I've been a member for three days now and I'm having a lot of fun as well as using the site's other features. I even told my friends about this site and I mentioned that it will eventually cost money or at least I'm expecting it to cost something. Now I didn't see anywhere plans to charge us but I'm assuming they will. Is it too much to ask if a price is being associated with this yet. I mean I'm already sold and just wondering how much the price will be?
I've been a member for three days now and I'm having a lot of fun as well as using the site's other features. I even told my Wife about this site and I mentioned that it will eventually cost money or at least I'm expecting it to cost something. Now I didn't see anywhere plans to charge us but I'm assuming they will. Is it too much to ask if a price is being associated with this yet. I mean I'm already sold and just wondering how much the price will be?
To be clear, every indication has been that the basic compendium stuff is all going to stay free indefinitely. The team has alluded to subscription charges for things like additional character sheets and other perks, as well as one-time fees for handbook content, but everything present currently is from the SRD/OGL and will continue to be free to use.
Ok, I will probably get on the bad side of the developers on this one but let me start off with, this site, even in its infancy, is amazing and "clean". With that being said, I know how much work goes into building such a database that is functional AND is good enough to be sent out to the public. Also it has to be legitimate enough to have a "price tag" associated with the item that most consumers are willing to pay. Here are my quick thoughts on how they may go about pricing this content. (we all have dreams now, don't we)
Caveat- Speculation at best; This is only if the consumer does not have to pay a subscription
1- Dirt cheap that gives both a previous purchaser and a new player have incentive to buy. i.e. DM's Guild content (yes, I know)
2- A cost that is 1/20th of the hard copy because assigning a value to said product is part of the preconceived mindset that higher cost equals better product (in some cases)
3- Half the price of a hard copy because time spent developing "a quality product" and twice as much work, painstakingly developing the same content on a completely different platform is arduous. In this case almost a Herculean task. Writing a book and developing an app are two completely different products even if they both achieve the same result. (that topic is best written in another thread)
4- Full price for the digital copy. (the teams inner thought while at the pricing meeting; "hey man, we need to get paid for our work too you know".) You would get groans from the entire community you are serving, tho they would be very reluctant to buy, me being one of those individuals.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
Ok, I will probably get on the bad side of the developers on this one but let me start off with, this site, even in its infancy, is amazing and "clean". With that being said, I know how much work goes into building such a database that is functional AND is good enough to be sent out to the public. Also it has to be legitimate enough to have a "price tag" associated with the item that most consumers are willing to pay. Here are my quick thoughts on how they may go about pricing this content. (we all have dreams now, don't we)
Caveat- Speculation at best; This is only if the consumer does not have to pay a subscription
1- Dirt cheap that gives both a previous purchaser and a new player have incentive to buy. i.e. DM's Guild content (yes, I know)
2- A cost that is 1/20th of the hard copy because assigning a value to said product is part of the preconceived mindset that higher cost equals better product (in some cases)
3- Half the price of a hard copy because time spent developing "a quality product" and twice as much work, painstakingly developing the same content on a completely different platform is arduous. In this case almost a Herculean task. Writing a book and developing an app are two completely different products even if they both achieve the same result. (that topic is best written in another thread)
4- Full price for the digital copy. (the teams inner thought while at the pricing meeting; "hey man, we need to get paid for our work too you know".) You would get groans from the entire community you are serving, tho they would be very reluctant to buy, me being one of those individuals.
The price point of data packages is very likely not something that the D&D Beyond staff has any control over. As a WotC licensee, they are required to charge whatever WotC tells them to charge. Other WotC licensees have been consistently charging the full MSRP of the hardcovers for their content, I would be surprised to see it offered for a lower price here.
That said, I would prefer something like 50% of the hardcover cost at most if it is something the staff has any control over :)
As a consumer, it feels like being raked over the coals for some of the objects, if say you were playing these on Fantasy grounds this could legit be the third time you have purchased the PHB/DMG/MM. Granted as a player you would mainly just need the PHB and maybe the MM for some spells/abilities. But I don't like the idea of hammering the people dedicate time to run the game with the costs. DMing is fun, but it is also work.
Maybe the HC books in the future can be printed with notecard inside with a key for a discount or even free download of the online tools. But I don't see a good solution for people who have already paid.
More to the point, I believe that both of you are correct. They (the ones who did the development) do not have a voice in the pricing. That is a good thing and a bad thing at the same time. That leads to the next question; is that a good business model? If so, why... If not why? There are classes, books theories and studies on pricing, all of which contradict themselves and each other. But now I am in the weeds with the answer I was trying to get to.
