Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
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Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
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They truly cracked the code here - WotC realized the secret desire of all DnD gamers.
To turn DnD into an overpriced, cruddy, procedurally generated videogame.
Except an actual 'DnD' style videogame publisher could have also told them that a thriving 3rd party mod development community is critical to the success of a DnD style videogame.
Pretty sure this was shared for the soon to be former Hasbro / WotC senior leadership….
It was probably shared BY the senior leadership. Never a scam too low for those up on high.
$30 a month is probably reaching a point where it's going to drive players away from digital and into PnP, or outright away. If anything it's going to push those who do stick with D&D into homebrew and 3pp.
AI DMs while I can see a need for this, I have a feeling, that things are going to be heavily railroaded as a result, or end up playing more like a wargame.
Deauthorizing of 1.0a we knew they were going to keep trying that, and I have a feeling outside of brute forcing, or trickery, they're just going to keep it up until the matter is taken to court, and that is still no gurantee if people voluntarily give up their rights.
And think of how much more difficult it'll be for it to hold onto the plot when it's also trying to get you to play for magic item loot boxes and Tiamat NFTs XD
I vaguely remember a Neverwinter Nights third party module (gasp... The horror!), that was pseudo-randomized. I figure that their AI efforts will probably be on par with that or Dungeon Hack. Here is this randomly generated dungeon/map to explore with the same recycled NPCs with a new random name giving out a randomized generic quest. So RPG-lite and heavy on the combat. Great if all you care about is being a murder hobo, not so great if you care about everything else that makes the game interesting.
"When truth presents itself, the wise person see the light, takes it in, and makes adjustments. The fool tries to adjust the truth so he does not have to adjust to it." ~ Henry Cloud #ORC #OpenDND
I remember Colossal Cave Adventure.
Pure text based fun.
Of course, with D&D's history of in-house digital projects, I bet we get a lot of super-hyped up screenshots and a promo video or three, but it never actually sees the light of day.
Here's my problem with all of this UNCONFIRMED RUMOR garbage everyone keeps bringing up...
There are people who have financial incentives to spread lies and falsehoods to drum up views, add revenue, create ill will and hatred towards D&D to drive WoTC out of the market so players will buy into there systems, Paizo & Kobold are two confirmed contenders I know of. I am sure there are more.
I don't like people who drive hate based on unconfirmed rumors and given the outlandish and nonsensical nature of most of them, no people, WoTC is not trying to deliberately destroy there company, maybe start asking "does this sound like something a reasonable competent company that wants to stay in business would do or something an unscrupulous person/company might say they would do in order to hurt them?."
The problem is just looking at what we do know, it doesn't look good and using logic to see where they are headed. For example, from Wizards of the Coast CEO Cynthia Williams:
So part of their issue is that only Dungeon Masters purchase books and other materials, and their game plan moving forward centers around using D&D Beyond to "unlock" add-ons like DLC in video games. Given what they seem to be angling towards, this is more in line with the infamous "Horse Armor DLC" than anything else. It's also ignoring the fact that the majority of the books they sell are generally focused on Dungeon Masters!!! It would be pretty stupid for the entire group of players to purchase Curse of Strahd, as it would ruin the campaign. Yet, they are whining about the fact they created a book that only DM's should purchase being purchased by only DM's?!?
Reading into the article's statements, they are upset that I use heroforge.com to generate my avatar instead of being forced to pay dndbeyond.com a fee to get one. My friends should have to pay for all the Sources to unlock every sub-class they want to use instead of me using my Master Tier to share books (you know, how we do things with physical books) with the campaign I am part of. All of this points to them grossly misunderstanding how a TTRPG works, and putting their effort into gatekeeping/rent-seeking instead of building the franchise.
"When truth presents itself, the wise person see the light, takes it in, and makes adjustments. The fool tries to adjust the truth so he does not have to adjust to it." ~ Henry Cloud #ORC #OpenDND
'Wizards'? They are apparently not.
But if WotC's intent was to kneecap any D&D-compatible growth in this hobby, make D&D devalued & toxic to everybody, & break everyone's trust in WotC all within mere days, then OGL 1.1 was genius!
It has revealed that WotC is now a threat to anything D&D-compatible instead of being a capable steward of it.
But the last straw for me was WotC's response to the inevitable backlash against this.
I mean, Ew! WotC's pretense in that response - that OGL 1.1 was just a 'draft' or a 'work in process' - was just a bunch of lies & gaslighting. It was so disingenuous that it made me cringe.
The silver lining: I was first exposed to D&D in 1974 & I started to GM it in 1977. So it was going to be difficult for me to let go of D&D after OGL 1.1 leaked.
But now WotC's lies & gaslighting about it has poisoned the brand to me. This makes it easy for me to let go of D&D. I can move on to something else.
As I mentioned on another thread, they won (following that one line) since they scared away all the other content creators; they got exclusivity on a desert to do whatever they wanted.
For real.
Imagine though that instead of one book, they had written two. One for running it, and another smaller booklet that included special character options for the setting/adventure as well as general level knowledge and description, a sort of campaign primer for players. Everything you need to create the perfect character for the adventure: subrace, backgrounds, feats, equipment, maybe even some unique subclasses or spells.
