I feel like Wizards are a little disconnected from how a lot of people play their game. They have a much broader audience than they used to. I DM for about 20 people. We have new people all the time. The biggest use we got out of the old online tools was the character creator, it's much easier to teach people how to play than how to create a character and we'd often have people drop in at short notice.
I'd be happier with a higher priced subscription service that just gave me access to all the character creation services. I don't want to devote so much of my life and time to DnD but I do want to know all my options, most of my players are the same.
Really confused, besides the fact that this has been discussed many time and the answer is in many forums so i dont feel the need to repeat what has been discussed before. However in the space of 15 minutes you have posted 2 separate threads concerning the same issue in two different areas. The part that confused me the most however is the fact that you asked for 2 different things in both forums as a response to the pricing model. This one you want a subscription for all content and in the other you want books at a higher price with a digital version included, so I'm not really if you here trying to propose solutions or just trying to be notices (but that is none of my business and you are welcome to do as you please) i am just trying to understand exactly what your point is with these posts so myself and the other users on this forum might be able to assist you better.
I think it would be reasonable to have a "All character creation" Bundle. Which doesn't unlock the compendiums, monsters, but does open all character creation options. Kind of like a "ultimate bundle for players" If that could be metered out over a subscription really depends on the licensing agreement.
But I am sure if they charged like the old 4e digital sub (That is $9.99 per month, with longer commitments bringing the monthly price down a bit) then it would certainly be financially doable. Even considering it offering a hero tier sub included, they would get $84 a year over the hero tier. Considering the ultimate bundle is ~$300, getting just player options for $84 a year probably equals out. Especially if you believe your platform is in it for the long haul. The first year is basically a wash, where any players who sign up less than a year are "beating the system" but every month after that is essentially free money for DDB.
As for the demand for this type of sub, and the willingness to actually pay. A couple of pros and cons.
Pro: Lower entry cost, easy player use. As a player, the entry cost can be pretty substantial, buying phb and any other resources puts a huge front end cost, for a system you don't even know you want to use yet. (The basic rules don't really allow actually using the tools in practice of say a campaign).
Con: Higher over time cost, renting vs owning. Eventually, if you are subbing, it would have been cheaper to just buy everything. And traditionally consumers prefer to own a product rather than rent it. BUT since effectively everything on DDB is rented (they will shut down the website one day), that drawback might not hold as much power.
To Mittens: I'm tired of seeing this "solution" it ignores a portion of the community. Not everyone's gaming group is conducive to the "collect money from each player" solution. Some people play with loose knit gaming groups, gaming groups with significant financial burdens (like families), or with adventure league strangers. Some even play with groups online who have already contributed to content through other platforms and may be disinclined to add into the investment of a new resource. For those groups it is impractical to ask for money, and even in more traditional circumstances it is an embarrassing thing to start hitting people up for money. The OP wants to pay for the content themselves. Telling them to bum money off their fellow gamers doesn't solve his problem it just makes him look like a dead beat to his friends.
To the OP WizardsBane: The pricing system that DnDBeyond has put in place is not going to fit everyone nor is it really negotiable at this point. DnDBeyond has made it clear that they cannot control the per book cost to access content. If you feel strongly about the cost concern email Wizards of the Coast directly as they are the ones that set the book cost and could in theory package the hardbacks with a digital access code.
I don't know if this solution has ever come up before, but I just thought of it and it's worth discussing. If someone knows why this wouldn't work, feel free to chime in.
The most common argument I hear against the subscription model is that it's impractical. However, Curse already has the groundwork in place to collect subscriptions, and based on the way purchasing piecemeal works, they're clearly willing to be reasonable when it comes to paying for content over time.
So how about an option where you can subscribe for like $10/mo and unlock everything for use with the character generator? No compendium content or even independent listings, but a fully functional character creator and "Hero" tier access.
As you pay on that, it chips away at the cost of a Legendary Bundle. Once you have covered the cost, you no longer have to pay for the $10 sub and it automatically drops you down to Hero Tier, unless you opt to cancel. If you cancel early, you can use the credit accrued to unlock individual books and features, since it all goes to the same place eventually (minus the cost of the Hero Tier).
The other option I can think of as a compromise would be to charge a low fee per character. Like for a one-time fee of $2.99, you build a character with all options available, but it goes back to being locked if you try to make another character. That fee can also chip away at the cost of a Legendary Bundle. The main issue I see with that is a person making one character, printing it out, and then going in and editing it as a different character. It's a lot of work for a whole party, but I wouldn't put anything past people these days.
