# D&D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]



## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## seebs (Sep 21, 2017)

Wow, I'm impressed. At a cost of multiple years of delays and tens of thousands of dollars, they've made a thing that doesn't remotely address any of my reasons for wanting PDFs. That's brilliant!


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## Nikosandros (Sep 21, 2017)

I'm a bit confused by the Kindle part. It seems that it is an proprietary app for iOS and Android. Is it somehow related to Amazon? Or is the article using "Kindle" as a synonym of electronic book with text re-flow on a proprietary app?


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## ArwensDaughter (Sep 21, 2017)

It's odd to me that there's no link (in the Mashable article) to an official WOTC announcement.  
If this is accurate, it is an interesting/puzzling choice given that DnD Beyond is working on apps for iOS and Android that would do this and more.


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

By this time everyone who wants a PDF has one.  The market who was more than willing to give them money passed them by.


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## Mercule (Sep 21, 2017)

ArwensDaughter said:


> It's odd to me that there's no link (in the Mashable article) to an official WOTC announcement.
> If this is accurate, it is an interesting/puzzling choice given that DnD Beyond is working on apps for iOS and Android that would do this and more.



This was my thought, exactly. Unless they're somehow speaking of the same app (which I don't think), this is very, very bizarre.


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## DEFCON 1 (Sep 21, 2017)

Emirikol Prime said:


> By this time everyone who wants a PDF has one.  The market who was more than willing to give them money passed them by.




Right.  And they don't care, they didn't want your money.  Why does that upset you?

I mean, if you have a PDF of the D&D books at this point (however you acquired them) and yet still have this undying need to give WotC money for it... then why not just go to the store and buy another set of books, then donate them to your local library or something?  Then you get to feel good TWICE!  Once for "paying" WotC for your PDF, then again for helping out other people who might not have the possibility of buying the books themselves.


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## Nikosandros (Sep 21, 2017)

ArwensDaughter said:


> It's odd to me that there's no link (in the Mashable article) to an official WOTC announcement.
> If this is accurate, it is an interesting/puzzling choice given that DnD Beyond is working on apps for iOS and Android that would do this and more.




Maybe the article is actually referring (in a confusing way) to the apps that D&D Beyond has announced?


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## JRedmond (Sep 21, 2017)

I feel like they're clueless and it's referring to D&D Beyond.  Otherwise it seems like an odd decision.


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## Hollow Man (Sep 21, 2017)

It sure sounds like these are the apps for D&D Beyond (some of it is free, pieces are a few bucks each, a whole book is $30, price decreases if you bought pieces previously).

-HM


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## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## AriochQ (Sep 21, 2017)

So buy a physical book, buy D and D Beyond, and buy the same material a third time for the reader app. What a deal! (sarcasm)


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## TDarien (Sep 21, 2017)

I'm about 90% positive this is about the D&D Beyond apps, especially since the pricing model is exactly the same.  Makes zero sense otherwise.


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## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Mistwell (Sep 21, 2017)

seebs said:


> Wow, I'm impressed. At a cost of multiple years of delays and tens of thousands of dollars, they've made a thing that doesn't remotely address any of my reasons for wanting PDFs. That's brilliant!




You are never going to get legal PDFs of 5e until 6e comes out. It's time to start going through those stages of grief on that issue. It's time man. Time to accept.


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## Mistwell (Sep 21, 2017)

AriochQ said:


> So buy a physical book, buy D and D Beyond, and buy the same material a third time for the reader app. What a deal! (sarcasm)




Pretty sure this IS D&D Beyond. [Edit - Ninja'ed many times]


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## ZeshinX (Sep 21, 2017)

I'll stick to the books and continue to politely ignore most attempts by WotC to embrace technology.


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## darjr (Sep 21, 2017)

IF this is really like a PDF trapped in an app? I'll consider it.


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## ArwensDaughter (Sep 21, 2017)

Nikosandros said:


> Maybe the article is actually referring (in a confusing way) to the apps that D&D Beyond has announced?




Yeah, I wondered about that.  But it's an extraordinarily poorly written article it that's the case.  Or, the author didn't know the apps were connected part of the DDB project?  If that's true, it doesn't speak well for the reliability or authenticity of the information.


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## TDarien (Sep 21, 2017)

So I just tweeted the author asking if this was different from the Beyond apps.  He said it was.  If that's the case I really don't understand it, because it then just sounds like a less useful version of the D&D Beyond Compendium.


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## doctheweasel (Sep 21, 2017)

ArwensDaughter said:


> Yeah, I wondered about that.  But it's an extraordinarily poorly written article it that's the case.  Or, the author didn't know the apps were connected part of the DDB project?  If that's true, it doesn't speak well for the reliability or authenticity of the information.




I'm more willing to believe that it is a clueless author than WotC financing development of two concurrent-yet-separate services that launch within months of and compete with each other.


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## Superchunk77 (Sep 21, 2017)

The funny thing is that almost every other RPG game company sells PDF's of their books. Are they all frothing at the mouth about PDF piracy? No, they are not. Paizo is doing just fine selling PDF's. Sure, they lose a small percentage to piracy, but their bottom line is just fine, and they are pumping out material faster than anyone really needs. 

Likewise, I'm not a fan of Green Ronin's games, but I will admit that their pre-order model for their books is pretty sweet. You get the physical book for a slightly discounted price when pre-ordering, and the option to get the PDF of that book for an extra $5.

Portable shareable digital media is only getting more popular. PDF is a fantastic format that's cross-platform compatible, shareable, printable, searchable, quickly accessible, and extremely robust. 

WotC is shooting themselves in the foot yet again with this decision.


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## Vampyr3 (Sep 21, 2017)

This is the worst article I have ever read..wow.. pointless.. tells you nothing.... 

no one knows what this is..... so why bother...


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## Morrus (Sep 21, 2017)

TDarien said:


> So I just tweeted the author asking if this was different from the Beyond apps.  He said it was.  If that's the case I really don't understand it, because it then just sounds like a less useful version of the D&D Beyond Compendium.




Interesting!


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## Vampyr3 (Sep 21, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Learn some manners. Don't post in this thread again.





Wow, so sorry I shared my opinion of this Mashable article... I thought this was a place to talk about things.. Guess I know you have to tow the line and drink the kool-aid...

Wow...... Just Wow......


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## Morrus (Sep 21, 2017)

Vampyr3 said:


> Guess I know you have to tow the line and drink the kool-aid...
> 
> Wow...... Just Wow......




You know, I was actually mistaken, and was just coming back here to apologise (I am happy to admit when I've made a mistake), but before I could you went all Captain Escalation.

Don't argue in-thread with moderation, please.  And don't refer to moderation policy as "drinking kool-aid".


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## Flexor the Mighty! (Sep 21, 2017)

TDarien said:


> So I just tweeted the author asking if this was different from the Beyond apps.  He said it was.  If that's the case I really don't understand it, because it then just sounds like a less useful version of the D&D Beyond Compendium.




So Hasbro is putting out a product to compete with...a different officially licensed product.  Good to see they have a good handle on the digital marketplace.


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## Vampyr3 (Sep 21, 2017)

TDarien said:


> So I just tweeted the author asking if this was different from the Beyond apps. He said it was. If that's the case I really don't understand it because it then just sounds like a less useful version of the D&D Beyond Compendium.




Wow, then I don't understand what WOTC is thinking at all then..that's just crazy... I wish he MASHABLE ARTICLE would have been clearer on this, it was pretty confusing. AGIAN. I'm TALKING ABOUT THE MASHABLE ARTICLE! AND NOT THE POST-HERE. MASHABLE. NOT THIS THREAD. MASHABLE


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## Tormyr (Sep 21, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> Meh.
> 
> I'm glad for those that prefer this.
> 
> Personally, I prefer reading books. And then referring to the books during the game. And then, when someone else is wrong (because they are always wrong, and I am always right), hurling the book at them. That's how you book learn 'em.




Books kind of explode open when you throw them. Tablets are more aerodynamic and have sharp corners.


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## Chaderick (Sep 21, 2017)

I hope seebs doesn't mind, but this captures it perfectly for me: They've made a thing that doesn't remotely address any of my reasons for wanting PDFs.

I just prefer having a pdf copy of a book.  I'm capable of navigating to different sections of a pdf all by myself.

In fact, I'm quite good at it.  As complex as it might sound, I got the hang of it rather quickly.


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## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Wrathamon (Sep 21, 2017)

I think it is going to be Read all the Non-crunch for Free App ...  with a buy the Crunch if you want (but it's better to get that on D&D beyond but you dont get the fluff for free)

I dont know why people want PDF's to be honest. I find they just take up memory on my device and are not as usable at the table for quick reference as the various D&D compendium tools have been.  

I get if that is the only format to get it in ... but I rather have a interactive referenced tool and never have to buy a book or a pdf


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## Flexor the Mighty! (Sep 21, 2017)

Wrathamon said:


> I think it is going to be Read all the Non-crunch for Free App ...  with a buy the Crunch if you want (but it's better to get that on D&D beyond but you dont get the fluff for free)
> 
> I dont know why people want PDF's to be honest. I find they just take up memory on my device and are not as usable at the table for quick reference as the various D&D compendium tools have been.
> 
> I get if that is the only format to get it in ... but I rather have a interactive referenced tool and never have to buy a book or a pdf




Portability.  Many don't want to pay for something that is tied to a device or application.  I want to be able to read my PDF on my PC or phone, or tablet.  I want to pay once and then use that file on any device I own.


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## HippyCraig (Sep 21, 2017)

The iOS and Android Apps are supposed to have off line capability for DnD Beyond, why would they try to make another app that will have the same features and why would I pay for yet another digital copy.  If they did put this out it should compliment what is already bought on DnD Beyond since they can track who has a licence.  They are really late to the game.  Beside that why would you pay for just a PDF when you get the same material from DnD Beyond and get a character generator.  It not like the prices will be any cheaper.  Just doesn't make sense!


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## kenmarable (Sep 21, 2017)

"Yup. Beyond is more activity-oriented, so it can handle stuff like dice rolls. Reader is basically Kindle, with good, clear chapter divides." is actually completely wrong.

A) D&D Beyond actually does not handle any dice rolling. At all. Someone even went ahead and made a Chrome extension to do that because it's not there (but Curse does have it on their list, but there's lots of things on their list).

B) D&D Beyond compendium is very broken up by clear chapter divides. (Which I like, but I know others do not.)

In fact, *everything* the author says D&D Beyond does, it actually *does NOT do*. Everything the author says the new Reader app will do, actually D&D Beyond *already does*.


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## ArwensDaughter (Sep 21, 2017)

kenmarable said:


> "Yup. Beyond is more activity-oriented, so it can handle stuff like dice rolls. Reader is basically Kindle, with good, clear chapter divides." is actually completely wrong.
> 
> A) D&D Beyond actually does not handle any dice rolling. At all. Someone even went ahead and made a Chrome extension to do that because it's not there (but Curse does have it on their list, but there's lots of things on their list).
> 
> ...




Where did you find the author's comments on DnD Beyond?  Did I miss a link?

DDB does have a dice roller in the forums, but not in the character creator or on the character sheet.  Maybe that's what the author is thinking of?


Sent from my iPad using EN World mobile app


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## Morrus (Sep 21, 2017)

ArwensDaughter said:


> Where did you find the author's comments on DnD Beyond?  Did I miss a link?




In the article up there ^.


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## kenmarable (Sep 21, 2017)

Looking around some more, Polygon has a slightly better article on it, with details including it being built by Dialect that does Dragon+ and that the Polygon author tried a (buggy) beta.

So, you get:

- You can swipe to turn pages (so actually doesn't flow like Kindle)
- You can bookmark stuff

Whereas with D&D Beyond and Fantasy Grounds, for the same exact price you get:

- Character builders
- Community homebrewed content (not familiar with FG, but DDB handles monsters, spells, and magic items with more on the way)
- FG is a full VTT with all maps fog of war'ed and NPCs/Monsters tokened
- DDB has filterable and advanced searches
- FG can be used on any desktop or laptop
- DDB can be used on any device with a web browser (!)
- All web browsers can handle their own bookmarking
- etc.

So really, for apparently the same price you can get far fewer features that you can only use on mobile devices but at least you can swipe to turn pages??? I can really only see this working because it takes very little effort from Dialect to make this, so they need very few sales to be profitable. But unless there's some really amazing features they are going to add to their Beta before "sometime this Fall", I can't see this getting much more than very few sales. 

If you are considering this because you want to spend money on an electronic version of the books (and don't want a VTT), spend the same amount at DDB and get far more for your money.


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## Charles Rampant (Sep 21, 2017)

I have to say that if Wizards are bringing out a new app - rather than this being confused chat about DDB - they're going to sink like a stone. They've already covered the entire market with their collaborators.


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## Morrus (Sep 21, 2017)

Article updated with the new info (thanks [MENTION=40359]kenmarable[/MENTION])!


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## ArwensDaughter (Sep 21, 2017)

Morrus said:


> In the article up there ^.




Ah. It wasn't part of the enworld article/first post when I read it. 


Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app


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## bmfrosty (Sep 21, 2017)

kenmarable said:


> So really, for apparently the same price you can get far fewer features that you can only use on mobile devices but at least you can swipe to turn pages??? I can really only see this working because it takes very little effort from Dialect to make this, so they need very few sales to be profitable. But unless there's some really amazing features they are going to add to their Beta before "sometime this Fall", I can't see this getting much more than very few sales.
> 
> If you are considering this because you want to spend money on an electronic version of the books (and don't want a VTT), spend the same amount at DDB and get far more for your money.




I agree with you on the preferences here, but frankly, happy to let the market sort this out.  Fantasy Grounds probably has better features that D&D Beyond, but when I tried it out, I just didn't like it.  Am happy and fairly jazzed with with D&D Beyond, and happy with the direction that it's taking.

For some people it may be a big deal for them to get official content in a PDF similar format in an official and updated manner.


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## barasawa (Sep 21, 2017)

IOS or Android app for essentially pdfs/ebooks of the physical books we already have for the price that's close to being the same as the actual hardcover books!  Oh, and you can buy the parts of the book piecemeal. 
No discount for current book owners either. 

The only thing good I see about this is that you can get an electronic version that's been professionally done, though limited to it's own special reader app, and it's an official version. 

(ianal) Of course, years ago the courts declared that media shifting for your own personal use was legal. Sharing that with someone else still isn't as that's considered distributing. But if you own the book, and somehow acquire a pdf or ebook or whatever of that same book, as long as you own the actual book (no trading it in or anything), then you can legally have media shifted copy. Of course if for some reason you call down the wrath of copyright lawyers, that won't help you in court as they have way more persistence than we have money to fight them off with.

Then there's the PC users that are left out in the dust. Well, it's not a perfect solution, but you can run Android Apps on your PC using programs like Andy. ( https://www.andyroid.net/ )  There are lots of others out there, but Andy is free, and in my opinion has beaten all the others I've tried, even paid versions and a couple that are in android devkits.  So you have a number of choices for this option, I just listed my favorite.  

Overall, I think this a definitely not worth the price from what few details we have, and am very doubtful it can ever be worth that kind of price in the first place. Though I will admit that I want it, and it can be useful for gaming, though with some people, letting them use electronics at the table is a big no-no. (More than once I've heard a GM declare things like, "<player name> Stop texting or I'm going to break your phone!", or other things to convey that same idea.)

I'll give it a pass until they either drop it's price significantly, or give a big discount to us loyal gamers that already own those 3 books.


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## Blue (Sep 21, 2017)

Let me know when I can run this on my desktop and cut-n-paste for session preparation.


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## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Blue (Sep 21, 2017)

barasawa said:


> (ianal) Of course, years ago the courts declared that media shifting for your own personal use was legal. Sharing that with someone else still isn't as that's considered distributing. But if you own the book, and somehow acquire a pdf or ebook or whatever of that same book, as long as you own the actual book (no trading it in or anything), then you can legally have media shifted copy.




IANAL either, but my understanding was that you could media shift your OWN copy only.  So it's not legal to pirate a PDF even if you own the source in a different format, but it is legal to scan your own copy for your own use only.  And even then there might be issues with derivative works if you add functionality like bookmarks.

Of course, taking legal advice from someone like me on the internet is worth what you pay for it.


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## Jester David (Sep 21, 2017)

I expected WotC would go the dedicated reader app route. I'm just surprised by the delay. Finding a partner was likely part of the issue. This was almost certainly planned to be a part of the Dungeonscape app, before that agreement fell apart. And - as has been commented on by several other licence partners - working out an agreement with WotC is slow. 


I am torn on this. 


I like reading PDFs. They're easier to sit down and read than an app, working your way cover to cover. Especially on my iPad at work, or at conventions when I don't want to bring my whole library. But I do like just reading a book better. When given the choice (and the book isn't a collector's edition, like _Volo's Guide to Monsters_ I'll go with the book. (And since I often read before bed, books lead to a better sleep than reading off a screen.)
However, having tried using both Pathfinder PDFs and a Pathfinder fan app, in play the latter is far superior. Apps just make the game run smoother. Especially if it can contain the contents of multiple books, so you don't need to correctly guess the source like a PDF. And just having the text and quick loading speed eases the pain of looking something up during play. The problem with my PFRD app was that it was a single purchase app and the creator burned out under the wave of Paizo content and stopped updating...


Is this tied to D&D Beyond. It'd be nice if it was the same account so you only need to buy that digital access once.


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## bmfrosty (Sep 21, 2017)

barasawa said:


> Then there's the PC users that are left out in the dust. Well, it's not a perfect solution, but you can run Android Apps on your PC using programs like Andy. ( https://www.andyroid.net/ )  There are lots of others out there, but Andy is free, and in my opinion has beaten all the others I've tried, even paid versions and a couple that are in android devkits.  So you have a number of choices for this option, I just listed my favorite.



I'd probably wager a dollar or two that if successful there will eventually be a windows app available on the windows app store.


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> Right.  And they don't care, they didn't want your money.  Why does that upset you?
> 
> I mean, if you have a PDF of the D&D books at this point (however you acquired them) and yet still have this undying need to give WotC money for it... then why not just go to the store and buy another set of books, then donate them to your local library or something?  Then you get to feel good TWICE!  Once for "paying" WotC for your PDF, then again for helping out other people who might not have the possibility of buying the books themselves.




If you're going to ever reply with such snark and frankly disrespect, I'll ask you to never reply to me again.  Anything further will get you blocked.


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## Zaukrie (Sep 21, 2017)

So, different than Beyond? I don't get that at all. I can't see buying both of those, especially if they keep improving Beyond.


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## DEFCON 1 (Sep 21, 2017)

Emirikol Prime said:


> If you're going to ever reply with such snark and frankly disrespect, I'll ask you to never reply to me again.  Anything further will get you blocked.




You've only made 3 posts on ENWorld so far, two of which have been in this thread.  You'll need to post a lot more often for me to be affected by you blocking me.


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> You've only made 3 posts on ENWorld so far, two of which have been in this thread.  You'll need to post a lot more often for me to be affected by you blocking me.




I asked you to refrain from quoting me.   Anything further I'll count as harassment.


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## Satyrn (Sep 21, 2017)

Zaukrie said:


> So, different than Beyond? I don't get that at all. I can't see buying both of those, especially if they keep improving Beyond.




