Save my Game: The future of online Wotc content?

[DM_Jeff]

More worrisome is where will all the 3.5 articles go after next May? All I DO know is they all download and fit on the 4E jumpdrive they gave away at GenCon.

-DM Jeff

 

[Asmor]

Yeah, well I'm on the Ramen diet, and that means I've got no money to spend on D&D at the moment. If Wotc wants to migrate all their online content to a pay service, that's fine.

But it means they don't care to fight for interest in their company's products because I can't afford to buy them right now. That's also fine. But when I get my law degree, I'm gonna remember this.

You're right, the magic content could be less valuable than D&D material, but there's still an awful lot of it, especially in comparison to what we get.

That's comparing apples to oranges... Magic is a huge, huge cash cow. Wizards basically prints money.

On the other hand, I'm genuinely surprised that Hasbro hasn't forced them to sell or kill off D&D yet. I'm not sure whether D&D's just making more money than I suspect, or if I'm underestimating how much autonomy WotC retains, but I'm just surprised (and grateful) that D&D's still being published.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

More worrisome is where will all the 3.5 articles go after next May?

They are going to move them to their own section of the website where they will be redistributed for free in large-print format for the old grognards.

As for the new articles, I recall at one point before the official 4e announcement, someone from WotC discussing the D&D Insider and saying there would be free content still. Perhaps it will function like some of the newspaper websites; you can get certain articles without registering, but others ask for you to log in when you click on them.

 

[Asmor]

Haven't they said that anything published while you were a D&D insider would remain accessible to you after your account expired?

In that case, as we're all D&D Insiders right now (or, at least, have the ability to freely and easily become such), all the old stuff should be available.

In theory.

 

[pawsplay]

Ten years ago it would have been unthinkable to have so much free content for D&D.

It's spoiled to think people in a hobby industry should support that hobby?

 

[Riley]

Hey, I'm a little worried because Save my Game is now published under Dungeon instead of as a feature. Similarly, the playtest report is under Dragon now. Why did they move these titles to areas that presumably will become pay-only in a few months?

They need to put that stuff in DDI in order to have much of anything there for us to buy, apparently. Still, Save My Game is about the only thing on the Wizards website that I'd consider worthy of inclusion in Dragon. I just wish they wouldn't also pad the 'magazine' out with fluff like the web enhancements. Those've always seemed like little more than teasers or advertisements, and as such it seems silly to put them in the 'pay' section of the site.

 

[WhatGravitas]

And this is where WotC is going to have problems. They've spoiled us. They've made things so good for us that now, when they ask for a reasonable payment for services we feel ripped off.

That's not the only problem. I've no problem with not getting free stuff as previously. What REALLY annoys me, that they took our print magazines away to sell their previously free stuff.

That's a double hit: We're losing our usual spoilage AND lose our print channel at once. And this makes me a bit unhappy, even as I like almost everything about 4E.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Corbert]

On the other hand, I'm genuinely surprised that Hasbro hasn't forced them to sell or kill off D&D yet.

Frankly I wouldn't mind if they did sell it, if it were bought by someone who genuinely loves the game and doesn't just look at it like a ca$h cow like Ha$bro does.

 

[questing gm]

Sounds like it's time to download all of them off the website, before i have to pay for accessing the archive.

 

[Glyfair]

Spoiled or not, this really is going to prove a turn-off for a lot of people.

True. If you give someone a free car every single year, they will blame you if you decide you can't afford to do it anymore.