I'm just brainstorming, so I totally get that these have probably been discussed and shot down for one reason or another, but it seemed like a productive idea to bring up at least.
I like those suggestions. Keep in mind, Curse has negotiated prices with WotC, and subscriptions that unlock licensed products 'very likely' were part of those negotiations. Further down the line this pricing scheme would work very well, but only when WotC is ready, and willing, to go back to that sort of model.
I don't know if this solution has ever come up before, but I just thought of it and it's worth discussing. If someone knows why this wouldn't work, feel free to chime in.
The most common argument I hear against the subscription model is that it's impractical. However, Curse already has the groundwork in place to collect subscriptions, and based on the way purchasing piecemeal works, they're clearly willing to be reasonable when it comes to paying for content over time.
So how about an option where you can subscribe for like $10/mo and unlock everything for use with the character generator? No compendium content or even independent listings, but a fully functional character creator and "Hero" tier access.
As you pay on that, it chips away at the cost of a Legendary Bundle. Once you have covered the cost, you no longer have to pay for the $10 sub and it automatically drops you down to Hero Tier, unless you opt to cancel. If you cancel early, you can use the credit accrued to unlock individual books and features, since it all goes to the same place eventually (minus the cost of the Hero Tier).
I'm just brainstorming, so I totally get that these have probably been discussed and shot down for one reason or another, but it seemed like a productive idea to bring up at least.
That is . . . the best version of that suggestion that I have ever seen.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
The most common argument I hear against the subscription model is that it's impractical. However, Curse already has the groundwork in place to collect subscriptions, and based on the way purchasing piecemeal works, they're clearly willing to be reasonable when it comes to paying for content over time.
Character subscription model would be best compromise for me. If you run a large loose knit group it's unfeasible from get money from everyone, also I think it shows that wizards didn't understand how a lot of people used their 4e character creator, I run and play at a lot of drop in gaming days at university and various bars/gaming shops, it was so useful to be able to take a person who had zero experience with DnD sit them in front of a character creator and say "here are all your options, click things until you have a character you like and then we'll play" That's what I was looking for out of these tools and it just doesn't really exist.
If this option existed I would have purchased it already.
Character subscription model would be best compromise for me. If you run a large loose knit group it's unfeasible from get money from everyone, also I think it shows that wizards didn't understand how a lot of people used their 4e character creator, I run and play at a lot of drop in gaming days at university and various bars/gaming shops, it was so useful to be able to take a person who had zero experience with DnD sit them in front of a character creator and say "here are all your options, click things until you have a character you like and then we'll play" That's what I was looking for out of these tools and it just doesn't really exist.
If this option existed I would have purchased it already.
I as well.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
I am afraid that it is exactly due to how the 4ed character builder was that DDB will never have a similar offer.
Why? Because I have the feeling that WotC found out that such a model is anything but profitable, and probably was also hurting the books sales. I had not personally used the tool itself, as I did not really like how the 4th edition was (still bought some of the books though, damn hoarding and collectionism), but I guess it could play out as something like this: Have one person of a group create a subscribed account day x -> have everyone and their mother make a character, export and print -> turn off subscription day x+1. repeat as/when needed.
This is hardly a very viable business model, as the numbers just do not add up at the end of the day, given that the revenue per character is infinitesimal, and there would be no need to buy books from anyone playing the game, as the SDR rules cover everything needed to run the game, and you got everything you needed to create characters without owning a single book for the low-low one-time price of a few dollars.
Now, again, I HAVE NOT USED THE TOOL OR LOOKED INTO IT AT THE TIME, but judging by the comments I have seen on it, the above seems to be how it used to. If I am wrong, I'd be more than happy to be corrected and properly understand how it was (tried make a quick search but couldn't find any info).
As per all the above, it seems logical to me that WotC said "woah woah, hold your horses everyone, this is not working AT ALL" and when they started negotiating with Curse, I imagine they imposed something along the line of "No subscription-based content availability, no subscription-based character builder". And I personally cannot really blame them, to be honest.
