A Discussion on how WoTC can make money and not make people mad

Quote from Gnomarchy >>

One reason this forum sees little genuine engagement is that it attracts a community with entrenched biases against those who question the game's direction. Good-faith discourse is rare here, in part because dissenters, particularly those critical of WotC, are underrepresented.

I believe WotC has made both sound and questionable decisions for consumers. Their most significant positive move was releasing the 5e SRD under a creative commons license, which fostered openness and innovation.

However, I view the "Drops" initiative as a step backward for consumers. It represents a foothold for digital-only content that cannot truly be owned. Historically, nearly all 5e material was accompanied by a physical book, ensuring access even if D&D Beyond disappeared. While I personally prefer pdfs over bulky physical collections, which are cumbersome to store, transport, and vulnerable to damage, the principle of ownership remains important to me.

This concern stems from my experience when 4e ended and D&D Insider was discontinued. Despite paying for a subscription, I lost access to all the rules and resources I relied on. There is no guarantee that D&D Beyond won't face a similar fate, leaving players with nothing.

 Sorry, but I'm flabbergasted by anyone thinking critics of WotC are underrepresented here. 

Quote from MaedraDawnkeeper >>

They should, at least, reduce market share to under 50%, as that constitutes a monopoly in the US & is blatantly illegal & immoral.

While the 'illegal' part has been adequately answered already, it's worth discussing the "immoral" part as well.

Fundamentally, the reason for having antitrust law is because competition encourages companies to deliver more value for the consumer's money, because if they don't, they lose market share to a competitor. This is, obviously, good for the consumer. If you're leveraging your market position to produce worse value, that's when there's a problem (current catch phrase for that: "enshittification"). There's also a problem if you're using your market position to drive out your competitors.

Is WotC immune to that sort of concern? Of course not, though it's doubtful whether they're actually in a meaningful sense a monopoly at all (are they competing with other RPGs, or are they competing with entertainment products in general? I would argue that it's the latter), but in any case, the important question is whether something is a monopoly, the question is whether it's abusing monopoly power. There's an argument for the OGL crisis being that kind of thing (though the fact WotC backed down is a sign that they probably aren't actually a monopoly), but something like Drops? That's silly. Honestly, most of D&D Beyond's subscription services are an area where not only is WotC not a monopoly, they aren't even the dominant player (which is probably roll20).

Quote from Pantagruel666 >>

Quote from MaedraDawnkeeper >>

They should, at least, reduce market share to under 50%, as that constitutes a monopoly in the US & is blatantly illegal & immoral.

While the 'illegal' part has been adequately answered already, it's worth discussing the "immoral" part as well.

Fundamentally, the reason for having antitrust law is because competition encourages companies to deliver more value for the consumer's money, because if they don't, they lose market share to a competitor. This is, obviously, good for the consumer. If you're leveraging your market position to produce worse value, that's when there's a problem (current catch phrase for that: "enshittification"). There's also a problem if you're using your market position to drive out your competitors.

Is WotC immune to that sort of concern? Of course not, though it's doubtful whether they're actually in a meaningful sense a monopoly at all (are they competing with other RPGs, or are they competing with entertainment products in general? I would argue that it's the latter), but in any case, the important question is whether something is a monopoly, the question is whether it's abusing monopoly power. There's an argument for the OGL crisis being that kind of thing (though the fact WotC backed down is a sign that they probably aren't actually a monopoly), but something like Drops? That's silly. Honestly, most of D&D Beyond's subscription services are an area where not only is WotC not a monopoly, they aren't even the dominant player (which is probably roll20).

 I edited my post to clean up that.

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

Quote from hollowtpm >>

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

This is was my idea I suggested earlier:

 "...I'd like to see more books more often, even if on the thinner side, w/smaller art & more lore for more things(that is always required to go through intense sensitivity consultation & continuity checks)"

Quote from hollowtpm >>

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

 
Pdfs of the books. Easy 'nuff.

Quote from Gnomarchy >>

Quote from hollowtpm >>

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

 
Pdfs of the books. Easy 'nuff.

 Some suit or investor would demand they be copy-proofed in some way. Big Entertainment want everything copy-proofed.

The easiest solution would have to come with some convoluted DRM to make sure hypothetical lost infinite profit from copied PDFs isn't lost.

Quote from hollowtpm >>

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

 To be frank, for a significant portion of the perpetual complainers there's nothing Wizards of the Coast can do to make them happy. Many of the demands the perpetual complainers have made have been met, and they don't stop. Musing about what more WotC should do to curry favor with that crowd is a wasted effort. They'll never be happy with changes, new products, or value adds for subscriptions because they don't have realistic expectations or reasons for vilifying Wizards of the Coast and their products.

Right now Dungeons & Dragons is still the most popular and profitable it's ever been. Most of their customers aren't in here drumming up toxicity. Honestly I don't believe the ROI is there to justify chasing the problematic crowd who continually demonstrate they won't be happy with anything WotC does.

