WotC: Re-issue older editions.

[Dice4Hire]

Well the ones that were sold as PDFs before should be easy to make available again. Older products that were never pworted over to pdf might be a lot harder, assuming WOTC even has their own library of games, which I suppose they do, but have no information about.

Still WOTC could release a great deal of information for older editions if they choose, and stores like RPGnow are great for that.

 

[Treebore]

I cannot imagine this being remotely worth WotC's time.

For the print-on-demand option: Total nonstarter. Any such project will have a considerable start-up cost. You've got to find a print-on-demand provider; hammer out a deal; digitize anything you haven't already got in digital form; get the files to said PoD provider; publicize the new offering; and maintain the relationship. All of this, so that you can put out books for $20+ (PoD is expensive) that anyone can get used on eBay for $10? Sell old issues of Dragon where any given issue has maybe 3-4 people interested in buying it?

In a world without eBay, it's conceivable you might be able to scrape a few pennies' profit. In this world--not a chance.

For the .PDF option: This might be able to turn a small profit. But Erik Mona posted in another thread about opportunity cost; it's highly applicable here. When you're deciding how your employees should spend their time, it's not enough for a given project simply to be profitable in an absolute sense. It has to be more profitable than all the other ways that employee could be spending his or her time. Otherwise you're leaving money on the table, and right now I don't think WotC has any to spare.

If you want stuff from old editions, that's why we have eBay and the like. Every so often I get a hankering to read one of the old books again, and I've never had trouble finding them.

I take it you aren't very familiar with POD at all. Hard to find a POD provider? Not. It may be hard to find one your willing to work with, though. Or find one who has terms your willing to accept. But find one? Not so hard.

They could just work with Drivethrurpg again, they now do POD.

 

[Dausuul]

I take it you aren't very familiar with POD at all. Hard to find a POD provider? Not. It may be hard to find one your willing to work with, though. Or find one who has terms your willing to accept. But find one? Not so hard.

They could just work with Drivethrurpg again, they now do POD.

I figured "one you're willing to work with" is implicit in "find a PoD provider." Somebody has to look into PoD providers, make a list of possibilities, and recommend one. A deal has to be negotiated. Somebody in Accounting--probably a couple somebodies--has to sign off on it. Legal will need to look over the contract. All this stuff takes time out of the day of expensive, busy people.

 

[Alzrius]

I cannot imagine this being remotely worth WotC's time.

There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Dausuul, than are dreamt of in your imaginings.

For the print-on-demand option: Total nonstarter. Any such project will have a considerable start-up cost.

I'm not so sure that's true. Let's look at the steps you outlined in greater detail.

You've got to find a print-on-demand provider;

That's roughly the equivalent of calling lulu.com on the phone. Unless WotC has the worst long-distance provider EVAR, this won't register insofar as costs go.

In all seriousness, this is a bit more complicated, but not that much more.

hammer out a deal;

Presuming it's a professional POD company, they'll likely have set rates, so that's nothing that need be worried about too much.

digitize anything you haven't already got in digital form;

This is the crux of it. Most of the actual time and effort will go into this step. That said, this would clearly be a secondary or even tertiary concern at WotC. We don't need them doing this fast or in bulk - at this point we'd be happy if they were doing it at all.

Also, I don't know what goes into having something put into digital form, but I'd presume that if you already have PDFs of something, it won't be that difficult or time-consuming.

get the files to said PoD provider;

Which is likely little more than sending some emails.

publicize the new offering;

I think you're overestimating this. Beyond the initial announcement of them releasing POD books, there's little need to advertise. And even if they were so inclined, it's little more than a posting on their website.

and maintain the relationship.

"Hey, did we get our check from the Lulu guys this month?"

"Yeah, it's right here."

"Oh good. Make sure it's deposited before the end of the day, okay?"

"Sure thing."

'nuff said.

All of this, so that you can put out books for $20+ (PoD is expensive) that anyone can get used on eBay for $10?

Here's a link to a 64-page d20 product at lulu.com for $15. And here's a link to an eBay auction of the original 32-page S1 The Tomb of Horrors for $20.

In other words, it serves the consumer market just fine to have POD instead of eBay. That's not even considering how eBay doesn't always have what you want, you can get sniped in a bid or see the bidding get inflated (artificially or not), has no real guarantee of quality, etc.

Sell old issues of Dragon where any given issue has maybe 3-4 people interested in buying it?

That's a pretty major assumption on your part regarding how many people want older issues of Dragon. The only major issue there is that some parts of the magazines - such as the comics - only had their first-publication rights purchased, but not the subsequent-printing rights. That's what got TSR into so much trouble with the Dragon Magazine CD-ROM Archive.

Most likely, they'd have to sell copies of Dragon without the pages containing that material, which'd be a bit of a shame.

In a world without eBay, it's conceivable you might be able to scrape a few pennies' profit. In this world--not a chance.

I don't think you're giving the world enough credit...or you're giving eBay too much.

