I'd call them awful. Not sure what argument you were trying to make there but I don't think it was the gotcha you thought it was
You have never once done that? You have never watched anything or listened to anything someone just shared with you? Never streamed music on YouTube without having paid for it? None of that?
Sorry if "people deserve to be paid for what they produce" is a controversial statement to you. Personally I'd love to live in a Star Trek post capitalist utopia where everything is free and art is produced for the love of it but the fact is we don't, you have to pay for what you love and if you don't then sooner or later it'll stop being produced
I'd call them awful. Not sure what argument you were trying to make there but I don't think it was the gotcha you thought it was
The argument being made is that people who are so gung-ho about the digitization of D&D or of anything have in all probability consumed digital media using some means that does not pay the artist fairly. But we are supposed to believe it's only fair that a multibillion dollar company be allowed to tell us not to share what we have paid for?
Sorry if "people deserve to be paid for what they produce" is a controversial statement to you. Personally I'd love to live in a Star Trek post capitalist utopia where everything is free and art is produced for the love of it but the fact is we don't, you have to pay for what you love and if you don't then sooner or later it'll stop being produced
It seems you have misunderstood my point. I own physical copies of all gaming content I own. I only own physical books. I only own records and CDs. I don't believe I am entitled to own things for free.
My point is that those running to the defense of Wizards when Wizards tries to restrict the sharing of resources—even though the sharing of resources has always been a big part of the hobby as it was not uncommon for some or even most players to not own copies of the rules—in all probability themselves engage in the practice of consuming digital media for free. That is hurt creators. But don't dare hurt the multibillion dollar company!
Other publishers are happy for players to share resources. Because they want people to play their games. One person buying their game and getting for free the pdf in the process and sharing this with others is the least of their worries. They care more about the hobby than just making money from it.
I'd call them awful. Not sure what argument you were trying to make there but I don't think it was the gotcha you thought it was
You have never once done that? You have never watched anything or listened to anything someone just shared with you? Never streamed music on YouTube without having paid for it? None of that?
You do know that YouTube pays licensing fees to copyright holders right? If you're not the customer you're the product.
And yes, some people use adblock, but I pay for YT Premium, so all of my views count as an ad click for the channel in question.
You do know that YouTube pays licensing fees to copyright holders right? If you're not the customer you're the product.
And yes, some people use adblock, but I pay for YT Premium, so all of my views count as an ad click for the channel in question.
YouTube is among the worst culprits when it comes to how little artists are paid when people choose to stream their music. With a number of labels having once described the platform as the biggest threat to music and artists since piracy became rife.
Why do you figure most bands rather people consume their music through bandcamp or directly through labels or the bands themselves?
Because it's through those means they are paid fairly. Not through YouTube Music. Or Spotify. Or Apple Music.
Let's hear how you reconcile not giving a toss about artists enough to make sure they are paid fairly but your believing it's just awful for people to expect a multibillion dollar company to provide them with a pdf of something so this can be shared with others with whom they play.
YouTube is among the worst culprits when it comes to how little artists are paid when people choose to stream their music. With a number of labels having once described the platform as the biggest threat to music and artists since piracy became rife.
....
Let's hear how you reconcile not giving a toss about artists enough to make sure they are paid fairly but your believing it's just awful for people to expect a multibillion dollar company to provide them with a pdf of something so this can be shared with others with whom they play.
The state of the music industry is neither my problem, nor does it have anything to do with D&D.
Forgive me if this has been asked and answered already. I've got access to all the information in the new PHB through D&D Beyond because I pre-ordered the book. But I'd like to be able to look at it like a PDF and go through it like a book. When will that functionality be available (or is it already)?
Thanks!
Probably never. WotC is anti PDF for some unknown reason. It hasn't occurred to them that people can just scan the book, make a PDF and pirate it without needing an official PDF.
Or... it has occurred to them, and they came to the correct conclusion that official PDFs make the process you describe that much easier
This argument is weaksauce. The book isn't even at its release date and a cursory internet search yields at least 5 separate "unofficial" PDF incarnations. All it takes is 1. Just wait for the official release. However much easier you think this would be with an official PDF, the delta there is obviously and completely ineffectual.