What you would like to do, is technically possible, "just" with an higher up-front price, as technically you could buy all the character options (races, classes, subclasses, backgrounds) and even without a subscription you can create ad-libitum characters (obviously with the need to delete a character when you get to the cap of 6, without sub), but it is technically possible. Is it the best possible deal? No. Is it impossible to do anything even remotely similar to 4ed CB in DDB? No, there are ways if one is willing to look for them (another example which greatly limits the up-front price is to use the home-brew possibilities [which will be expanded to subclasses] to re-create anything that is in the books, and it would always be available to all characters you create from the same account, just as long as you do not try to make it public home-brew content).
Again, I apologise if my description above is erroneous, don't throw fireballs at me immediately, thank you, I am more interested in being corrected if I am wrong and have a civil and constructive conversation.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
...I have the feeling that WotC found out that such a model is anything but profitable, and probably was also hurting the books sales.
I know it certainly seemed unprofitable to my outsider's point of view. During the 4e era, WotC was putting out something like a new book every month, and one of my players was buying up each and every one in hard copy at their $40-$50 price. I know that WotC wasn't getting all of that money, part going to distributors and part to the stores selling the books, but it certainly seems like their portion could be larger than the $10/month price for D&D Insider (hope I'm not remembering the price incorrectly). And I had more than one person in my group that would have kept buying books, but stopped because they could get what they wanted (and more) cheaper thanks to the D&D Insider subscription, so it looked like book sales were affected from my point of view.
Of course, that subscription price is like what portion of the book price would actually go to WotC in that it isn't all profit - there are costs that each have to cover. Which is how there is a chance that, because I don't know the breakdown in the account ledgers, the thing that seems initially unprofitable might actually have been turning a profit - though obviously not a large enough one in their overall plan for the company, since the new plan is so very different (by which I mean the frequent large releases + dirt-cheap and get literally everything subscription model compared to the handful of large releases each year + cheaper in the long-term, more expensive in the short-term digital offerings).
Again, I apologise if my description above is erroneous, don't throw fireballs at me immediately, thank you, I am more interested in being corrected if I am wrong and have a civil and constructive conversation.
For the most part, I'd say that you were wrong, but, as you said, that is more a consequence of not using the service. In my own case, and similarly for others I knew who used DDI's services; it was more likely that a person would set up a DDI account, make a few characters to play in various games, and if they were the DM, probably also have the characters for their players loaded up as well. From that point forward, it was both cheaper and easier to just let the DDI account auto-renew forever instead of canceling and re-subscribing, since doing that would lose all of your old character data. Letting the subscription run for months on end was often better than making a set of five characters for your players, deleting your account, and then doing it all from scratch all over again because characters sheets changed every level and every number on the printed sheet changed every even level. My own DDI account ran for months while we weren't even playing so that I had access to my player's characters when the game started up again and I could read the Magazine publications every month.
Economically, an annuity (which is what a subscription is) tends to be a much better income stream than a lump sum payment. If the subscription is cheap enough, people will just factor it in to their normal budgets. This is why subscription television services like Netflicks do better over services that make you pay per episode, even though those ala-carte services may technically be cheaper in the long run. 4th ed had a lot of challenges to overcome, but DDI was not one of them. It is very likely that the DDI subscription model is what kept the edition afloat as long as it did, as that was a steady stream of money that was always going to keep coming. I would contend that if WotC hadn't been dumb and built the character builder on the back of Siverlight, they probably could still have 4th Ed hold-outs paying them monthly fees forever to use the builder for a retired system.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
The most common argument I hear against the subscription model is that it's impractical. However, Curse already has the groundwork in place to collect subscriptions, and based on the way purchasing piecemeal works, they're clearly willing to be reasonable when it comes to paying for content over time.
Character subscription model would be best compromise for me. If you run a large loose knit group it's unfeasible from get money from everyone, also I think it shows that wizards didn't understand how a lot of people used their 4e character creator, I run and play at a lot of drop in gaming days at university and various bars/gaming shops, it was so useful to be able to take a person who had zero experience with DnD sit them in front of a character creator and say "here are all your options, click things until you have a character you like and then we'll play" That's what I was looking for out of these tools and it just doesn't really exist.
If this option existed I would have purchased it already.
This indeed does sound nice and reasonable, but I'm feeling confused. I think you already can do this.
1) Buy PHB subclasses and backgrounds: it will cost $14 (or $17 if you add subraces). You don't even need to buy any subscriptions, provided you are willing to delete redundant characters the next day.
2) Find a potential new player who is unsure if D&D is a his\her cup of tea and doesn't want to make a big commitments yet. Technically, you can explain the pricing model of DDB and offer to split the cost of Volo/SCAG/Master tier subscription. But you don't think this is a good idea. The person could be overwhelmed with options, and this is problem.
