So, do you decry this when this practice is expected on every single crowdfunding effort? Pretty much every Kickstarter or Backerkit offering has tiers of buy in.
I do decry it in other settings too. It's ridiculous how prevalent stretch goals on crowdfunding campaigns have become. If it was just added stuff, it wouldn't matter too much. But many campaigns were delivered late, had logistical problems or just didn't release because of realist stretch goals.
If you're just talking about tiers of purchase, in most campaigns I've seen it's just a way to choose how much stuff you take. Do you want the PDF? Do you want the physical book?
They are moving into digital because people have been crying for digital content since they failed to offer pdfs for 3e materials.
Or, have you failed to notice the huge market for online play revealed by the pandemic?
And as I said, moving into digital is not necessarily a bad thing. But not all digital integration are equal. There are ways they could do it that would add a huge amount of value and be really convenient. But I'm convinced that Hasbro will move in a way that falsely project value, inconveniences customers and lock them in.
Dude, Gygax was trying to monetize it too. He just wasn't very good at it, and had limited modes of publishing as options.
I don't know about you - maybe you live in a forest, or have a huge trust fund? But most of us have to find some sort of professional skillset that we monetize - we do jobs to get paid.
So, is your argument that WotC... shouldn't do things to get paid?
I fail to see how any of what I said mean that I'm suggesting that WotC shouldn't get paid. They got paid in the last 25 years and I was fine with it. I'm all for a better and more convenient product. I'm willing to pay for more quality content. I'm not willing to have to put up more money for the same product.
Let me give you another example. Adobe is an absolute terrible company. They're getting sued right now by the US government. I could decry that they find every way possible to stop you from cancelling, or that the need to be always online has incredibly big impact on the performance of their software and makes your experience much worse, or that they can change their terms and service anytime (like they recently did with hints of using your content for AI) without you having a say. Would you just tell me that I don't want Adobe to be paid?
And once again, I'm not saying we are there as we speak. But Hasbro and WotC have shown us on
numerous occasions in the last two years what type of company they are now. I do not trust this company to take the right path from now on, and the bad path is really bad.