Gabe Newell said it best: "Piracy is a service problem."
There is a massive desire among the customer base for PDFs, and their reasoning is irrelevant; people want them. WoTC refuses to address that need. So the customer base faces this service problem and addresses its own need. If WoTC sold PDFs, people would buy them.
The PDFs people create are historically good enough. But WoTC has the ability to make PDFs superior to anything that can be made post-facto. An official PDF would have no OCR errors because it would be natively digital. Every page reference could be hyperlinked. And every time there's errata, you could get an email saying, "Hey man, come download an updated PDF with the latest corrections."
I would buy that. So, so many people would absolutely buy that.
Whatever percentage of people buy that, it doesn't even matter, because right now WoTC are getting 0% of $0. And that's, well let's see, 0 and 0, carry the 0... that's a big fat $0. Their decision to shun PDFs isn't some big-brain move, it's just a sustained knee-jerk fear reaction. In reality it serves neither the customer base nor the company.
This argument is weaksauce. The book isn't even at its release date and a cursory internet search yields at least 5 separate "unofficial" PDF incarnations. All it takes is 1. Just wait for the official release. However much easier you think this would be with an official PDF, the delta there is obviously and completely ineffectual.
This is the same energy as "why bother having traffic laws, criminals will just break them." Obviously they can't physically erase every illegal pdf off the internet, that doesn't mean they have to make the pirates' job any easier than they have to.
This is the same energy as "why bother having traffic laws, criminals will just break them." Obviously they can't physically erase every illegal pdf off the internet, that doesn't mean they have to make the pirates' job any easier than they have to.
... and yet a pdf tends to come free with any purchase of a physical game product when we are talking about just about any other publisher in the industry. Because those publishers see nothing wrong with groups sharing resources. Like we often did back in the early years of the hobby. When not every player owned copies of the rules. What Wizards are doing is analogous with their walking into our homes and telling us we must not let others look inside books we have paid for and how they will have to buy their own copies. Now they are not doing that. But if they are so gung-ho about groups being able to play over the internet why are they making that harder? Why do they expect people to pay a fee to share resources and only make that possible on limited platforms? It's pathetic how they see themselves as such a potential victim of piracy when smaller publishers could not care less. You want to protect a multibillion dollar corporation from potential piracy but aren't even prepared to pay artists their dues. The disconnect there is blinding in its obviousness.
This argument is weaksauce. The book isn't even at its release date and a cursory internet search yields at least 5 separate "unofficial" PDF incarnations. All it takes is 1. Just wait for the official release. However much easier you think this would be with an official PDF, the delta there is obviously and completely ineffectual.
This is the same energy as "why bother having traffic laws, criminals will just break them." Obviously they can't physically erase every illegal pdf off the internet, that doesn't mean they have to make the pirates' job any easier than they have to.
This has the same energy as "cut off your nose to spite your face." By your own analogy, you're advocating for the destruction of all motor vehicles because you're terrified that some people might break a traffic law if they're allowed to drive.
So, way to completely miss the point. It has nothing to do with difficulty OR criminality, or did you choose to respond to my post without actually reading it? Maybe if I summarize with a single line, you could bring yourself to try again:
Many people want to buy a PDF.
Whatever you think WoTC would lose by creating a PDF is already lost. It was lost before the book was even for general sale. Because WoTC refuses to provide the service that customers WANT TO PAY FOR. Your analogy is weaker than your original statement. WoTC refusing to sell a PDF doesn't enforce anything. It doesn't make anything more difficult; the goods are out there and they're not going away. The only thing an official PDF would make easier would be giving money to WoTC.
And you can still do exactly that when you buy a physical copy. Besides that they made it extremely easy to have one person buy the digital version and have that person share it with loas of other people for a small subscription fee.
The digital equivalent of having someone come to collect a tax from you because you have let your players look through your copy of the Player's Handbook.
Well we do pay for that in the Netherlands(via Thuiskopieheffing, or according to wikipedia Private copying levy in english), not sure about other countries of course.
Let me ask you what I have asked others: There is a rather obvious overlap between those who defend Wizards in this regard and those who are so gung-ho about the digitization of D&D. Have these people never watched a movie or a TV show or listened to an album that was shared with them by some means other than one that would pay their creators and fairly? But it's just a bridge too far to expect a multibillion dollar company like Wizards to make it easier for people to share resources?