I doubt anyone's expecting anyone to buy both, just like I doubt anyone expects someone who's bought Roll20 stuff is going to buy the Fantasy Grounds stuff.


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## darjr (Sep 21, 2017)

If the app is like Dragon+ there will be a web version.


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## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## The-Magic-Sword (Sep 21, 2017)

Emirikol Prime said:


> I asked you to refrain from quoting me.   Anything further I'll count as harassment.




Hmm, that seems more than a little disproportionate considering that the worst they've done is suggest that maybe the market that already has dubious pdfs isn't the target market here? DEFCON doesn't appear to be harassing or disrespecting anyone, such a reaction seems like it's own form of gaslighting.


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## Shasarak (Sep 21, 2017)

AriochQ said:


> So buy a physical book, buy D and D Beyond, and buy the same material a third time for the reader app. What a deal! (sarcasm)




But but but it is completely different!  You just dont understand.


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

The-Magic-Sword said:


> Hmm, that seems more than a little disproportionate considering that the worst they've done is suggest that maybe the market that already has dubious pdfs isn't the target market here? DEFCON doesn't appear to be harassing or disrespecting anyone, such a reaction seems like it's own form of gaslighting.




His tone was snarky and disrespectful.   It's how I feel. Unless harassment is now under a vote.   


Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

*D&amp;D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]*



lowkey13 said:


> So ... just a note. If you are participating in a public forum, such as this one, you should expect people to engage with you, and sometimes quote you. Even people that you disagree with. Unfortunately, you do not get to dictate the terms of a public conversation. Because if someone did get to dictate the terms of conversation, it would be me, because I am awesome and always right. Alas, the rest of the world has yet to acknowledge that.
> 
> Your remedies here are very simple and easy to understand-
> 
> ...




I felt harassed.  It's not up to a vote.  
He's been blocked.  

Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app


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## lowkey13 (Sep 21, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## AriochQ (Sep 21, 2017)

On a quasi related note...after swearing I would not spend money on D&D Beyond, my son informed me he wanted his own copies of DMG and MM so he could run a group at college.  Rather than buy a second set of physical books, I took the plunge and got D&D Beyond.

I must admit, I am becoming quite attached.  With my subscription level I can allow access to 36 total players and I have gotten quite adept at looking up stuff quickly.  I especially like the search options for magic items and spells.  For example, you can search for spells that have 'bonus action' casting times.

There is a slight learning curve, but it is not that onerous.  At this point I only bring my PHB for other players when I travel to my FLGS for AL games.


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## Mercule (Sep 21, 2017)

Emirikol Prime said:


> I felt harassed.  It's not up to a vote.
> He's been blocked.



This is why we can't have nice things!

Also, having gone back and read DEFCON 1's original quote of you, I have to wonder whether you're actually ready for the internet. Even in a pretty darn welcoming place like EN World, you don't get to talk trash about pirating PDFs without being called out. Maybe I should just block folks who have a casual attitude about felonies. It makes me feel all threatened and whatnot.

Do you check under your mattress for peas before bed, Buttercup?


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

*D&amp;D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]*



Mercule said:


> This is why we can't have nice things!
> 
> Also, having gone back and read DEFCON 1's original quote of you, I have to wonder whether you're actually ready for the internet. Even in a pretty darn welcoming place like EN World, you don't get to talk trash about pirating PDFs without being called out. Maybe I should just block folks who have a casual attitude about felonies. It makes me feel all threatened and whatnot.
> 
> Do you check under your mattress for peas before bed, Buttercup?




I don't have the PDFs pirated or not.  That's why I'm still asking WotC for them to be sold. And now you're calling me names.  


Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app


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## Flexor the Mighty! (Sep 21, 2017)

Downloading a pdf of a 50 dollar book is a felony?


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## Xaelvaen (Sep 21, 2017)

AriochQ said:


> On a quasi related note...after swearing I would not spend money on D&D Beyond, my son informed me he wanted his own copies of DMG and MM so he could run a group at college.  Rather than buy a second set of physical books, I took the plunge and got D&D Beyond.
> 
> I must admit, I am becoming quite attached.  With my subscription level I can allow access to 36 total players and I have gotten quite adept at looking up stuff quickly.  I especially like the search options for magic items and spells.  For example, you can search for spells that have 'bonus action' casting times.
> 
> There is a slight learning curve, but it is not that onerous.  At this point I only bring my PHB for other players when I travel to my FLGS for AL games.




I use a projector at my tables to cast digital maps onto the table, and that's how we play D&D.  When I found out D&D Beyond has hi-res digital maps for the adventures, I pretty much buy the 'core' books in physical form, and all the campaign books on Beyond, for the simple reason I no longer have to hand-make the maps for table-top play.

As far as a separate reader app, as huge of a fan as WoTC as I am, I just can't really see the logic in that sort of competition on D&D Beyond, especially once the off-line functioning apps launch.


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## Mercule (Sep 21, 2017)

Emirikol Prime said:


> By this time everyone who wants a PDF has one.  The market who was more than willing to give them money passed them by.






Emirikol Prime said:


> I don't have the PDFs pirated or not.  That's why I'm still asking WotC for them to be sold.



It's as much being flip about it as DEFCON 1's post was snarky.

Really, though, this isn't worth much of a conversation. Your sense of entitlement amuses me, though.


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## Emirikol Prime (Sep 21, 2017)

*D&amp;D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]*



Mercule said:


> It's as much being flip about it as DEFCON 1's post was snarky.
> 
> Really, though, this isn't worth much of a conversation. Your sense of entitlement amuses me, though.




I would have thought the sad face would have shown my tone.  It's a damn shame.  And I'm not entitled to anything so please don't attribute that to me.  


Asking a company for a product isn't entitled.  

Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app


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## Mercule (Sep 21, 2017)

Flexor the Mighty! said:


> Downloading a pdf of a 50 dollar book is a felony?



IANAL, but I believe it is. US IP laws are pretty draconian.

Which really sucks, since the original intent of copyright and patent was to give a window of incentive to putting ideas into the common domain. But... that's probably an open door to politics, which would be bad. I'll just say that I'm not a fan of our current IP laws.


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## Lidgar (Sep 21, 2017)

View attachment 88844


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## rknop (Sep 21, 2017)

This offering is ridiculous, and is nothing like a PDF.  A PDF you can use on whatever device you want, using whatever reader you want.

Also, to those who say everybody who wants a PDF has it: not me.  In fact, the lack of legal (and, ideally, reasonably priced) PDFs is the reason I haven't even purchased a 5e Player's Handbook.  I probably would have picked up the core three books by now IF I thought I could get a PDF.  (Ideally, for free with the book as you can for so many companies nowadays.  If not that, then at a reduced price, as you can from Paizo.)  Since I knew I couldn't get legal PDFs, I have not even seriously looked at the 5e books.

If I thought I could get them, I would have bought the books.

And, yeah, I know that just because there's no legal way to get a D&D PDF, that doesn't mean there is no way to get a D&D PDF.  But, WOTC's utter cluelessness on this matter has made me not a customer.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 21, 2017)

AriochQ said:


> So buy a physical book, buy D and D Beyond, and buy the same material a third time for the reader app. What a deal! (sarcasm)



No kidding. 

Oh... you forgot ROll20 and Fantasy Grounds versions.  It's a pity that there's no "s" in their abbreviation, because it's quite obviously Wizard$ of the Co$t with all the "a generous opportunity to buy things multiple times." I've already had to replace the PHB5E due to the binding coming loose. By comparison I have 2E books that are still quite functional despite being over 20 years old and seeing equally as much use for a large part of that time.


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## Xaelvaen (Sep 21, 2017)

Then don't buy them multiple times.  I buy one copy of the media type I want it.  If people want it in multiple forms, more power to them.  It's nice to have options.


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## barasawa (Sep 21, 2017)

Thanks lowkey13, but the articles I saw said specifically "media shifting" as they were talking about changing it from one form of media to another. After all, format shifting would included various different file types, and I suspect pull in some other meanings that lawyers like to use. 
I'm not talking backups, I'm specifically talking about making things you own that you need to use on some different type of media. For instance, an audio recording into braille, or the reverse of that - a physical book into audio, a cd into a computer file for an ipod or other portable device, etc.  Most of the examples they used were obviously intended for those with disabilities, but they weren't restricted to that and included a lot of others. It's part of what was considered "fair use" by the court.  Backups are a whole different discussion. 

Of course other countries have different rules. I forgot to account for those outside the USA. Sorry about that.  

The laws don't prevent you from converting it to a different media, though they do prevent you from breaking any DRM except in some vary restrictive cases, but books don't have DRM.  They do however prevent you from sharing those personal media shifted copies with anyone else. Though there is nothing legally wrong with you having it, and the law doesn't make a distinction as to who made it, just who 'distributed' it. 

Wow, you have an ISP that spies on what you do on the net?  Get a new ISP. Sure, that won't help you if the cops are after you, but damn, they should keep their nose out of your business if there's no legal warrant involved.


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## barasawa (Sep 21, 2017)

Blue said:


> IANAL either, but my understanding was that you could media shift your OWN copy only.  So it's not legal to pirate a PDF even if you own the source in a different format, but it is legal to scan your own copy for your own use only.  And even then there might be issues with derivative works if you add functionality like bookmarks.
> 
> Of course, taking legal advice from someone like me on the internet is worth what you pay for it.




Haven't heard anything in that mentioned about adding functionality, but as you don't share your own personal copy with anyone, I did mention that, I'd guess it's a moot point. After all, adding bookmarks or hyperlinks in it would be like writing notes, putting in page markers, and postit notes/tags in a book, so I'd think it would fall under fair use. Again, as I stated, you still can't share it with anyone. 

The articles I read on it when that decision was made, didn't say anything about how YOU obtained the file. Just the legality of owning it, and that you were allowed to obtain it, even if someone else made it. The court recognized that many people that would need or use this ability, don't have the ability to do so themselves. Of course, there apparently wasn't anything to protect the person making it for you, so they are still liable for distributing, and if DRM had to be broken, something books don't have, they were up the creek for that as well.  

I agree about the legal advice thing. I wouldn't go so far as to call this legal advice as ianal.   On the other hand, I have been reading the news on lots of things related to this since they've started that nightmare of the DMCA.  By the way, the copyright industry speads a lot of flat out lies and halftruths over what actually is legal or not, so a lot of people have been bamboozled by them. Of course, even if you do something totally legal, it doesn't stop them from throwing frivolous lawsuits at you until you crumble. Watched a case where Sony sued a software company for the exact same thing 4 or 5 times in a row, losing every single time. When they filed that last lawsuit, the guys just had to finally give up, they had no money left to mount a defense. Sony got what it wanted because our system is screwed up even though they were wrong. It happens.


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## barasawa (Sep 21, 2017)

bmfrosty said:


> I'd probably wager a dollar or two that if successful there will eventually be a windows app available on the windows app store.




If it's successful, and they get enough requests for it, I wouldn't be surprised. 
Of course the company has done some pretty boneheaded moves before when it comes to anything electronic, so who knows. 
All in all, I'd like it on the PC, at a reasonable price, but that might be years, so if you must do PC, there are ways. 
I'm guessing that Macs have a way of running those as well, but not being a mac person I just don't know.


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## EthanSental (Sep 21, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> No kidding.
> 
> Oh... you forgot ROll20 and Fantasy Grounds versions.  It's a pity that there's no "s" in their abbreviation, because it's quite obviously Wizard$ of the Co$t with all the "a generous opportunity to buy things multiple times." I've already had to replace the PHB5E due to the binding coming loose. By comparison I have 2E books that are still quite functional despite being over 20 years old and seeing equally as much use for a large part of that time.




Hopefully you contacted WoTC and got the boom replaced for you.  I haven't had any problems...knock on woods... with my books but my pathfinder core book ha the binding issue.


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## lkj (Sep 21, 2017)

It does seem like there's a very large overlap with DDB. Well, at least eventually, when DDB release their app. It does seem like DDB will offer all of this, but with more functionality.

I can only think they might feel it appeals to a different audience. There are folks that just have no desire to sign into a service that has all these other bells and whistles. They just want their ebook and that's it.

And it's quite possible that audience is pretty large. That would explain it. To me anyway.

AD


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 21, 2017)

Wrathamon said:


> I dont know why people want PDF's to be honest. I find they just take up memory on my device and are not as usable at the table for quick reference as the various D&D compendium tools have been.



If you have to travel with a library of books, it's very helpful to have PDF versions for a tablet. They're not as friendly as books, but at least they're present.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 21, 2017)

EthanSental said:


> Hopefully you contacted WoTC and got the boom replaced for you.  I haven't had any problems...knock on woods... with my books but my pathfinder core book ha the binding issue.



Yeah they basically told me to go howl because the book fell apart at 2 years, which was past their "replace by" date. The new one's no great shakes, either, and it's only a year old. I bought it at a hefty discount online, though. I'm not really sure I should bother contacting them. Have people actually had luck getting something out of them? 

I don't expect rulebooks to stay pristine but... I have a 1E DMG that's well over 30 years old and still kicking and 2E books that are 25 years old and also still kicking. So, seriously, this used to not be a thing.


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## Morrus (Sep 21, 2017)

Different options are for different people. Nobody is asking you to buy D&D Beyond AND this D&D Reader app.

When George RR Martin's latest book comes out in hardcover, and then in softcover, you're not being forced to buy the same content twice. You buy it once in the format you prefer. And if you want it in two formats, cool. 

It's better that these options exist than that these options do not exist. What are people suggesting? That the product not be allowed to exist because they personally don't want it?

The very existence of a product you do not want is not an evil. I don't want a Mini Cooper, but I'm not on BMW's forums (is it them who make them now?) chastising them for creating the thing. I also have the audiobook versions of some novels I own. And I have DVDs of some old VHS tapes, and for some reason own_ Aliens _in four(!) formats.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 21, 2017)

Xaelvaen said:


> Then don't buy them multiple times.  I buy one copy of the media type I want it.  If people want it in multiple forms, more power to them.  It's nice to have options.



Oh I don't intend to, but it's not at all unlikely that, as gaming moves more online, that I'll be forced to. 

But saying "hey WotC this is why I'm not buying" is perfectly legit. I'm not super happy with many of the decisions they've been taking in 5E more broadly with books that seem to heavily mix player and DM content and the pile of adventure paths that seem to be all they release. It's pretty much like WotC sees cable TV style bundling as the way to go. If I felt I had an alternative game I could play---realistically given the nature of gaming groups, not theoretically as in "yes I realize there are a lot of other games out there"---I'd probably drop 5E.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 21, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Different options are for different people. Nobody is asking you to buy D&D Beyond AND this D&D Reader app.
> 
> When George RR Martin's latest book comes out in hardcover, and then in softcover, you're not being forced to buy the same content twice. You buy it once in the format you prefer. And if you want it in two formats, cool.




Certainly true. I guess rules content is rather different than a novel IMO. I don't actually need to read George RR Martin's novel to play a group-oriented game. 




> It's better that these options exist than that these options do not exist. What are people suggesting? That the product not be allowed to exist because they personally don't want it?



I think the issue is that there doesn't seem to be an appreciable discount for owning in one format or transportability across platforms. I mean, if you play two games, one on Fantasy Grounds and the other on Roll20, you're pretty much likely locked into having to buy twice. That feels very exploitative.


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## mrm1138 (Sep 21, 2017)

I would only consider using this if, add others have suggested, the app is tied to the same  marketplace as D&D Beyond. If so, it would be useful to be able to go back and forth between the two once DDB's encounter tools have been implemented. That way, I wouldn't need to navigate away from the encounter I'm running to look up a rule.


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## mrpopstar (Sep 22, 2017)

barasawa said:


> Thanks lowkey13, but the articles I saw said specifically "media shifting" as they were talking about changing it from one form of media to another. After all, format shifting would included various different file types, and I suspect pull in some other meanings that lawyers like to use.
> I'm not talking backups, I'm specifically talking about making things you own that you need to use on some different type of media. For instance, an audio recording into braille, or the reverse of that - a physical book into audio, a cd into a computer file for an ipod or other portable device, etc.  Most of the examples they used were obviously intended for those with disabilities, but they weren't restricted to that and included a lot of others. It's part of what was considered "fair use" by the court.  Backups are a whole different discussion.



In actuality, the "media shifting" that you're referring to *is* largely intended for those with physical access issues, but it does afford some wiggle room for educators and the like.



> The laws don't prevent you from converting it to a different media, though they do prevent you from breaking any DRM except in some vary restrictive cases, but books don't have DRM.  They do however prevent you from sharing those personal media shifted copies with anyone else. Though there is nothing legally wrong with you having it, and the law doesn't make a distinction as to who made it, just who 'distributed' it.



The laws *do* prevent you from converting it to a different media, they just allow for special use cases in which litigation would be unsavory (as in the case of suing a blind man for having a book "media shifted" to a braille copy).

The American Library Association is quite active on this front in terms of shaping policy.

In simplest terms: Making a copy without having copyrights is a crime. Distribution is normally where you see litigation because there is money involved (makes criminality and damages clear cut).



> Wow, you have an ISP that spies on what you do on the net?  Get a new ISP. Sure, that won't help you if the cops are after you, but damn, they should keep their nose out of your business if there's no legal warrant involved.



The MPAA and RIAA teamed up with all of the major Internet Service Providers in the United States almost a decade ago and launched the Center for Copyright Information (CCI), which involves anti-piracy monitoring and notification of rights holders.


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## Morrus (Sep 22, 2017)

mrpopstar said:


> Distribution is normally where you see litigation because there is money involved




And because it can be detected (because by definition it's visible), whereas you copying stuff yourself generally cannot.


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## Azzy (Sep 22, 2017)

This is obviously a false flag operation intended to divert people into buying D&D Beyond. 

Am I doing it right?


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## Charles Rampant (Sep 22, 2017)

I wonder if the company doing this takes the same view as a small store also selling books in the same neighbourhood as a Waterstones; sure, the big name in the market will take _most_ of the sales, but you don't need _all_ of the sales to justify opening, you just need _enough_ sales to turn a profit. 

On the licensing front, I once read that Marvel at one point had sold the license to make models smaller than 6" tall to one company, and licences to make models more than 6" tall to another company... only to turn around and sell a licence to another company to make models _exactly_ 6" tall! If true, then it suggests how the IP licensing departments work for these companies...


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## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 22, 2017)

Curse has stated that they have a team, in house, working in parallel on the mobile/tablet app. Dialect is not associated with Curse, ergo, it is not going to be the D&D Beyond app.


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## gyor (Sep 22, 2017)

This should have been released BEFORE not after the core books were released I'm not paying for my books twice.


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## Morrus (Sep 22, 2017)

gyor said:


> This should have been released BEFORE not after the core books were released I'm not paying for my books twice.




And that's OK. Buy your book in whatever format you like best. Hardcover, softcover, audiobook, Kindle, braille. Nobody is asking you to buy it twice, unless you want to. Like I said, I have four copies of _Aliens_!


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## mach1.9pants (Sep 22, 2017)

I wonder if this will be cheaper than DDB, as it offers less? Otherwise I can happily read any book I have on DDB just as easy and enjoyably as a kindle or iBooks book, or a PDF on any of my devices. I can't see the point unless it is cheaper.