EDIT to add: WotC has been burned by piracy enough that I doubt they'll ever do PDFs. The problem isn't WotC, it's either the pirates or capitalism in general, take your pick.

Quote from ApplePaladin >>

Quote from hollowtpm >>

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

 To be frank, for a significant portion of the perpetual complainers there's nothing Wizards of the Coast can do to make them happy. Many of the demands the perpetual complainers have made have been met, and they don't stop. Musing about what more WotC should do to curry favor with that crowd is a wasted effort. They'll never be happy with changes, new products, or value adds for subscriptions because they don't have realistic expectations or reasons for vilifying Wizards of the Coast and their products.

Right now Dungeons & Dragons is still the most popular and profitable it's ever been. Most of their customers aren't in here drumming up toxicity. Honestly I don't believe the ROI is there to justify chasing the problematic crowd who continually demonstrate they won't be happy with anything WotC does.

EDIT to add: WotC has been burned by piracy enough that I doubt they'll ever do PDFs. The problem isn't WotC, it's either the pirates or capitalism in general, take your pick.

 IMO, the problem is suits running a toy & game company like a Silicon Valley start-up to please the hungry howling void that is shareholders, & corporations having more rights & protections than regular people in the US due to a century+ of rigged courts, not capitalism inherently.

Quote from MaedraDawnkeeper >>

 

This is was my idea I suggested earlier:

 "...I'd like to see more books more often, even if on the thinner side, w/smaller art & more lore for more things(that is always required to go through intense sensitivity consultation & continuity checks)"

 That sounds a bit like what they did in earlier editions, when they made splat books, which didn’t really work. Some of the problems could be fixable, like balancing the various supplements and combinations against each other. 
But others are more challenging. For example, making lots of settings splits the market, so instead of D&D players, there were spelljammer players, dark sun players, etc. 

And as far as books, when they were developing 5e, they found most people buy 3 books. Ever. The PHB and maybe 2 others. That’s why this edition has a much slower release schedule.

Granted, that’s from like 20 years ago, back when print was the only option. Lots of things have changed. Could be things that didn’t work then might work now. But that’s generally why they’ve ceded things like setting books and super-specific subclass options to 3rd party publishers. 

Quote from MaedraDawnkeeper >>

Quote from Gnomarchy >>

Quote from hollowtpm >>

I find it funny though that many of the voices here who are saying WoTC is the issue, or along those lines chose to not engage with my actual purpose of the post

Share ideas for the company to make money and make those people who are upset at how they made money happy.

If people are unhappy instead of complaining, I wanted to also bring a space to promote and engage in the solution. Part of identifying a problem is also helping to find the solution.

Hence why when stated that the problem is WoTC owning more than 50% of the market, I asked how to make it so they do not and are still making a goof profit - That is the kind of discourse we need to help the "corporate" side of this Hobby. Yes we the community own D&D in the sense, but frankly I want both 3rd party and WoTC to be profitable so I can keep spending my money on their things. I like buying premade stuff and tweaking it, so I would like to see their ideas work. Not just be shut down as "money grabbing."

 
Pdfs of the books. Easy 'nuff.

 Some suit or investor would demand they be copy-proofed in some way. Big Entertainment want everything copy-proofed.

The easiest solution would have to come with some convoluted DRM to make sure hypothetical lost infinite profit from copied PDFs isn't lost.

Yeah, they're kinda funny about not wanting anyone with access to a file-sharing site to start distributing their property for free. Such an irrational position...

Quote from The_Ace_of_Rogues >>

Yeah, they're kinda funny about not wanting anyone with access to a file-sharing site to start distributing their property for free. Such an irrational position...

Pretty sure the last straw on pdf distribution was when 4th edition was pirated and released on the internet... before it was even in the stores.

Yeah, that's what they call a "case in point argument", I believe.

It's disappointing that sarcasm and snark continue to overshadow good-faith arguments and attempts to find solutions. I'll remind this thread that nearly every other ttrpg publisher successfully sells pdfs. There are viable alternatives that preserve ownership and avoid the risks inherent in subscription-based access. I'm done with the bickering.

Quote from Gnomarchy >>

It's disappointing that sarcasm and snark continue to overshadow good-faith arguments and attempts to find solutions. I'll remind this thread that nearly every other ttrpg publisher successfully sells pdfs. There are viable alternatives that preserve ownership and avoid the risks inherent in subscription-based access. I'm done with the bickering.

I'll remind you that D&D has an extremely generous online content sharing feature that costs less than a typical fast food meal per month. D&D has strong objective evidence that using PDFs can hurt them big time. Plus, consider that pretty much every other TTRPG publisher has only a fraction of the market following that D&D does, which makes piracy less attractive to those who would carry it out and less damaging to the company since it will likely hit a much smaller portion of their bottom line. WotC demonstrably has legitimate concerns about what will happen to file copies of their intellectual property, and they have allowed and then adopted an extremely effective and accessible alternative method. Speaking of arguing in good faith, I'd suggest people might wish to consider acknowledging that PDFs are not the be-all-end-all of electronic TTRPG media.