Yes I have, but only because that music or does shows weren't readily available for me. Since spotify and Netflix I haven't done that. And D&D has never been not readily available, either by buying the book physically or online, loaning the book from a library or asking a friend to lent it to you. And for sharing online you have dndbeyond to share content with friends.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"grandpa" Salkur, deep gnome artificer/sorcerer: Spiderwrangler's Forged in Chaos | Pepin, Human Artificer/cleric: Goblin horde | Mixtli, Volcano Genasi Artificer: Champions of the Citadel | Erix Vadalitis, Human Druid: Rising from the last war |Smithy, Human Artificer: Night Ravens: Black orchids for Biscotti | Tamphalic Aliprax, Blue Dragonborn Wizard: Chronicles of the Accursed | Doc, Dwarven Cleric (2024): The adventure at Hope's End
And you can still do exactly that when you buy a physical copy. Besides that they made it extremely easy to have one person buy the digital version and have that person share it with loas of other people for a small subscription fee.
The digital equivalent of having someone come to collect a tax from you because you have let your players look through your copy of the Player's Handbook.
Well we do pay for that in the Netherlands(via Thuiskopieheffing, or according to wikipedia Private copying levy in english), not sure about other countries of course.
Let me ask you what I have asked others: There is a rather obvious overlap between those who defend Wizards in this regard and those who are so gung-ho about the digitization of D&D. Have these people never watched a movie or a TV show or listened to an album that was shared with them by some means other than one that would pay their creators and fairly? But it's just a bridge too far to expect a multibillion dollar company like Wizards to make it easier for people to share resources?
Yes I have, but only because that music or does shows weren't readily available for me. Since spotify and Netflix I haven't done that. And D&D has never been not readily available, either by buying the book physically or online, loaning the book from a library or asking a friend to lent it to you. And for sharing online you have dndbeyond to share content with friends.
You misread and misunderstood my first point. I wasn't talking about taxes placed on recordable media. I was presenting a comical scenario in which Wizards send people to our homes to collect a tax because we have let someone look inside a physical book that we own. Many tables back in the day owned a single copy of the rules. That's still the case for some groups. Online as well as offline. The reason Wizards are so against the idea of providing pdfs of their books is because they want to limit the sharing of resources among players. Because they care much more about making money than they do supporting the community.
As I have already pointed out a pdf tends to come free with any purchase of a physical game product when we are talking about just about any other publisher in the industry. Because those publishers see nothing wrong with groups sharing resources. Like we often did back in the early years of the hobby.
So why not Wizards?
EDIT: Thuiskopieheffing is a levy placed on hardware that can carry data. It concerns the copying of copyrighted material. It is entirely irrelevant to what I said as what I was referring to when I said what they were doing by not providing pdfs or other means to share digital resources without forcing us to pay a fee to do so was the digital equivalent of having someone come to collect a tax from us because we have let our players look through our copies of the Player's Handbook was the physical book. Now obviously they are not doing that. But that is what it feels like when the only possible legal means for us to share digital resources is for them to request a fee. Smaller publishers who have more to lose by making fewer sales given their lives depend on them don't care. But a multibillion dollar company just can't bear the thought that a DM somewhere might provide his or her players pdfs of the PHB? It is about greed plain and simple.
As I have already pointed out a pdf tends to come free with any purchase of a physical game product when we are talking about just about any other publisher in the industry. Because those publishers see nothing wrong with groups sharing resources. Like we often did back in the early years of the hobby.
So why not Wizards?
Since you seem exclusively prone to mischaracterizing what others are saying - I’ll put this in a nice, simple bullet point list that is harder to misrepresent.
1. PDFs make it easier to engage in copyright violations. Bad people are still going to engage in copyright violations and people like the poster above are still going to try and intentionally mislead folks by conflating fair use (permissible under copyright) with.. a secret Wizards police force breaking into your house to monitor your physical books? Their poorly articulated point kind of went off the deep end.