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## chibi graz'zt (Sep 22, 2017)

Much ado about nothing.
-W. Shakespear


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## Shasarak (Sep 22, 2017)

Mercule said:


> Even in a pretty darn welcoming place like EN World....






Mercule said:


> Do you check under your mattress for peas before bed, Buttercup?




The irony is strong in this one.

Mmm, irony.


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## Jacqual (Sep 22, 2017)

Sqn Cdr Flashheart said:


> I wonder if this will be cheaper than DDB, as it offers less? Otherwise I can happily read any book I have on DDB just as easy and enjoyably as a kindle or iBooks book, or a PDF on any of my devices. I can't see the point unless it is cheaper.




 From what I read prices are identical


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## darjr (Sep 22, 2017)

I'll say one thing. This growing competition seems like a good thing.


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## BookBarbarian (Sep 22, 2017)

gyor said:


> This should have been released BEFORE not after the core books were released



But that could lead to less people buying the physical books, which could lead to less people going to FLGSs to get them which could hurt said FLGSs, which likley are running games of M:tG which makes far more money for WotC than D&D does. You and I may not like the strategy WotC had, but I can see the logic of it.



gyor said:


> I'm not paying for my books twice.



A perfectly reasonable determination.


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## Remathilis (Sep 22, 2017)

Hello? WotC? This is Remathilis. We need to talk. 

Ok, I have nothing against yet-another digital variant of 5e coming out. I don't mind its a self-contained e-reader rather than PDF. I don't even mind that its done by the same people who did Dragon+. Lets talk about your pricing.

No, not the "I'm not buying the book twice" conversation. Its the "compared to D&DBeyond, what does this app offer me?" conversation.

Curse is working on an App version of D&D Beyond that will have offline capabilities. Right now, they can sell me for $30 the complete Player's Handbook. I can read it on my phone, tablet, or laptop. I can search, bookmark, and cross-reference/hyperlink. I get databases of monsters, spells, magic items, and rules, plus custom player content, and did I mention a character builder on top? 

This app will charge me $30 for the same PHB content, and it offers me... what advantage again?

"Oh," he chortled "I don't use the character builder, I just want the rulebooks!"

But, you can buy the Compendium Content only on D&DB _"Purchasing this bundle unlocks the Player's Handbook book in digital format in the game compendium with all the artwork and maps, cross-linking, and tooltips. The Compendium Content bundle does not grant access to all the content’s options in the rest of the toolset, such as the searchable listings, character builder, or digital sheet."_ 

Price: $19.99. 

Did nobody at WotC TELL Dialect that they're product is redundant AND overpriced compared to Curse's? Is it mandated that they charge $30/$25 for per book? EVEN IF I was in the market to just buy the books to put on my device for easy carrying and never touch the character builder or databases, its STILL cheaper to buy the Compendium Only Content from D&DB for $20 a pop. 

Now, if WotC REALLY wants this to be the "digital PDF alternative" for 5e books, they need to do the following:

1.) $19.99 per book. Sell it at the same price Curse sells Compendium Only. People who want all of D&DBeyond's bells and whistles (like the character generator and eventual encounter builder) can plunk down $10 more for the database stuff.

2.) Offer a Subscription-based Model. This would be the perfect place to test out a $6.99 monthly access to all books model. People who want to own the books can buy them, but if you just want to rent them (ala music streaming services or Netflix) have an alternative. 

3.) Start offering cross-platform purchases. It might be impossible to track who bought a hardcover PHB, but its much easier to know who bought Curse of Strahd on Roll 20 and offer them a discount on the D&DB or D&DReader version just by allowing the companies to share access to customer profiles. I'm not sure the technical logistics of it, but I'm thinking it can be done.

4.) DMs Guild Integration. Its an E-reader; it should be able to emulate PDF reading easy enough. Allow purchases from the DM's Guild to show up on D&D Reader and the app to allow the user to read the PDF from inside it. Sure, it won't be as nice as the rendered pages of the main books, but if I buy something from DM's Guild, I'd like to have it at my fingertips the same way I can have the PHB. 

5.) Web-based access. They can do it for Dragon+, they can do it for this. 

Right now, Dialect is being set up for failure because its priced equal to D&D Beyond or Roll 20, but offers 1/2 the features of either. D&D Reader should be the budget-friendly version compared to those.


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## BookBarbarian (Sep 22, 2017)

Hmm. I love the content of Dragon+, but I honestly hate the app. It's clunky. It's slow. That's not a good mark for the d&d reader in my book. 

Still as a platform it might be worthwhile. I wonder if they'll start releasing older edition content on it too.


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## Xaelvaen (Sep 22, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> Oh I don't intend to, but it's not at all unlikely that, as gaming moves more online, that I'll be forced to.
> 
> But saying "hey WotC this is why I'm not buying" is perfectly legit. I'm not super happy with many of the decisions they've been taking in 5E more broadly with books that seem to heavily mix player and DM content and the pile of adventure paths that seem to be all they release. It's pretty much like WotC sees cable TV style bundling as the way to go. If I felt I had an alternative game I could play---realistically given the nature of gaming groups, not theoretically as in "yes I realize there are a lot of other games out there"---I'd probably drop 5E.




I'll admit I'm not completely able to grasp the other side of the coin here - I play with my immediately family as well as friends, so I've not had the need for online interaction to enjoy 5E - I'm sure that jades me to the point that digital content (or the lack thereof) hasn't really affected me.  In example, I can't stand reading books in pdf format when I'm reading word for word.  Sure, I dig them for quick reference, but staring at a glowing screen to read walls of text just kills me.

I'm very content with the pace of 5E, and even moreso with the substance, but I do get different strokes for different folks.  I'd be happy with nothing but physical books, but D&D Beyond really helps me play the game faster.  Being able to just middle mouse click on each monster in a campaign listing, and automatically open that page, tab to each monster without having to flip through multiple pages while holding my place with a playing card or some odd thing... worth my money to the point I only buy the physical books now because I'm a nutjob collector.

I hope the new line of content (like the X... can't think of the name at the moment) will play more to your liking =)


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## Pravus (Sep 22, 2017)

You can have a digital version of the books, in a proprietary digital format, using a propitiatory digital app. That is one of the dumbest things I heard in a long time.

So what is going to happen with iOS and Android OS updates? Who is going to pay to keep that app current?  What happens to your digital book when Wizard's stop paying to update that app?

I just cannot believe someone thought that spending a huge amount of money for a reader when Adobe or the many other third party PDF readers are available to everyone for free, that gets updated when devices and OSs change.

That is why PDF is my preferred digital format, I am confident that there will be a reader available 5, 10, even 15 years from now. This effort by Wizards I doubt will survive 3 years before we hear complaints it is not working on some device or a future updated OS.


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## Jester David (Sep 22, 2017)

gyor said:


> This should have been released BEFORE not after the core books were released I'm not paying for my books twice.




They *tried*. With DungeonScape. That didn't work well because they chose a poor partner. I'm sure WotC isn't happy it took three years either.


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## dave2008 (Sep 22, 2017)

Morrus said:


> ..., and for some reason own_ Aliens _in four(!) formats.




Because it is totally worth it!


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 22, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Hello? WotC? This is Remathilis. We need to talk.
> 
> Ok, I have nothing against yet-another digital variant of 5e coming out. I don't mind its a self-contained e-reader rather than PDF. I don't even mind that its done by the same people who did Dragon+. Lets talk about your pricing.
> 
> ...




So to me this sounds like a 3rd party company is making a product, and will be paying WotC licensing/royalties.

Why is that important?

First, because it's somebody else putting together a product that they think will appeal to gamers and that they can sell. My guess is that somebody had the concept, but until the OGL was available, couldn't go forward with it. Then it's just development time. 

It's not up to WotC to tell other companies how to design or price their products. Welcome to the free market. A company looks at the marketplace, the product they want to design, and price based on what they think will sell. Many use a pricing structure that allows frequent specials, so you never actually pay "full price."

Of course, their goal as a company would be to make money. Which means they need access to the stuff that's not OGL. So they license that from WotC, just like all of the other companies with a digital product that has this content. 

The pricing is influenced by WotC because they obviously set the licensing/royalty fee. But from there, it's the company making the product that has to decide what they need to make on each sale to have a viable business/product.

Perhaps one of the main reasons WotC avoids releasing pdf versions is because it would stifle the market for 3rd party companies to produce products that would purchase their licensable content? In other words, don't compete with your other revenue streams.

And that is a better thing in general because:
More products licensing the content, making them more money.
Other companies do the heavy lifting of designing, building and maintaining the digital products.
That companies that specialize in digital products will be better at it than a company that designs a TTRPG.
You get a variety of digital products, none of which will appeal to everyone, but hopefully everyone will find a digital product that appeals to them.

Etc.

So I don't think WotC spent anything on this. I think Dialect is probably spending the money, and they are developers of content that is formatted to work on today's technology (phones and tablets). PDFs are great for documents you want to print, but far from optimal for content you intend to view on your computer, phone, or tablet. 

Let's see: https://dialectinc.com

Well what do you know? A company that specializes in producing digital content solutions. A company that has no connection with WotC other than they were hired by WotC to produce Dragon+. 

Here's their page about Dragon+: https://dialectinc.com/portfolio/dragon/

I would guess they were hired by WotC to design a solution for them. Now I'm guessing that Dialect is designing their own product, but it could be one that WotC is footing the bill for. But I suspect that they wouldn't be competing directly with their other digital content providers.

Since it's a Dialect designed product, I'm sure it will be accessible in the same ways that Dragon+ is.


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## Jester David (Sep 22, 2017)

Pravus said:


> That is why PDF is my preferred digital format, I am confident that there will be a reader available 5, 10, even 15 years from now. This effort by Wizards I doubt will survive 3 years before we hear complaints it is not working on some device or a future updated OS.



PDFs, as a technology, are 24 years old (according to Wikipedia).
Adding another 15 years to that is a long time for a file format.

The *oldest* PDFs I have are under 16 years old. Some ancient pirated 3.0 books I found on a burned CD a few months back and threw onto Google Drive (the CD was barely readable and I was unable to recover half the files on it). 
It's a *big* file. 29k for <100 pages. And it looks like absolute crap. No hyperlinks, no bookmarks, no OCR. The pages change size every few pages. The text is blurry and the images have the pixelated artifacts of a bad JPEG conversion.

In theory PDFs wills still be usable in 15 years. I'm not sure if you'll want to use one at that point. Assuming your rollable iPad 3D-X will have an app that even reads them...


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## Remathilis (Sep 22, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> So to me this sounds like a 3rd party company is making a product, and will be paying WotC licensing/royalties.
> 
> Why is that important?
> 
> ...




Then Dialect has shown no foresight into the market and has set itself up for failure.

Dialect is attempting to sell the bare-bones DVD version of a movie at the same price as the feature-rich Blu-Ray/DVD/Digital combo pack. EVEN IF I was in the market for a digital D&D reading solution, D&D Beyond is far better price at $10 less PER BOOK than D&D Reader's price. Simple math; I could buy all three core books Compendium Only on D&D Beyond for the cost of two on D&D Reader. At for the same cost as a D&DR book, I get a character generator, databases, an forthcoming encounter builder, even a pronunciation guide with D&D Beyond.

This isn't Fantasy Grounds vs Roll 20 where both digital tabletops offer mostly similar options, this is bringing a knife to a gunfight. 

I wish them the best of luck. They are going to need it. Because right now, Curse has eaten their lunch.


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## Pravus (Sep 22, 2017)

I did some Adobe Acrobat work a few years back maybe 8 to 10, and yes PDF has been around for a long time, but it has not been static. I remember the upgrade from PDF 3 to PDF 4 and how not compatible things were from the back end of PDF authoring, but regardless of the authoring version the Reader still reads old version of the PDF format. I don't know what the current version PDF authoring is running at today, but my point is that PDF is evolving and Adobe is invested to make sure things work for the end user.

The question to ask, is Dialect invested to make sure whatever their digital property format will continue to work when the costs become too great, be it from licencing fees or the cost of maintaining their application?


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## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 22, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Then Dialect has shown no foresight into the market and has set itself up for failure.




Have you seen Dragon+?


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## JohnnyZemo (Sep 22, 2017)

Mercule said:


> IANAL, but I believe it is. US IP laws are pretty draconian.




Unless there are special laws related to pirating books, it's probably just a misdemeanor. In most states in the U.S., the value of the thing being stolen has to be at least $500 for it to be a felony.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

Pravus said:


> You can have a digital version of the books, in a proprietary digital format, using a propitiatory digital app. That is one of the dumbest things I heard in a long time.



Exactly so, and I agree with you about the issue of longevity of their format. They're doing it because they want to force us into their ecology and prevent piracy. However, it's classic "punish the honest" because the pirates don't much care and get illegal PDFs anyway. Many other game companies realize this and provide PDFs with their books via programs like Bits and Mortar (hence incentives for shopping at your FLGS) or via a nice discount if you buy it online from them.


----------



## hbarsquared (Sep 22, 2017)

This is just such a weird announcement.  What does this Reader offer that Beyond doesn't do already?  Bookmarks, turning pages by sliding?  That's it?  I'm pretty confident, too, that Beyond will integrate such features soon, judging by their excellent communication with users and adaptability.

No issues with the idea, but I agree with the "knife to a gunfight" metaphor. What's the point.

It actually sounds made-up, like some bloke saw an old Beyond announcement and assumed it was by the same guys of Dragon+, having done zero research.


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## Jhaelen (Sep 22, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> You are never going to get legal PDFs of 5e until 6e comes out. It's time to start going through those stages of grief on that issue. It's time man. Time to accept.



Fine by me, I'm waiting for 6e anyway.


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## mach1.9pants (Sep 22, 2017)

Jhaelen said:


> Fine by me, I'm waiting for 6e anyway.




I doubt 6E will have PDFs either!


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## Jhaelen (Sep 22, 2017)

Sqn Cdr Flashheart said:


> I doubt 6E will have PDFs either!



Well, depending on when 6e will hit the market, it may be offered as mem-chip implants...


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## Echohawk (Sep 22, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Like I said, I have four copies of _Aliens_!



Please tell me that you have the other movies in the series also in all four formats? Otherwise I'm going to get all twitchy visualising an incomplete _Aliens_ collection on your shelf. (It's perfectly okay to lie about this just to ease my imagination.)


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## Morrus (Sep 22, 2017)

Echohawk said:


> Please tell me that you have the other movies in the series also in all four formats? Otherwise I'm going to get all twitchy visualising an incomplete _Aliens_ collection on your shelf. (It's perfectly okay to lie about this just to ease my imagination.)




There’s only one other movie in the series.


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 22, 2017)

hbarsquared said:


> This is just such a weird announcement.  What does this Reader offer that Beyond doesn't do already?  Bookmarks, turning pages by sliding?  That's it?  I'm pretty confident, too, that Beyond will integrate such features soon, judging by their excellent communication with users and adaptability.
> 
> No issues with the idea, but I agree with the "knife to a gunfight" metaphor. What's the point.
> 
> It actually sounds made-up, like some bloke saw an old Beyond announcement and assumed it was by the same guys of Dragon+, having done zero research.




Perhaps it provides a stream of income for Dialect, while Beyond doesn’t? 

I think that a lot of assumptions are being made about a product that hasn’t even been announced by either company that stands to benefit.


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 22, 2017)

Pravus said:


> I did some Adobe Acrobat work a few years back maybe 8 to 10, and yes PDF has been around for a long time, but it has not been static. I remember the upgrade from PDF 3 to PDF 4 and how not compatible things were from the back end of PDF authoring, but regardless of the authoring version the Reader still reads old version of the PDF format. I don't know what the current version PDF authoring is running at today, but my point is that PDF is evolving and Adobe is invested to make sure things work for the end user.
> 
> The question to ask, is Dialect invested to make sure whatever their digital property format will continue to work when the costs become too great, be it from licencing fees or the cost of maintaining their application?




Well, since it appears to be their core business model and product, I’d say yes. 

Since Adobe isn’t in the business of publishing digital content themselves, it’s simply a product that a company like WotC could choose to use themselves. As I said, I think WotC has chosen to NOT be in the digital content delivery business, instead maintaining the content only and allowing companies who are the ability to sell it.

Plus, creating a content delivery system for RPGs opens up additional business for them, since they can just as easily deliver content for any company that they license content from.

Perhaps this product is horrible. That’s ok. The market will sort it out. Undoubtedly there are other companies that have different products in development.


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 22, 2017)

hbarsquared said:


> This is just such a weird announcement.  What does this Reader offer that Beyond doesn't do already?  Bookmarks, turning pages by sliding?  That's it?  I'm pretty confident, too, that Beyond will integrate such features soon, judging by their excellent communication with users and adaptability.
> 
> No issues with the idea, but I agree with the "knife to a gunfight" metaphor. What's the point.
> 
> It actually sounds made-up, like some bloke saw an old Beyond announcement and assumed it was by the same guys of Dragon+, having done zero research.




Actually it sounds like a rumor/leak. Because I don’t see any announcement by Dialect or WotC yet.

The point seems obvious to me if you look at what Dialect does. They are a digital content delivery company. The point, for them, would be to sell some digital content...


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 22, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> Exactly so, and I agree with you about the issue of longevity of their format. They're doing it because they want to force us into their ecology and prevent piracy. However, it's classic "punish the honest" because the pirates don't much care and get illegal PDFs anyway. Many other game companies realize this and provide PDFs with their books via programs like Bits and Mortar (hence incentives for shopping at your FLGS) or via a nice discount if you buy it online from them.




What!?!? A company (Dialect) that wants to sell you their product? I can’t believe it.

Dialect doesn’t have any skin in the game about piracy.

And like I said, I think that this, along with several other digital content providers selling this content is a pretty strong argument that WotC isn’t providing PDFs because it would compete directly against the companies that are buying their content to sell digitally.

Let’s see...we can sell or provide PDFs to our customers directly, or we can sell the same content to multiple companies competing in the open market to develop innovative products to add value? 

Sell at a discount/give away with purchase or....sell more stuff?

Seems pretty obvious to me. And from what I can tell, of the three (more?) sources already selling the content, they all seem to be doing quite well in selling the content. Each company isn’t really concerned about getting their product in every gamer’s hand, not that they would mind. No, they each have their sales goals, their own business model, and they measure success off of that.


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 22, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Then Dialect has shown no foresight into the market and has set itself up for failure.
> 
> Dialect is attempting to sell the bare-bones DVD version of a movie at the same price as the feature-rich Blu-Ray/DVD/Digital combo pack. EVEN IF I was in the market for a digital D&D reading solution, D&D Beyond is far better price at $10 less PER BOOK than D&D Reader's price. Simple math; I could buy all three core books Compendium Only on D&D Beyond for the cost of two on D&D Reader. At for the same cost as a D&DR book, I get a character generator, databases, an forthcoming encounter builder, even a pronunciation guide with D&D Beyond.
> 
> ...




I’m sure they appreciate your goodwill over a product that they haven’t even announced yet. 

Personally I think I’ll wait to see what their actual product is, with their actual pricing including promotions and discounts, and decide whether it’s worth purchasing then.