So, overall:

PDFs:Good idea, but not for the people w/decision-making powers.

Now, as for other good ideas...

Improving the internal content of books to sell more units!

I think more lore in books is a reasonable thing at this point, w/both heavy continuity & sensitivity checks that complement each other. It'd sell more physical books w/more to read.

Likewise, releases having more suggestions for how to reflavor content in a book for games outside of the setting it's sold in/with would help people feel more comfortable adding a book to their collection. Setting lock is a real feeling people get with supplementary material, so a guide to reasonably undoing just that would help a lot. The same system of heavy continuity & sensitivity checks that complement each other would be a boon here as well.

Quote from MaedraDawnkeeper>>

So, overall:

PDFs:Good idea, but not for the people w/decision-making powers.

No, bad idea because the size of the target audience makes it a ripe target for abuse of such an easily copied and disseminated medium. Please keep in mind that the net effect of large scale piracy is to hurt the quality of future products, since the company both won't be making as much money to turn back around into future development and investors will either be turned off altogether or reasonably advocate that the company allocate funds into avenues that generate larger- or even positive, if it gets bad enough- returns. I realize it's in vogue to get all high and mighty about how morally bankrupt it is for companies to focus on making profits, but the funny thing is that companies or divisions thereof that fail to stay in the black end up literally bankrupt instead, which isn't really conducive to keeping product lines alive.

I have had knives pulled on me in the 90's -00's because I let women and PoC play at my table only to get called a fascist for bad mouthing a business decision I see as greedy. No wonder I have talked in these less and less.    

I would love to have a nuanced discussion on business strategies and what i saw working but really don't have the energy for it, because it goes toxic instantly, and it isn't just the dissatisfied who are rabble rousers. The ones who like it the way it is are just as Rabble rousing and free with baseless accusations as their opposition. 
Bane's body odor, we had people implying that anyone using "5.5" instead of 5E2024 was a secret racist trying to start editions wars. 

We can't even have discussion on how to do things without making people mad, because mad seems to be the default, Pro or Con any issue. That is the sad reality.

Bothsidesism is gross false equivalence and unproductive in serious conversation. Calling the updated 2024 ruleset 5.5 in 2024 was a dogwhistle and it was rooted in attempts to start edition wars and some of the people driving that activity were doing it because they were upset WotC was continuing the removal of racist stereotypes that they started back with Monsters of the Multiverse. There's no pretending those facts aren't facts.

New leadership at WotC decided only recently to adopt the 5.5 language for multiple reasons (not least of which is how awkward it was referring to everything released in 2025 and 2026 as 2024 products). But notice that there weren't cheers of joy for the 5.5 naming convention folks getting what they wanted. The perpetually angry crowd just kept being perpetually angry and re-litigating old issues. Oh, and they also got mad that WotC adopted the 5.5 naming convention after not adopting it earlier. As I've said several times now, there's no winning for WotC in regards to chasing after that crowd because nothing they do will make that crowd happy. They can only dig themselves deeper into a position of being resented by that crowd. When it comes to the extremely vocal, terminally online haters, Wizards of the Coast is trapped in zugzwang.

Meanwhile, the rest of us - the majority of their customers - can be critical of the occasional fumble but are otherwise happy with the products, services, and business decisions from Wizards of the Coast. When it comes to the Drops I don't even see anything to be mad about for my own sake, because as a longtime subscriber I'm already paying and now I'm getting additional stuff without paying additional money. From my point of view it's extremely difficult to argue WotC is being greedy by giving me more stuff without charging me more money. I've got practically every streaming service upping their subscription rates, and practically every SaaS application also upping subscriptions and shoehorning AI functionality no one wants into their products. WotC adding more content without increasing prices feels a lot like a value add to me. But just because I'm copacetic with the Drops doesn't me I - and the majority of content customers like me - are going to be toxic with the people who are complaining. Mostly I'm seeing folks who are happy with the Drops content offering helpful advice like "make homebrew copies to share with your players" to the folks who are grumbling. It's more than a stretch to call that toxic just to make a tortured "both sides are bad" argument in bad faith.

Quote from The_Ace_of_Rogues >>

Quote from MaedraDawnkeeper>>

So, overall:

PDFs:Good idea, but not for the people w/decision-making powers.

 

No, bad idea because the size of the target audience makes it a ripe target for abuse of such an easily copied and disseminated medium. Please keep in mind that the net effect of large scale piracy is to hurt the quality of future products, since the company both won't be making as much money to turn back around into future development and investors will either be turned off altogether or reasonably advocate that the company allocate funds into avenues that generate larger- or even positive, if it gets bad enough- returns. I realize it's in vogue to get all high and mighty about how morally bankrupt it is for companies to focus on making profits, but the funny thing is that companies or divisions thereof that fail to stay in the black end up literally bankrupt instead, which isn't really conducive to keeping product lines alive.

 Virtually every other tabletop RPG sells their books in PDF format without any issues of piracy harming them in any major scale.  There's nothing special about D&D that would cause it to be different in that respect.