Quote from _mrfuller82003_ >>

WOTC just paid out $146 million and took on DDB's 80 employees. After doing this, you guys think that Hasbro (a FOR PROFIT company) will now start giving away all of the digital content for free? LOL.  

 "for free" doesn't mean what you think it does.

WOTC+D&Dbeyond has been leaving money on the table for YEARS, since there are quite a lot of people who would like to buy books both online and physical, but not for twice the price.

So you have people like me (who buys most of the books physical but uses a free D&Dbeyond account since paid wouldn't get me much), and people like my GM who buys almost no books on paper but buys almost all of them electronically, using the "master" account to share the content out among multiple campaigns.  

Change the model to encourage paying for physical books and for online and suddenly, more people would bridge the divide, giving them more money overall (quite a lot more money, actually, especially if it was tied to a sub).

That's cool

Maybe now we can get some features working properly.  Looking at you Aberrant Mind sorcerer....

Not excited. Get ready for subscribers only content, microtransactions, and skyrocketing subscription rates.

so, if i bought mah physical book.

WHERE'S MY DIGITAL?

Makes sense and brings certainty re the transition to the next version. It will be interesting to see how this affects WotC's business model.

Well, here is hoping DnDb implements UA again.

Congratulations D&DBeyond. Keep it up!

Seems some people have lost the plot a bit here.

Some facts to remember.

1) Dndbeyond =/= a pdf

2) The closest 'bit' that is like a simple pdf is buying the compendium only option, and that is already not the same price as a hardcopy (*)

3) If you have 'brought it twice', with the full access option, you are buying all the intergration. Last time I checked a physical book couldn't do all that.

(*) If there are realistic arguments to be made for a 'digital code' it would be to get the compendium only option.

I could be wrong but it seems highly unlikely that WOTC will just give you a load of extra stuff free, remember its very much not free to them. So if they did they would need to cover those costs in the physical book price, would it be fair for non-dndbeyond users to be subsidising dndbeyond users?

I love DnD Beyond, so convenient, but the ONLY thing that was holding it back from perfection is the fact I had to buy the digital copies of the hard book copies I’ve owned for years. I understood it was because DnD Beyond and Wizards were separate companies. But now…please…this would be a game changer if I could redeem all my books to online versions. Congratulations to both!

Quote from FrozenLogurt >>

I love DnD Beyond, so convenient, but the ONLY thing that was holding it back from perfection is the fact I had to buy the digital copies of the hard book copies I’ve owned for years. I understood it was because DnD Beyond and Wizards were separate companies. But now…please…this would be a game changer if I could redeem all my books to online versions. Congratulations to both!

 They're still separate companies, it's just the Mother company that is now the same.

To all the people asking for Hard Cover to Digital freebies, answer this, how would you differentiate legitimate owners, and people who CLAIM to own Hard Covers and don't just go into a shop and take a picture of the barcode on the back of the book with their phone as "proof of ownership" ?  

Also, when was the last time you went into a bookstore, picked up a copy of your favourite authors new novel, and then magically received a copy of it on Kindle?

Could they include 1-time codes in physical book purchases going forward, absolutely, but not retroactively.

Quote from Orolmy >>

To all the people asking for Hard Cover to Digital freebies, answer this, how would you differentiate legitimate owners, and people who CLAIM to own Hard Covers and don't just go into a shop and take a picture of the barcode on the back of the book with their phone as "proof of ownership" ?  

Also, when was the last time you went into a bookstore, picked up a copy of your favourite authors new novel, and then magically received a copy of it on Kindle?

 You realize that including a one time use code in a physical book for a digital copy has been doable for over a decade now, right?

Quote from SaltMage57 >>

 You realize that including a one time use code in a physical book for a digital copy has been doable for over a decade now, right?

 And are any of those one-time codes in the DnD hard-covers currently...?

Quote from SaltMage57 >>

Quote from Orolmy >>

To all the people asking for Hard Cover to Digital freebies, answer this, how would you differentiate legitimate owners, and people who CLAIM to own Hard Covers and don't just go into a shop and take a picture of the barcode on the back of the book with their phone as "proof of ownership" ?  

Also, when was the last time you went into a bookstore, picked up a copy of your favourite authors new novel, and then magically received a copy of it on Kindle?

 You realize that including a one time use code in a physical book for a digital copy has been doable for over a decade now, right?

 Think back a little. DnD books printed before the merger, the ones everyone claims to own, do they have codes printed inside currently that state proof of purchase or link to a page to verify it? From memory they do not. Now moving forward with new books printed they might have these types of code for some content, probably compendium writing, or a major discount for tool sets. However, much like people are saying, how would you plan to PROVE you own these books already instead of just CLAIMING to own them. Do you still have your receipts from a purchase in store or from amazon delivering the book? If this is the case MAYBE this system can be used. However, most people throw away the receipts and such seeing them as pointless paper. The conclusion is there is no way to port the pre-merger books over without severe risk of piracy and fraud. Honor system has been destroyed by pirates and the like, few companies looking to make a profit would go this route. Best option would be to buy physical/digital bundles moving forward, which is buying the books twice maybe three times in technicality. As stated the only way to appease all groups is to add codes in moving forward maybe for the toolset (character creator options, encounter builder, cr tracker, map maker(maybe?), etc.). We live in a world where most people's solution is literally piracy which causes the issues for any ACTUAL solution in which getting a digital and physical together looks like a bad plan. This is what gets music sharing companies shutdown, or rent a movie places (people pay cheap then copy/burn and send info). The amount of times I look on a subreddit and hear the solution is to "look up free PDFs" I honestly get a little nauseous that CRIME is the first and primary solution. I understand monetary issues truly, buying content multiple times feels weird and kind of like a scam. But there is a necessity now, a merger has happened with more available in both player and DM hands. Getting digital copies saves the hassle, hyper link to where info is, quick auto rolls, all features laid out and initiative tracker to avoid skipping in combat. As said, if we want codes they would have to be in any reprinted books moving forward just to avoid an honor system abuse. I guess the short answer is, you will need to do a secondary purchase. 

Please PLEASE have some sort of deal that lets us buy physical books and use them on DDB - it's what everyone wants.

As nice as that would be Zoken44 i am not sure it is doable from a practical standpoint. Going forward perhaps but not retroactively. 

Quote from Bagel_Bear >>

Quote from SordidEuphemism >>

Does this mean we'll see hardcovers with discount codes for the online books? It'd go a long way!

 

Or just a code to redeem for the digital book not a discount!

 Wondering the same.

Quote from SordidEuphemism >>

Let's say I pay 40 bucks for the physical BOOK_OF_STUFF. DDB also has B_O_S available online - I can buy the text, or I can buy the text AND integration into the toolset. If I've bought the physical book, I'm suggesting the text be free, and the integration be a small fee.

 That's a really great idea!

Does this mean we'll finally be able to access expansions we own physical copies of within dnd beyond? because that's been a major hurdle for me being able to use that content in online campaigns.