Would that sell? You know it would. I know it would. How does WotC not know it would?
People want content for what they're doing in the game. For players, that's building and playing a character. They need content for that. Not for running a cool adventure.
They could special their books better to player vs DM. Many books strike a middle balance and are designed for either/or. If they wanted to monetize to players they'd simply need to change what content they're bundling up in a book. DMs might still pick them up, even if they're marketed to players, especially since most DMs are also players. But it'd be an easier sell to a non-DM if the book is smaller, and more targeted to their needs/interest and cheaper as a result.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
23 days.
From Dec 21st 2022 to Jan 13th 2023, after a somewhat half-a$$ attempt to quell rumors of a god awful 'draft' change to the OGL, Wotc/Hasbro executives watched it burn. The Wotc/Hasbro corporate PR put out a statement equivalent to pi$$ing on the burning ashes in an attempt to quell the flames.
23 years of trust and respect torched in 23 days.
The old saying goes, "Trust and respect are not freely given, but must be earned though good deeds and acts."
At this point who knows what the hell will happen.[ 8 ball predictions say worst is yet ahead ] so forgive me if I morn for the future, for the skies are still dark and the way forward in fog and smoke.
23 years of trust, burned to ashes in 23 days.
Place dental impression upon the metallic gluteus Maximus.
I agree players want content that is useful to them, but selling a $30 book that has material a player shouldn't read is silly. I've yet to meet the player that listened when a book said, "Don't read this, it's only for the DM." It's easy to tell the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master's Guide isn't for players, but what about Tasha's Cauldron of Everything or Xander's Guide to Everything? Both of those books have things that only a DM should be aware of, so WotC is wanting players to essentially purchase a $30 book and not read half of it. Mordekainen introduces a major revision to non-Player Handbook character races, but that is a scant fraction of the overall book primarily only needed by the Dungeon Master.
Honestly, WotC has failed to create a compelling reason for a player to want to purchase Sourcebooks, outside of those of us that just love tinkering with the setting/system. The DnD Basic Rules: DND Beyond Edition, unlike the PDF edition of DnD Basic Rules gives you the ability to play as all the classes in the game (although with only a single sub-class) along with the most important rules to the game. The Player's Handbook is useful if you want some variety to your classes, and you can somewhat make an argument for Tasha's and Xander's (which also add sub-classes and a new class). Outside of those books, I am not sure any of other WotC Sourcebook makes a strong case of value for a player purchase unless they are playing a specific setting or really want a specific sub-class.
"When truth presents itself, the wise person see the light, takes it in, and makes adjustments. The fool tries to adjust the truth so he does not have to adjust to it." ~ Henry Cloud #ORC #OpenDND
The more I think about last year's attempted board take over of Hasbro by an investment firm to spin off WotC from Hasbo control the more I think the investor voters were all duped and we could have avoided this shit fate
The very fact that they wanted to turn dnd into a lifestyle brand shows just how far removed the execs are from the game and the culture around it.
They failed to understand that d&d already is as close to being a lifestyle as it can possibly be. In that single phrase they completely ignored decades in which si many of us were mocked, ignored or bullied for being geeks and nerds.. The satanic panic, the social context that saw so many of us shunned or marginalised for liking and playing games..
Yet we're still here, and we really don't need a brand manager to tell us that what we have had for the last few decades was a lifestyle.
There's families where up to 3 generations of people play RPGs in general, and DnD in particular. Many of us who have the means she understand the business world had accepted that they're VTT would have been an expensive gift to give ourselves and many were ready for it...
But both the extent of what they plan and the brazen, culpable, blindness towards what actually keeps the game moving has been severe enough to kill a community stone dead. Sure, we'll still play the game... But we'll be invisible to them
They will probably still turn a profit, because a lot of people don't know better, but it will have a short run and ultimately not be worth the investment....
Too think that all of this is self inflicted is just sad
WoTC is not a unique challenge but a symptom of the ever growing corporate toxic expanse. The current leadership Cynthia Williams, is from the Amazon and Microsoft proving grounds. All the evidence of this shift were their within corporate expectations. I do enjoy the positive discourse and all the really insightful ideas being put in place as new offerings by the 3rd party community. Playing this game since I was 9 I have watched the TSR rise and fall, the WoTC retail expanse and the eventual rise of 5e. DND will be around forever the question is what state will be in. I tend to agree with most of the OGL commentary in the thread until we see the final draft speculation can be a tenuous minefield at best. Hope everyone is staying safe and try to play a game its good for the brain. 😃🔮✨
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Although this statement was better than the childish first post, you still lie to us in the beginning. Drafts don't go out with contracts to sign within a week and term sheets. This is an attempt to control the narrative, buy time, and get people to return to D&D Beyond to participate in the survey. A closed survey run by a group many of us no longer trust.
I'm getting strong Southpark "we're sorry" vibes from WotC and how do they not see that these words are hollow without tangible effort/proof that we can see??