I like D&D Beyond and have played around with it a bit, but so far I have yet to see a product that is a must have for me. So I haven’t purchased any content yet. None of the products released so far provide the sort of interface and features I would like. I did purchase some content for Fantasy Grounds when it was on special on Steam over a year ago and have yet to log in and actually use it. 

So I’m excited to see what they come up with, and I’m hopeful I can incorporate my own content too. D&D Beyond allows some of that, but not where I really need it. 

But if I can’t add my own content, then I don’t want a product designed around a lot of bells and whistles I can’t use. And D&D Beyond is not well designed as just a reference, it’s designed as a game aid centered around a character creation and maintenance system I can’t use yet.


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## Sword of Spirit (Sep 22, 2017)

Just weighing in to shake my head in disbelief over WotC's crazy pdf allergy this edition.

I'm not sure what the thinking is, or who the buck is stopping with, but it baffles me. I mean, D&D isn't being run by idiots right now, and I'm pretty sure they've already thought of pretty much everything we've thought of. So why the decision not to do pdfs? Why attempting to find ways to do _everything but_ stand alone file formats (ie, pdfs or other e-readers)?

It makes me wonder if maybe Hasbro has implemented a company-wide no pdfs policy or something.


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## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 22, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> I mean, D&D isn't being run by idiots right now, and I'm pretty sure they've already thought of pretty much everything we've thought of.




Exactly, which is why they haven't released PDF's.


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## darjr (Sep 22, 2017)

They have released PDF's. DMSGuild has quite a few of them. The Basic set is a collection of PDFs. They release PDF's for sale and free ones seemingly all the time without a hitch.

If the reason were they thought it was such a terrible format, they wouldn't release nearly as many as they do. As it is it seems they think PDF is a very fine format to sell things in and give things away in. New things even.

Just not for the three core and a select few other products.


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## Mercule (Sep 22, 2017)

JohnnyZemo said:


> Unless there are special laws related to pirating books, it's probably just a misdemeanor. In most states in the U.S., the value of the thing being stolen has to be at least $500 for it to be a felony.



I thought the DMCA removed the lower limit for covered items. I could be very wrong, though. I just know the law goes well beyond what I'd consider reasonable (I'm pretty much in the camp of strong protection for 7-10 years, then it automatically goes into public domain, with some protections for personal likenesses but the whole Disney/Happy Birthday thing should have been moot several decades ago).


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

barasawa said:


> The articles I read on it when that decision was made, didn't say anything about how YOU obtained the file. Just the legality of owning it, and that you were allowed to obtain it, even if someone else made it. The court recognized that many people that would need or use this ability, don't have the ability to do so themselves. Of course, there apparently wasn't anything to protect the person making it for you, so they are still liable for distributing, and if DRM had to be broken, something books don't have, they were up the creek for that as well.




Law rarely talks about the process of how something happened and focuses on things that can be proven or disproven by evidence. Possession, for instance, doesn't require that you "own" something. It does usually require that you know you have something, though that's likely to be an issue if you ever get involved with the legal system. If I give you a closed up bag that happens to have illegal drugs in it and you're arrested the fact that the drugs are "mine" not "yours" is irrelevant to whether you possess them. It's going to hinge on whether you could be reasonably said to know that there are drugs in the bag. For instance, if the drugs are carefully concealed in the bottom of a larger bag and there is evidence you had just got it then you may be able to claim that you didn't "knowingly possess" the drugs. (Caveat: IANAL but many years ago I was a juror on a trial that hinged on this point and thus had it explained in detail by lawyers.)


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> What!?!? A company (Dialect) that wants to sell you their product? I can’t believe it.



I'm not saying that WotC doesn't want to sell their product, that's obvious. I don't mind paying for it either. My issue is that I feel that they're pushing novel content delivery platforms that are not too likely to be sticking around and making a confusing and non-transparent marketplace with too many slightly different features. There's the dead tree variety, Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, DDB, and now Dialect, maybe yet others. You want to use content in each, pay for it separately. 



> And like I said, I think that this, along with several other digital content providers selling this content is a pretty strong argument that WotC isn’t providing PDFs because it would compete directly against the companies that are buying their content to sell digitally.




So they care about those companies more than their customers? Many of us have been customers for _decades_. 



> Let’s see...we can sell or provide PDFs to our customers directly, or we can sell the same content to multiple companies competing in the open market to develop innovative products to add value?




Big assumption that they'll be "adding value." I'm actually rather skeptical, very much based on WotC's track record in the electronic world. 




> Sell at a discount/give away with purchase or....sell more stuff? Seems pretty obvious to me. And from what I can tell, of the three (more?) sources already selling the content, they all seem to be doing quite well in selling the content. Each company isn’t really concerned about getting their product in every gamer’s hand, not that they would mind. No, they each have their sales goals, their own business model, and they measure success off of that.




I'm not questioning their right to do it. Clearly they have that legal right. 

From the (or at least this) consumer's standpoint though they've made a situation with a confusing set of competing ecologies, all built on WotC's cable TV style "bundling" pricing model for books, which are already highly bundled to ensure that there's a large proportion of the book that will never be used by many purchasers, all of which require multiple purchases for the rights. This means WotC is attempting to get me to open my wallet over and over, not for novel content, but _for the same thing I already own_. The only difference is delivery mode. So what happens when I meet someone who's, say, invested in Roll20 and I'm invested in, say, Fantasy Grounds, and basically we can't play the game simply because of platform incompatibilities? Well the answer is... someone's going to be buying access again. What happens if, as is fairly likely, rights are bought but one of the companies goes under or the inevitable merger happens next time there's a dot.bomb? WotC happily keeps all the cash from the multiple purchases, that's what. 

Adding value digitally would allow for solid discounts of purchasing unbundled by WotC's choice of how to put the books together. Alas, if you want a few magic items from one of the titles... it's time to spend $5. DM switches platforms? Buy it again! 

From their standpoint that might be "innovative" and "smart business". From my standpoint, I know rent-seeking behavior when I see it. 

If I realistically thought I could get a different game going I'd probably do it, just because of their increasingly predatory pricing model built solely on being the biggest game in the marketplace of potential games. Their propensity for bundling already cut way back on what I'm willing to purchase even in dead tree format and I won't be buying their digital stuff.

Actually, now that I think about it, they don't really care about the companies they're doing business with, either. It's not going to be fun when the music stops in two years or so and there's one fewer chair....


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## DEFCON 1 (Sep 22, 2017)

If anyone wants to play D&D 5E via PDF, they can.  They can download the Basic Rules.

If someone is choosing not to do that, and also is choosing not to buy the 5E hardcover books because they can't also get it in PDF... my personal opinion is that that person doesn't really care to play 5E or not.  Which means they are probably playing a different game (quite possibly another version of D&D)... and if that's the case, then Wizards of the Coast is fine with that.

After all... if having a full suite of PDFs of the edition of D&D you are playing is a requirement to you... you have many previous editions of D&D you can play right now.  Most books from most of the previous editions all available to you on DMsGuild.  Congrats!  Happy gaming!

I just hope no one is cutting off their nose to spite their face.  Deliberately not playing in a 5E game they actually really want to play in but won't, just because they can't get a book in PDF.  That seems ridiculously self-flagellating to me.  But hey... if playing a High Elf Noble Thief, a Mountain Dwarf Folk Hero Champion, or a Human Criminal Evoker doesn't do it for you (all things you can play in 5E via PDF)... c'est la vie.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> Exactly, which is why they haven't released PDF's.



I'm not entirely sure they're as smart as they think given that pretty much every digital endeavor they've launched has vastly over-promised on what it could deliver. Insider ended up just being the character builder without any of the additional tools and it was a bloated and crash-prone beast built on a product that Microsoft had sunsetted.


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## seebs (Sep 22, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> You are never going to get legal PDFs of 5e until 6e comes out. It's time to start going through those stages of grief on that issue. It's time man. Time to accept.




I have accepted it. Accepting it involves mocking them. I am sure they have long since accepted that.


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## seebs (Sep 22, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> If anyone wants to play D&D 5E via PDF, they can.  They can download the Basic Rules.
> 
> If someone is choosing not to do that, and also is choosing not to buy the 5E hardcover books because they can't also get it in PDF... my personal opinion is that that person doesn't really care to play 5E or not.  Which means they are probably playing a different game (quite possibly another version of D&D)... and if that's the case, then Wizards of the Coast is fine with that.
> 
> ...




Oh, I play 5E. I just have a worse play experience than I would if they released PDFs, and I probably buy fewer books than I would if they released PDFs.

I do think you're underestimating the significance of accessibility concerns. Physical books don't allow screen readers. Having only a small subset of the game in textual format, and that for free, means no income at all from people who would need disability accommodations...


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## seebs (Sep 22, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> What!?!? A company (Dialect) that wants to sell you their product? I can’t believe it.
> 
> Dialect doesn’t have any skin in the game about piracy.
> 
> ...




There's a lot of people who'd buy a PDF from Wizards, but won't buy the various third-party things. (I won't, because I have *no* confidence that they will last and be accessible later.) So they're throwing away a large portion of the prospective market for digital copies, but in exchange, they're letting someone else siphon lots of the profit away from the sales they *do* make. Brilliant!

I don't think it would be very direct competition. PDFs are not competing with Beyond very effectively; if you want Beyond, what it does is way better for you than what a PDF does would be.

But the net result is, people who have "pirated" copies of the game get a play experience that I would like much better than anything Wizards is willing to sell me. And that's sort of the essence of "anti-piracy" measures; they don't hurt pirates, they do hurt paying customers.


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## Azgulor (Sep 22, 2017)

Morrus said:


> There’s only one other movie in the series.




A-FRAKKIN-MEN!!!!


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> Just weighing in to shake my head in disbelief over WotC's crazy pdf allergy this edition.



As far as I know, WotC has never released PDFs of the current edition of D&D, certainly not widely.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

seebs said:


> Oh, I play 5E. I just have a worse play experience than I would if they released PDFs, and I probably buy fewer books than I would if they released PDFs. <...> Having only a small subset of the game in textual format, and that for free, means no income at all from people who would need disability accommodations...




Or just want to be able to avoid having to carry a giant pile of books and instead have things available on a tablet in the event that a monster, magic item, spell, or some text/description needs to be looked up. I've taken a tablet with the PDF _and_ the dead tree book to the same session so I can have the PDF open to a page I know I'll need quickly and be able to flip through the book.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 22, 2017)

seebs said:


> There's a lot of people who'd buy a PDF from Wizards, but won't buy the various third-party things. (I won't, because I have *no* confidence that they will last and be accessible later.)



I totally agree with you and that really crystallizes my issue with the pricing model. WotC has talked about how TSR in the 2E days fragmented its market, creating a lot of fratricidal competition. In this case, they've managed to offshore the risk but by having so many different digital offerings they've created a fragmented market. However, I'm very much of the mind that at least one of these companies, possibly more, will go belly up in a few years. So the "lifetime access" I'm buying is decidedly temporary in an unpredictable way.


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## darjr (Sep 22, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> As far as I know, WotC has never released PDFs of the current edition of D&D, certainly not widely.



4e was released on drive thru in PDF. 

In fact they took it down citing piracy. https://m.slashdot.org/story/116889


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## Nikosandros (Sep 22, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> As far as I know, WotC has never released PDFs of the current edition of D&D, certainly not widely.




4e was released in PDF from Drivethru until they stopped PDF altogether for some years and pulled all of them (including the previous editions ones) from all the vendors.


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## Charles Kovacs (Sep 22, 2017)

such convoluted ways to just deliver something you already have with the books. Searchable? I think most don't care, sticky notes and those little adhesive page tabs work just fine for me.

If you don't have a book then maybe these eSolutions are cool(or if your a DM and have to lug all the crap around. But most players only bring their char sheets to sessions and maybe their PHB. I have only met a few players that drag all their books with them to a session.


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## darjr (Sep 22, 2017)

Edit to add that yea, I'm probably full of it.


I think they are testing the waters. 

I'll further add that this WILL lead to a PDF of the core set. 

I think it's just a matter of time now.


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## darjr (Sep 22, 2017)

Of coarse DRM in the web standard could be the driver of this new app and we'll never see a PDF. Maybe this is a testing of that. Maybe all PDFs will go this way at WoTC. I certainly hope not.

And I don't actually think this is the case.


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## Rygar (Sep 22, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Different options are for different people. Nobody is asking you to buy D&D Beyond AND this D&D Reader app.
> 
> When George RR Martin's latest book comes out in hardcover, and then in softcover, you're not being forced to buy the same content twice. You buy it once in the format you prefer. And if you want it in two formats, cool.
> 
> ...




I would argue that yes, these products should not exist.

D&D needs products that generate strong revenue, increase adoption, and invest existing customers.  Everything WOTC makes comes at the cost of something they're not going to make.  Right now WOTC keeps screwing around with PDF's, microtransaction laden PDF's no less, while killing off their novel lines for example.  PDF's are a 0 growth market as has been demonstrated by E-book sales, and based on the UK's 2016 numbers more like a negative growth market, yet WOTC keeps trying to push them.  How is making multiple microtransaction laden PDF product lines helping adoption?  How many people are going to pay for one class/item they can look up in a book they almost certainly already own or their friend sitting beside them owns?  How many people were on the fence about continuing D&D that just suddenly said "OMG I can rebuy all of my books in PDF format!!".  There's *no* real market for these products.

On the other hand, they could be continuing novel lines that showed for decades to invest existing customers, bring in new customers, and even sell D&D products to people who would never play an RPG.  They could be scquiring more customers by making more than one setting since some number of people flat out don't like Forgotten Realms.  They could be investing more people in the game by selling quality adventures to capture the market that doesn't have the time or imagination for making their own.

But instead they're spending money on *another* microtransaction laden PDF viewer to sell to a stagnant market.  So yes, I do argue that these products shouldn't exist, they're consuming dollars that could've been spent on things that would've helped the brand and the product line.


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## Thac0 the Barbarian (Sep 22, 2017)

*D&amp;D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]*



Rygar said:


> I would argue that yes, these products should not exist.
> 
> D&D needs products that generate strong revenue, increase adoption, and invest existing customers.  Everything WOTC makes comes at the cost of something they're not going to make.  Right now WOTC keeps screwing around with PDF's, microtransaction laden PDF's no less, while killing off their novel lines for example.  PDF's are a 0 growth market as has been demonstrated by E-book sales, and based on the UK's 2016 numbers more like a negative growth market, yet WOTC keeps trying to push them.  How is making multiple microtransaction laden PDF product lines helping adoption?  How many people are going to pay for one class/item they can look up in a book they almost certainly already own or their friend sitting beside them owns?  How many people were on the fence about continuing D&D that just suddenly said "OMG I can rebuy all of my books in PDF format!!".  There's *no* real market for these products.
> 
> ...




I think this post is dependent on a lot of assumptions that may not apply however.  If what he is using a standard licensing model for these programs, there is not actually a development opportunity cost for wotc itself, just an opportunity cost for those other companies were developing said products.  It may not make sense for a company such as crucial to publish the reader, and the market will sort that out, but it doesn't actually keep wotc from working on things such as Novel lines since it isn't developed in house. Well one can take the notion of opportunity cost to ridiculous lengths,  as a practical point the actual cost of this for wotc might be quite minimal.  

It does prevent WOTC from utilizing a singular did you experience from a branding standpoint, so that may be a poor decision, but it does allow them instead to serve different markets with different needs.  Personally, I find e-book experiences to be vastly superior to PDFs while using screen smaller than a standard book dimension, but inferior when looking at working on a larger screen such as A desktop.  The superiority of one of the other is entirely dependent on use scenario, at least in my view. Well the strengths of PDFs as a archival format are quite rightly identified, when I think about the breath of consumers , for many people that may not be the most pressing issue. I enjoy having old copies of all the second edition books, but Lord knows I don't actually use them. Chances are that when Dungeons & Dragons moves on from his current edition I will move on as well, which makes perpetual access less bothersome to me as a practical level, although individuals will place differing weight on the philosophic offensiveness of "rented" materials.  

Finally, I think it's important to note that each different electronic offering maybe serving a different niche. That is not a poor business decision, provided that niche is large enough to support the companies' aims.  I often see proclamations on EN World by many users (not just Rygar). That there is or isn't a market for a given approach. Given the breadth of DND players and the fact that the presence or not a market is entirely dependent on how large you require market to be, I suspect that almost no one on this forum can make these proclamations fully authoritatively. That's particularly since individual products can form new markets by changing users interest, which is why we have markets and not planned economies in the first place. 


Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app


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## kenmarable (Sep 22, 2017)

Rygar said:


> I would argue that yes, these products should not exist.
> 
> D&D needs products that generate strong revenue, increase adoption, and invest existing customers.  Everything WOTC makes comes at the cost of something they're not going to make.  Right now WOTC keeps screwing around with PDF's, microtransaction laden PDF's no less, while killing off their novel lines for example.  PDF's are a 0 growth market as has been demonstrated by E-book sales, and based on the UK's 2016 numbers more like a negative growth market, yet WOTC keeps trying to push them.  How is making multiple microtransaction laden PDF product lines helping adoption?  How many people are going to pay for one class/item they can look up in a book they almost certainly already own or their friend sitting beside them owns?  How many people were on the fence about continuing D&D that just suddenly said "OMG I can rebuy all of my books in PDF format!!".  There's *no* real market for these products.
> 
> ...




We don't know the arrangement between Dialect and WotC, but this doesn't seem like a giant money sink (and if it's anything like their other projects recently, largely funded by the 3rd party - not WotC). Of course, we can't tell until we see the app, but from seeing Dragon+ and from what has been described about D&D Reader, it sounds relatively cheap to produce. (And I say this as a full time web programmer who has worked some in mobile.) This isn't the massive efforts of hundreds or even thousands of hours of labor something like D&D Beyond or Fantasy Grounds takes in converting the content. It sounds like primarily an update to the same software they have running Dragon+ (and considering they have many other clients than WotC, it might be an app that largely already exists), and the content pretty much as locked down PDFs. 

So I don't see this coming at the expense of really anything. Knowing what's likely going on "under the hood" on something like this, I can assure you that not doing this would be very far from balancing out the novel lines. I wish the novels were still going strong, too, but that's an entirely separate issue from this. This looks to be very minimal work from WotC, and if Dialect is even picking up the majority of the cost and effort, then it's virtually no effort from WotC at all!


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## DEFCON 1 (Sep 22, 2017)

Rygar said:


> How many people are going to pay for one class/item they can look up in a book they almost certainly already own or their friend sitting beside them owns?  How many people were on the fence about continuing D&D that just suddenly said "OMG I can rebuy all of my books in PDF format!!".  There's *no* real market for these products.




Over in the _Lost Tales of Myth Drannor: DDAL's "Secret" D&D Book For Gen Con 50_ thread they mentioned that someone just bought that module (that they could get for free by going to any number of upcoming cons) for *$225* on Ebay.

There are people out there willing to buy anything.  Including a reader such as this.  You don't give enough credit to people willing to drop piles of cash on all kinds of stupid crap.


