D&D General DDB/WOTC Price Increases

cbwjm · 2026-04-16T23:02:29+0100

Lanefan said:
Clearly this works for you as an online player. If they keep pushing the game into DDB, however, that's not going to help the physical-at-table cohort one bit.

I think the physical at table cohort is slowly dying out anyway (that is the physical character sheets/pen and paper players). They either stick to older editions or are transitioning to DDB for at the table play creating a hybrid system where character sheets and books are all online and dice are physical. The subscription is a relatively small investment, especially with the sharing of resources from the DM.

Clint_L · 2026-04-16T23:05:40+0100

I'm not primarily an online player. I vastly prefer to play in person, and using miniatures and terrain. I use dice. So many dice. I will play online and use a VTT if circumstances demand. I do like some online tools to facilitate my planning and play; the encounter builder/runner is amazing for steamlining planning and play, and the online character sheets are brilliant, especially for my newbies. Being able to give access to all the books online is also wonderful; there's no way I could replicate that with physical books. But the play is in person whenever possible.

Edit: I also had our library bring in some physical books, but a handful of PHBs plus one DMG and one MM cost us about three years' worth of DDB subscription, while only being able to serve a few students at a time.

Distracted DM · 2026-04-16T23:10:41+0100

I prefer in-person games, but all of my friends that I ran games for for years and years pre-COVID now only want to play online because it's more convenient. So I get why people maybe think one way or the other...

I run online because I made it my means to make a living, and because I like the players that I run for. I have great players.

But when a friend asked me to start running for our old friend-group again, my requirement was that it be in person. There was a lot of pushback on that, but I told them if I'm gonna run for pure enjoyment and friendship it'd have to be face to face.

Clint_L · 2026-04-17T05:15:26+0100

I find that when we are focused on play the online experience isn’t that far removed. It’s the before and after that I most dearly miss when we can’t be in person.

Blue · 2026-04-17T12:55:18+0100

AlViking said:
You are going from a history of their first attempt to have books online and Gleemax was inherently flawed from it's inception. I don't think that's a large enough sample size to mean anything.

I am going from a history of every single full edition change WotC has ever done. It's literally the absolute best information we can get. No, it's not a large sample size, but saying "just because this has happened every single time before, I can't see it happening this time because we haven't had a lot of edition changes" isn't a stronger statement.

Blue · 2026-04-17T12:57:42+0100

doctorbadwolf said:
Can't speak for you, but yes. You got the value every month you used the service.

"I can't speak for you, but I'll speak for you."

If you want to discuss, please don't do things like that.

AlViking · 2026-04-17T13:08:55+0100

Blue said:
I am going from a history of every single full edition change WotC has ever done. It's literally the absolute best information we can get. No, it's not a large sample size, but saying "just because this has happened every single time before, I can't see it happening this time because we haven't had a lot of edition changes" isn't a stronger statement.

DDI was shut down because the Silverlight software that it was built on was no longer supported. Your assumption has nothing to stand on. Well, technically if all internet servers are shut down one day and the content can't be easily moved somewhere else DDB will no longer be available. If that ever happens I doubt DDB going away will be the last of our concerns.