Anyway, while Wizards knows folks are going to flagrantly violate copyright that doesn’t mean they have to make it easy by offering a high quality, easy-to-share product. Ensuring the best quality product on the market is your own, that encourages some people to buy the high quality legitimate product, rather than pirate it.
2. Wizards is the biggest fish in town, and thus stands to lose the most. Despite what the folks who clearly should be on Pathfinder or other games’ forums (but choose to post on the forums for 5e because they want this game to fail) seem to think, D&D is the only real name in town. Even Pathfinder, is closest competitor, is not anywhere close to D&D’s size and scale - and certainly nowhere close to its name recognition.
What does that mean? It means Wizards has the most to lose from pushing PDFs. Even if the percent of piracy remained static across all games, Wizards’ loss would be numerically far larger, as it would be a percent of a far larger starting value.
And, of course, the percent of piracy is not static - you just have to look at the other nonsense posts of the above user on this thread, where they basically argue “it is okay to ignore copyright law, as long as you don’t like the company who you are ripping off.” That is a morally repugnant, legally wrong stance, of course - but it is a prevalent one. People like their smaller companies are are more likely to pay them, which minimizes their risk when offering PDFs.
3. Wizards has the resources not to need PDFs. In the modern world, you really need a digital toolset - many people play online or like the convenience of having searchable, always accessible rules. PDFs are a cheep way to fill that necessity. None of the other companies have the resources to run a digital toolset like D&D Beyond (and, given the glitches it faces, even Wizards struggles with running something like this).
Because Wizards can make digital tools in the way others cannot do as easily, that reduces their need to use PDFs.
TL;DR: Why is Wizards not using PDFs? They are particularly vulnerable to copyright violations and simply do not need to rely on a half-measure as they can make more intensive digital tools..
According to the Terms of Service, if you have paid the associated fee or otherwise acquired a license to access the virtual items on D&DBeyond, WotC grants you license to download and install a copy of all that content for backup or archival purposes provided you're making a reasonable number of copies.
An easy way to do that is using the Tampermonkey browser plugin to add a little bit of Javascript (in jQuery form) for straightforward DOM manipulation and AJAX operations which automates the compiling and downloading of the content from this website into a PDF. It won't look as pretty as the original but a quick fix for those looking for offline access to the software they paid for.
TL;DR: Why is Wizards not using PDFs? They are particularly vulnerable to copyright violations and simply do not need to rely on a half-measure as they can make more intensive digital tools..
However particularly vulnerable to copyright violations Wizards may be makes no difference. pdfs of every book published by Wizards of the Coast are readily available online. Wizards could be selling pdfs and making money from it. People pay to buy pdfs of other games even though these too can be found floating around online. The little faith in their customers or in their products that Wizards shows in this regard is hardly inspiring.
As someone else said: They have customers lining up to buy pdfs. They just don't want to provide them because they hate the idea of players sharing resources. Any copy of a book a DM might share with a player would be a copy Wizards didn't sell.
For many who don't particularly care for Beyond beyond how useful it is for character creation particularly for the innumerate among us a quality pdf would be superior to the digital tools they have in place. Digital tools for which people must pay a fee in order to share them with others. I have seen pdfs of adventures for other systems that are more innovative in their use of available technology and particularly when it comes to what can be done with maps than anything I have seen on Beyond. Let's not pretend this website is at the forefront of creativity.
For years gaming groups have shared game content. This is why other publishers happily provide pdfs. Because they know all it takes is for one person to buy the rules and they can run the game for others and perhaps share those rules with those others if necessary. It makes it easier and more affordable to get more people playing their games. Which is what matters most to them—not putting smiles on their shareholders' faces. You were asked elsewhere if people who are sharing pdfs of game content are such "awful" people as you described them how would you describe those who consume music in a way that does not pay the artists accordingly and you ignored the question. You want to protect a poor little multibillion dollar company from copyright violations but don't give a toss about people streaming music and artists being paid a pittance for it. Which is to say you just make up excuses for Wizards but don't really care about whether or not people consume in a conscionable manner. Speaking of consuming in a conscionable manner what do you figure the carbon footprint is of a pdf? What do you figure the carbon footprint is of a website like Beyond and the traffic it receives from any given single user using the tools here? Do you care? Out of curiosity.