Here Thain, this is my theory why you hit the problem "right on the nose" It boils down to these two groups of people.
1- The owners of the content, they deserve to be paid for a product or service given to the consumer, and rightfully so.
2- The consumer wants a product that is both better than what they had previously and doesn't want to be taken advantage of at the same time. The consumer is willing to go pretty far for a product that they are committed to. I my self, have purchased the PHB, the MM and the DMG more than a few times... for legitimate reasons. (A different post for another time) The more time, money and effort one spends repurchasing a product that he or she already has, has an exponential - diminishing - return. This is where group 1 and group 2have to have a compromise. Let us not call it that, let us call it, "What do you think the fair market value of said product is? And where do you think the consumer stands in relation to the price we chose?" We as consumers are not part of this decision, we are are at the mercy of the company in this process.
So.... you read this asking, why even respond when you already laid out your point in your previous post? Answer: I and the rest of the D&D community do not want to be taken advantage of specifically in regards to this product. If this company doesn't move into the 21st century, they will very quickly loose their younger fan base. If they come into the market thinking the consumer will purchase this product at "Hard Cover" prices, yes some will, but you will loose ME and others that are in a similar situation. (Example: Roll20 and the price for a DIGITAL version of the MM.... you have to be kidding me) Trust me on this, there are a lot of us out there. We are your diehard consumers. (we =$) I want to keep playing, and the books are awesome, but computers are so much easier to search, produce less clutter at the table and synergize with how the game is to be run in the future.
I hope that this gets into the ears of the ones that price this product, for we all want this product to do very well and we want to pay a fair and reasonable price for it. In conclusion, please do not price each extension at $49.99 U.S. For I will bow out respectfully, and say my books are good enough. (me=$0)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
Also, I feel like pointing out not everyone is from the US and therefore not everyone uses USD. Being from Canada, I am very worried I will be charged in USD for using the products, which would be a significant increase of price for me (around 30% more expensive). I sure the D&D Beyond team already considered this, but selling books and selling an app are 2 very different things. Books on amazon.ca (Canada) are currently about 15% more than books on amazon.com (US). This is acceptable in a way...but charging the full 30% difference between Canada and US would quickly become VERY expensive. I use Canada because this is my country, but this app being "international", many people from many countries would run into the same issue!
I would not be too worried about a price. If they throw a price tag on it, I will be quick to point out that Pathfinder SRD is free. Albeit they might have to add some ads to cover server upkeep.
What I would expect is a free basic version as a SRD for everyone (because these are available even without DND Beyond). Also I commend Wizards for making the free pdfs for 5th ed (I finally forgive them for 4th ed).
I could see a premium version to remove ads (if that is the route they go) or offer additional content.
- What kind of additional content? Like someone mentioned maybe an unlimited amount of character sheet storage, but what I would like would require some creativity and effort. For a premium account, I would hope they offer token pictures and sample room designed encounters on the monsters pages (a ridiculous amount of work). For example a pseudodragon might have an encounter map of a deteriorated wizards study in an abandoned tower. *Just hire me and I could flesh out rooms for every monster you can imagine.
I'd rather pay a lifelong subscription fee than have to shell out for books every 3-4 years...especially if the core rules are leveraged for other genres.
Marktj- The part with ads in it to supplement the cost of said product would be awesome. I would go for that., I would have no idea where they would put it in the app but that is a great alternative to paying a fee that feels like "Kobod Robbery" to have a product that would be my... (place small fortune here) for my multiple sets of books. But this gets us away from the pricing question that this post originator originally asked.
I have been thinking about a reasonable price to charge, and this is what I think might be a fair compromise.
1- $59.99 for a stand alone set that includes PHB MM Swords Cost, Volos and DMG. This gives you lifetime updates patches and fixes. (this would be a 1 time fee)
2- $14.99 for each additional supplement, i.e. Storm Kings, Strad, Prince of... (again, a 1 time fee)
3- The adds would be on a lower subscription based form, and those would be priced at $4.99 a month.
I know this is flawed but would you get the idea. I would like to see what you all would like to pay for this service.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
I do agree that open access for hardcover pdf content is cool. I'd like to see something like they did for 4th edition with a minimal cost but with something like there doing on roll 20 where you can host games and still access the compendium, items, monsters and spells along with features from the second and third phase. I think the minimal cost was around ten dollars for a monthly subscription.
