So can anyone tell me why wealthy people pay less for everything while those who cannot afford it all get locked out of all of the cool new content and charged a lot more money for the bits as they go along?
It's too expensive and I realise charging incrementally for content is what some people want but the incremental cost is just too high. Before you know it you will have spent way more than the cost of the full collection costs with its discount and still not have all the content. It puts me off dealing with a Brand that manipulates its customers like this. I just cannot afford to use this which is a shame because I like what I see.
So can anyone tell me why wealthy people pay less for everything while those who cannot afford it all get locked out of all of the cool new content and charged a lot more money for the bits as they go along?
It's too expensive and I realise charging incrementally for content is what some people want but the incremental cost is just too high. Before you know it you will have spent way more than the cost of the full collection costs with its discount and still not have all the content. It puts me off dealing with a Brand that manipulates its customers like this. I just cannot afford to use this which is a shame because I like what I see.
Well done but for now no thanks.
Whatever you purchase incrementally is deducted from the cost of the book it comes from so its pretty much impossible to pay more than the value of the book. Same goes for the legendary bundle - you can buy bits and pieces and the cost of the bundle will be reduced accordingly. DDB has worked really hard to not rip off its customers and uninformed comments are really not helpful.
I have physical copies of PHB, DMG, MM, Xanthars Guide, and a pdf of Volos Guide. I would really love to use the app and the website for my games. But it seems a bit much to have to pay an average of 30$/book. Can the books and content be included in the price per month. If I could have access to everything for the 5.99/month I’d be on that like donkey kong.
So can anyone tell me why wealthy people pay less for everything while those who cannot afford it all get locked out of all of the cool new content and charged a lot more money for the bits as they go along?
I'm not sure where you are looking... but I'm not seeing anything on this site that asks me how much money I have before it sets the price for me to buy something. Looks like the price is the same whether the buyer is wealthy or poor, so I really don't even understand what you are talking about with broke folks (which happen to include me) allegedly being "charged a lot more money".
My comments are not completely uninformed I have read about the pricing. I still feel its manipulative and my opinion is valid you don't have to like it.
I am only offering my opinion as a potential customer to DDB. They can take it on board or ignore it it's up to them, if they want more customers I imagine they will review threads like this. Just because you've seen this before doesn't mean no one else can share their own view so let people have their say without attacking them.
I think it's way too expensive and i dislike the pay more for less incremental model. I'm not forcing anyone to agree. Many retailers spend fortunes trying to get feedback from their customers. DDB should be grateful when customers give it freely especially negative feedback or how can they improve?
Unless you buy the whole book in the end it's still costing you much more per item, spell, character etc and I assume you don't get the 15% off unless you get everybook? its sucking you in to buying the whole thing which is very expensive - it's an awkward way to progress. Unless you buy it ALL you will be worse off. I want to see everything a DDB has to offer and after trying it out I don't even know if I'm seeing everything thats available. I don't want to be "Tempted" into buying more and more bundles just to see what's out there and then not use it.
So can anyone tell me why wealthy people pay less for everything while those who cannot afford it all get locked out of all of the cool new content and charged a lot more money for the bits as they go along?
I suffer from several debilitating conditions that make it next to impossible to work whilst not being enough to qualify for disability benefits in my country. This puts me in a position where I live off of welfare but have the constant stress of having to look for jobs that I'll never get. I quite literally live below the poverty line.
And yet, I managed to find a way to get the Legendary Bundle.
That's fine. It's entirely your opinion, and even though I don't share it there are no points upon which to argue.
...i dislike the pay more for less incremental model.
This is the part I'm confused about. As far as I can see, there is no such model being used for the D&D Beyond pricing.
Whether you buy everything on offer today by picking up the Legendary Bundle, or pick up just a few pieces of this or that which are within your budget and over time purchase everything, you are only being asked to pay the total price of the Legendary Bundle - never more. That is because each bit that you buy subtracts what you paid for it from the cost of the larger thing that it is part of - both in the case of piece of a book making that book cheaper to buy the rest of, and in the case of anything you buy making the price of Legendary Bundle go down, because D&D Beyond are deliberately not having anyone get penalized with having to spend extra money buy not being able to afford the big purchase right away.