3) Log into your account, open a character builder, say "here are the some of your options, click things until you have a character you like and then we'll play".
4a) If your guest says "I think I'm done. I want to be Urchin Assassin", then you are done. Start campaign. You have a good time playing. Now is a good time to talk about feats, supplements, homebrew spells, Twitch accounts and pricing models.
4b) If your guest says "Wait, I want to be a Drow Swashbuckler with Mage Slayer feat. Also, I'm unable to find the Hex spell. Where are my options?", then you are done. Your guest is clearly ready to hear about supplements, home rules, multiclassing, Sage Advice and pricing models.
On one hand, I feel like this scenario offers everything you need to interact with the person having zero D&D experience (and is significantly cheaper). On the other hand, I feel like something is missing here. My solution clearly lacks convenience and feels not streamlined, even kludgy. But if this is purely a matter of convenience, why are we discussing pricing models? Shouldn't we talk about making the process easier instead?
You both explained two quite different ways of living the same service, if I am not mistaken. You both seem to agree, though, that the subscription-based content could, in the long run, still be profitable and give stability.
I still believe that, unfortunately, DDI has not been profitable enough for WotC to pursue a similar model with DDB, and therefore they decided not only to outsource the development and running of the portal/tools, but also (speculation) to "hardcode" the non subscription-based content clause.
I am not in any way saying it wouldn't be a valid option, I am just saying that I personally prefer (yes, I seriously prefer it) having control over what is available to me and potentially my players in terms of content, and buy only what I actually need and want, instead of a flat amount per month that gives me everything.
Survival of a system or edition or service is not the same as keeping the development of a system or service alive and living, and I believe, in my extreme lack of knowledge no doubt, rather the current model is the one that can if not guarantee at least help ensure a more stable income to the service in order to also have means to invest in making everything better.
This is obviously all in my opinion, as someone who does not have numbers under my eyes or a deep knowledge of business models or economical trends and whatnot.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
To Mittens: I'm tired of seeing this "solution" it ignores a portion of the community. Not everyone's gaming group is conducive to the "collect money from each player" solution. Some people play with loose knit gaming groups, gaming groups with significant financial burdens (like families), or with adventure league strangers. Some even play with groups online who have already contributed to content through other platforms and may be disinclined to add into the investment of a new resource. For those groups it is impractical to ask for money, and even in more traditional circumstances it is an embarrassing thing to start hitting people up for money. The OP wants to pay for the content themselves. Telling them to bum money off their fellow gamers doesn't solve his problem it just makes him look like a dead beat to his friends.
I misread OP as saying they wanted a higher priced subscription plan for them and each person at the table, not as OP wanted to pay for a subscription fee and then sit people in front of a computer to use DDB. I also missed the drop-in part. So in this case, my solution doesn't work and I appreciate you clarifying that. Asking random people for a few bucks to create a character would be weird.
I play with the same group of people every week and I have a family, as does one of the players at our table, and the significant financial burden you mention (kids are expensive!) along with other players having lower paying jobs is the reason we split the cost of books, only now we're splitting books on DDB and sharing it because it's cheaper than buying the hardcover and we don't have to wait until game night to read through stuff. It's no different then everyone kicking in a few bucks to buy food on game night. People pitching in to share the cost of something everyone benefits from is the opposite of a deadbeat.
The most common argument I hear against the subscription model is that it's impractical. However, Curse already has the groundwork in place to collect subscriptions, and based on the way purchasing piecemeal works, they're clearly willing to be reasonable when it comes to paying for content over time.
Character subscription model would be best compromise for me. If you run a large loose knit group it's unfeasible from get money from everyone, also I think it shows that wizards didn't understand how a lot of people used their 4e character creator, I run and play at a lot of drop in gaming days at university and various bars/gaming shops, it was so useful to be able to take a person who had zero experience with DnD sit them in front of a character creator and say "here are all your options, click things until you have a character you like and then we'll play" That's what I was looking for out of these tools and it just doesn't really exist.
If this option existed I would have purchased it already.
I misunderstood your original post and you're right, that is unfeasible. I never had DDI, so I'm admittedly ignorant of what it could do (though I heard the monster builder in it was really good). If you buy the content here on DDB, there's absolutely nothing stopping you from doing what you're proposing. However, if you're looking for a subscription option to have access to everything that you can then share with other people, I don't see how that's financially stable without it either being a significant monthly cost or requiring restrictions far greater than what the DDB team has worked hard to establish with the current price structure. That being said, I could be completely wrong and they have something around the corner.