I also think that $9.99 or even $14.99 would be an acceptable monthly fee that I'd be willing to pay, as long as you get the most recent material "for free" and available upon release, meaning all the new books and material are available to search and consult as long as you're a subscriber. That amounts to $120 to $150 yearly sub, but you get access to ALL available material at all times as long as you're a subscriber. Another option would be to simply pay for digital books/material (50% of paper format) as a one time fee and have a minimal monthly fee of $3.99 or something similar. All in all, I hope they come up with a model that satisfies customer (you and I), publisher (WOTC) and distributor (D&D Beyond) without unnecessary greed!
WOTC and D&D Beyond should definitely consider that their average customer base only have time to gather and play once or twice a month so anything over what I said would be too expensive!
I like both ideas and to expand on the one time fee, it should be available without connection to the internet. The second part would be awesome if it was updated with all content for a monthly fee at no additional cost. But $14.99 is a bit expensive for a subscription for a 352 page book (ex MM).
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
I like both ideas and to expand on the one time fee, it should be available without connection to the internet. The second part would be awesome if it was updated with all content for a monthly fee at no additional cost. But $14.99 is a bit expensive for a subscription for a 352 page book (ex MM).
I'm pretty sure that Tyraz was stating that $14.99 was the monthly subscription price that got you everything (so, all of the books, as well as all of the extra features like unlimited character slots, etc.). And, should you let the subscription lapse, you lose access to that paid content (so only SRD, can't create new characters until you delete enough although all your previous ones are still usable, etc.). This would be an alternative to purchasing each book individually as a one-time purchase.
At least, that's what I would assume would be covered for such a subscription cost -- I'd feel very cheated if I was having to pay a sub around that level and then also had to buy all the books individually as well. I should be able to either get a sub that unlocks everything as long as I pay, or to pay as I go on each book individually but then have that content as long as D&D Beyond is a thing.
What's to stop copyright infringement of HC material? I know there's special locks and features of viewing pdfs that contain the material., but for example, Drivethrurpg sells there watermarked material at a single cost but it doesn't stop piracy. You would loose full price of published harccover material, take a lose on discounted digital material and hope your fan base is solid enough to incur the cost.
I agree with the both of you but again, $14.99 is a little steep for a monthly subscription. $4.99 would be a "Fair Market Value" for a subscription, I mean look at Roll20, you get way more for way less.
Second, there is already copyright infringement happening with the main three books. Lets not kid our selves. That happens no matter how cheap the price is. What this company needs to do is get out of the gate fast, and with as much support behind the work as possible. If they do not, they will have lost what was a perfect opportunity to set the bar for any other games in the future and to solidify its fan base.
Do it right, have a introductory offer for the first month that is way under the original price. You get the hard core people happy and you get the quality of the product out there for all to see. This is a great idea, but I highly doubt they would even want to do that. But these are just empty thoughts.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
No your thinking right along with me. I'm a hardcore gamer that is D&D devoted. I haven't found a system that I like that has so much potential then this edition. There's so much they could offer for a "set price" and "total access" would turn on people and turn off people. But let's not forget the fundamentals of a thriving business. Profit, profit and more profit. I know this has turned a lot of dungeon masters and players off but it is still selling and to be frank and honest. I'd wonder why they wouldn't charge for this system tool. Sure roll20 is cheap but it's poorly made and was only the response when Wizards didn't deliver on the agreement of their own type of Roll20. It seems Curse has found a way to bring it. If so, you are correct and do it all the way. I mean, sure their still going to sell paper products. But time is progressing into the future. Even though they had a slow start to older released material as pdf purchases, it's refreshing that they have so much material that their bringing back on top of the work their doing now. I wouldn't be so much sold with the DM Guild but more for official material by the makers.
Yes, this is what I meant! the 14.99 would give access to ALL books and ALL material and would not require you to purchase books individually. This means that when a new book is published, you get access to it automatically as part of the 14.99 monthly fee you're paying.
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I've been a member for three days now and I'm having a lot of fun as well as using the site's other features. I even told my friends about this site and I mentioned that it will eventually cost money or at least I'm expecting it to cost something. Now I didn't see anywhere plans to charge us but I'm assuming they will. Is it too much to ask if a price is being associated with this yet. I mean I'm already sold and just wondering how much the price will be?
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InsidersThere has been no official word on pricing yet, but keep your eyes open. There will be an announcement about it when the time comes.
A dwarf with a canoe on his back? What could go wrong?
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in awhile.
One million dollars.
