Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

Hey folks! I am going to make a wider post about this, but as the most active thread on the forums about the marketplace changes, it seemed prudent to start here.

Regarding partial purchases: if you want to buy a book that you made a la carte/individual purchases from, you must contact customer service to receive your discount. The marketplace article has been updated to reflect this.

Are they going to be updating the store accordingly so that such methods are no longer needed in the future?

Just want to add my voice to those saying they are frustrated by the honestly unbelievable lack of communication around this and other recent developments. Having significant changes sprung on us without warning just sucks. Particularly when things like, just as an example, the filtering of previously purchased items is so unclear (having a cart button is clear enough, but what does a "+" mean and why is it on some items I already own and one I don't?).

I am really disappointed in and frustrated by what I consider a major issue of consistently poor communication and lack of transparency from WotC. I really love this game and I want to support it's continued development, but man stuff like this makes it difficult.

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

Hey folks! I am going to make a wider post about this, but as the most active thread on the forums about the marketplace changes, it seemed prudent to start here.

Regarding partial purchases: if you want to buy a book that you made a la carte/individual purchases from, you must contact customer service to receive your discount. The marketplace article has been updated to reflect this.

 So, to clarify, I have to remember what I've bought piecemeal and from what book, then contact DDB to try and get a discount? Rather than just...having the discount?

Is this a short term fix or is this the MO from now on?

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

You can see what individual purchases you've made in your Order History and in the Licenses tab on your Account page.

I know it's clunky AF, but this is the current method of getting that discount. I'll make sure that feedback is heard.

 Just want to say a Huge thank you for the communication,  really thank you!!!

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

no problem! I'm just sorry I wasn't in here earlier, but as you can imagine, it's been a bit... much... over the last 36-ish hours, hahaha.

 Thank you from those of us who are not always so vocal.

And good luck with the role out.

I think doing this was a huge mistake to be honest. I used to buy whole (physical) sourcebooks just for my own enjoyment, as well as individual piecemeal digital options for specific characters. WoTC already have been disappointing us and ruining their own reputation time and time again. I kept using dndbeyond and regularly spending money on books and piecemeal options honestly because it was convenient and i do enjoy dnd a lot, but I'm not going to buy a whole book I'm not even interested in for one damn subclass.

My friend switched to just making and calculating their own character sheets using other content easily available for free elsewhere online  a while ago and i think I'm going to have to start doing the same.

The convenience is no longer even slightly enough for the price they've now made it. And doing this without any announcement beforehand has degraded what was left of the trust so i don't think I'll be buying any more physical sourcebooks either. Just super disappointing and a terrible business move as far as i can tell.

edited for clarity :))

Ive been complaining about and being talked down to by the community and silenced by the WotC team since this change was obviously going to happen a couple of years ago.

"There are no plans to do that."   "It's only for partnered content."

Sincerely, eat a giant helping of processed pig byproducts.

or You know... Just give us a $10 sub option that grants access to all the material.

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

I don't have the answer to that question right now, but the community team and moderators are collecting as much feedback about this as y'all are giving us, so please continue to voice those thoughts!

Please bring back a la carte options. Those are my thoughts.

Bring back a la carte options please. My party and I are all brand new DND players, we are not going to spend hundreds of dollars on sourcebooks to get the few character options we'll need to get into the game. A la carte offered a way to dip our toes in with a smaller financial commitment and the discount on the rest of the sourcebook was incentive to buy it fully down the road. As an unbiased new player with no prior knowledge or opinion on this company's reputation: this feels very scummy.

Just adding another post in support of bringing back the a la carte purchase options. With this removed I'll never spend another cent on D&D Beyond, and this is coming from someone who has spent hundreds. I don't mean to whine or seem unappreciative of the effort that goes into D&D Beyond. But that was one of the core reasons I utilized the store here in the first place. There are other methods of obtaining such information if D&D Beyond decides to go "whole book or nothing" and I can and will utilize them.

I'm obviously jumping to conclusions here but it's starting to sound like they were working on this marketplace update, it wasn't fully finished by deadline, so they released this buggy version and didn't announce it beforehand because it wasn't done.

As to the decision to stop the individual purchase items, just adding my voice to those saying this really sucks. I've made a few purchases that were, for example, just the monsters from a book to use in my own campaign because I don't need the entire setting. I'm sure some execs somewhere have their powerpoints about how this is better for the company's bottom line but from a customer perspective it's just cruddy.

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

no problem! I'm just sorry I wasn't in here earlier, but as you can imagine, it's been a bit... much... over the last 36-ish hours, hahaha.

A lot of us are frustrated and upset. Dealing with angry customers is not fun. Thank you for reading and replying back to us, your communication helps. You are doing a good job, and I hope your compensation and pay reflects that.

Moving forward, are there plans to increase communication and transparency with the community? Ever since the original founders left and Hasbro took over, communication has been going down hill and that is not okay. Community engagement is a difficult and thankless task that needs to be done, and that task is just as important as software development, marketing, accounting, etc. There is an undeniable night-and-day difference in enthusiam, excitement, and hope in Beyond's community between five years ago when I first joined this site and right now. With timely communication, it will be easier for the community to self regulate and to increase brand loyalty.

