D&D (2024) How D&D Beyond Will Handle Access To 2014 Rules

D&D Beyond has announced how the transition to the new 2024 edition will work on the platform, and how legacy access to the 2014 version of D&D will be implemented.

• You will still be able to access the 2014 Basic Rules and core rulebooks.
• You will still be able to make characters using the 2014 Player's Handbook.
• Existing home-brew content will not be impacted.
• These 2014 rules will be accessible and will be marked with a 'legacy' badge: classes, subclasses, species, backgrounds, feats, monsters.
• Tooltips will reflect the 2024 rules.
• Monster stat blocks will be updated to 2024.
• There will be terminology changes (Heroic Inspiration, Species, etc.)

D&D (2024) - Wizards of the Coast Backtracks on D&D Beyond and 2014 Content

Wizards of the Coast posted an overnight update stating that they are not going forward with previously released plans to require those wishing to use some 2014 content on D&D Beyond to use the Homebrew function to manually enter it. Instead, all the content including spells and magic items will...

www.enworld.org

 

[Imaro]

This is all I am talking about, I do no care about WotC enabling PF1, A5e or ToV. Of course they did, none of these would exist without WotC.

Well at least we agree on this...

 

[Minigiant]

Again, who cares? None of that is necessary for the industry to exist and make money, certainly not from a single publisher.

Somebody has to do the marketing or the industry doesn't exist.

The hobby can exist. But without marketing, the industry doesn't.

The entire Fantasy Adventurers RPG industry leans on WOTC for 90% of the marketing.

 

[Micah Sweet]

This assumption comes from the fact that it's (for all intents and purposes) always been this way, worked out for the industry and, most importantly, no one has been able to do better wiha different model. If the assumption is incorrect why does the situation of WotC having the most marketshare continue? Why hasn't it failed yet?

Didn't we all agree that "because it's always been done this way" was a terrible reason to maintain a practice?

You haven't proven anything to me, certainly profitability demands WotC power.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well at least we agree on this...

No one is saying they didn't need WotC to get started. That's obvious. I'm saying they don't need them now.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Somebody has to do the marketing or the industry doesn't exist.

The hobby can exist. But without marketing, the industry doesn't.

The entire Fantasy Adventurers RPG industry leans on WOTC for 90% of the marketing.

Then the marketing load will need to be shared out, obviously. Better for more companies that way.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

no, but it still means it does not need to be one company. I read your ‘something’ as one game / company, if that is not what you meant, then we are on the same page.

I think that in practise the "something" will always be one game/company because of the high network effect in play and other barriers to entry in the ttrpg market.
One cannot just decide to play an rpg. One has to get a bunch of people onboard and get them together in time and space on an ongoing basis to get anything going.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I want a healthy and diverse community, where people play different games that suit their interests and temperament. Having one companies product aggressively dominate the industry works against that. If diverse and varied gaming means a smaller industry overall (because no company is too strong to compete with), so be it.

 

[mamba]

If the assumption is incorrect why does the situation of WotC having the most marketshare continue?

I am not sure how the above fact justifies your assumption at all. D&D became dominant because it was first, the entire hobby had ups and downs, even while D&D was mostly the number 1 or 2 during its ‘career’. That is stayed so close to the top for so long is due to inertia, marketing budget, and network effects.

There is no law of business that requires one company to be dominant in any given field, and in most fields that is not the case

 

[OB1]

Somebody has to do the marketing or the industry doesn't exist.

The hobby can exist. But without marketing, the industry doesn't.

The entire Fantasy Adventurers RPG industry leans on WOTC for 90% of the marketing.

Exactly this. WotC is the only company pouring significant resources into expanding the TTRPG market through advertising, and as such, they reap most of the rewards from doing so. And with 2024, they remained focused on bringing a new generation of players into the hobby, as seen by the focus on making the Core more user friendly and investing in tools like DDB and Sigil to make the game easier to play.

While it's unlikely that another company will ever dethrone D&D as the market leader in the Fantasy TTRPG space, a well run company with the resources to advertise their platform could get as high as 35-45% market share (think Uber/Lyft, AirBnB/Verbo), but as of yet, the market isn't big enough for a solid competitor to emerge.

If 2024/DDB/Sigil is a good enough product to really expand the TTRPG market to the next level, expect a strong competitor to emerge in the next decade. My own guess is that competitor focuses on either SciFantasy or Superheroes rather than Renaissance Fantasy as a competitive edge over D&D (allowing them to claim the title of #1 in one of those genres).

 

[Minigiant]

Then the marketing load will need to be shared out, obviously. Better for more companies that way.

No one else has the money to do it.

Fantasy Adventurer RPGs is run by WOTC and both Fantasy and sci fi war gaming are run by GW because they have and invest the money in the marketing to make their IP valuable.

There is no big VTM-lite because the owners of WOD, Paradox, have made a mess of marketing. And no one else promoted an alternate well. So the Urban Dark Fantasy RPG industry is in the dumps.