I still believe that, unfortunately, DDI has not been profitable enough for WotC to pursue a similar model with DDB, and therefore they decided not only to outsource the development and running of the portal/tools, but also (speculation) to "hardcode" the non subscription-based content clause.
I am not in any way saying it wouldn't be a valid option, I am just saying that I personally prefer (yes, I seriously prefer it) having control over what is available to me and potentially my players in terms of content, and buy only what I actually need and want, instead of a flat amount per month that gives me everything.
I prefer the same. I have enough subscriptions as it is, I really don't want another one. What I would really like is a version of the legendary bundle that includes all the play options (races, classes/subclasses, magic items, backgrounds, etc.) without any of the adventure stuff.
Master Tier Subscription pre-paid for one year (to share PHB w/players) $54.99 / 12 = $4.58
$4.58 + $2.19 = $6.77
So, OP's requested subscription price is $6.77 per month to do what she/he wants. Individual players can use free accounts with 6 character limit.
If I understand OP's post correctly, the goal is to affordably teach new players D&D with character creation, and since they are new, the options in the PHB should be more than enough to start.
If, after that, those players get more involved (rather than casual players) and want more options, those players can buy the options they want from the other books (ie. new classes/sub-classes, etc).
EDIT: In case I'm not being clear, I'm suggesting that the purchase be made upfront, instead of amortized over one year. Since a strictly month-to-moth subscription is always more than paying upfront (in almost every industry), OP actually saves money by buying upfront, and just thinking about it as a "subscription".
I feel like Wizards are a little disconnected from how a lot of people play their game. They have a much broader audience than they used to. I DM for about 20 people. We have new people all the time. The biggest use we got out of the old online tools was the character creator, it's much easier to teach people how to play than how to create a character and we'd often have people drop in at short notice.
I'd be happier with a higher priced subscription service that just gave me access to all the character creation services. I don't want to devote so much of my life and time to DnD but I do want to know all my options, most of my players are the same.
Really confused, besides the fact that this has been discussed many time and the answer is in many forums so i dont feel the need to repeat what has been discussed before. However in the space of 15 minutes you have posted 2 separate threads concerning the same issue in two different areas. The part that confused me the most however is the fact that you asked for 2 different things in both forums as a response to the pricing model. This one you want a subscription for all content and in the other you want books at a higher price with a digital version included, so I'm not really if you here trying to propose solutions or just trying to be notices (but that is none of my business and you are welcome to do as you please) i am just trying to understand exactly what your point is with these posts so myself and the other users on this forum might be able to assist you better.
Mega Threads - Staff Quotes - Useful Resources - Homebrew FAQ - Pricing FAQ
I think it would be reasonable to have a "All character creation" Bundle. Which doesn't unlock the compendiums, monsters, but does open all character creation options. Kind of like a "ultimate bundle for players" If that could be metered out over a subscription really depends on the licensing agreement.
But I am sure if they charged like the old 4e digital sub (That is $9.99 per month, with longer commitments bringing the monthly price down a bit) then it would certainly be financially doable. Even considering it offering a hero tier sub included, they would get $84 a year over the hero tier. Considering the ultimate bundle is ~$300, getting just player options for $84 a year probably equals out. Especially if you believe your platform is in it for the long haul. The first year is basically a wash, where any players who sign up less than a year are "beating the system" but every month after that is essentially free money for DDB.
As for the demand for this type of sub, and the willingness to actually pay. A couple of pros and cons.
Pro: Lower entry cost, easy player use. As a player, the entry cost can be pretty substantial, buying phb and any other resources puts a huge front end cost, for a system you don't even know you want to use yet. (The basic rules don't really allow actually using the tools in practice of say a campaign).
Con: Higher over time cost, renting vs owning. Eventually, if you are subbing, it would have been cheaper to just buy everything. And traditionally consumers prefer to own a product rather than rent it. BUT since effectively everything on DDB is rented (they will shut down the website one day), that drawback might not hold as much power.
