jdrakeh. My apologies. It has been corrected.)

 

[jdrakeh]

Some of you really need to take some basic economics and business classes before you get torque off about a business spreading production costs over an entire product line.

The RPG market doesn't work like a lot of other markets when it comes to defraying production costs. Many (perhaps even most) freelancers, for example, get paid for work after a product is printed and sometimes, after it has been on shelves for several months or even years (usually, months, though).

 

[jdrakeh]

Second, and this is my personal preference, a digital copy, or a hard copy of a digital copy, jdraken , will never replace the original. For much the same reason I sent away for the deluxe box to hold the director's editions of the Lord of the Rings movies, I perceive value in the ownership of the actual product. And much like Monte's Ptolus masterpiece, the production value and tactile satisfaction that come from owning the actual product will, for me, always trump a digital copy.

That rationale really only pertains to collectors of game books (or, rather, people who admire game books as art pieces, rather than game books). Aesthetics are of little consequence to the utilitarian gamer, I've found. And, that I think, might be the real difference between PDFs and hard copy books. PDFs are for people who prize utility over aesthtics, while hard copy books are for people who prize aesthetics over utility.

 

[Kheti sa-Menik]

It's not an argument. It's an observation.

Not even an accurate one. I read many threads here and on other boards where people were upset with the 3.x full price PDFs. The complaints gradually petered out when folks realized WOTC doesn't give a damn about customer feedback.

 

[jdrakeh]

Not even an accurate one. I read many threads here and on other boards where people were upset with the 3.x full price PDFs. The complaints gradually petered out when folks realized WOTC doesn't give a damn about customer feedback.

This has already been addressed and I admitted that I must have missed such arguments - but, by all means, kick that dead horse some more! As for WotC not giving a daman about customer feedback, since the entirety of 4e seems to be built around addressing very common customer complaints, I suspect that they might, in fact, give at least a little bit of a damn about customer feedback.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I just wanted to say that unless something significant has changed, the cost for these PDFs has nothing to do with market forces, because the companies involved don't expect or even want to sell many of them.

And I suspect this has as much to do with wanting to sell DDI subscriptions as printed books. The more useful and inexpensive an electronic format is to the typical gamer, the more that intrudes on the related resources (online rules lookup) of the DDI (though, of course, not the additional content).

That rationale really only pertains to collectors of game books (or, rather, people who admire game books as art pieces, rather than game books). Aesthetics are of little consequence to the utilitarian gamer, I've found. And, that I think, might be the real difference between PDFs and hard copy books. PDFs are for people who prize utility over aesthtics, while hard copy books are for people who prize aesthetics over utility.

I get what you are saying, but as written, this is nonsense. Professionally printed books with good bindings have utility. It's a different utility than the PDF, but still utility. I prize utility over aesthetics immensely, and the only time I'll get a PDF is when the hardcover isn't available, I'll very rarely use the book, or the PDF is dirt cheap. Heck, if there was an option to get most printed books cheaper, with the art removed, and just enough layout to be functional, in nothing but black & white, with a solid cover and the title--I'd get that.

As for complaining about 3.* pricing, I never said anything about it, on the grounds that if you don't have anything nice to say ...

OTOH, I don't particular blame WotC for this, or get upset about it. I just don't buy their PDFs (or anything else they do that isn't a printed product). I doubt there is a price point acceptable to them that would also be worth it to me.

 

[ki11erDM]

The RPG market doesn't work like a lot of other markets when it comes to defraying production costs. Many (perhaps even most) freelancers, for example, get paid for work after a product is printed and sometimes, after it has been on shelves for several months or even years (usually, months, though).

I have not looked... are any of the people that wrote the Core 3 books freelancers? I know the main names aren't but not sure if anyone else has any creadits.

 

[Arnwyn]

I have a stack of printed PDF products that refutes this fallacy, as common as it may be.

Actually, what you end up having there, then, is a printed product. And not just any printed product, but an exceedingly crappy poor quality printed product - quite different from the actual hardcopy. No - a drawback of PDFs really is that you need a computer to make use of them.

It's not a fallacy.

Re: Complaints. I simply find it odd that almost nobody complained about WotC charging full cover price for their D&D 3x PDF products (which they have been doing for years now), but as soon as they charged less than full cover price for their D&D 4e products, a small group of people more or less went into meltdown mode. Why is that, I wonder?

Guh? I guess you'd find something that never happened odd. There were considerably more complaints re: the 3e books than anything the 4e books have (and will) muster up. What's with bringing up 4e at all? Odd, indeed. (Oh, you admit that you were completely out of the loop for quite some time? It would have been wiser, then, to not make such a comment in the first place. Whoops on your part.) Here's another boot to that horse.

That rationale really only pertains to collectors of game books (or, rather, people who admire game books as art pieces, rather than game books). Aesthetics are of little consequence to the utilitarian gamer, I've found. And, that I think, might be the real difference between PDFs and hard copy books. PDFs are for people who prize utility over aesthtics, while hard copy books are for people who prize aesthetics over utility.

Not being tied to a computer along with a significant reduction in eye strain while still using it during a game session at one's table is of much greater utility to some.

Looks like hard copy books really are for people who prize utility as well.


(But with all that said, one shouldn't deny that PDFs, despite their many, many drawbacks, have some significant advantages to some segment of the population. That segment might be willing to pay a premium for those particular advantages, and there's nothing wrong with that.)

 

[Nyarlathotep]

The thing that I don't get about the pricing scheme is that the core books are already available on the net (albiet pirated copies). By setting the PDF price at the same as hardcover, there is no incentive for people to buy vs. steal them (aside from personal values). Generally (and I am assuming this) the people buying PDFs will be technically literate and would probably be able to find both pirated and purchasable copies of the PDFs. If the price were lower I could see more actually buying the PDFs vs stealing them, but with the price where it is, I suspect that the stealing wins out over the purchasing.

This is all supposition on my part, so there are obviously no stats to back any of this up.

 

[malraux]

Actually, what you end up having there, then, is a printed product. And not just any printed product, but an exceedingly crappy poor quality printed product - quite different from the actual hardcopy. No - a drawback of PDFs really is that you need a computer to make use of them.

It's not a fallacy.

A decent printer loaded with quality paper working with a good quality source file can turn out a very good quality product. The major difference is how much you are willing to spend on binding, but even 3 hole punch + 3 ring binder is pretty good.