----------



## Vampyr3 (Sep 22, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> Over in the _Lost Tales of Myth Drannor: DDAL's "Secret" D&D Book For Gen Con 50_ thread they mentioned that someone just bought that module (that they could get for free by going to any number of upcoming cons) for *$225* on Ebay.
> 
> There are people out there willing to buy anything. Including a reader such as this. You don't give enough credit to people willing to drop piles of cash on all kinds of stupid crap.





The quote 







> "A fool and his money are so parted comes to mind"


----------



## ChampionoftheTriad (Sep 22, 2017)

Emirikol Prime said:


> By this time everyone who wants a PDF has one.  The market who was more than willing to give them money passed them by.



 Indeed. This is just more proof that WotC is like the Microsoft of table top gaming (every OTHER edition is a craptastic in some way. Can't wait for 6th, ugh). They put out their excellent  main product. People clamor for digital support. WotC tries, in an overly controlling and expensive way, to provide it. Not enough money/no control, dead end. Companies like Lone Wolf Development come along with their HeroLab, to fill the demand. They work license deals with game companies, and carve out a specialized niche to make the business model work. Years pass, everyone has spent tons of money on books, pdfs, and digital copies. WotC says "hey, I guess people really DO want digital support, and those guys are making it work." Then WotC throws money at it, comes up with a product in total secrecy, and then tells you that you want it and you WILL pay them for it. It's a turd, it flops, because you can't tell people what they will spend money on. WotC says "see, I told you there was no real market for this." And kills product. Meanwhile, there will never be a full suite of D&D books available on HeroLab (or others). They will never learn.


----------



## rknop (Sep 22, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Different options are for different people. Nobody is asking you to buy D&D Beyond AND this D&D Reader app
> 
> ....
> 
> It's better that these options exist than that these options do not exist. What are people suggesting? That the product not be allowed to exist because they personally don't want it?




I agree that things I do not want have a right to exist.  And that it's no skin off my teeth if it does exist.

My problem is the suggestion that this product at _all_ addresses the problem of a lack of PDFs available for 5e.  A proprietary format that runs on a proprietary ap that you have get just for this one thing you want to read does not cut the bill.  It would be similar to a a physical book that came chained to a chair and a desk lamp which were the only chair and desk lamp that you're allowed to use while reading the book.  Saying that that product offering would at all address the desires of those who want a physical book would be dubious at best.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 22, 2017)

rknop said:


> I agree that things I do not want have a right to exist.  And that it's no skin off my teeth if it does exist.
> 
> My problem is the suggestion that this product at _all_ addresses the problem of a lack of PDFs available for 5e.  A proprietary format that runs on a proprietary ap that you have get just for this one thing you want to read does not cut the bill.  It would be similar to a a physical book that came chained to a chair and a desk lamp which were the only chair and desk lamp that you're allowed to use while reading the book.  Saying that that product offering would at all address the desires of those who want a physical book would be dubious at best.




What did you plan on doing with a legal PDF on a regular basis that is made impossible in this format?


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> What did you plan on doing with a legal PDF on a regular basis that is made impossible in this format?



Not who you were responding to, but when I ran Pathfinder I used the PRD to copy monster stat blocks into documents, create custom variants of things, have tailored spell lists and hand out cards with magic item stats on it. As long as D&D Beyond and this new product can allow for copying into a Word doc, I'm satisfied. If they don't then they don't serve MY needs. 

Thankfully, D&DB allows copy and paste from the web, so hopefully this product does too.


----------



## Satyrn (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> What did you plan on doing with a legal PDF on a regular basis that is made impossible in this format?




Also not who you were responding to, but if I understand those who want pdfs, it's not because of the regular functionality they get out of a pdf. The selling point would be the peace of mind the apparent stability of the format provides. It's rather likely they will still be a le to use their pdf 10 years from now.

The stability of these digital offerings is sort of a crapshoot.


----------



## rknop (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> What did you plan on doing with a legal PDF on a regular basis that is made impossible in this format?




Seriously?

Read them on my Linux machine, to start.

Use the reader I want to use.

Still be able to read them even when the app is no longer supported and doesn't run on newer versions of Android.

Not be stuck in a walled-garden proprietary ecosystem.


----------



## Shasarak (Sep 23, 2017)

> The *oldest* PDFs I have are under 16 years old. Some ancient pirated 3.0 books I found on a burned CD a few months back and threw onto Google Drive (the CD was barely readable and I was unable to recover half the files on it).
> It's a *big* file. 29k for <100 pages. And it looks like absolute crap. No hyperlinks, no bookmarks, no OCR. The pages change size every few pages. The text is blurry and the images have the pixelated artifacts of a bad JPEG conversion.




Wait, 29k is a *big* file?  So I can only fit 500,000 copies of that pdf on my usb drive then?


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 23, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Not who you were responding to, but when I ran Pathfinder I used the PRD




Different topic. That would be PRD vs SRD. Not PDF vs this app.


----------



## darjr (Sep 23, 2017)

I’m not anathema to this product. In fact I think it’s cool that they are trying to meet some of us halfway.

Another thing a pdf provides is a way for disabled or deaf folks to use tools on them allowing them to hear the pdf or read it in a way that wouldn’t be economically viable for curse or this other company to do. Also as there are great readers out there that let me put in notes and links and highlights that are hot linked. Been looking into using something like it to run AL mods and stop printing them out.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 23, 2017)

rknop said:


> Seriously?
> 
> Read them on my Linux machine, to start.




You should be able to do that. Probably not on day one, but someone will port the app to Linux in all likelihood. Or you should do that! 



> Use the reader I want to use.




That's not really something you can "do" though. What is it you want to DO with it that cannot be done using this app?



> Still be able to read them even when the app is no longer supported and doesn't run on newer versions of Android.




Speculative. 

Doesn't sound like there are a whole lot of obvious reasons. One you should be able to do, one seems to have no purpose beyond vague preference (you may like the new platform better), and one is speculative. Is that really what you thought "seriously" would convey things like "use on Linux"?


----------



## darjr (Sep 23, 2017)

[MENTION=2525]Mistwell[/MENTION] are you really asking these questions? 

First, no he can't just port it over. The code is proprietary. IF it was a PDF he could write his very own reader. But not some custom proprietary app. Is Curse going to make their app open source to be ported? I'd wager on never.

Use the reader of his choice? OF COARSE it's something you can DO. How about read it on an epaper reader like a kindle? A kindle will never run this app. But it can read a PDF. Or a braile translator that reads PDF. This app won't do that. I'll bet this app won't even support text to speech.

And as far as being speculative? Weren't you just having issues with a vendor because of old broken software? Software being abandoned and locking up data isn't a new problem and it's not about to go away. A PDF doesn't really have that problem. Their is copious documentation out there about PDF and quite a few open source example reader implementations. A new one could be written post haste if all other readers were abandoned or no longer worked on current hardware. This software from curse and others not only can't make that claim at the moment, they very likely never ever will.

His points are solid and I think your response is a stretch even for you.

It boils down to WotC doesn't release these in PDF because they won't, and that's their prerogative. Despite all the spilled ink, I don't really fault them. It's their stuff. All I can do is keep pointing out why I want PDF and why it's a good idea.

I have a suspicion that they agree with me on many fronts, hence so many different ways to get the data out there that creep up to being ebook or PDF like. I think they'll get there. I hope so anyway.


----------



## seebs (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> What did you plan on doing with a legal PDF on a regular basis that is made impossible in this format?




View it on *any device I own* that can display PDFs, which is most of them. Chromebook? Sure. Laptop? Yup. iPad? Yup. Android tablet? Yup. Make annotations which I can save into the file so they become part of the file? Yup. Rotate pages, remove pages I don't use? Yup. Read it *forever* on any future device even decades from now? Yup.

"A standard format that does not go away when the vendor fails" is a *really* important feature for me in a gaming document.


----------



## seebs (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> You should be able to do that. Probably not on day one, but someone will port the app to Linux in all likelihood. Or you should do that!




I cannot believe that you said this, and then dismissed something someone else said as "speculative".

Have you ever ported a non-trivial app from non-Linux to Linux? When it was proprietary and no source code was available?

You haven't. 

Anyway, *right now*, there's no Linux app. That you think there might be one later is irrelevant.



> That's not really something you can "do" though. What is it you want to DO with it that cannot be done using this app?




Well, right now? *Anything at all.* Because the app isn't actually here, it's a future-tense thing. If they'd released a PDF, I'd have the PDF right now and could read it on anything I wanted.

Choice of reader apps may not be a specific task, but consider the gap in performance between a good and a bad PDF reader. I had a crappy PDF reader app. Then I got a good one. Suddenly I could swipe through pages and have every page show up as a high quality render in under a second, instead of waiting five seconds for the rendering to finish. Can I read a book with either app? Sure. Is one of them *dramatically* better than the other? Yes.



> Speculative.




A heck of a lot less speculative than your suggestion that maybe someday there will be a Linux version. What reason do you have to imagine that this particular proprietary app will last forever, or even maybe twenty years? Because I've got PDFs I've had for twenty years, and they still work.



> Doesn't sound like there are a whole lot of obvious reasons. One you should be able to do, one seems to have no purpose beyond vague preference (you may like the new platform better), and one is speculative. Is that really what you thought "seriously" would convey things like "use on Linux"?




This is stunningly disingenuous. There is no reason to imagine that it would be *possible* to "port" the app, since there's no evidence that they're going to release source code. (Hint: People whose entire business model is DRM usually don't.) "Vague" preference? That's a pretty dismissive way to dismiss other people's preferences. Why shouldn't other people's preferences matter? Why do their preferences not matter, just because you consider them "vague"? And how on earth can you call someone *else's* argument "speculative" when you've just asserted, based on no evidence whatsoever, that there will definitely be a Linux port of a proprietary DRM-based app with a relatively small target audience?

I've seen things like this come and go. How many of them can you think of that were in use 20 years ago and still work today?


----------



## ChampionoftheTriad (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> You should be able to do that. Probably not on day one, but someone will port the app to Linux in all likelihood. Or you should do that!
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Yes, it is speculative. Based on experience it is probable. I have seen WotC develop the Character Builder that shipped with the 3.0 PH. It was great, it was cool....it never got finished. Then they engaged CodeMonkey to make e-Tools, it was great, it was cool, it got finished, I bought a lot of content for it. WotC yanked the license and -canned the whole deal...without warning. Then, while marketing the launch of 4E, they flouted their NEW digital tools. It would be out when 4E was. It will be great. It will be cool...How'd that turn out? Now, they are developing a new digital too set. And, mid-stream, SURPRISE! we're doing a digital reader app!

This is beside the blindsiding of Paizo, cutting off Dragon and Dungeon magazine. And cutting off pdf sales, not just free ones, SALES. Totally reliable.


----------



## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 23, 2017)

ChampionoftheTriad said:


> Now, they are developing a new digital too set.




WotC isn't developing anything.


----------



## CapnZapp (Sep 23, 2017)

seebs said:


> Wow, I'm impressed. At a cost of multiple years of delays and tens of thousands of dollars, they've made a thing that doesn't remotely address any of my reasons for wanting PDFs. That's brilliant!



I'm curious - what do you want out of PDFs? 

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app


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## CapnZapp (Sep 23, 2017)

Nikosandros said:


> I'm a bit confused by the Kindle part. It seems that it is an proprietary app for iOS and Android. Is it somehow related to Amazon? Or is the article using "Kindle" as a synonym of electronic book with text re-flow on a proprietary app?



I'm assuming the latter: "like a PDF but locked"

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app


----------



## CapnZapp (Sep 23, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> Right.  And they don't care, they didn't want your money.  Why does that upset you?
> 
> I mean, if you have a PDF of the D&D books at this point (however you acquired them) and yet still have this undying need to give WotC money for it... then why not just go to the store and buy another set of books, then donate them to your local library or something?  Then you get to feel good TWICE!  Once for "paying" WotC for your PDF, then again for helping out other people who might not have the possibility of buying the books themselves.



Why did you feel the need to post this?

Could you not live with the thought that had WotC issued electronic rulebooks earlier, they would have had at least one happy customer? 

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app


----------



## rknop (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> That's not really something you can "do" though. What is it you want to DO with it that cannot be done using this app?




OK, then answer this question.

Suppose a hardcover physical book only came in a version chained to a specific chair with a specific desk lamp.  You were only allowed to read the book while sitting in THAT chair and using THAT lamp.

What would you want to DO with a hardcover that didn't come so encumbered that you couldn't do with the one that came with its own required chair and lamp?

(Also, cutting the chain requires not only specialized equipment and skills, but is explicitly illegal.  Hiring somebody else to cut the chain is even more illegal.)


----------



## Sword of Spirit (Sep 23, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> Exactly, which is why they haven't released PDF's.




Because they're smarter than all the other RPG companies out there? Because they've hit on to some amazing way to make money that creating pdfs would hamper?

Well, it'd sure be nice to hear from them exactly what that _is_. Maybe they are afraid of giving away their great idea to competitors.

As I said, it's baffling. I haven't read this entire thread, but unless someone suggested something truly innovative after the first few pages, I still can't come up with any reason other than Hasbro overlords being anti-pdf.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Different topic. That would be PRD vs SRD. Not PDF vs this app.



I can do the same from a PDF with ocr text as well. All I'm saying is the app should allow the same. If you can't copy text from it, it is useless. 

Fwiw, you can copy the text from any Pathfinder PDF, and any D&D classics PDF as well.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> I’m sure they appreciate your goodwill over a product that they haven’t even announced yet.




So interviews and pictures in Polygon and Mashable don't count as an announcement? Are they using a crystal ball or NSA wiretapping to know about this project? 





Ilbranteloth said:


> Personally I think I’ll wait to see what their actual product is, with their actual pricing including promotions and discounts, and decide whether it’s worth purchasing then.




"If, for example, you'll only ever care about rolling a bard, you can just buy that. Prices for individual sections are $3 or $5 (depending on what you buy) and the three full rulebooks — Player's Handbook, Monster Manual, and Dungeon Master's Guide — are $30 apiece for everything."

Sounds pretty announced. 



Ilbranteloth said:


> I like D&D Beyond and have played around with it a bit, but so far I have yet to see a product that is a must have for me. So I haven’t purchased any content yet. None of the products released so far provide the sort of interface and features I would like. I did purchase some content for Fantasy Grounds when it was on special on Steam over a year ago and have yet to log in and actually use it.




Different Strokes for Different folks. I'm not saying Rd20/FG/D&DB are for everyone, but my point is they offer a LOT more VALUE for the same cost as this e-reader. And even if you don't want that value, D&DB can offer you similar content for $10 less. If all you bought were the major rulebooks (PHB, DMG, MM, SCAG, VGtM, XGtE) you're saving $60 dollars getting compendium only versions on D&DB. We're talking $180 for D&D Reader vs. $120 for D&D Beyond for the SAME CONTENT. 

I sure hope that page-flip transition and bookmarking is worth it!  



Ilbranteloth said:


> So I’m excited to see what they come up with, and I’m hopeful I can incorporate my own content too. D&D Beyond allows some of that, but not where I really need it.




So far, its looking like its own a reference tool for looking at the hardback books online. They may surprise, but at this stage the articles seem to paint this as a kindle with a very specific set of books. 



Ilbranteloth said:


> But if I can’t add my own content, then I don’t want a product designed around a lot of bells and whistles I can’t use. And D&D Beyond is not well designed as just a reference, it’s designed as a game aid centered around a character creation and maintenance system I can’t use yet.




My point isn't that D&D Beyond should be the be-all, end-all of D&D online tools. My point is that this product is bringing nothing new to the table and charging too much for its limits compared to the same content as Rd20 or D&DB. 

My suggestions (which you have utterly ignored) are to make this product unique compared to D&D Beyond. Make it the budget alternative to D&D Beyond for people who just want a copy of the PHB on their phone but don't want extra bells and whistles. $20 for the PHB is on the edge of impulse buy. Or, if WotC won't let them sell it for less than $30, add something more than "the PHB in an e-reader" to make it stand out; a subscription service to "stream" the books like Spotify or Hulu, or the ability to add purchases from DM's Guild in so I can have my AL adventures or fan stuff accessible next to my PHB. Or make some cross compatible promotion pricing so that If I DO buy it for $30 here, I might get it on R20 for only $20 dollars when I share my login or get a unique access code on purchase. If they can't stick codes in the back of the physical PHB, they easily could make randomized unique codes in tied to a specific email address in the digital version. 

I get the feeling none of that will happen. This will be the text of the books, formatted like D+ articles, for the same price as products with additional value. And if it is, it will fail and they will be handing out codes for people who purchased books on this platform to buy them on D&D Beyond when it goes belly up. 

I'm sorry, but if I was in the market for an online D&D solution, this would be several steps below dead last as written.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 23, 2017)

rknop said:


> OK, then answer this question.
> 
> Suppose a hardcover physical book only came in a version chained to a specific chair with a specific desk lamp.  You were only allowed to read the book while sitting in THAT chair and using THAT lamp.
> 
> ...




If you can show me how "releasing digital content for an new app usable on literally millions of devices across the world" is the same as "chained to a specific chair with a specific desk lamp"? Because they're nothing alike. One is an extreme exaggeration for effect in typical Internet attention-seeking over the top hysteria, and the other is just a new friggin app you can either buy or not like the thousands of other apps on the market. If you don't like this product, don't buy it. But stop pretending someone is forcing you to buy this and it's the only way for you to access this content. I think this is what, the fifth or sixth means of accessing this content? Nobody is chaining YOU to a desk and lamp. And no, you're not entitled to a PDF just because that's your preference. 

Some people will like it, others will not, but I think you're not going to get legal PDFs of this content. And while you're free to complain about that for the next decade if you choose, as far as I can tell you can do much of what you want with this product as you could do on a PDF. This product serves 98% of the purposes of a PDF and then some. You're acting like that remaining 2% is what makes PDFs useful, but it's not. This is the same content, usable on many many platforms, to be able to read it and search it and do all sorts of things with it during your game and during game prep. Those are the same primary goals of a PDF.


----------



## Over the Hill Gamer (Sep 23, 2017)

Was massively confused.  I just bought Tomb of Annihilation and had to make a decision about whether to get the hardcopy or buy it via dndbeyond, where it is searchable and the monsters, spells, magic items are conveniently accessible.  Now it looks like I will have a 3rd option, the WotC app.  Actually, if you include roll20, where I frequently play, and Fantasy Grounds, where I sometimes play, that's actually 5 options.  All of them have their advantages, depending on how you game. However, each of these options requires repurchasing the same product in a different format.  So one needs to make a difficult decision.  I really like the dndbeyond interface but it has minimal usefulness for roll20 or fantasy grounds play.  At this point, it's a digital supplement to live play.  The other factor to consider is the longevity of these applications.  Will dndbeyond, roll20, and fantasy grounds be around in 5 years and will I be still able to access Tomb of Annihilation?  Maybe. They could disappear in a year or in 5 years and there goes all of my content. It's ironic in the current digital age that a hardcopy may in fact be the most universally useful version of Tomb of Annihilation.  I can use it live or online.  It will be sitting on my bookshelf for as long as I want it to stay there.  So I bought the hardcopy version.  It looks great and has a nice map.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

On a second note; if WotC is afraid of PDFs but wants the books in e-format, why not make e-book versions available on Kindle, Nook, Google Play Books, iTunes, the Microsoft store, etc. I'm not a e-book enthusiast, but I bought several books for Google Play and they work fine on my laptop, tablet, and phone and I trust Google will be around in 5 years. You could also buy on the e-reader of your choice. Seems that would be an alternative to PDFS people might get behind...