I can solve this for you:
1. Collect $9 from each player ($180)
2. Buy the PHB, DMG, SCAG, Tortle race, Backgrounds from ToA, Volo’s race pack
3. Use the remaining money to buy one year master tier subscription
4. Invite all players to two campaigns you’ve set up and turn on content sharing
5. Have them kick in $4 every year to renew the master tier subscription and buy the next splat book
6. (optional) Have them put in a few extra dollars to buy the magic items from all the adventures
Now you have all the character creation options for everyone for a one-time cost of $9 instead of $81 every year.
What if they leave? Well they would have lost access anyway, so this is a better deal regardless.
To Mittens: I'm tired of seeing this "solution" it ignores a portion of the community. Not everyone's gaming group is conducive to the "collect money from each player" solution. Some people play with loose knit gaming groups, gaming groups with significant financial burdens (like families), or with adventure league strangers. Some even play with groups online who have already contributed to content through other platforms and may be disinclined to add into the investment of a new resource. For those groups it is impractical to ask for money, and even in more traditional circumstances it is an embarrassing thing to start hitting people up for money. The OP wants to pay for the content themselves. Telling them to bum money off their fellow gamers doesn't solve his problem it just makes him look like a dead beat to his friends.
To the OP WizardsBane: The pricing system that DnDBeyond has put in place is not going to fit everyone nor is it really negotiable at this point. DnDBeyond has made it clear that they cannot control the per book cost to access content. If you feel strongly about the cost concern email Wizards of the Coast directly as they are the ones that set the book cost and could in theory package the hardbacks with a digital access code.
I don't know if this solution has ever come up before, but I just thought of it and it's worth discussing. If someone knows why this wouldn't work, feel free to chime in.
The most common argument I hear against the subscription model is that it's impractical. However, Curse already has the groundwork in place to collect subscriptions, and based on the way purchasing piecemeal works, they're clearly willing to be reasonable when it comes to paying for content over time.
So how about an option where you can subscribe for like $10/mo and unlock everything for use with the character generator? No compendium content or even independent listings, but a fully functional character creator and "Hero" tier access.
As you pay on that, it chips away at the cost of a Legendary Bundle. Once you have covered the cost, you no longer have to pay for the $10 sub and it automatically drops you down to Hero Tier, unless you opt to cancel. If you cancel early, you can use the credit accrued to unlock individual books and features, since it all goes to the same place eventually (minus the cost of the Hero Tier).
The other option I can think of as a compromise would be to charge a low fee per character. Like for a one-time fee of $2.99, you build a character with all options available, but it goes back to being locked if you try to make another character. That fee can also chip away at the cost of a Legendary Bundle. The main issue I see with that is a person making one character, printing it out, and then going in and editing it as a different character. It's a lot of work for a whole party, but I wouldn't put anything past people these days.
I'm just brainstorming, so I totally get that these have probably been discussed and shot down for one reason or another, but it seemed like a productive idea to bring up at least.
I like those suggestions. Keep in mind, Curse has negotiated prices with WotC, and subscriptions that unlock licensed products 'very likely' were part of those negotiations. Further down the line this pricing scheme would work very well, but only when WotC is ready, and willing, to go back to that sort of model.
Site Rules & Guidelines --- Focused Feedback Mega Threads --- Staff Quotes --- Homebrew Tutorial --- Pricing FAQ
Please feel free to message either Sorce or another moderator if you have any concerns.
For sure. I'm just trying to still the waters as much as I can haha. DBB came up on Reddit again today and it's been what you would expect.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
It's the D&D Insider subscription model, except you can cash in your stored sub-money for book content outside of the builder at a later date.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
I am afraid that it is exactly due to how the 4ed character builder was that DDB will never have a similar offer.
Why? Because I have the feeling that WotC found out that such a model is anything but profitable, and probably was also hurting the books sales. I had not personally used the tool itself, as I did not really like how the 4th edition was (still bought some of the books though, damn hoarding and collectionism), but I guess it could play out as something like this:
Have one person of a group create a subscribed account day x -> have everyone and their mother make a character, export and print -> turn off subscription day x+1. repeat as/when needed.
This is hardly a very viable business model, as the numbers just do not add up at the end of the day, given that the revenue per character is infinitesimal, and there would be no need to buy books from anyone playing the game, as the SDR rules cover everything needed to run the game, and you got everything you needed to create characters without owning a single book for the low-low one-time price of a few dollars.
Now, again, I HAVE NOT USED THE TOOL OR LOOKED INTO IT AT THE TIME, but judging by the comments I have seen on it, the above seems to be how it used to.
If I am wrong, I'd be more than happy to be corrected and properly understand how it was (tried make a quick search but couldn't find any info).