For the .PDF option: Piracy issues aside, this might be able to turn a small profit. But Erik Mona posted in another thread about opportunity cost; it's highly applicable here. When you're deciding how your employees should spend their time, it's not enough for a given project simply to be profitable in an absolute sense. It has to be more profitable than all the other ways that employee could be spending his or her time. Otherwise you're leaving money on the table, and right now I don't think WotC has any to spare.

That's true, but a lot of what WotC's doing now doesn't seem to be as profitable as they'd like. I and a lot of others here are suggesting that this might be more profitable than you (and they at WotC) realize.

If you want stuff from old editions, that's why we have eBay and the like. Every so often I get a hankering to read one of the old books again, and I've never had trouble finding them.

You're lucky then, I've had trouble finding things I want on eBay plenty of times. And even more trouble finding the things I want on eBay for reasonable prices in good condition.

 

[shadzar]

In a world without eBay, it's conceivable you might be able to scrape a few pennies' profit. In this world--not a chance.

Limited supply of decaying dead-tree stock that you have no control over and get no income from, vs unlimited supply of new stock, that you get profits from.

Collectors could buy the original for their collections, or put theirs up before it falls apart (orange spines), and people wanting new copies could get them as their first copy, or as replacement copies. You have the option to sell product to people that never had a print copy.

I would say POD v eBay has more to offer than just a few pennies.

A DVD (or more) of the old RPG-NOW titles would also be easy to get to the POD company without having to worry about data corruption and easy to store without taking up much space.

The only question comes to if WotC would want anyone having access to those PDFs again, or even EPS versions.

Making money from something is more than not making money from something.

 

[Glade Riven]

There is the question of how much of the original printed material TSA saved that would have been passed on to WotC - and I'm talking about original materials to make the print runs, not the finished products. Who knows how much was lost over the years. One unpaid storage facility bill and a sizable chuck disappears. A leak in a roof, damaged to buildings from inclement weather, a pipe bursting in the basement, etc. - it doesn't take much. Even if it is computerised, before the switch to Adobe as the standard software for print everything was done in Quark. And Quark is a nightmare to work with.

Updating the formats for quality printing, even for POD, is a time consuming and expensive process. Depending on what has to be done, it can be more expensive than producing a brand new book. Because of this, I'd have to list this idea as unlikely to come to fruition. The potential return on investment is too low for the potential costs.

 

[shadzar]

There is the question of how much of the original printed material TSA saved that would have been passed on to WotC - and I'm talking about original materials to make the print runs, not the finished products. Who knows how much was lost over the years. One unpaid storage facility bill and a sizable chuck disappears. A leak in a roof, damaged to buildings from inclement weather, a pipe bursting in the basement, etc. - it doesn't take much. Even if it is computerised, before the switch to Adobe as the standard software for print everything was done in Quark. And Quark is a nightmare to work with.

Updating the formats for quality printing, even for POD, is a time consuming and expensive process. Depending on what has to be done, it can be more expensive than producing a brand new book. Because of this, I'd have to list this idea as unlikely to come to fruition. The potential return on investment is too low for the potential costs.

TSR's entire(?) catalog and a large part of WotC's for D&D was online for download in PDF form until they pulled legal PDFs to stop piracy.

While they weren't the best scans, and didnt have each variant such as covers/etc...the work of making them ready for POD has already been done.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Like I posted in the other thread Print on Demand, and doing only print on demand, and not offering PDF's, would also solve the piracy issue WOTC claims to be so afraid of. My old modules are getting pretty beat up looking, so if they don't mark up the price too much I would be all over buying new POD copies of my modules.

How many sales will they get? Maybe a 1,000, maybe more, but it would not only be some money, but it would be good customer service, and increase good will. Something WOTC does need.

Listen friend, you cant' put goodwill on the DDI. It's not electronic and therefore, is of no value to the new initative that WoTC is taking.

 

[Glade Riven]

TSR's entire(?) catalog and a large part of WotC's for D&D was online for download in PDF form until they pulled legal PDFs to stop piracy.

While they weren't the best scans, and didnt have each variant such as covers/etc...the work of making them ready for POD has already been done.

There is a HUGE difference between a print quality PDF for a book and the crappy scans they had for online distribution. Would you honestly pay $50+ for books of that poor of quality? I wouldn't. Even in mint condition, the book quality for these products are inferior to today's expectations. With the competition of original product up on Ebay for fairly low prices (even the MIB stuff isn't that high of price by collector's standards), they could not afford to be stingy on quality.

And yes, WotC does have to pay the executives, the lawyers, and everyone else involved in the process a lot of money to find the right POD service that will negotiate to give WotC the best deal. These people aren't cheap. It isn't just a matter of dumping those PDFs up on Lulu.

Another thing to consider is that TSR could not stay in business with that particular product as it is. Why should WotC devote time, resources, and financial risk towards with such poor potential for profit?

 

[shadzar]

Because it worked well for them until someone got their painties in a twist about the PDFs.

For those not having the older books, or wanting something to spare their existing books from further wear and tear, many of the core books weren't that bad from what I hear.

That is the main thing that would be needed is the PHB/DMG/MM equivalents from each edition.