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 23, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> On a second note; if WotC is afraid of PDFs but wants the books in e-format, why not make e-book versions available on Kindle, Nook, Google Play Books, iTunes, the Microsoft store, etc. I'm not a e-book enthusiast, but I bought several books for Google Play and they work fine on my laptop, tablet, and phone and I trust Google will be around in 5 years. You could also buy on the e-reader of your choice. Seems that would be an alternative to PDFS people might get behind...




Because they've said their goal isn't to make them in e-format only, it's to make them in a digital format that can do many things beyond just reading them. Fantasy Grounds, Roll20, DND Beyond, and now this app all do things with the content that goes well beyond just being able to read it. That's always been their stated goal.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Because they've said their goal isn't to make them in e-format only, it's to make them in a digital format that can do many things beyond just reading them. Fantasy Grounds, Roll20, DND Beyond, and now this app all do things with the content that goes well beyond just being able to read it. That's always been their stated goal.



Such as? Everything I've seen about this is that reading is all it does. Want to share what I missed that this product does that the others don't?


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 23, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Such as? Everything I've seen about this is that reading is all it does. Want to share what I missed that this product does that the others don't?




Well it doesn't do much more than reading, but what we no so far there is apparently a thumbnail interface for sections poping out, and favoritng of content, and the ability to deliver just discrete sections for a smaller fee.  There is mention of Dragon+, so I suspect they will add an interface linked to that as well along with this app.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Well it doesn't do much more than reading, but what we no so far there is apparently a thumbnail interface for sections poping out, and favoritng of content, and the ability to deliver just discrete sections for a smaller fee.  There is mention of Dragon+, so I suspect they will add an interface linked to that as well along with this app.



I just checked Google Play Books, I can look at thumbnails of each page when speed searching, search the text, annotate pages, bookmark, and read across platforms. The only thing I can't do is buy books section by section, but that seems like a fairly minor trade-off. I'm sure most other e-readers are similar. 

Again, I'm at a loss as to what this product does that already existing products don't do or do better...


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Just another thought; the entire 5e catalog is 15 books plus a few PDFs. What if they intend to do the back catalog as well? Convert 3e, 4e and older books for purchase? That would set them apart from the other projects out there.

Not likely, but a thought.


----------



## Ilbranteloth (Sep 23, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> So interviews and pictures in Polygon and Mashable don't count as an announcement? Are they using a crystal ball or NSA wiretapping to know about this project?
> 
> "If, for example, you'll only ever care about rolling a bard, you can just buy that. Prices for individual sections are $3 or $5 (depending on what you buy) and the three full rulebooks — Player's Handbook, Monster Manual, and Dungeon Master's Guide — are $30 apiece for everything."
> 
> Sounds pretty announced.




I would consider an advertisement, or at least an announcement on one of the key company's pages an announcement. That's just me.



Remathilis said:


> Different Strokes for Different folks. I'm not saying Rd20/FG/D&DB are for everyone, but my point is they offer a LOT more VALUE for the same cost as this e-reader. And even if you don't want that value, D&DB can offer you similar content for $10 less. If all you bought were the major rulebooks (PHB, DMG, MM, SCAG, VGtM, XGtE) you're saving $60 dollars getting compendium only versions on D&DB. We're talking $180 for D&D Reader vs. $120 for D&D Beyond for the SAME CONTENT.
> 
> I sure hope that page-flip transition and bookmarking is worth it!




Well, if the product doesn't work for me, then it has no value to me. Doesn't mean it's not a product that has value to others, though. That's why companies release different products.



Remathilis said:


> So far, its looking like its own a reference tool for looking at the hardback books online. They may surprise, but at this stage the articles seem to paint this as a kindle with a very specific set of books.




And that's sort of my point. So far we've had a brief mention in an interview. No official announcement, with all of the features detailed, etc. So to call it dead in the water seems a bit premature to me.



Remathilis said:


> My point isn't that D&D Beyond should be the be-all, end-all of D&D online tools. My point is that this product is bringing nothing new to the table and charging too much for its limits compared to the same content as Rd20 or D&DB.
> 
> My suggestions (which you have utterly ignored) are to make this product unique compared to D&D Beyond. Make it the budget alternative to D&D Beyond for people who just want a copy of the PHB on their phone but don't want extra bells and whistles. $20 for the PHB is on the edge of impulse buy. Or, if WotC won't let them sell it for less than $30, add something more than "the PHB in an e-reader" to make it stand out; a subscription service to "stream" the books like Spotify or Hulu, or the ability to add purchases from DM's Guild in so I can have my AL adventures or fan stuff accessible next to my PHB. Or make some cross compatible promotion pricing so that If I DO buy it for $30 here, I might get it on R20 for only $20 dollars when I share my login or get a unique access code on purchase. If they can't stick codes in the back of the physical PHB, they easily could make randomized unique codes in tied to a specific email address in the digital version.
> 
> ...




No, I haven't ignored them. I was just responding specifically to your assertion that it's dead on arrival. I admit I wasn't having a great day and was a bit snarky, so I apologize for that.

What it really comes down to for me is that Dialect is in the business of providing innovative digital content solutions. I suspect they have a better understanding of the market than me. Also, I recognize that even if a product doesn't fit my needs (like Roll20, and to a lesser degree D&D Beyond), it doesn't mean that it won't be a successful product. I also wouldn't be surprised if this was in development already when D&D Beyond announced and released their product. 

You could very well be right, maybe it's just not enough. But until the companies involved actually announce the product and features, I think it's too soon to come to a conclusion. That's all.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 23, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> I just checked Google Play Books, I can look at thumbnails of each page when speed searching, search the text, annotate pages, bookmark, and read across platforms. The only thing I can't do is buy books section by section, but that seems like a fairly minor trade-off. I'm sure most other e-readers are similar.
> 
> Again, I'm at a loss as to what this product does that already existing products don't do or do better...




Can Google Books deliver their monthly magazine to your phone automatically, and then as you're reading the magazine can it link to the parts of the core books you've purchased for a quick pop-up rule lookup, as you go?


----------



## Ilbranteloth (Sep 23, 2017)

seebs said:


> There's a lot of people who'd buy a PDF from Wizards, but won't buy the various third-party things. (I won't, because I have *no* confidence that they will last and be accessible later.) So they're throwing away a large portion of the prospective market for digital copies, but in exchange, they're letting someone else siphon lots of the profit away from the sales they *do* make. Brilliant!




It is brilliant when you include the cost of paying developers, support for the product, the infrastructure to support the product, etc. There's little point for WotC to either pay for what would be needed in-house. And to pay somebody else to do it for you is also expensive (usually more expensive than in-house). 

But the bigger advantage, by far, is that WotC assumes no risk. If a third party is making the product and paying WotC for the content, then WotC has no expenses to offset before they start making a profit, nor do they assume any risk if the product doesn't sell well. As you pointed out, it's brilliant. 



seebs said:


> I don't think it would be very direct competition. PDFs are not competing with Beyond very effectively; if you want Beyond, what it does is way better for you than what a PDF does would be.
> 
> But the net result is, people who have "pirated" copies of the game get a play experience that I would like much better than anything Wizards is willing to sell me. And that's sort of the essence of "anti-piracy" measures; they don't hurt pirates, they do hurt paying customers.




Well, selling a digital copy of the same content, or even giving it away with the purchase of a book, certainly isn't going to encourage other companies to spend their own time and money, and assume the risk for such a product. All I'm saying is that with the evidence at hand - now the fourth company (at least) production a product to provide the same licensed digital content seems to point to a business model where WotC has decided that they aren't the best people to design, build, and support a digital product. 

I suspect a lot of this also has to do with the struggles they had in the 3e/4e era in creating a lasting and complete solution. As far as in-house designed or purchased products, they've been there, done that.

And while the solutions that have been released haven't served everyone's needs, I think that almost all of them have done well enough that it's encouraging for other companies who feel they have a solution that fills an empty niche. 

And based on that, I don't think that the primary reason WotC hasn't released pdfs has anything to do with piracy.


----------



## Morrus (Sep 23, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> I just checked Google Play Books, I can look at thumbnails of each page when speed searching, search the text, annotate pages, bookmark, and read across platforms. The only thing I can't do is buy books section by section, but that seems like a fairly minor trade-off. I'm sure most other e-readers are similar.
> 
> Again, I'm at a loss as to what this product does that already existing products don't do or do better...




Does every product have to do something new? When you buy a car, does it have to fly? Does every paperback you buy have to do something new? 

The book is offered in a variety of formats. You choose the one which suits you. They don’t all have to innovate!

Offering a choice of formats is a good thing. You get to choose the format.


----------



## Satyrn (Sep 23, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Does every product have to do something new? When you buy a car, does it have to fly? Does every paperback you buy have to do something new?
> 
> The book is offered in a variety of formats. You choose the one which suits you. They don’t all have to innovate!
> 
> Offering a choice of formats is a good thing. You get to choose the format.




Indeed.

I'm kind of wondering now though why they don't produce an ebook to be sold through Google Books, Kobo and the like. Maybe the format doesn't work so well for image heavy publications like D&D books.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Can Google Books deliver their monthly magazine to your phone automatically, and then as you're reading the magazine can it link to the parts of the core books you've purchased for a quick pop-up rule lookup, as you go?




Can this? You're assuming a lot again. 

First, you're assuming that there is content on Dragon+ that would need cross-linking to the core books. D+ is two years old at this point, and its never had any rules-related content that wasn't a link posted to the Wizards main site or DM's Guild. The issues are mostly puff pieces about upcoming products, occasional fiction pieces, and behind-the-scenes interviews with designers. Unless there is a radical shift in the type of content delivered (more akin to classic Dragon or even 4e-era Dragon) there is absolutely no need for such hyperlinking.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 23, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Does every product have to do something new? When you buy a car, does it have to fly? Does every paperback you buy have to do something new?
> 
> The book is offered in a variety of formats. You choose the one which suits you. They don’t all have to innovate!
> 
> Offering a choice of formats is a good thing. You get to choose the format.




It doesn't have to be new, but it has to have something special about it. 

I've bought the Original Trilogy of Star Wars 5 times; the original letterbox versions on VHS, the 97 Special Editions on VHS, The first DVD release boxset, the 2nd individual release DVDs with the bonus unaltered versions, and the Blu-Ray versions. They're the same movie; Luke still blows up the Death Star, Han is still put in carbonite, and Vader still betrays the Emperor; but each version gives me something unique since the original VHS letterbox; be it additional scenes (for good or ill), bonus content, improved visual/audio enhancement, etc. There is a reason to buy each. 

This feels like a company putting out the 2004 DVD release without any bonus content (extras or alterations) but charging the same cost as the Ultimate Edition Blu-Ray Box set. I'm getting nothing special for the same cost as the bells-and-whistles versions already out there. I get there is an audience for the no-frills "give me just the movie"  releases, but it doesn't seem fair to charge them the same amount as the ones with deleted scenes, directors commentary, and special features. 

As I keep saying, if I'm looking for just the books, D&D Beyond's Compendium Only is far better deal at $10 less. Which is why I keep asking "why should I pay $10 more for the same content here?" 

Offering a choice is a good thing. And if that choice is "pay $20 for something or pay $30 for the same thing", then the people who choose the latter deserved to be separated from their money, as the proverb goes.


----------



## fjw70 (Sep 23, 2017)

I originally thought this product didn't make any sense with DDB around and the app coming in the near future. But then I thought about it and if this new product can offer a more bookish feel to it and better navigation then it may have a market. 

I love DDB and have bought into heavily but the compendium navigation isn't great.  It's okay (I am hoping the app will be better). The real strength of DDB are in the tools.

So there could be enough differentiation between these products for the existence of both to make sense.


----------



## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 24, 2017)

fjw70 said:


> I love DDB and have bought into heavily but the compendium navigation isn't great.




Adam did a video where he discussed various aspects of design and development. He said that the team had heard people's complaints about navigation and that they're working on making it better.

In fact, pretty much every complaint other than price and DDB's very existence (which seems to offend some people), has been heard and is being looked at.


----------



## fjw70 (Sep 24, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> Adam did a video where he discussed various aspects of design and development. He said that the team had heard people's complaints about navigation and that they're working on making it better.
> 
> In fact, pretty much every complaint other than price and DDB's very existence (which seems to offend some people), has been heard and is being looked at.




I did see that. I expect it will get batter over time.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 24, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Can this? You're assuming a lot again.
> 
> First, you're assuming that there is content on Dragon+ that would need cross-linking to the core books. D+ is two years old at this point, and its never had any rules-related content that wasn't a link posted to the Wizards main site or DM's Guild. The issues are mostly puff pieces about upcoming products, occasional fiction pieces, and behind-the-scenes interviews with designers. Unless there is a radical shift in the type of content delivered (more akin to classic Dragon or even 4e-era Dragon) there is absolutely no need for such hyperlinking.




So you're saying this might do something that Google books cannot do?


----------



## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 24, 2017)

fjw70 said:


> I did see that. I expect it will get batter over time.




So, like... a 3D file you can use in your churro-maker? That kind of batter?

Or is this some sort of baseball reference I don't understand?


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 24, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> So you're saying this might do something that Google books cannot do?



The better question is "is such a hypothetical feature worth creating a whole new app and storefront for, vs the options already available?"

Again, I'm just curious why the need for a proprietary format when established ebook retailers are already a thing.


----------



## Azzy (Sep 24, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> The better question is "is such a hypothetical feature worth creating a whole new app and storefront for, vs the options already available?"
> 
> Again, I'm just curious why the need for a proprietary format when established ebook retailers are already a thing.




I think it is probably the continued fear (on the part of WotC/Hasbro) that pdfs will result in piracy and less sales of the current game. I don't give much credence to that view, but that is probably the reason (based on what happened with both 3e and 4e's pdf sales).


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 24, 2017)

Azzy said:


> I think it is probably the continued fear (on the part of WotC/Hasbro) that pdfs will result in piracy and less sales of the current game. I don't give much credence to that view, but that is probably the reason (based on what happened with both 3e and 4e's pdf sales).



Don't use PDFs. Kindles don't. Google play books don't. PDF wasn't the only alternative to building a from scratch app. 

It's a moot point, but I was just wondering what was wrong with using established ebook vendors, that's all.


----------



## dave2008 (Sep 24, 2017)

fjw70 said:


> I did see that. I expect it will get batter over time.




Yum!  I love batter!


----------



## Rygar (Sep 24, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Does every product have to do something new? When you buy a car, does it have to fly? Does every paperback you buy have to do something new?
> 
> The book is offered in a variety of formats. You choose the one which suits you. They don’t all have to innovate!
> 
> Offering a choice of formats is a good thing. You get to choose the format.




I'm going to have to disagree with you again.

Offering a choice of formats when there's a reasonably significant market or a reasonably significant probability of growth is a good thing.  Spending money to create products in a very stagnant market format, and then trying to load them up with micro-transactions (Which for a book isn't trivial or cheap), instead of spending money on actually growing your product is not a good thing.  In fact, it's probably one of the biggest signals that you're watching a product line where the leaders have absolutely no idea what they're doing and product meetings consist of "Hey!  My kids like watching things on their tablet and buying chests in video games, if we do that to D&D we'll make a mint!".  While ignoring the fact that their pricing strategy is so ridiculous that even the small market this might have appealed to is sure to go out and pirate their books.

If there was any doubt that Dungeons and Dragons wasn't going to be led to irrelevance by incompetent leadership this *really* should've cleared that up.  They literally just spent a ton of money making a product that has no market, never will, and 5 minutes on Reddit would've told them that.


----------



## kenmarable (Sep 24, 2017)

Rygar said:


> I'm going to have to disagree with you again.
> 
> Offering a choice of formats when there's a reasonably significant market or a reasonably significant probability of growth is a good thing.  Spending money to create products in a very stagnant market format, and then trying to load them up with micro-transactions (Which for a book isn't trivial or cheap), instead of spending money on actually growing your product is not a good thing.  In fact, it's probably one of the biggest signals that you're watching a product line where the leaders have absolutely no idea what they're doing and product meetings consist of "Hey!  My kids like watching things on their tablet and buying chests in video games, if we do that to D&D we'll make a mint!".  While ignoring the fact that their pricing strategy is so ridiculous that even the small market this might have appealed to is sure to go out and pirate their books.
> 
> If there was any doubt that Dungeons and Dragons wasn't going to be led to irrelevance by incompetent leadership this *really* should've cleared that up.  They literally just spent a ton of money making a product that has no market, never will, and 5 minutes on Reddit would've told them that.




You are relying on two premises which I’m pretty sure are false. One, from all descriptions of the Reader, I can’t see this costing “a ton of money” to build - and I say that from decades of experience building these sorts of things. D&D Beyond, Fantasy Grounds, Roll20 - those all took massive effort. A reader app even with a storefront, no not really. Two, you are assuming WitC is both funding this and is the driving force behind it. There has been zero evidence of that, and considering all of their various partnerships recently, I think that’s unlikely. Possible, but all evidence points towards not.

Without either one of those premises, your argument falls apart. Especially if you going to try to prove the conclusion that D&D is being “led to irrelevance by incompetent leadership“ when what data we have shows that the game is doing PHENOMENALLY well sales-wise, you can understand why we might need more convincing before we agree with you.

(And not to mention that Reddit is such a massively small portion of their market, I sure hope they don’t take that as the defining factor!!)


----------



## Morrus (Sep 24, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> The better question is "is such a hypothetical feature worth creating a whole new app and storefront for, vs the options already available?"
> 
> Again, I'm just curious why the need for a proprietary format when established ebook retailers are already a thing.




Because a stand-alone app somebody might find while browsing the Apple App Store is a gateway. 

Not everybody is you. I don’t have the faintest clue about DDB, but I do use the iOS App Store. If I didn’t run a major D&D website, I imagine I’d be even *less* informed. I suspect there are many potential customers for this.

Apps are things. They’re not unusual. There is no possible reason I can think of to *not* offer the D&D books as an app. It’s a no-brained. Why on earth *wouldn’t* they?


----------



## darjr (Sep 24, 2017)

Makes me wonder why there isn’t a drivethru books app?


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 24, 2017)

Morrus said:


> Because a stand-alone app somebody might find while browsing the Apple App Store is a gateway.
> 
> Not everybody is you. I don’t have the faintest clue about DDB, but I do use the iOS App Store. If I didn’t run a major D&D website, I imagine I’d be even *less* informed. I suspect there are many potential customers for this.
> 
> Apps are things. They’re not unusual. There is no possible reason I can think of to *not* offer the D&D books as an app. It’s a no-brained. Why on earth *wouldn’t* they?




My issue is, based on what we know, its a bad deal to get your D&D content. I'm having a hard time understanding why people are adamant about spending $30 per book for the functionality $20 per book elsewhere can give you. People are defending their right to be charged more for the same content. 

