D&D Beyond Drops Banned at my Tables

I'm going to speak plainly here. Players at my tables may only ever have access to the options that every player has access to. That means if one player has a source book but won't lend it to other players, or if the sources cannot be shared through D&D Beyond it is disallowed at my tables. 

This is not an uncommon sentiment. No-one player gets to buy their way to cool content that other players don't have access to.

As a result D&D Beyond Drops with their inability to be shared via content management and the Master Tier subscription are banned without discussion at my tables. I know many other DMs who are intending the same. 

Either allow these drops to be purchasable separately, or allow them to be shared via a Master Tier subscription. Failing to do either of these makes the drops entirely pointless. I will not recommend every player goes out and subscribes just to get access to these options. That's simply not fair on some of my players. I get that this is a decision by the higher ups to try and 'more effectively monetise' D&D, but it's a step too far. Personally, if this is the forward plan for D&D it'll result in leaving D&D Beyond and encouraging all the players I have (over 50) to do the same. I know in the GM group that I'm a member of the sentiment last night was universal - this is a bad move by D&D Beyond. 

Please reconsider!

https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/d-d-beyond-general/general-discussion/240257-is-d-d-beyond-requiring-subscriptions?page=2

Page 2, post 43.

Oh, I'm aware of this and frankly Parry's words carry zero weight. Any reasonably competent person would have known before this rolled out it would be unpopular. Like so very much else in our modern world it's an example of poor project management to push out an unfinished thought and call it a feature. 

I believe in transparency, which is not the same as no secrets.  Other players should have some sort of access (at least in the beginning) of the campaign to each other's sheets.

I am in your corner basically.  If a person has X, it has to be shared with the DM.  If it is shared with the DM and not other players, the question is why?  Depending on that answer (which is probably not an acceptable reason) I can see banning it.  

Quote from martintheactor >>

Do other GMs feel that this is a fair ruling? Do you disagree? I'm curious to know what DMs specifically think here.

It's appropriate to forbid content that not everyone has access to. As long as drops are not eligible for content sharing (which it sounds like they might change), and the game doesn't otherwise require having a D&D Beyond account, sure, forbidding Drops is appropriate. Honestly, you might want to ban them even if they are shareable, given the apparent dev process they're likely to be about as well balanced as random classes from Dragon magazine back in the day (which is to say, hilariously unbalanced).

Quote from martintheactor >>

So folks, I'm love fellow DM feedback on a ruling I made today. I have spoke with my GM group (15 or so of us who meet regularly to test game systems and throw ideas around) and they all seem to agree on this, but curious to see what others might think.

I've banned all D&D Beyond 'Drops' from my tables. 

The reason? Fairness. Players at my tables may only use sources that everyone has access to. If someone purchased a book but won't lend it to fellow players so they can benefit from the options, then the options within that book are banned. I want to see a level playing field at my tables. D&D Beyond effectively creates feats, spells, and background that cannot be content shared and require a D&D Beyond subscription to use/access. 

Do other GMs feel that this is a fair ruling? Do you disagree? I'm curious to know what DMs specifically think here.

I agree that they should be shareable, and that all players at a table should have access to the same options. However, since it's fairly trivial for a DM to create homebrew copies of these things that all players in their campaign can automatically access, it strikes me as a non-issue in practice, and not worth issuing blanket bans on whole sections of content.

I think it is reasonable, but I personally disagree. Even if only one player has access to Drops, the entire group would if the DM would be willing to put in 5 minutes of work to make it. It just seems like this is more about making a statement than addressing player fairness. Making statements are all well and good, but I am not going to punish anyone at my table to make them. 

Quote from martintheactor >>

Oh, I'm aware of this and frankly Parry's words carry zero weight. Any reasonably competent person would have known before this rolled out it would be unpopular. Like so very much else in our modern world it's an example of poor project management to push out an unfinished thought and call it a feature. 

 The head of DND Beyond's words carrying zero weight.

The MAN IN CHARGE' OF BEYOND'S words carrying ZERO weight.

Who do you need to hear it from for it to be weighty enough?

It's weird that you're choosing to arbitrarily punish your players when you have the ability to just copy the content as homebrew and share it with them.

By all means encourage WotC to make the Drops content available for purchase. Personally, I'd love to get physical copies. But punishing your players seems misguided.

 So instead of saying "I can give my table access to anything they're interested in", you decided "I'm going to gatekeep their access". That is ... arbitrary.

They've already said you can manually share items that people want, through Homebrew, while they discuss how to handle player options.

Can you please stop whining about this? I think this is the third thread you've started on this topic, and it always ends the same way.
People complained that they weren't getting enough for their subscription, so they gave them exclusive items.
It's also meant as an incentive for more people to subscribe to the Master Tier.
Yes, it would be nice if drops were shareable with everyone.
But what's also repeatedly made clear here is that you're unwilling to do even the bare minimum for your players to make it possible for everyone to use.

Quote from DerBlooob >>

It's also meant as an incentive for more people to subscribe to the Master Tier.

 
You cannot share the options through the Master Tier. Were this to allow sharing of the options then yes I'd agree it'd be perfectly reasonable. I have a master tier for the purposes of ensuring that my entire group has access to the options everyone else has access to. The problem is that Master Tier doesn't allow sharing of these new drops. Oh and let me be clear, this post was to provide feedback - i.e. it was bad to not allow them to be sharable by Master Tier Subscriptions. The post over in DMs Only was to gather other DM opinions. Was it just me, was I the odd person out? Frankly DM opinions on the game carry more weight than blind fan opinions which you often get here in the feedback section.

As to those suggesting that I could just create homebrew versions - yes I could, but would I also be expected then to create a homebrew solution for some random 3rd party content a player discovers on DriveThruRPG? A GM's workload is already a high one in D&D - higher than a lot of other TTRPGs. Yes, there's a solution out there but it's an unreasonable one when all WotC needed to do was ensure that this stuff was sharable by a particular subscription level, or allow it to be purchased separately. 

And let's add something else here folks. What about the player who comes to the game in a years' time. They're new and shiny, and they find out that because they only started player a year later, another player at the table has got a cool spell that they didn't even know existed. 

There's being a fan of the game, then there's supporting anti-consumer practices by companies interested in only money. This is blatantly anti-consumer and isn't okay.