However particularly vulnerable to copyright violations Wizards may be makes no difference. pdfs of every book published by Wizards of the Coast are readily available online. Wizards could be selling pdfs and making money from it. People pay to buy pdfs of other games even though these too can be found floating around online. The little faith in their customers or in their products that Wizards shows in this regard is hardly inspiring.
I found these two sentences in the same paragraph to be more than a little funny.
However particularly vulnerable to copyright violations Wizards may be makes no difference. pdfs of every book published by Wizards of the Coast are readily available online. Wizards could be selling pdfs and making money from it. People pay to buy pdfs of other games even though these too can be found floating around online. The little faith in their customers or in their products that Wizards shows in this regard is hardly inspiring.
I found these two sentences in the same paragraph to be more than a little funny.
Then you missed the point entirely: pdfs of other publishers' games are also readily available online and yet many of us who play their games still pay money for them. I own physical copies of every single game product I own even if I have previously purchased a pdf of it even though I could easily have just used a pdf floating around online. So what exactly are Wizards afraid of by selling pdfs? They fear if they sell pdfs groups will share a single purchase of a book and many will no longer pay money for them. (Personally I don't see why that should be a problem. It still means people are playing their game which is what would matter most if they cared more about the hobby and the community than they did their bank accounts. It isn't as if that is how many of us did it and many still do: sharing one set of physical core rule books between a group. This used to be seen as perfectly normal. But Wizards hate the idea because it's all about the bottom line to them. They are trying to do everything they can to make it seem as if every one of us most own copies of the rules. Promotional materials for the 2024 ruleset said a purchase of all three books was necessary for the "full D&D experience." Which is not true by any stretch of logic or imagination.) But if Wizards do fear people would just stop buying their books maybe their books just aren't worth buying as much as those people are still prepared to pay money for despite how readily available they are in pdf form online as well. Maybe that is what they fear. I do hope that has cleared things up for you.
I didn't miss your point just because I don't think you have really organized your thoughts on the matter very well. In the same figurative breath, you have questioned why WotC doesn't trust their customers AND offered up the exact reason why they shouldn't.
Other publishers don't have the luxury of being able to choose what formats to use; they need every bit of exposure they can get. Even Pathfinder, the next largest TTRPG, does not have the sales to match D&D, even with PDFs included in their online sales. WotC can choose to be more protective of their bottom line and make their product less accessible and the numbers show that they can get away with it.
Sorry if "people deserve to be paid for what they produce" is a controversial statement to you. Personally I'd love to live in a Star Trek post capitalist utopia where everything is free and art is produced for the love of it but the fact is we don't, you have to pay for what you love and if you don't then sooner or later it'll stop being produced
The argument being made is that people who are so gung-ho about the digitization of D&D or of anything have in all probability consumed digital media using some means that does not pay the artist fairly. But we are supposed to believe it's only fair that a multibillion dollar company be allowed to tell us not to share what we have paid for?
It seems you have misunderstood my point. I own physical copies of all gaming content I own. I only own physical books. I only own records and CDs. I don't believe I am entitled to own things for free.
My point is that those running to the defense of Wizards when Wizards tries to restrict the sharing of resources—even though the sharing of resources has always been a big part of the hobby as it was not uncommon for some or even most players to not own copies of the rules—in all probability themselves engage in the practice of consuming digital media for free. That is hurt creators. But don't dare hurt the multibillion dollar company!
Other publishers are happy for players to share resources. Because they want people to play their games. One person buying their game and getting for free the pdf in the process and sharing this with others is the least of their worries. They care more about the hobby than just making money from it.
You do know that YouTube pays licensing fees to copyright holders right? If you're not the customer you're the product.
And yes, some people use adblock, but I pay for YT Premium, so all of my views count as an ad click for the channel in question.
YouTube is among the worst culprits when it comes to how little artists are paid when people choose to stream their music. With a number of labels having once described the platform as the biggest threat to music and artists since piracy became rife.
Why do you figure most bands rather people consume their music through bandcamp or directly through labels or the bands themselves?
Because it's through those means they are paid fairly. Not through YouTube Music. Or Spotify. Or Apple Music.