I just think that this app vs. the eventual D&D Beyond app (both slated for "this fall"), when they are compared side-by-side, one side is going to come up lacking. And its a shame. At $20 per book, I'd have invested in it as a "budget-friendly" choice to the more feature rich D&D Beyond or VTT versions. At $30 per book, the value simply isn't there to justify it.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 24, 2017)

Rygar said:


> I'm going to have to disagree with you again.
> 
> Offering a choice of formats when there's a reasonably significant market or a reasonably significant probability of growth is a good thing.  Spending money to create products in a very stagnant market format, and then trying to load them up with micro-transactions (Which for a book isn't trivial or cheap), instead of spending money on actually growing your product is not a good thing.




Prove it's a "very stagnant market format". That seems to be you replacing objectivity with subjectivity. 



> If there was any doubt that Dungeons and Dragons wasn't going to be led to irrelevance by incompetent leadership this *really* should've cleared that up. They literally just spent a ton of money making a product that has no market, never will, and 5 minutes on Reddit would've told them that.




They spent zero. They spent no money at all. In fact, they ONLY make money on this . Someone else completely not part of their company is spending money on it.

One might even say, "If there was any doubt that discussion of this topic wasn't going to be led to irrelevance by incompetent posters, this *really* should've cleared that up."  I kid. Seriously, I don't actually mean that sentence about you, I just thought it was funny. But really, this app is not being made by WOTC, and you should probably know that going into a discussion about it. It's just another licensed product, like many other licensed products out there.


----------



## Satyrn (Sep 24, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> My issue is, based on what we know, its a bad deal to get your D&D content. I'm having a hard time understanding why people are adamant about spending $30 per book for the functionality $20 per book elsewhere can give you. People are defending their right to be charged more for the same content.
> 
> I just think that this app vs. the eventual D&D Beyond app (both slated for "this fall"), when they are compared side-by-side, one side is going to come up lacking. And its a shame. At $20 per book, I'd have invested in it as a "budget-friendly" choice to the more feature rich D&D Beyond or VTT versions. At $30 per book, the value simply isn't there to justify it.




For my part, I rather doubt the accuracy of the prices mentioned. DDB, for example, waited almost right until release to give pricing details. And on top of that, Fantasy Grounds has adjusted their prices recently, haven't they?

I expect that what we've heard about the prices for this reader aren't going to be the final price.


----------



## lowkey13 (Sep 24, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


----------



## Morrus (Sep 24, 2017)

*D&amp;D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]*



Remathilis said:


> My issue is, based on what we know, its a bad deal to get your D&D content. I'm having a hard time understanding why people are adamant about spending $30 per book for the functionality $20 per book elsewhere can give you. People are defending their right to be charged more for the same content.
> 
> I just think that this app vs. the eventual D&D Beyond app (both slated for "this fall"), when they are compared side-by-side, one side is going to come up lacking. And its a shame. At $20 per book, I'd have invested in it as a "budget-friendly" choice to the more feature rich D&D Beyond or VTT versions. At $30 per book, the value simply isn't there to justify it.




I don’t understand why this is an issue for you. Don’t buy it. It’s an easy fix! 

There is no good reason to not sell a book in a new format. Apps are a popular format, whether you want them or not. 

Buy the book in whatever format you want. I don’t understand the mentality which makes somebody go online and complain about the existence of the book in formats other than the one they want.


----------



## TheSwartz (Sep 24, 2017)

I HIGHLY doubt that they'll give this to users who've bought their products (multiple times) free, or deeply discounted... and, yet again, you're paying for a subscription product dependent on that service staying in existence; not owning a PDF that you can keep forever. I dislike pathfinder, but see Paizo for a fair way to do this.


----------



## Morrus (Sep 24, 2017)

DrGerm said:


> I HIGHLY doubt that they'll give this to users who've bought their products (multiple times) free, or deeply discounted...




Who’s “they”? WotC isn’t making this.


----------



## DEFCON 1 (Sep 24, 2017)

CapnZapp said:


> Why did you feel the need to post this?
> 
> Could you not live with the thought that had WotC issued electronic rulebooks earlier, they would have had at least one happy customer?
> 
> Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app




Because "I want to give WotC my money but they won't take it" is the dumbest reason in my opinion I always hear about anything WotC does or doesn't do.  So when I hear it yet again, I like to point out if giving WotC your money is *really* that important to you, then go ahead and give it to them.

"I want to give them my money" is NEVER a reason why WotC should choose or not choose to do anything.  And if that's the best reason you can come up with for why they should do something, then you have an extremely weak argument.


----------



## Remathilis (Sep 24, 2017)

Morrus said:


> I don’t understand why this is an issue for you. Don’t buy it. It’s an easy fix!
> 
> There is no good reason to not sell a book in a new format. Apps are a popular format, whether you want them or not.
> 
> Buy the book in whatever format you want. I don’t understand the mentality which makes somebody go online and complain about the existence of the book in formats other than the one they want.




Because it COULD be a good product! I don't want to see it fail, I really don't. As I said, at a different value I'd be inclined to buy in. But it just seems to be the wrong way to go about making such a product. For me, its not about PDFs or being forced to pay for content again digitally. Those fights are over and done. Its about this product being a bad value as it is currently being reported. Compared to alternatives, its BADLY PRICED product. 

So I won't buy it. Fixed. If I feel the urge to buy digital content, I'll support Curse as I feel they're product gives me better value for my money. I have a feeling that I'm not alone in that sentiment. 

Believe me, I'm as big a WotC shill as any fanboy, but this product is just... poorly thought out.


----------



## Morrus (Sep 24, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Because it COULD be a good product! I don't want to see it fail, I really don't. As I said, at a different value I'd be inclined to buy in. But it just seems to be the wrong way to go about making such a product. For me, its not about PDFs or being forced to pay for content again digitally. Those fights are over and done. Its about this product being a bad value as it is currently being reported. Compared to alternatives, its BADLY PRICED product.
> 
> So I won't buy it. Fixed. If I feel the urge to buy digital content, I'll support Curse as I feel they're product gives me better value for my money. I have a feeling that I'm not alone in that sentiment.
> 
> Believe me, I'm as big a WotC shill as any fanboy, but this product is just... poorly thought out.




It’s not from WotC. It’s clearly a licensed product. I suspect you’ll see a LOT of licensed products you don’t want over the coming years. That’s OK. Hell, I don’t even know what DDB is!

I get that it’s not worth the price to you. That’s fine.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 24, 2017)

DrGerm said:


> I HIGHLY doubt that they'll give this to users who've bought their products (multiple times) free, or deeply discounted... and, yet again, you're paying for a subscription product dependent on that service staying in existence; not owning a PDF that you can keep forever. I dislike pathfinder, but see Paizo for a fair way to do this.




Digital is ephemeral. I don't even understand this idea that PDFs are "forever". I've lost countless PDFs and expect to lose countless more before I die. And for sure my kid won't inherent my PDF "collection". Whatever is left of them at the end of my life will die with me. Only my physical books are likely to last a long time. So what is this "PDFs will last FOREVER!" stuff about? PDFs are only roughly 20 years old as a technology anyway.  If I really care about having stuff long term, I buy a hard copy. 

By the way I still have some apps I bought using my Palm Treo from 2002. Including reader apps with content.  The device continues to fire up and be usable for those apps just fine. I am not even sure the premise that apps are more subject to loss than PDFs is a valid one.  You call it a "service" but I am guessing this is as much downloaded content that stays in your app and device indefinitely as much as a PDF would.


----------



## fantasmamore (Sep 24, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Digital is ephemeral.



No, it's not. People from all over the world convert old books in digital formats just to address that. Digital is eternal. 


Mistwell said:


> I've lost countless PDFs and expect to lose countless more before I die. And for sure my kid won't inherent my PDF "collection".



Use a cloud service or the equivalent of "time machine", an app for macs. I have never lost a document the last ten years. I have lost or destroyed physical books in these years however. 


Mistwell said:


> PDFs are only roughly 20 years old as a technology anyway.



PDFs are the standard format for printing (WoTC sent a pdf file to the printer in order to produce the physical book). If there is going to be another format in the future it will most probably be a postscript format similar to pdf and even if it's not, you can convert each pdf you own in a variety of formats. As long as there is printing involved, pdf or similar formats are going to be the industry standard. 


Mistwell said:


> By the way I still have some apps I bought using my Palm Treo from 2002. Including reader apps with content.  The device continues to fire up[...]



And I still use Windows XP through Parallels in my laptop in order to run old programs. I am not sure that I can do the same with an android app however. 
I bought an iphone 3G around 2008 and I kept using it untill 2-3 years ago. Over the last few years I couldn't buy anything from the store (nothing was compatible with the ios3 or whatever version I was running) and when (finally) the device died there was no way for me to find the "peppermint" app that I was using to create colour palettes since it was no longer available in the store. Today (albeit in android) there is no app as easy to use and fast and full of useful features as Peppermint once was. Imagine if peppermint was an app for reading books designed only for this app. 

So, digital is forever, but not every digital file can stand the test of time. 

Personally I don't care if WotC doesn't publish pdfs, I buy the physical book and the fantasygrounds module and this is more than enough for me. But I do understand why people want pdfs and why they consider it as a superior format. Tomorrow I am going to run Reavers of Harkenwold (4e) through fantasy grounds and imagine from what format I extracted images, maps and text...


----------



## Shasarak (Sep 24, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> Huge amounts of passion and vitriol vented over a product that hasn't been released, and that we are still unclear as to the functionality.
> 
> Man, I love the internet.




Would you prefer some discussion about your product or would you prefer the deafening sound of no one giving a damn?

Personally I found the Dragon + app to be particularly awful to use so I will not be using anything based on that.


----------



## guachi (Sep 24, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Fwiw, you can copy the text from any Pathfinder PDF, and any D&D classics PDF as well.




I do this all the time with my D&D classics PDFs. All. The. Time.

I'm running a campaign that's so far used nothing but old modules. Even though I've gone out and bought paper copies of all the modules I've run (except B10. It's really expensive) I still buy the PDFs to hack apart. Very useful.


----------



## Shasarak (Sep 24, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> Because "I want to give WotC my money but they won't take it" is the dumbest reason in my opinion I always hear about anything WotC does or doesn't do.  So when I hear it yet again, I like to point out if giving WotC your money is *really* that important to you, then go ahead and give it to them.




It is not the "dumbest" reason; that would be what ever reason it is that WotC is currently using to justify their decision.


----------



## guachi (Sep 24, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Digital is ephemeral. I don't even understand this idea that PDFs are "forever".




In the digital realm, PDFs are the closest thing we have to a "forever" format. Well, PDF and MP3, both of which are 24 years-old.


----------



## Mistwell (Sep 24, 2017)

fantasmamore said:


> And I still use Windows XP through Parallels in my laptop in order to run old programs. I am not sure that I can do the same with an android app however.




You can. My daughter does it every day, with an old phone that has no connectivity. She still uses the old apps I downloaded on it years ago. I also moved those apps to a new android device a couple times as well. I see no reason to think an app is more or less ephemeral than a PDF. It seems very much like a "angels dancing on the head of a pin" type theoretical argument. For practical purposes, I am not seeing this great divide you're talking about between the longevity of an app and a PDF for the purposes we're talking about. 



> Personally I don't care if WotC doesn't publish pdfs




So why passionately argue about something you don't care about?


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## Mistwell (Sep 24, 2017)

guachi said:


> In the digital realm, PDFs are the closest thing we have to a "forever" format. Well, PDF and MP3, both of which are 24 years-old.




I have lots and lots of software that is older than 24 years old. I have stuff going back to 1983 I think? My dad has stuff going back to the late 70s.


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## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 24, 2017)

Morrus said:


> That’s OK. Hell, I don’t even know what DDB is!




How can you possibly not know what DDB is? You've reported on it numerous times and it's a major news item in D&D currently and for the last few months.


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## fantasmamore (Sep 24, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> So why passionately argue about something you don't care about?




I use pdfs everyday, I am a graphic designer. I see the versatility and potential that they have. I understand why someone likes them it just so happens that at this specific moment I don't need them for 5e. However I do use pdfs to extract content out of older edition books since I cannot find content for my favourite virtual tabletop. 
I don't know if releasing pdfs is going to do good at WotC. If it competes with the physical books sales or helps piracy. But really, I cannot think of a better format for rpg rulebooks. I also hate pdfs for things like novels but that's irrelevant. 
There is a reason that all the other RPG publishers out there and even WotC (older editions + DM's Guild) are selling pdfs and not epubs or html pages or txts...


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## R_Chance (Sep 24, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> I have lots and lots of software that is older than 24 years old. I have stuff going back to 1983 I think? My dad has stuff going back to the late 70s.




You, me and your Dad   But it takes access to older hardware , obsolete operating systems and / or emulators to do that. I migrate my older stuff to newer media periodically as well. I just moved a lot of stuff off 3.5" floppies to digital storage on a portable HD for example. I keep a Win95 and XP rigs around for some older programs. I have another box with Linux on it. I have Commodore 32 and 64 machines lurking in the back of the closet. Most people don't maintain their older hardware for a variety of reasons. Financial, space, destructive children, spouses who object  and so on. PDFs have been around for a long time and popularity will keep it around. Along with legacy software and OS emulators. The only problem I have with this (the D&D reader) is the potential for a shut down / maintenance ending of a proprietary format with limited appeal and no use beyond this app. Of course, DDB has those same issues...


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## Azzy (Sep 25, 2017)

fantasmamore said:


> But really, I cannot think of a better format for rpg rulebooks.




The only one I could think of is the iBook format. However, that's also a proprietary format that can't be used on non-iOS machines (last I checked). So, yeah, pdfs it is.


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## JRedmond (Sep 25, 2017)

Morrus said:


> That’s OK. Hell, I don’t even know what DDB is!




DDB is the abbreviation for D&D Beyond sir.


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## lowkey13 (Sep 25, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Shasarak (Sep 25, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> "Hey Jake, a bunch of people who have never seen our product and aren't sure what it does are preemptively raging against us, because reasons."
> 
> "Thank goodness they care, Fred. Without them, what would we do?"




If Jake can not manage the fake news then maybe he should hire a Russian firm that can.


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> You can. My daughter does it every day, with an old phone that has no connectivity. She still uses the old apps I downloaded on it years ago. I also moved those apps to a new android device a couple times as well. I see no reason to think an app is more or less ephemeral than a PDF. It seems very much like a "angels dancing on the head of a pin" type theoretical argument. For practical purposes, I am not seeing this great divide you're talking about between the longevity of an app and a PDF for the purposes we're talking about.
> 
> 
> 
> So why passionately argue about something you don't care about?




This has been explained to you over and over. The pdf format is well known, well documented, and there are several open source implementations from trivial toy programs designed to teach folks how to use pdf to the gnu pdf processing suite. Compared to a proprietary app with code locked up behind a corporate firewall it’s obvious why pdf has staying power where any apps or websites might not.


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> "Hey Jake, a bunch of people who have never seen our product and aren't sure what it does are preemptively raging against us, because reasons."
> 
> "Thank goodness they care, Fred. Without them, what would we do?"




Hey look it’s somebody on the net waisting thier time showing us how much better they are than us time waisters. How diabolical!


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## CapnZapp (Sep 25, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Digital is ephemeral. I don't even understand this idea that PDFs are "forever". I've lost countless PDFs and expect to lose countless more before I die. And for sure my kid won't inherent my PDF "collection". Whatever is left of them at the end of my life will die with me. Only my physical books are likely to last a long time. So what is this "PDFs will last FOREVER!" stuff about? PDFs are only roughly 20 years old as a technology anyway.  If I really care about having stuff long term, I buy a hard copy.
> 
> By the way I still have some apps I bought using my Palm Treo from 2002. Including reader apps with content.  The device continues to fire up and be usable for those apps just fine. I am not even sure the premise that apps are more subject to loss than PDFs is a valid one.  You call it a "service" but I am guessing this is as much downloaded content that stays in your app and device indefinitely as much as a PDF would.



No, now you're just rambling on. This is wrong. (Not the parts where you lose your stuff, maybe, but that's highly irrelevant as an argument)

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app


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## kenmarable (Sep 25, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> "Hey Jake, a bunch of people who have never seen our product and aren't sure what it does are preemptively raging against us, because reasons."
> 
> "Thank goodness they care, Fred. Without them, what would we do?"




Umm... multiple news reports released simultaneously with direct hands-on experience....  you do realize that “Fred and Jake”* are the ones who actually made this into a story, right? They choose this time and this method to let the public know about their product, so it’d be kinda weird if right after going to the press, they wound up not wanting anyone to actually talk about it. I mean that’s sort of the entire point of press releases, isn’t it?


* As an aside, considering how unclear and subdued the press coverage was, my money is that it was Dialect rather than WotC. WotC has been pretty clear in managing their announcements and media coverage, whereas Dialect looks like a small shop still learning the ropes.


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## lowkey13 (Sep 25, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Mistwell (Sep 25, 2017)

darjr said:


> This has been explained to you over and over.




Smug doesn't sell well. 



> The pdf format is well known, well documented, and there are several open source implementations from trivial toy programs designed to teach folks how to use pdf to the gnu pdf processing suite. Compared to a proprietary app with code locked up behind a corporate firewall it’s obvious why pdf has staying power where any apps or websites might not.




Apps have staying power as well. You seem to have confused the concept of an app with the concept of a website. A website, and a database controlled in the cloud, can be shut down at whim. An app however is as "hard a copy" as a PDF most of the time, and there is no reason to believe it will mysteriously be remotely removed from your devise or locked along with all of it's content some day without your permission. You keep asserting that apps are somehow routinely removed remotely or locked or otherwise disabled, but reality doesn't support this view. It's supported with websites, but not with apps you buy. As I just mentioned, my daughter routinely uses apps I paid for years ago on a device that has no connectivity. It's much more akin to software you purchase on a disc than it is to a website.

Now if you know of some study or review or well thought of analysis from a reputable source that shows that apps over the long term are very ephemeral and are routinely disabled over time, I'd like to see it. Beyond that, you simply continuing to assert that PDFs are forever but apps are not isn't compelling. Apps are almost as old as PDFs, and apps have a long history of remaining and functioning even after the company that made them has long gone out of business most of the time - particularly the content type apps like this one.  But I am open to persuasion - let's see your source on how content-viewing apps are nefariously or otherwise disabled by their publishers on a routine basis over time.

My guess is this reaction you represent is a combination of "change is unknown and therefore bad" and "I can do unintended and disallowed things with PDFs that I might not be able to do with an app". But I could be wrong, because as I said that's purely a guess on my part and I don't want to attribute false motives. But, using a content reading app instead of a PDF is surely a change from the "industry standard" which I suspect in itself is considered a bad purely because it is unfamiliar, and I also suspect the familiarity of PDFs has led to a number of PDF-manipulating applications which allow one to do things with the content in a PDF which is otherwise not allowed by the license connected to the sale of that PDF, and those things might not be as possible with an app. So, that's the reason for my suspicions.


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

PDF apps have all the strengths you mention PLUS PDFs are an understood format with available source code. And yes many apps are backed by online websites. This very app is being written by a company that did dragon+ that is basically a front end app to a web site. And yes apps are pulled all the time. Some even out from the very place they are installed. I’m not the one who needs a reality check.