Ok, I will probably get on the bad side of the developers on this one but let me start off with, this site, even in its infancy, is amazing and "clean". With that being said, I know how much work goes into building such a database that is functional AND is good enough to be sent out to the public. Also it has to be legitimate enough to have a "price tag" associated with the item that most consumers are willing to pay. Here are my quick thoughts on how they may go about pricing this content. (we all have dreams now, don't we)
Caveat- Speculation at best; This is only if the consumer does not have to pay a subscription
1- Dirt cheap that gives both a previous purchaser and a new player have incentive to buy. i.e. DM's Guild content (yes, I know)
2- A cost that is 1/20th of the hard copy because assigning a value to said product is part of the preconceived mindset that higher cost equals better product (in some cases)
3- Half the price of a hard copy because time spent developing "a quality product" and twice as much work, painstakingly developing the same content on a completely different platform is arduous. In this case almost a Herculean task. Writing a book and developing an app are two completely different products even if they both achieve the same result. (that topic is best written in another thread)
4- Full price for the digital copy. (the teams inner thought while at the pricing meeting; "hey man, we need to get paid for our work too you know".) You would get groans from the entire community you are serving, tho they would be very reluctant to buy, me being one of those individuals.
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
As a consumer, it feels like being raked over the coals for some of the objects, if say you were playing these on Fantasy grounds this could legit be the third time you have purchased the PHB/DMG/MM. Granted as a player you would mainly just need the PHB and maybe the MM for some spells/abilities. But I don't like the idea of hammering the people dedicate time to run the game with the costs. DMing is fun, but it is also work.
Maybe the HC books in the future can be printed with notecard inside with a key for a discount or even free download of the online tools. But I don't see a good solution for people who have already paid.
Skizzerz, you are correct,
More to the point, I believe that both of you are correct. They (the ones who did the development) do not have a voice in the pricing. That is a good thing and a bad thing at the same time. That leads to the next question; is that a good business model? If so, why... If not why? There are classes, books theories and studies on pricing, all of which contradict themselves and each other. But now I am in the weeds with the answer I was trying to get to.
Here Thain, this is my theory why you hit the problem "right on the nose"
It boils down to these two groups of people.
1- The owners of the content, they deserve to be paid for a product or service given to the consumer, and rightfully so.
2- The consumer wants a product that is both better than what they had previously and doesn't want to be taken advantage of at the same time. The consumer is willing to go pretty far for a product that they are committed to. I my self, have purchased the PHB, the MM and the DMG more than a few times... for legitimate reasons. (A different post for another time) The more time, money and effort one spends repurchasing a product that he or she already has, has an exponential - diminishing - return. This is where group 1 and group 2have to have a compromise. Let us not call it that, let us call it, "What do you think the fair market value of said product is? And where do you think the consumer stands in relation to the price we chose?" We as consumers are not part of this decision, we are are at the mercy of the company in this process.
So.... you read this asking, why even respond when you already laid out your point in your previous post? Answer: I and the rest of the D&D community do not want to be taken advantage of specifically in regards to this product. If this company doesn't move into the 21st century, they will very quickly loose their younger fan base. If they come into the market thinking the consumer will purchase this product at "Hard Cover" prices, yes some will, but you will loose ME and others that are in a similar situation. (Example: Roll20 and the price for a DIGITAL version of the MM.... you have to be kidding me) Trust me on this, there are a lot of us out there. We are your diehard consumers. (we =$) I want to keep playing, and the books are awesome, but computers are so much easier to search, produce less clutter at the table and synergize with how the game is to be run in the future.
I hope that this gets into the ears of the ones that price this product, for we all want this product to do very well and we want to pay a fair and reasonable price for it. In conclusion, please do not price each extension at $49.99 U.S. For I will bow out respectfully, and say my books are good enough. (me=$0)
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
Also, I feel like pointing out not everyone is from the US and therefore not everyone uses USD. Being from Canada, I am very worried I will be charged in USD for using the products, which would be a significant increase of price for me (around 30% more expensive). I sure the D&D Beyond team already considered this, but selling books and selling an app are 2 very different things. Books on amazon.ca (Canada) are currently about 15% more than books on amazon.com (US). This is acceptable in a way...but charging the full 30% difference between Canada and US would quickly become VERY expensive. I use Canada because this is my country, but this app being "international", many people from many countries would run into the same issue!
I would not be too worried about a price. If they throw a price tag on it, I will be quick to point out that Pathfinder SRD is free. Albeit they might have to add some ads to cover server upkeep.
What I would expect is a free basic version as a SRD for everyone (because these are available even without DND Beyond). Also I commend Wizards for making the free pdfs for 5th ed (I finally forgive them for 4th ed).
I could see a premium version to remove ads (if that is the route they go) or offer additional content.
- What kind of additional content? Like someone mentioned maybe an unlimited amount of character sheet storage, but what I would like would require some creativity and effort. For a premium account, I would hope they offer token pictures and sample room designed encounters on the monsters pages (a ridiculous amount of work). For example a pseudodragon might have an encounter map of a deteriorated wizards study in an abandoned tower. *Just hire me and I could flesh out rooms for every monster you can imagine.