Let's hear how you reconcile not giving a toss about artists enough to make sure they are paid fairly but your believing it's just awful for people to expect a multibillion dollar company to provide them with a pdf of something so this can be shared with others with whom they play.
The state of the music industry is neither my problem, nor does it have anything to do with D&D.
OCR has been a thing for a long time now. I can take a photograph of a page of a book and my phone will parse the text for me if I want it to.
This argument is weaksauce. The book isn't even at its release date and a cursory internet search yields at least 5 separate "unofficial" PDF incarnations. All it takes is 1. Just wait for the official release. However much easier you think this would be with an official PDF, the delta there is obviously and completely ineffectual.
Gabe Newell said it best: "Piracy is a service problem."
There is a massive desire among the customer base for PDFs, and their reasoning is irrelevant; people want them. WoTC refuses to address that need. So the customer base faces this service problem and addresses its own need. If WoTC sold PDFs, people would buy them.
The PDFs people create are historically good enough. But WoTC has the ability to make PDFs superior to anything that can be made post-facto. An official PDF would have no OCR errors because it would be natively digital. Every page reference could be hyperlinked. And every time there's errata, you could get an email saying, "Hey man, come download an updated PDF with the latest corrections."
I would buy that. So, so many people would absolutely buy that.
Whatever percentage of people buy that, it doesn't even matter, because right now WoTC are getting 0% of $0. And that's, well let's see, 0 and 0, carry the 0... that's a big fat $0. Their decision to shun PDFs isn't some big-brain move, it's just a sustained knee-jerk fear reaction. In reality it serves neither the customer base nor the company.
This is the same energy as "why bother having traffic laws, criminals will just break them." Obviously they can't physically erase every illegal pdf off the internet, that doesn't mean they have to make the pirates' job any easier than they have to.
... and yet a pdf tends to come free with any purchase of a physical game product when we are talking about just about any other publisher in the industry. Because those publishers see nothing wrong with groups sharing resources. Like we often did back in the early years of the hobby. When not every player owned copies of the rules. What Wizards are doing is analogous with their walking into our homes and telling us we must not let others look inside books we have paid for and how they will have to buy their own copies. Now they are not doing that. But if they are so gung-ho about groups being able to play over the internet why are they making that harder? Why do they expect people to pay a fee to share resources and only make that possible on limited platforms? It's pathetic how they see themselves as such a potential victim of piracy when smaller publishers could not care less. You want to protect a multibillion dollar corporation from potential piracy but aren't even prepared to pay artists their dues. The disconnect there is blinding in its obviousness.
This has the same energy as "cut off your nose to spite your face." By your own analogy, you're advocating for the destruction of all motor vehicles because you're terrified that some people might break a traffic law if they're allowed to drive.
So, way to completely miss the point. It has nothing to do with difficulty OR criminality, or did you choose to respond to my post without actually reading it? Maybe if I summarize with a single line, you could bring yourself to try again:
Many people want to buy a PDF.
Whatever you think WoTC would lose by creating a PDF is already lost. It was lost before the book was even for general sale. Because WoTC refuses to provide the service that customers WANT TO PAY FOR. Your analogy is weaker than your original statement. WoTC refusing to sell a PDF doesn't enforce anything. It doesn't make anything more difficult; the goods are out there and they're not going away. The only thing an official PDF would make easier would be giving money to WoTC.
Well we do pay for that in the Netherlands(via Thuiskopieheffing, or according to wikipedia Private copying levy in english), not sure about other countries of course.
Yes I have, but only because that music or does shows weren't readily available for me. Since spotify and Netflix I haven't done that. And D&D has never been not readily available, either by buying the book physically or online, loaning the book from a library or asking a friend to lent it to you. And for sharing online you have dndbeyond to share content with friends.
"grandpa" Salkur, deep gnome artificer/sorcerer: Spiderwrangler's Forged in Chaos | Pepin, Human Artificer/cleric: Goblin horde | Mixtli, Volcano Genasi Artificer: Champions of the Citadel | Erix Vadalitis, Human Druid: Rising from the last war | Smithy, Human Artificer: Night Ravens: Black orchids for Biscotti | Tamphalic Aliprax, Blue Dragonborn Wizard: Chronicles of the Accursed | Doc, Dwarven Cleric (2024): The adventure at Hope's End
You misread and misunderstood my first point. I wasn't talking about taxes placed on recordable media. I was presenting a comical scenario in which Wizards send people to our homes to collect a tax because we have let someone look inside a physical book that we own. Many tables back in the day owned a single copy of the rules. That's still the case for some groups. Online as well as offline. The reason Wizards are so against the idea of providing pdfs of their books is because they want to limit the sharing of resources among players. Because they care much more about making money than they do supporting the community.
