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General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Hey, are we all cool with having to buy the same book twice, or what?
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<blockquote data-quote="Sword of Spirit" data-source="post: 7987866" data-attributes="member: 6677017"><p>Sure, that's likely what it comes down to.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>The given explanation was very diplomatically customer-focused, when I think the real reason is the bolded one above. That sort of irritates me.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Well how are we going to have internet discussions with that sort of crazy requirements? <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink ;)" data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /></p><p></p><p>Seriously though, here's what it comes down to, as I see it:</p><p></p><p>1) They probably don't think they would make very much money doing it. Some people have the money to buy DND Beyond and virtual table top versions of the content, and do so, when all they really want is a pdf. If those people bought less expensive pdfs instead, they would lose some money. They most likely estimate that the number of people who will buy basic pdfs who won't buy that other stuff is not high enough for it to be a net positive to their bottom line.</p><p></p><p>2) They may or may not be right. My gut tells me it can probably be done profitably. Especially now that they've established these other digital means. Maybe they'll put them out in another year or two once they have little fear they'll lose potential DND Beyond, etc customers. Maybe that was the plan all along.</p><p></p><p>3) Making reasonably priced pdfs available is a goodwill builder. Unless they will actually lose money doing it, they should do it for that alone, even if they only break even with it.</p><p></p><p>Now, it's quite possible that they've considered all of that, and their best estimates are telling them to wait late 2021/early 2022 to release pdfs to maximum establishment of their digital licenses before losing too much goodwill over lack of pdfs.</p><p></p><p>Personally, I think prioritizing goodwill over other considerations (ie, even being willing to take a tiny loss of profit if you can handle it) is just the right way to do business. WotC has been doing better with that during the 5e era than they (and TSR) had for a long time, probably because the 5e D&D design/development team was essentially begging both the corporation to let them make the game, and us to buy it. Early 5e development was almost like some sort of small press thing. But I feel like now it's shifted from "How do we best capture the essence of D&D that people want in a way that they will want with careful awareness of our stewardship over this D&D thing that is bigger than any of us?" to "Now that we're wildly succcessful, just focus on continually growing that bottom dollar." It's really hard to keep goodwill unless you are actively focusing on it.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Sword of Spirit, post: 7987866, member: 6677017"] Sure, that's likely what it comes down to. The given explanation was very diplomatically customer-focused, when I think the real reason is the bolded one above. That sort of irritates me. Well how are we going to have internet discussions with that sort of crazy requirements? ;) Seriously though, here's what it comes down to, as I see it: 1) They probably don't think they would make very much money doing it. Some people have the money to buy DND Beyond and virtual table top versions of the content, and do so, when all they really want is a pdf. If those people bought less expensive pdfs instead, they would lose some money. They most likely estimate that the number of people who will buy basic pdfs who won't buy that other stuff is not high enough for it to be a net positive to their bottom line. 2) They may or may not be right. My gut tells me it can probably be done profitably. Especially now that they've established these other digital means. Maybe they'll put them out in another year or two once they have little fear they'll lose potential DND Beyond, etc customers. Maybe that was the plan all along. 3) Making reasonably priced pdfs available is a goodwill builder. Unless they will actually lose money doing it, they should do it for that alone, even if they only break even with it. Now, it's quite possible that they've considered all of that, and their best estimates are telling them to wait late 2021/early 2022 to release pdfs to maximum establishment of their digital licenses before losing too much goodwill over lack of pdfs. Personally, I think prioritizing goodwill over other considerations (ie, even being willing to take a tiny loss of profit if you can handle it) is just the right way to do business. WotC has been doing better with that during the 5e era than they (and TSR) had for a long time, probably because the 5e D&D design/development team was essentially begging both the corporation to let them make the game, and us to buy it. Early 5e development was almost like some sort of small press thing. But I feel like now it's shifted from "How do we best capture the essence of D&D that people want in a way that they will want with careful awareness of our stewardship over this D&D thing that is bigger than any of us?" to "Now that we're wildly succcessful, just focus on continually growing that bottom dollar." It's really hard to keep goodwill unless you are actively focusing on it. [/QUOTE]
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Community
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Hey, are we all cool with having to buy the same book twice, or what?
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