@AndrewWest - This is a good a topic.
I'd rather pay a lifelong subscription fee than have to shell out for books every 3-4 years...especially if the core rules are leveraged for other genres.
Just saying.
Marktj- The part with ads in it to supplement the cost of said product would be awesome. I would go for that., I would have no idea where they would put it in the app but that is a great alternative to paying a fee that feels like "Kobod Robbery" to have a product that would be my... (place small fortune here) for my multiple sets of books. But this gets us away from the pricing question that this post originator originally asked.
I have been thinking about a reasonable price to charge, and this is what I think might be a fair compromise.
1- $59.99 for a stand alone set that includes PHB MM Swords Cost, Volos and DMG. This gives you lifetime updates patches and fixes. (this would be a 1 time fee)
2- $14.99 for each additional supplement, i.e. Storm Kings, Strad, Prince of... (again, a 1 time fee)
3- The adds would be on a lower subscription based form, and those would be priced at $4.99 a month.
I know this is flawed but would you get the idea. I would like to see what you all would like to pay for this service.
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
I do agree that open access for hardcover pdf content is cool. I'd like to see something like they did for 4th edition with a minimal cost but with something like there doing on roll 20 where you can host games and still access the compendium, items, monsters and spells along with features from the second and third phase. I think the minimal cost was around ten dollars for a monthly subscription.
I also think that $9.99 or even $14.99 would be an acceptable monthly fee that I'd be willing to pay, as long as you get the most recent material "for free" and available upon release, meaning all the new books and material are available to search and consult as long as you're a subscriber. That amounts to $120 to $150 yearly sub, but you get access to ALL available material at all times as long as you're a subscriber. Another option would be to simply pay for digital books/material (50% of paper format) as a one time fee and have a minimal monthly fee of $3.99 or something similar. All in all, I hope they come up with a model that satisfies customer (you and I), publisher (WOTC) and distributor (D&D Beyond) without unnecessary greed!
WOTC and D&D Beyond should definitely consider that their average customer base only have time to gather and play once or twice a month so anything over what I said would be too expensive!
I like both ideas and to expand on the one time fee, it should be available without connection to the internet. The second part would be awesome if it was updated with all content for a monthly fee at no additional cost. But $14.99 is a bit expensive for a subscription for a 352 page book (ex MM).
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
What's to stop copyright infringement of HC material? I know there's special locks and features of viewing pdfs that contain the material., but for example, Drivethrurpg sells there watermarked material at a single cost but it doesn't stop piracy. You would loose full price of published harccover material, take a lose on discounted digital material and hope your fan base is solid enough to incur the cost.
I agree with the both of you but again, $14.99 is a little steep for a monthly subscription. $4.99 would be a "Fair Market Value" for a subscription, I mean look at Roll20, you get way more for way less.
Second, there is already copyright infringement happening with the main three books. Lets not kid our selves. That happens no matter how cheap the price is. What this company needs to do is get out of the gate fast, and with as much support behind the work as possible. If they do not, they will have lost what was a perfect opportunity to set the bar for any other games in the future and to solidify its fan base.
Do it right, have a introductory offer for the first month that is way under the original price. You get the hard core people happy and you get the quality of the product out there for all to see. This is a great idea, but I highly doubt they would even want to do that. But these are just empty thoughts.
-There are no right or wrong answers, just difficult Choices.
No your thinking right along with me. I'm a hardcore gamer that is D&D devoted. I haven't found a system that I like that has so much potential then this edition. There's so much they could offer for a "set price" and "total access" would turn on people and turn off people. But let's not forget the fundamentals of a thriving business. Profit, profit and more profit. I know this has turned a lot of dungeon masters and players off but it is still selling and to be frank and honest. I'd wonder why they wouldn't charge for this system tool. Sure roll20 is cheap but it's poorly made and was only the response when Wizards didn't deliver on the agreement of their own type of Roll20. It seems Curse has found a way to bring it. If so, you are correct and do it all the way. I mean, sure their still going to sell paper products. But time is progressing into the future. Even though they had a slow start to older released material as pdf purchases, it's refreshing that they have so much material that their bringing back on top of the work their doing now. I wouldn't be so much sold with the DM Guild but more for official material by the makers.
Yes, this is what I meant! the 14.99 would give access to ALL books and ALL material and would not require you to purchase books individually. This means that when a new book is published, you get access to it automatically as part of the 14.99 monthly fee you're paying.