As per all the above, it seems logical to me that WotC said "woah woah, hold your horses everyone, this is not working AT ALL" and when they started negotiating with Curse, I imagine they imposed something along the line of "No subscription-based content availability, no subscription-based character builder".
And I personally cannot really blame them, to be honest.
What you would like to do, is technically possible, "just" with an higher up-front price, as technically you could buy all the character options (races, classes, subclasses, backgrounds) and even without a subscription you can create ad-libitum characters (obviously with the need to delete a character when you get to the cap of 6, without sub), but it is technically possible.
Is it the best possible deal? No. Is it impossible to do anything even remotely similar to 4ed CB in DDB? No, there are ways if one is willing to look for them (another example which greatly limits the up-front price is to use the home-brew possibilities [which will be expanded to subclasses] to re-create anything that is in the books, and it would always be available to all characters you create from the same account, just as long as you do not try to make it public home-brew content).
Again, I apologise if my description above is erroneous, don't throw fireballs at me immediately, thank you, I am more interested in being corrected if I am wrong and have a civil and constructive conversation.
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
I know it certainly seemed unprofitable to my outsider's point of view. During the 4e era, WotC was putting out something like a new book every month, and one of my players was buying up each and every one in hard copy at their $40-$50 price. I know that WotC wasn't getting all of that money, part going to distributors and part to the stores selling the books, but it certainly seems like their portion could be larger than the $10/month price for D&D Insider (hope I'm not remembering the price incorrectly). And I had more than one person in my group that would have kept buying books, but stopped because they could get what they wanted (and more) cheaper thanks to the D&D Insider subscription, so it looked like book sales were affected from my point of view.
Of course, that subscription price is like what portion of the book price would actually go to WotC in that it isn't all profit - there are costs that each have to cover. Which is how there is a chance that, because I don't know the breakdown in the account ledgers, the thing that seems initially unprofitable might actually have been turning a profit - though obviously not a large enough one in their overall plan for the company, since the new plan is so very different (by which I mean the frequent large releases + dirt-cheap and get literally everything subscription model compared to the handful of large releases each year + cheaper in the long-term, more expensive in the short-term digital offerings).
Thanks to both AaronOfBarbaria and Metamorphose.
You both explained two quite different ways of living the same service, if I am not mistaken. You both seem to agree, though, that the subscription-based content could, in the long run, still be profitable and give stability.
I still believe that, unfortunately, DDI has not been profitable enough for WotC to pursue a similar model with DDB, and therefore they decided not only to outsource the development and running of the portal/tools, but also (speculation) to "hardcode" the non subscription-based content clause.
I am not in any way saying it wouldn't be a valid option, I am just saying that I personally prefer (yes, I seriously prefer it) having control over what is available to me and potentially my players in terms of content, and buy only what I actually need and want, instead of a flat amount per month that gives me everything.
Survival of a system or edition or service is not the same as keeping the development of a system or service alive and living, and I believe, in my extreme lack of knowledge no doubt, rather the current model is the one that can if not guarantee at least help ensure a more stable income to the service in order to also have means to invest in making everything better.
This is obviously all in my opinion, as someone who does not have numbers under my eyes or a deep knowledge of business models or economical trends and whatnot.
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
I misread OP as saying they wanted a higher priced subscription plan for them and each person at the table, not as OP wanted to pay for a subscription fee and then sit people in front of a computer to use DDB. I also missed the drop-in part. So in this case, my solution doesn't work and I appreciate you clarifying that. Asking random people for a few bucks to create a character would be weird.
PHB $29.99 / 12 = $2.19 / mo
Master Tier Subscription pre-paid for one year (to share PHB w/players) $54.99 / 12 = $4.58
$4.58 + $2.19 = $6.77
So, OP's requested subscription price is $6.77 per month to do what she/he wants. Individual players can use free accounts with 6 character limit.
If I understand OP's post correctly, the goal is to affordably teach new players D&D with character creation, and since they are new, the options in the PHB should be more than enough to start.
If, after that, those players get more involved (rather than casual players) and want more options, those players can buy the options they want from the other books (ie. new classes/sub-classes, etc).
EDIT: In case I'm not being clear, I'm suggesting that the purchase be made upfront, instead of amortized over one year. Since a strictly month-to-moth subscription is always more than paying upfront (in almost every industry), OP actually saves money by buying upfront, and just thinking about it as a "subscription".
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?