My comments are not completely uninformed I have read about the pricing. I still feel its manipulative and my opinion is valid you don't have to like it.
I am only offering my opinion as a potential customer to DDB. They can take it on board or ignore it it's up to them, if they want more customers I imagine they will review threads like this. Just because you've seen this before doesn't mean no one else can share their own view so let people have their say without attacking them.
I think it's way too expensive and i dislike the pay more for less incremental model. I'm not forcing anyone to agree. Many retailers spend fortunes trying to get feedback from their customers. DDB should be grateful when customers give it freely especially negative feedback or how can they improve?
Unless you buy the whole book in the end it's still costing you much more per item, spell, character etc and I assume you don't get the 15% off unless you get everybook? its sucking you in to buying the whole thing which is very expensive - it's an awkward way to progress. Unless you buy it ALL you will be worse off. I want to see everything a DDB has to offer and after trying it out I don't even know if I'm seeing everything thats available. I don't want to be "Tempted" into buying more and more bundles just to see what's out there and then not use it.
I won't argue with your opinion, but I will argue that some of your comments are factually incorrect. Each bit and bob you purchase counts toward the purchase of the source book it comes from and thus toward the legendary bundle. If you buy just the spells from the PHB, you will notice the PHB's cost is reduced by that amount in the marketplace. If you would like to see a $15-20/month model, just purchase around that much material each month until you have all that you want. Then you won't have to pay anything else to use the site. As others who have done the math have demonstrated, over time that is much cheaper than paying $15-20/month for all the materials whether you use them or not. If you need unlimited characters or want to share what you've purchased with your gaming group, then pick up a subscription and reduce your source purchases accordingly.
If your argument is that you only want to buy certain bits and bobs from various books and that it isn't fair that purchasing an entire book is cheaper than buying just the bits and bobs, I don't know what to tell you. You still won't pay more than the cost of the whole book for a book. If you just want the spells from the PHB, it's cheaper than buying the book. If you want the whole PHB but can't afford it in a month, you can buy part of the book a little at a time until you have the whole book. Then you don't have to pay for it here ever again.
Yes, you get a DISCOUNT if you buy in bulk, much like many other retailers in today's marketplace. Piecemeal purchases will be more expensive as a business standard. This is why restaurants have 'meals', wireless companies have 'plans', and car dealerships have 'packages' - piecing out individual offerings would be much more expensive. I understand that you may feel like you're being 'sucked in' or 'tempted', but this would be what advertising and marketing departments are paid to do across companies worldwide. As other users have cited above, D&D Beyond does include any piecemeal costs into a discounted larger purchase, so that expense is applied directly to the purchase of the book. Not many retailers go that far to appeal to their customers.
Your opinions on the pricing points and business model are received, and we do appreciate the feedback given. While these items are firmly seated for the time being and not likely to change, we can never be sure what the future holds in store. D&D Beyond offers a lot of utility without any purchases being made, so please enjoy what is freely offered as you discover whether or not this site works for your needs.
@Sedge (or any other moderator) is there any chance the pricing FAQ thread can be updated so the very first post includes the info that WotC does not own Curse, etc, as well as the math others have repeatedly used to demonstrate that buying piecemeal works better than a subscription, and then going forward whenever someone makes an account to complain about having to "buy the books twice" you can just point them there in a PM and get rid of the annoying posts that have been answered ad nauseum?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
You don't OWN your books on DDB: WotC can change them any time. What do you think will happen when OneD&D comes out?
I think it's way too expensive and i dislike the pay more for less incremental model. I'm not forcing anyone to agree. Many retailers spend fortunes trying to get feedback from their customers. DDB should be grateful when customers give it freely especially negative feedback or how can they improve?
