Roll for Combat reveals the terms of the "sweetheart deal" offered to 3pp

[Faolyn]

What 15 million subscribers? As far as I can tell, subscriber numbers have never been released for D&D Beyond. 10 million accounts was the thing in April of last year. But say it's 15 million accounts. How many of those are active, so not dormant accounts just sitting there? Is it 20%? 30%? More? Less? I don't know, but I doubt it's even a majority. Then, how many of those accounts are subscribed? you only need one subscription per group really, and the people I've played with have always unsubscribed whenever they weren't in an active campaign, and only one account was ever subscribed per group, because more would be pointless. So one out of every five active accounts maybe? Let's be generous and say 25%. So 15 million accounts, 30% active, 25% of those subscribed. That's 1.125 million subscribers. Substantially fewer than the total number of accounts. And if the number of subscribers was actually a significant proportion of the number of accounts, we would have heard such a number proclaimed at some point. We haven't, so it's likely to be a small fraction of total accounts.

Plus there's the people who don't read those articles, watch the videos, or click on the ads, and who send promotional emails directly to spam.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Don’t know you were born, is an expression for not knowing how lucky you are. I didn’t say anyone was stupid.

If you are substantially over the $750k mark then it may not be worthwhile. If you are under then the advertising opportunity is golden.

Also people are fundamentally misunderstanding/misrepresenting the maths…

$750,000 revenue annually = $0 commission 0%
$800,000 revenue = $7,500 commission 0.9%
$1,000,000 revenue = $37,500 commission 3.75%
$1,500,000 revenue = $112,500 commission 7.5%

The suggestion that these figures can’t be profitable at over $750,000 is ridiculous.

I don’t think 3pp were born yesterday. They want to keep more of their own money. I don’t think that’s stupid. Neither do I think it’s something that’s intrinsically good for the hobby or somehow better than WotC having some of it. They’re all capability entrepreneurs.

I don’t buy the idea that these figures are crippling. If overheads are that tight, you just put the price up by 3-7% which is what? $1.50 - $3.50 on a large hardback. Which is a stretch anyway because while the first book you print/publish/put online costs you $150,000 to make, the second one costs you a couple of dollars / nothing.

Also, the cost of distributing pdfs is not that high compared to actual books. Or better said: the costs to creat are the same. And after having sold a certain amount, all you get is income. So 15% above 750k might mean, that you still keep 80% of that for yourself.

That does not mean it was a great deal for all and I think that the royality clause was not worth the trouble for wotc. But it was not the pure rip off people made it out to be.
Depending on the view, it is wotc who is currently ripped off, because they get nothing (in cash).

 

[Pedantic]

Also, the cost of distributing pdfs is not that high compared to actual books. Or better said: the costs to creat are the same. And after having sold a certain amount, all you get is income. So 15% above 750k might mean, that you still keep 80% of that for yourself.

That does not mean it was a great deal for all and I think that the royality clause was not worth the trouble for wotc. But it was not the pure rip off people made it out to be.
Depending on the view, it is wotc who is currently ripped off, because they get nothing (in cash).

"Not a great deal" is a very mild way of putting "demanding money for something you guaranteed was perpetually free." That kind of characterization, as if WotC were negotiating a new situation instead of clawing back something they'd already given away is particularly frustrating.

WotC cannot be "ripped off" here, no more than I can be ripped off if you sell a book I gave you as a Christmas present and don't give me any of the proceeds. It only helps WotC's position to cede that framing to them.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

"Not a great deal" is a very mild way of putting "demanding money for something you guaranteed was perpetually free." That kind of characterization, as if WotC were negotiating a new situation instead of clawing back something they'd already given away is particularly frustrating.

WotC cannot be "ripped off" here, no more than I can be ripped off if you sell a book I gave you as a Christmas present and don't give me any of the proceeds. It only helps WotC's position to cede that framing to them.

You can take a gift back after what is called "grober Undank". I don't say it applies here. Only to reply to your example.

I also did not say, WotC was ripped of, neither did I wanted to imply that. I said, it is how deciders at WotC may have looked upon it.

My stance is:

the free givaway was also free advertising and spreading and thus a win-win situation. This is why I added "in cash" after that statement.

And now we are steering into a lose-lose situation.