As I have already pointed out a pdf tends to come free with any purchase of a physical game product when we are talking about just about any other publisher in the industry. Because those publishers see nothing wrong with groups sharing resources. Like we often did back in the early years of the hobby.
So why not Wizards?
EDIT: Thuiskopieheffing is a levy placed on hardware that can carry data. It concerns the copying of copyrighted material. It is entirely irrelevant to what I said as what I was referring to when I said what they were doing by not providing pdfs or other means to share digital resources without forcing us to pay a fee to do so was the digital equivalent of having someone come to collect a tax from us because we have let our players look through our copies of the Player's Handbook was the physical book. Now obviously they are not doing that. But that is what it feels like when the only possible legal means for us to share digital resources is for them to request a fee. Smaller publishers who have more to lose by making fewer sales given their lives depend on them don't care. But a multibillion dollar company just can't bear the thought that a DM somewhere might provide his or her players pdfs of the PHB? It is about greed plain and simple.
Since you seem exclusively prone to mischaracterizing what others are saying - I’ll put this in a nice, simple bullet point list that is harder to misrepresent.
1. PDFs make it easier to engage in copyright violations. Bad people are still going to engage in copyright violations and people like the poster above are still going to try and intentionally mislead folks by conflating fair use (permissible under copyright) with.. a secret Wizards police force breaking into your house to monitor your physical books? Their poorly articulated point kind of went off the deep end.
Anyway, while Wizards knows folks are going to flagrantly violate copyright that doesn’t mean they have to make it easy by offering a high quality, easy-to-share product. Ensuring the best quality product on the market is your own, that encourages some people to buy the high quality legitimate product, rather than pirate it.
2. Wizards is the biggest fish in town, and thus stands to lose the most. Despite what the folks who clearly should be on Pathfinder or other games’ forums (but choose to post on the forums for 5e because they want this game to fail) seem to think, D&D is the only real name in town. Even Pathfinder, is closest competitor, is not anywhere close to D&D’s size and scale - and certainly nowhere close to its name recognition.
What does that mean? It means Wizards has the most to lose from pushing PDFs. Even if the percent of piracy remained static across all games, Wizards’ loss would be numerically far larger, as it would be a percent of a far larger starting value.
And, of course, the percent of piracy is not static - you just have to look at the other nonsense posts of the above user on this thread, where they basically argue “it is okay to ignore copyright law, as long as you don’t like the company who you are ripping off.” That is a morally repugnant, legally wrong stance, of course - but it is a prevalent one. People like their smaller companies are are more likely to pay them, which minimizes their risk when offering PDFs.
3. Wizards has the resources not to need PDFs. In the modern world, you really need a digital toolset - many people play online or like the convenience of having searchable, always accessible rules. PDFs are a cheep way to fill that necessity. None of the other companies have the resources to run a digital toolset like D&D Beyond (and, given the glitches it faces, even Wizards struggles with running something like this).
Because Wizards can make digital tools in the way others cannot do as easily, that reduces their need to use PDFs.
TL;DR: Why is Wizards not using PDFs? They are particularly vulnerable to copyright violations and simply do not need to rely on a half-measure as they can make more intensive digital tools..
According to the Terms of Service, if you have paid the associated fee or otherwise acquired a license to access the virtual items on D&DBeyond, WotC grants you license to download and install a copy of all that content for backup or archival purposes provided you're making a reasonable number of copies.
An easy way to do that is using the Tampermonkey browser plugin to add a little bit of Javascript (in jQuery form) for straightforward DOM manipulation and AJAX operations which automates the compiling and downloading of the content from this website into a PDF. It won't look as pretty as the original but a quick fix for those looking for offline access to the software they paid for.