Unless you buy the whole book in the end it's still costing you much more per item, spell, character etc and I assume you don't get the 15% off unless you get everybook? its sucking you in to buying the whole thing which is very expensive - it's an awkward way to progress. Unless you buy it ALL you will be worse off. I want to see everything a DDB has to offer and after trying it out I don't even know if I'm seeing everything thats available. I don't want to be "Tempted" into buying more and more bundles just to see what's out there and then not use it.
You're missing a key point here. Anything money you spend for items piecemeal goes towards the price of the whole book. For instance. I've purchased the Monsters out of Volo's guide for $12.99. Now I only need to spend $17 more to purchase the rest of the book, as can be seen here:
So you will NEVER pay more than the full price for a book, no matter whether you buy it all at once, or piecemeal. Once you've spend the full book price on sections, you unlock the full book
I'll use Tales from the Yawning portal as an example.
Lets say I bought Against the Giants, The Forge of Fury, and Tomb of Horrors for $6.99 each. That's a total of 20.97 for 3 adventures. Now, two weeks later I decide I want to run Dead in Thay. Byy itself, it would cost another $6.99, but because I've already spent $20.97, I only have to spend $4.03 to get ALL of Dead in Thay, The Sunless Citadel, White Plume Mountain, and the Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan.
The same is true for the Legendary bundle. As soon as you've spent enough to meet the price of the legendary bundle, you unlock the full bundle and the 15% discount on all future content.
I was really looking forward to using this to organize my campaigns and to have tools here, but its kind of pointless if I have to buy everything again. I own every D&D book and I am not about to spend that kind of money again. You should really find a way to make it so that people can use the resources here without having to re-buy the books. For those of us who are so invested in the hardcovers it makes converting to this pointless. Was excited to use the site, but since i cant use any of its resources within my campaigns now its pointless.
Thanks for the answers.
Public Mod Note
(Stormknight):
merged here from separate post
My comments are not completely uninformed I have read about the pricing. I still feel its manipulative and my opinion is valid you don't have to like it.
I am only offering my opinion as a potential customer to DDB. They can take it on board or ignore it it's up to them, if they want more customers I imagine they will review threads like this. Just because you've seen this before doesn't mean no one else can share their own view so let people have their say without attacking them.
I think it's way too expensive and i dislike the pay more for less incremental model. I'm not forcing anyone to agree. Many retailers spend fortunes trying to get feedback from their customers. DDB should be grateful when customers give it freely especially negative feedback or how can they improve?
Unless you buy the whole book in the end it's still costing you much more per item, spell, character etc and I assume you don't get the 15% off unless you get everybook? its sucking you in to buying the whole thing which is very expensive - it's an awkward way to progress. Unless you buy it ALL you will be worse off. I want to see everything a DDB has to offer and after trying it out I don't even know if I'm seeing everything thats available. I don't want to be "Tempted" into buying more and more bundles just to see what's out there and then not use it.
As a prospective customer that is a valid point. However, I think (no evidence presented to us by Curse) that they are doing quite well. If they have money to put job posting after job posting to build the team up since launch I'm assuming they've met their payback and ROI figures already (or are well on track to do so). They've ramped up making video content, brought in people like Matt Mercer and Marisha Ray to create pronunciation guides for monsters. Are sponsoring Critical Role, etc. All signs point to a business model that's working. They continue to release new content. Are able to give away Legendary Bundles monthly (via their monthly Twitch update streams).
Capitalist Economic Theory at its best. Supply and Demand working as it should. There are plenty of satisfied paying customers.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Want to see Virtual Table Top like no other before it built within DnDBeyond.com? Upvote the feature request. It's 2nd highest voted so far:
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The lack of personally owned digital/physical material seems to be a massive bone of contention for much of your customers. Lets say I spend £300 buying the legendary content, as well and the maximum tier sub (which i do currently pay), and then the worst thing possible happens and this website closes, I lose all my content and have to repurchase everything again outside of DnD Beyond. does that sound correct? Id buy everything here as your tools are great, but Id need some promise that regardless of the success of this website i would still have access to the content in the years to come.