What sets D&D apart from other TTRPGs is not just the marketing and name recognition. What sets D&D apart is the level of convenience and quality of life features that comes with being part of a big corporation. Having physical and digital books is the easy part, any modern TTRPG these days got that. What D&D got that others do not is the plethora of physical and digital tools (mats, minis, book tabs, GM screens, monster cards, Beyond's whole suite of tools, à la carte purchases, content sharing, etc.) that brings the game alive for players and makes running the game easier on GMs. Having timely communication, community engagement, and a sense of belonging and purpose is also a big part of that.

D&D's closest competitor is Pathfinder, and as far as I can tell, they do not drop the ball in community engagement. Not only are they able to rally the TTRPG consumer base, they are also able to rally a portion of the industry, to take advantage of Wizard's abysmal PR response to the OGL incident. Beyond, Wizards, and Hasbro should not be neglecting communicating with its community over big changes like removing à la carte purchases. We will not like the changes, and we will probably still be up in arms anyways, but at least give us a reason to be empathetic and understanding so the cooler heads among us can nip misinformation in the bud and maintain a more positive outlook. The reason can be as simple as being greedy, and Hasbro better be. Last I checked, Hasbro is not performing so well. When Beyond discontinued further development in multilingual support some years ago, they said that the Italian PHB compendium did not sell very well, and while the community is not happy about it, we understand and can empathesize with the situation.

I do not know the exact steps that needs to be taken, but I wish to see the level of enthusiam, excitement, and hope that Beyond once had.

Throw in my vote to bring back à la carte purchases too. And sorry to slam you with an essay, but I hope you and the rest of the Beyond team to have a good day or night wherever y'all may be.

Quote from LemonyRat >>

I think doing this was a huge mistake to be honest. I used to buy whole (physical) sourcebooks just for my own enjoyment, as well as individual piecemeal digital options for specific characters. WoTC already have been disappointing us and ruining their own reputation time and time again. I kept using dndbeyond and regularly spending money on books and piecemeal options honestly because it was convenient and i do enjoy dnd a lot, but I'm not going to buy a whole book I'm not even interested in for one damn subclass.

My friend switched to just making and calculating their own character sheets using all the content easily available for free elsewhere online  a while ago and i think I'm going to have to start doing the same.

The convenience is no longer even slightly enough for the price they've now made it. And doing this without any announcement beforehand has degraded what was left of the trust so i don't think I'll be buying any more physical sourcebooks either. Just super disappointing and a terrible business move as far as i can tell.

 Where is this "free" official content,  I would wager it is illegal, and if that is ok with you you might rethink posting promotion of theft.

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

I don't have the answer to that question right now, but the community team and moderators are collecting as much feedback about this as y'all are giving us, so please continue to voice those thoughts!

 Thanks for checking in. I do hope that these teams are paying attention. I can’t imagine being the messenger in this situation is fun, so I sincerely appreciate the time you’ve taken to engage.

This move away from a la carte purchasing seems nonsensical and tone-deaf at best; sneaky and avaricious at worst. Sounds like it wasn’t even fully ready for implementation. More communication would have eased the sting a little, but it would not change the fact that this is a clear message that people who play this game and pay for its products are among the least important parts of the equation. Corporations gonna corporation, but WOW.

I don’t tend to complain much, but my goodness, this rubbed me the wrong way.

Quote from kayakingpoodle >>

Where is this "free" official content,  I would wager it is illegal, and if that is ok with you you might rethink posting promotion of theft.

This point brings up another important aspect of the situation that is, at the very least, worth briefly noting.

The sad truth is that many folks aren’t realistically going to follow the rules. People, especially kids, will often fall back to theft/piracy when the price isn’t worth the hassle, especially when the “free” content is readily available on the numerous sites I won’t name. 

It’s easy to dodge the elephant in the room by saying “shucks, now everyone will have to use the homebrew tools instead of buying piecemail.” And it’s a nice, safe alternative to offer — but the fact is that very few people are taking the time out of their day to reenter purchased content into DDB’s homebrew creator, in part because DDB’s homebrew creator flippin’ sucks. No, folks will fall back to less desirable methods of acquiring content.

I’m not endorsing theft or piracy by any means, only trying to provide context to the issue. Purchasing à la carte was a happy medium between paying a lot and paying nothing, and all the WotC hate floating around isn’t exactly pressuring players to choose the former.

Quote from LaTiaJacquise >>

I don't have the answer to that question right now, but the community team and moderators are collecting as much feedback about this as y'all are giving us, so please continue to voice those thoughts!

 I was in the process of starting a new campaign and just found out about this change. I cannot tell you how disappointed I am, as I was very used to getting items as needed. I have a new player joining my gaming group, and was going to buy her any background or class stuff she needed as a welcome gesture. I can no longer do that. 

I also second the notion another player said. This was a good option not just for players to offset cost for DMs, but also to dip their feet into online character creation. I can't see how this change benefits anyone in the long run. 

Please bring back the option to buy what we need. Especially those of us that have the physical books already, and who also have any module purchased on a VTT. We simply are not going to buy all of the content a third time at full price. At the bare minimum let us send proof of purchase of our physical copy for some kind of discount. Us DMs spend enough money as it is.