WotC Roll For Combat: Hasbro Downgraded. Toys Rotting on the Shelves

[mamba]

Really depends. Hasbro has real assets... you can't say that for every company on the stock market... so...

if they do, the knife stops falling eventually, then it is save to pick up

 

[MichaelSomething]

The lower the stock, the easier it is for Enworld to form an activist investor group, buy enough stock to have influence over company affairs; and then force WOTC to make D&D the way we want to be!

 

[Morrus]

The lower the stock, the easier it is for Enworld to form an activist investor group, buy enough stock to have influence over company affairs; and then force WOTC to make D&D the way we want to be!

Except that the members of this community definitely do not agree on how they want D&D to be!

 

[MichaelSomething]

Except that the members of this community definitely do not agree on how they want D&D to be!

Then I better form my sub group faster then the Enworlders with different ideals do!

Assemble people who want the Commoner class to return!!!!

 

[Mistwell]

I do wish people would stop re-posting clickbait YouTube videos here. Most of us come here to get away from that garbage.

So I noticed I got 30 thumbs-up likes on this comment to @Henadic Theologian from me, and one laugh response from Henadic Theologian.

And I noticed also Henadic laughed at every comment in this thread calling him out for linking to clickbait.

Given the overwhelming response appears to be negative to Henadic for doing that (30 to 1 is pretty overwhelming here), I just wanted him to know when he does that I read his response as the nervous laughter of someone uncomfortable for having been caught doing something they know they probably shouldn't.

In which case, I appreciate Henadic letting me know that.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

We can agree we can't agree.

My opinion is Hasbro shouldn't lose of sight the franchise Batlezoo by Roll for Combat. If the product was right, Hasbro could earn a lot of money with a D&D version of collecting+training monsters style Pokemon or Digimon. With the right software tools, D&D-Beyond could allow solo-mode. This mean D&DB working as VTT but also like the option of CRPG.

But I am afraid Hasbro and Roll for Combat don't trust each other enoughly to reach a collab agreement. What a pity!

Maybe something is fault by Hasbro. It is not only too linked to Disney franchises, but now cartoons aren't on TV but in streamer services, and this means no all the children watch the same shows. Some times I have been in a toy shop (searching Hero Quest board game, or something to buy for my nephews) and some figures of marvel superheroes by Hasbro were like produced by a pirate/rip off company from Asia.

And even if the products were right, now fewer children are born, and these would rather videogames. And videogame industry is a risky bet. Now BG3 is the current superstar, but we know several titles failed and fallen into the oblivion. And the videogames get old very poorly too soon. And if the last year the economy hasn't been too good, then you have to sacrifice spending on leisure.

Hasbro wants to bet for multimedia franchises, and this shouldn't be a bad strategy, but this may need a lot of time.

Even if WotC did a right work, this hasn't been a good year for Hasbro.

* I wonder if Hasbro should talk with LEGO or Playmobil for any possible merger.

 

[Nikosandros]

Thanks for the link. Not only is the video really informative, but I discovered a very cool channel!

 

[Umbran]

And I noticed also Henadic laughed at every comment in this thread calling him out for linking to clickbait.

Mod Note:
And I noticed that you are making this personal.
And leaning on "my opinion is popular, yours is not" isn't great either.
Please stop.

Also, to @Henadic Theologian - Please stop using the "laugh" emoji to treat disagreement as a joke, or to mock. It isn't the most actionable offense, but, it doesn't leave you looking great.

 

[Velderan]

I was reading EnWorld at the same time as I started listening to the latest Roll for Combat video, called "New Secrets Revealed: The Original Leakers Recap The WoTC OGL Scandal." So yes, it's a click-bait title. They are going over the history of what happened including getting texts about OGL 1.1 literally a year ago today. I find it interesting. So I'm going to try and embed it into my post in the thought that some of you will think the same.


I don't watch a lot of click-bait stuff, but when I find something useful and the authors know what they are talking about, I make an exception.

Edited to add: well now I know how to embed videos. Cool beans.

The interesting thing he mentioned was according to his source, somewhere between 50k and 60k people unsubscribed during the DDB cancellation push and at the time, that was roughly 10% of the subscriber base. No idea how accurate that number is since he only mentioned one source but given how connected they clearly were at the time, I'd guess it's not far off from the truth.

 

[Clint_L]

In 2021 DDB allegedly had close to ten million "users," which seems like an awful lot; I am kind of skeptical. However, the paid subscriber base being 5-10% of that does not seem unreasonable. My paid subscription to DDB props up an awful lot of free accounts. In 2023, Chris Cocks claimed that, by Hasbro's reckoning, close to 50% of D&D games now use some form of digital tabletop, mostly DDB.

Edit: I suspect a lot of those DDB free accounts were seldom used and since abandoned. I would love to know how many regularly active accounts there are. It seems to me that the subscription numbers should be out there somewhere, as Hasbro is a publicly traded company.