I am glad DDB is doing well, it's a good product. I'd love to use it and it's clear they plan to expand it but I won't pay twice and I can't recommend it to the groups I play with because so much is missing so it's not an option for me unless I pay a substantial amount more. I hope DDB is around when 6E comes out and is ready to offer us an alternative to books that way I will have a real choice. But it wasn't around for 5 e's release so we got the books and now someone wants us to pay again. I suspect 6e will be more joined up with online and book offering in future. If DDB 5e was much cheaper like a top up cost then I'd be interested but 300 is way too high. I know it's not cheap to develop DDB and run it, expand it etc and I don't expect it to be free. I just think its too high for a non print product. After all if I get bored of it I cannot stick it on ebay or pass it on to a friend as a gift like I did with 4e books. Anway there are other products out there like roll20 and fantasy grounds and I hope they all do well.
The same is true for the Legendary bundle. As soon as you've spent enough to meet the price of the legendary bundle, you unlock the full bundle and the 15% discount on all future content.
Ok LtDarien thanks for the illustration I get it. It sounds like youre saying you only get 15% off future content but not the legendary bundle when you reach the full price. Do you get a 15% refund when you reach the full price of the legendary bundle because if you don't then its cheaper to buy the bundle upfront and not incrementally.
And dont forget that it is with a discount already.
As you say cjwash the hard cover is about 50 dollars but the digital is 30 dollar. So its a discount of 20 dollar.
I'm not stupid. I'm just unlucky when I'm thinking.
Yes I gathered all of that information after my post was added to this thread yesterday. Thanks for listing it all out for me though.
So can anyone tell me why wealthy people pay less for everything while those who cannot afford it all get locked out of all of the cool new content and charged a lot more money for the bits as they go along?
It's too expensive and I realise charging incrementally for content is what some people want but the incremental cost is just too high. Before you know it you will have spent way more than the cost of the full collection costs with its discount and still not have all the content. It puts me off dealing with a Brand that manipulates its customers like this. I just cannot afford to use this which is a shame because I like what I see.
Well done but for now no thanks.
How many circles do we have to run in before we can say that this conversation has been well and truly had?
I have physical copies of PHB, DMG, MM, Xanthars Guide, and a pdf of Volos Guide. I would really love to use the app and the website for my games. But it seems a bit much to have to pay an average of 30$/book. Can the books and content be included in the price per month. If I could have access to everything for the 5.99/month I’d be on that like donkey kong.
I'm not sure where you are looking... but I'm not seeing anything on this site that asks me how much money I have before it sets the price for me to buy something. Looks like the price is the same whether the buyer is wealthy or poor, so I really don't even understand what you are talking about with broke folks (which happen to include me) allegedly being "charged a lot more money".
My comments are not completely uninformed I have read about the pricing. I still feel its manipulative and my opinion is valid you don't have to like it.
I am only offering my opinion as a potential customer to DDB. They can take it on board or ignore it it's up to them, if they want more customers I imagine they will review threads like this. Just because you've seen this before doesn't mean no one else can share their own view so let people have their say without attacking them.
I think it's way too expensive and i dislike the pay more for less incremental model. I'm not forcing anyone to agree. Many retailers spend fortunes trying to get feedback from their customers. DDB should be grateful when customers give it freely especially negative feedback or how can they improve?
Unless you buy the whole book in the end it's still costing you much more per item, spell, character etc and I assume you don't get the 15% off unless you get everybook? its sucking you in to buying the whole thing which is very expensive - it's an awkward way to progress. Unless you buy it ALL you will be worse off. I want to see everything a DDB has to offer and after trying it out I don't even know if I'm seeing everything thats available. I don't want to be "Tempted" into buying more and more bundles just to see what's out there and then not use it.
And yet, I managed to find a way to get the Legendary Bundle.
That's fine. It's entirely your opinion, and even though I don't share it there are no points upon which to argue.