Free Content: [Basic Rules],
[Phandelver],[Frozen Sick],[Acquisitions Inc.],[Vecna Dossier],[Radiant Citadel], [Spelljammer],[Dragonlance], [Prisoner 13],[Minecraft],[Star Forge], [Baldur’s Gate], [Lightning Keep], [Stormwreck Isle], [Pinebrook], [Caverns of Tsojcanth], [The Lost Horn], [Elemental Evil].Free Dice: [Frostmaiden],
[Flourishing], [Sanguine],[Themberchaud], [Baldur's Gate 3], [Lego].However particularly vulnerable to copyright violations Wizards may be makes no difference. pdfs of every book published by Wizards of the Coast are readily available online. Wizards could be selling pdfs and making money from it. People pay to buy pdfs of other games even though these too can be found floating around online. The little faith in their customers or in their products that Wizards shows in this regard is hardly inspiring.
As someone else said: They have customers lining up to buy pdfs. They just don't want to provide them because they hate the idea of players sharing resources. Any copy of a book a DM might share with a player would be a copy Wizards didn't sell.
For many who don't particularly care for Beyond beyond how useful it is for character creation particularly for the innumerate among us a quality pdf would be superior to the digital tools they have in place. Digital tools for which people must pay a fee in order to share them with others. I have seen pdfs of adventures for other systems that are more innovative in their use of available technology and particularly when it comes to what can be done with maps than anything I have seen on Beyond. Let's not pretend this website is at the forefront of creativity.
For years gaming groups have shared game content. This is why other publishers happily provide pdfs. Because they know all it takes is for one person to buy the rules and they can run the game for others and perhaps share those rules with those others if necessary. It makes it easier and more affordable to get more people playing their games. Which is what matters most to them—not putting smiles on their shareholders' faces. You were asked elsewhere if people who are sharing pdfs of game content are such "awful" people as you described them how would you describe those who consume music in a way that does not pay the artists accordingly and you ignored the question. You want to protect a poor little multibillion dollar company from copyright violations but don't give a toss about people streaming music and artists being paid a pittance for it. Which is to say you just make up excuses for Wizards but don't really care about whether or not people consume in a conscionable manner. Speaking of consuming in a conscionable manner what do you figure the carbon footprint is of a pdf? What do you figure the carbon footprint is of a website like Beyond and the traffic it receives from any given single user using the tools here? Do you care? Out of curiosity.
Then those people can wait until 5th edition is out of print first, like all the other editions that eventually became purchasable PDFs.
Also, what Caerwyn said.
I found these two sentences in the same paragraph to be more than a little funny.
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Then you missed the point entirely: pdfs of other publishers' games are also readily available online and yet many of us who play their games still pay money for them. I own physical copies of every single game product I own even if I have previously purchased a pdf of it even though I could easily have just used a pdf floating around online. So what exactly are Wizards afraid of by selling pdfs? They fear if they sell pdfs groups will share a single purchase of a book and many will no longer pay money for them. (Personally I don't see why that should be a problem. It still means people are playing their game which is what would matter most if they cared more about the hobby and the community than they did their bank accounts. It isn't as if that is how many of us did it and many still do: sharing one set of physical core rule books between a group. This used to be seen as perfectly normal. But Wizards hate the idea because it's all about the bottom line to them. They are trying to do everything they can to make it seem as if every one of us most own copies of the rules. Promotional materials for the 2024 ruleset said a purchase of all three books was necessary for the "full D&D experience." Which is not true by any stretch of logic or imagination.) But if Wizards do fear people would just stop buying their books maybe their books just aren't worth buying as much as those people are still prepared to pay money for despite how readily available they are in pdf form online as well. Maybe that is what they fear. I do hope that has cleared things up for you.
I didn't miss your point just because I don't think you have really organized your thoughts on the matter very well. In the same figurative breath, you have questioned why WotC doesn't trust their customers AND offered up the exact reason why they shouldn't.
Other publishers don't have the luxury of being able to choose what formats to use; they need every bit of exposure they can get. Even Pathfinder, the next largest TTRPG, does not have the sales to match D&D, even with PDFs included in their online sales. WotC can choose to be more protective of their bottom line and make their product less accessible and the numbers show that they can get away with it.
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