This is the part I'm confused about. As far as I can see, there is no such model being used for the D&D Beyond pricing.Whether you buy everything on offer today by picking up the Legendary Bundle, or pick up just a few pieces of this or that which are within your budget and over time purchase everything, you are only being asked to pay the total price of the Legendary Bundle - never more. That is because each bit that you buy subtracts what you paid for it from the cost of the larger thing that it is part of - both in the case of piece of a book making that book cheaper to buy the rest of, and in the case of anything you buy making the price of Legendary Bundle go down, because D&D Beyond are deliberately not having anyone get penalized with having to spend extra money buy not being able to afford the big purchase right away.
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ModeratorYes, you get a DISCOUNT if you buy in bulk, much like many other retailers in today's marketplace. Piecemeal purchases will be more expensive as a business standard. This is why restaurants have 'meals', wireless companies have 'plans', and car dealerships have 'packages' - piecing out individual offerings would be much more expensive. I understand that you may feel like you're being 'sucked in' or 'tempted', but this would be what advertising and marketing departments are paid to do across companies worldwide. As other users have cited above, D&D Beyond does include any piecemeal costs into a discounted larger purchase, so that expense is applied directly to the purchase of the book. Not many retailers go that far to appeal to their customers.
Your opinions on the pricing points and business model are received, and we do appreciate the feedback given. While these items are firmly seated for the time being and not likely to change, we can never be sure what the future holds in store. D&D Beyond offers a lot of utility without any purchases being made, so please enjoy what is freely offered as you discover whether or not this site works for your needs.
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Send me a message with any questions or concerns
@Sedge (or any other moderator) is there any chance the pricing FAQ thread can be updated so the very first post includes the info that WotC does not own Curse, etc, as well as the math others have repeatedly used to demonstrate that buying piecemeal works better than a subscription, and then going forward whenever someone makes an account to complain about having to "buy the books twice" you can just point them there in a PM and get rid of the annoying posts that have been answered ad nauseum?
You don't OWN your books on DDB: WotC can change them any time. What do you think will happen when OneD&D comes out?
I was really looking forward to using this to organize my campaigns and to have tools here, but its kind of pointless if I have to buy everything again. I own every D&D book and I am not about to spend that kind of money again. You should really find a way to make it so that people can use the resources here without having to re-buy the books. For those of us who are so invested in the hardcovers it makes converting to this pointless. Was excited to use the site, but since i cant use any of its resources within my campaigns now its pointless.
Thanks for the answers.
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Thanks for the assist. I'll check out the FAQs too.
The lack of personally owned digital/physical material seems to be a massive bone of contention for much of your customers. Lets say I spend £300 buying the legendary content, as well and the maximum tier sub (which i do currently pay), and then the worst thing possible happens and this website closes, I lose all my content and have to repurchase everything again outside of DnD Beyond. does that sound correct? Id buy everything here as your tools are great, but Id need some promise that regardless of the success of this website i would still have access to the content in the years to come.
I am glad DDB is doing well, it's a good product. I'd love to use it and it's clear they plan to expand it but I won't pay twice and I can't recommend it to the groups I play with because so much is missing so it's not an option for me unless I pay a substantial amount more. I hope DDB is around when 6E comes out and is ready to offer us an alternative to books that way I will have a real choice. But it wasn't around for 5 e's release so we got the books and now someone wants us to pay again. I suspect 6e will be more joined up with online and book offering in future. If DDB 5e was much cheaper like a top up cost then I'd be interested but 300 is way too high. I know it's not cheap to develop DDB and run it, expand it etc and I don't expect it to be free. I just think its too high for a non print product. After all if I get bored of it I cannot stick it on ebay or pass it on to a friend as a gift like I did with 4e books. Anway there are other products out there like roll20 and fantasy grounds and I hope they all do well.
Happy gaming all.
Ok LtDarien thanks for the illustration I get it. It sounds like youre saying you only get 15% off future content but not the legendary bundle when you reach the full price. Do you get a 15% refund when you reach the full price of the legendary bundle because if you don't then its cheaper to buy the bundle upfront and not incrementally.