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Smug.....   My guess is this reaction you represent is a combination of "change is unknown and therefore bad" and "I can do unintended and disallowed things with PDFs that I might not be able to do with an app". But I could be wrong, because as I said that's purely a guess on my part and I don't want to attribute false motives. But, using a content reading app instead of a PDF is surely a change from the "industry standard" which I suspect in itself is considered a bad purely because it is unfamiliar, and I also suspect the familiarity of PDFs has led to a number of PDF-manipulating applications which allow one to do things with the content in a PDF which is otherwise not allowed by the license connected to the sale of that PDF, and those things might not be as possible with an app. So, that's the reason for my suspicions.




I wish you would stop trying to malign folks with nefarious  and illegal intent just to win an argument. What’s wrong with you man?


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## Mistwell (Sep 25, 2017)

CapnZapp said:


> No, now you're just rambling on. This is wrong. (Not the parts where you lose your stuff, maybe, but that's highly irrelevant as an argument)
> 
> Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app




What is wrong about it? Or are we all just supposed to take your word for it, that you have some insider knowledge we are not all privy to, or have some deep level of expertise in this field which us plebs are too inexperienced to appreciate? Please do regale us with your wisdom, oh Captain Zapp posting drive-by quips from his C6603.


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## Mistwell (Sep 25, 2017)

darjr said:


> I wish you would stop trying to malign folks with nefarious  and illegal intent just to win an argument. What’s wrong with you man?




 I said I could be wrong and it's only a guess and I don't want to attribute false motives. That's in response to you smugly saying that you expressing your opinion repeatedly was you telling me how it is and implying people should just shut up if they disagree with your opinion because once you expressed it that should be the end of it...which is how you started the post I was replying to.  Maybe stop with the didactic tone and explain your motives instead?


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

[MENTION=2525]Mistwell[/MENTION] I must concede, that no, apps are not routinely removed as you assert I’ve asserted. However that wasn’t my point. My point is that I believe PDF is a perfectly viable and fine way to deliver RPGA books. And I’d like to be able to purchase PDF of the core from WotC.


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> I said I could be wrong and it's only a guess and I don't want to attribute false motives. That's in response to you smugly saying that you expressing your opinion repeatedly was you telling me how it is and implying people should just shut up if they disagree with your opinion because once you expressed it that should be the end of it...which is how you started the post I was replying to.




I implied nothing of the kind. You just didn’t seem to be listening.


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## Mistwell (Sep 25, 2017)

darjr said:


> [MENTION=2525]Mistwell[/MENTION] I must concede, that no, apps are not routinely removed as you assert I’ve asserted. However that wasn’t my point. My point is that I believe PDF is a perfectly viable and fine way to deliver RPGA books. And I’d like to be able to purchase PDF of the core from WotC.




Sure, and I have no problem with you wanting to buy PDFs. And my point is an app is also a perfectly viable and fine way to deliver RPG books, or at least this company thinks it will be.


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## mjsoctober (Sep 25, 2017)

Morrus said:


> It’s not from WotC. It’s clearly a licensed product. I suspect you’ll see a LOT of licensed products you don’t want over the coming years. That’s OK. Hell, I don’t even know what DDB is!
> 
> I get that it’s not worth the price to you. That’s fine.




I have to side with Remathilis here, and point out that the problem _isn't_ 3rd parties offering the content in _different_ formats, but offering it in _the same format_ for the same price with fewer features.

We are scratching our heads because DDB (D&D Beyond) is working on an app for iOS and Android that will allow offline access to the books.

If you buy the PHB from DDB for $30 you _also_ get a rich desktop solution with all the content you bought along with a character builder, and homebrew monster builder at no extra cost.

If you buy the PHB from DDR (D&D Reader) you don't get _anything_ else, just the PHB.

If DDR cost less, it would make sense, but at the current listed price it just doesn't make sense. Before someone says "But maybe someone will want it in that _different format_, please remember that D&D Beyond _will have the same format coming out_!

In the end, yes, it doesn't hurt me one little bit for DDR to exist, but part of me is annoyed that people who read about DDR, but don't know about DDB, will be ripped off.

For what it's worth, here's a handy chart:


View attachment 88915


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## rknop (Sep 25, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> ... An app however is as "hard a copy" as a PDF most of the time, and there is no reason to believe it will mysteriously be remotely removed from your devise or locked along with all of it's content some day without your permission. You keep asserting that apps are somehow routinely removed remotely or locked or otherwise disabled, but reality doesn't support this view. It's supported with websites, but not with apps you buy. As I just mentioned, my daughter routinely uses apps I paid for years ago on a device that has no connectivity. It's much more akin to software you purchase on a disc than it is to a website.




How much software on disks that you purchased 20 years ago can you still use?

Chances are the software came on 3.5" floppies.  (Well, 25 years ago.)   Many computers don't even have that format any more.  Lots of people have word processing documents from ages past that they can't open because the proprietary software used to write it no longer exists.  (Paperback Writer on the C128, anybody?)

As the Gutenberg project has been arguing for years, the most future proof format for text documents is plain ASCII.  However, PDF does pretty well.  Crucially, it's an openly documented format.  Anybody can implement it, and all the information needed to do so is publicly available.  This is not true for a proprietary format, nor is it true if you need a specific app to run it.



> Apps are almost as old as PDFs,




Um.  The iphone was first a thing in 2007 or thereabouts.  I was writing PDFs in the late 1990s.  PDF as a format is at least twice as old as apps are.

I've used quite a number of android apps that I can  no longer use because they don't work with newer versions of android, and because the author of the app no longer cares to update it.

Another point of history: when DriveThruRPG first opened, there was a kerfluffle because they were using DRM on their PDFs.  A lot of people (myself included) complained about this.  Among other things was the complaint that these PDFs were not future proof.  They depended on an Adobe server that would be there to authorize the DRM for you. Many people argued back that we were being paranoid and open-source zealots.  Adobe, after all, is a very big and stable company, and it's ridiculous to fear that it will go away any time soon.

You can guess what happened.  Within a surprisingly short period of time (if memory serves, it was only a year or two), Adobe announced that it was discontinuing the DRM that DTRPG was using.  DTRPG was forced to issue new PDFs to the people who'd bought them.  The people who'd bought them were lucky that DTRPG was still around to do so; had the company gone out of business (which wouldn't have been a problem, DRM proponents argued, because Adobe was plenty stable), people would have been SOL.

DTRPG now makes the very wise choice to sell watermarked PDFs rather than DRM-encumbered PDFs.

It's always a mistake to buy content with proprietary locks on it, unless you're happy with the risk of not being able to access that content five or ten years in the future.  DVDs are mostly OK, because the locks have been fully cracked.  Of course, it's not legal to download the software necessary to watch a DVD you have legally purchased on hardware you own... but that's the US copyright regime for you.  If you really want to *own* the RPG books you buy, if you want to be able to crack them open in 40 years (like I did the other day with my 1e PHB),  you need them in an open format that is supported by lots of different readers.  They can't be a format that's only viewable by a set of proprietary readers, or that's locked behind DRM.  Track record shows that PDF is probably the best format to bet on.


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## Mistwell (Sep 25, 2017)

rknop said:


> How much software on disks that you purchased 20 years ago can you still use?




Just about all of it?



> Chances are the software came on 3.5" floppies.  (Well, 25 years ago.)   Many computers don't even have that format any more.




I have 3.5 drives on all my computers still. They're really cheap, and the slot is tiny. I also move stuff from 3.5 to sticks sometimes. If you actually have a need for an old program, it's not that hard.



> Um.  The iphone was first a thing in 2007 or thereabouts.  I was writing PDFs in the late 1990s.  PDF as a format is at least twice as old as apps are.




Hahahaha that's cute that you think the iphone invented apps!

Again, I have apps from my palm treo from 2002. Palm devices had apps going back much further than that (Pam Pilot was 1996 for example). The Psion Organiser was invented in the  mid-1980s, though I never used one. Apple had nothing to do with inventing the concept of the app. They just improved on it - which accurately describes pretty much the entire history of Apple. 



> I've used quite a number of android apps that I can  no longer use because they don't work with newer versions of android, and because the author of the app no longer cares to update it.




But they still work on older versions of android. Which you likely still own. Much like I do. And there will always be emulators for old versions of android as well due to this very issue. Your old android apps will never go away if you still want to use them. Much like, even if you don't own an Atari 2600, you can still find lots of ways to play all the games from the Atari 2600. Apps are like software that way...they live on. 



> It's always a mistake to buy content with proprietary locks on it




I disagree, but even if I agreed your entire basis for assuming there is a lock on this is pure speculation.  And my pure speculation is this will be an app where, once you download it and the content, it will stay on your device and be usable even without connectivity or the continuing existence of the company that made it. Maybe I am wrong...but we're both firmly in the realm of guessing on this point so I am not sure what the point is of debating it.


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## rknop (Sep 25, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Hahahaha that's cute that you think the iphone invented apps!
> 
> Again, I have apps from my palm treo from 2002. Palm devices had apps going back much further than that (Pam Pilot was 1996 for example)




...and if you still have Palm devices around to run those apps, then you are an outlier.




> But they still work on older versions of android. Which you likely still own.




Nope.  Devices don't last that long.  They die.  Their batteries go to hell.  It's not worth keeping them going.

Think about what you're suggesting here.  Keep around a whole bunch of old devices so that you can run the old apps to get access to the books you bought back when those apps where the current thing.  Compare that to just being able to move your whole collection to whatever your current computer is and use the reader of your choice.  The latter is what PDF offers.  The former is a huge pain in the butt, and not at all comparable to having DRM-free PDFs.

Or, sure, emulators.  It's still a pain in the butt.  And if the apps have any kind of DRM or software protection on them, chances are you're violating the law when you strip it in order to run it on your emulator.


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## darjr (Sep 25, 2017)

Or shift it to another device after it’s not available to buy.


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## Mistwell (Sep 25, 2017)

rknop said:


> ...and if you still have Palm devices around to run those apps, then you are an outlier.




First, I think wanting to use PDFs of a version of a game from many years ago already makes someone an outlier. Second, emulators are free.



> Nope.  Devices don't last that long.  They die.  Their batteries go to hell.  It's not worth keeping them going.
> 
> Think about what you're suggesting here.  Keep around a whole bunch of old devices so that you can run the old apps to get access to the books you bought back when those apps where the current thing.  Compare that to just being able to move your whole collection to whatever your current computer is and use the reader of your choice.  The latter is what PDF offers.  The former is a huge pain in the butt, and not at all comparable to having DRM-free PDFs.




Emulators are free.



> Or, sure, emulators.  It's still a pain in the butt.




It's not really more a pain in the butt than constantly updating to the new version of my PDF readers. Which seem to update all the friggen time due to the new viruses they keep finding that takes advantage of some of that technology. 



> And if the apps have any kind of DRM or software protection on them, chances are you're violating the law when you strip it in order to run it on your emulator.




Generally speaking if they no longer make the original device it runs on and the company is long gone, there is no legal issue. Generally, those companies that don't exist don't renew their IP. 

I think people are dug in on their opinion on this one, but in reality we're not talking about a huge difference between a PDF and an App for long term usability. Both can be used long term most of the time, and wanting to use it in 20 years from now to begin with is slightly on the unusual side anyway. Realistically you will likely be playing something else by then anyway. 

But you know, the Internet, and outrage, and we want what we want when we want it and damn any who disagree, and all that. But I think most people will get what they want out of an app as much as they'd get what they want out of a PDF.


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## DM Howard (Sep 26, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> First, I think wanting to use PDFs of a version of a game from many years ago already makes someone an outlier. Second, emulators are free.




True, but I'd say in the tabletop gaming hobby, this trends more towards the norm.



Mistwell said:


> Emulators are free.




Very true, if you can find them, and double experience if you find the correct one, that works with your current system AND isn't riddled with malware and trojans.  Not everyone is as tech savvy as others are.



Mistwell said:


> It's not really more a pain in the butt than constantly updating to the new version of my PDF readers. Which seem to update all the friggen time due to the new viruses they keep finding that takes advantage of some of that technology.




Being able to update my PDF reader of choice is going to be much easier than having to actively search for an emulator that works for what you are wanting to do.



Mistwell said:


> But you know, the Internet, and outrage, and we want what we want when we want it and damn any who disagree, and all that. But I think most people will get what they want out of an app as much as they'd get what they want out of a PDF.




I agree with you here, Mistwell, I think people are getting a little too bent out of shape.  I have been guilty of this in the past, specifically with my frustration with WotC's release schedule/content choices so I'm just as guilty as anyone.


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 26, 2017)

mjsoctober said:


> I have to side with Remathilis here, and point out that the problem _isn't_ 3rd parties offering the content in _different_ formats, but offering it in _the same format_ for the same price with fewer features.
> 
> We are scratching our heads because DDB (D&D Beyond) is working on an app for iOS and Android that will allow offline access to the books.
> 
> ...




First, it won't be the same format. It will be on the same _platform_, but that's quite different.

Also, I still haven't seen/read any actual announcement from the companies outlining all of the features of the product. Maybe I missed something. 

Your handy-dandy chart simply identifies what little information we have from an interview. To start with, since it's being produced by the same company that produces Dragon+ which _has_ a desktop website that is searchable, it would lead me to believe there would be the same capabilities for the D&D Reader.

I'm not looking for a character builder, so both look like they'll meet my needs based on the small amount of info in your chart. Comparing an available product to one that you haven't even seen screen shots or a full list of features is pointless. We don't have enough information to declare one better than the other.


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 26, 2017)

rknop said:


> It's always a mistake to buy content with proprietary locks on it, unless you're happy with the risk of not being able to access that content five or ten years in the future.  DVDs are mostly OK, because the locks have been fully cracked.  Of course, it's not legal to download the software necessary to watch a DVD you have legally purchased on hardware you own... but that's the US copyright regime for you.  If you really want to *own* the RPG books you buy, if you want to be able to crack them open in 40 years (like I did the other day with my 1e PHB),  you need them in an open format that is supported by lots of different readers.  They can't be a format that's only viewable by a set of proprietary readers, or that's locked behind DRM.  Track record shows that PDF is probably the best format to bet on.




Well, mistake or not, you're limited to the options available.

First, if you really want to own the RPG books you buy, then buy the books. 

As for being the "best format to bet on," it really depends on the what the company is trying to accomplish. Considering that WotC has released a lot of material via PDF in the past, and I'm sure they are well aware with the folks that are requesting it, I'd have to guess that WotC has decided that releasing the core books in PDF format doesn't meet their goals. That is, it's _not_ the best format for them.

Note that you being able to open the document in 40 years isn't a money maker for the company 40 years from now. Their concerns isn't probably aligned with yours in terms of what you can do with it 40 years from now. 

I have a bunch of those PDFs, and you know what? They aren't the best format. If it's a book I'll reference regularly, then I buy a hard copy. 

So far, they have "bet" on at least five companies now. The first didn't come through. Three of them have released their products, and are selling product. Another one sounds like they'll be releasing another option in the near future.

So right now a 75% success rate out of released products (assuming I haven't missed one), is pretty darn good. The fact that other companies are still jumping in with new products is another good sign. Obviously they see an opportunity to make money with their product.

Also note that with a product like D&D, the usual rules of competition don't apply. For example, you can complain that they haven't released PDFs, but if you want to play D&D with the PHB, DMG, and MM, then you have to purchase one of the options they provide (unless you want to pirate a copy). 

So WotC makes money no matter which app you choose - including the physical books. For the individual companies making the apps, that's a different story, they are competing amongst themselves. But there are similar situations out there. By this point there have probably been thousands of programs and apps that provide a digital copy of the Bible, for example. A great many of those programs don't work on the newest technology, and those who like such programs have often purchased them several times. This is also similar to music, where in many cases people have purchased the same music multiple times over their lives as well.

I still go back to the same suspicion. I don't think WotC cares at all what the digital solution looks like. They aren't in the business of designing and selling digital solutions, and I'm pretty sure they don't want to be. They are in the business of selling the content. So they would naturally be most interested in having as many companies producing digital solutions, and letting the market decide which ones rise to the top. The chance that a single digital solution will appeal to everybody and meet everybody's needs is pretty much nil. But multiple solutions cater to different audiences, and also have the advantage of selling more content.


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## rknop (Sep 26, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> First, if you really want to own the RPG books you buy, then buy the books.




Yes... buy the physical books, or buy a non-DRMed ebook in an openly defined and widely supported format (such as PDF).

If you buy something DRMed, or in a format that requires a proprietary app, then, even if "they'd never do that", your continued ability to legally read the book you bought depends on the continued permission of the company that controls the DRM scheme or the app.


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## EternalRain (Sep 26, 2017)

This whole conversation seems to be much to do about nothing to me.  

PDFs would be great, but they are not going to give them to us while this is the current edition.  So the reader is a similar option that you can have now, or you can wait until some time in the undetermined future when the next edition comes out and they offer it in PDF.  If you don't want to support a proprietry reader option, don't.  You are no worse off than you are now.


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## fantasmamore (Sep 26, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> So far, they have "bet" on at least five companies now.




You are right, there are more than 5. 

1. Dungeonscape / Trapdoor (defunct)
2. Fantasy Grounds / Smiteworks
3. Roll 20 / Roll20 (?)
4. D&D Beyond / Curse
5. Dragon +, D&D reader (?) app / Dialect
6. DM's Guild, drivethrough / OneBookShelf
7*.* D20Pro / Mesa Mundi (why everyone forgets about that?)

Are there any other companies that sell official D&D products through apps or websites?


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 26, 2017)

rknop said:


> Yes... buy the physical books, or buy a non-DRMed ebook in an openly defined and widely supported format (such as PDF).
> 
> If you buy something DRMed, or in a format that requires a proprietary app, then, even if "they'd never do that", your continued ability to legally read the book you bought depends on the continued permission of the company that controls the DRM scheme or the app.




I'm not disagreeing with what you're saying. But that's only valid if they actually provide non-DRM PDFs, which they aren't. 

And my point is, that as a consumer, what you are saying is absolutely correct. You want to choose an option that will be available forever, and without limitations. But when there are multiple options, then the feature set is another factor. Each person then has to decide if the feature set is worth being tied into a proprietary system, or if they should spend their money elsewhere.

But WotC, or any company, has other considerations. While they obviously want it to be the best experience for the customer, selling something permanent and perpetual means you won't ever have to purchase it again. I've purchased the same music on vinyl, CD, remastered CD, and sometimes in an expanded box set CD, not to mention a music subscription that lets me access it online. That means the company (and hopefully the artists, although that's an entirely different issue), got paid several times by me. That's a business model that companies love.

WotC is also looking for as many sales channels as possible. So every new app that is released is a new sales channel for them. Again, I purchased Fantasy Grounds and some content, expecting that I might use it. I haven't. Not even once. But that's not preventing me from looking at the next options. D&D Beyond is cool, if a bit clunky. But it doesn't allow me to include my home-brew content in things like the rules, classes, races, etc. If they do, then it's more likely to be a good option for me. Otherwise, the only use it has for me is a digital reference for the RAW. So if D&D Reader has the same price, with a better user experience, since I don't need all of the other stuff D&D Beyond has, it's probably the one I'd buy. Proprietary format or not.


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## Rygar (Sep 27, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> So far, they have "bet" on at least five companies now. The first didn't come through. Three of them have released their products, and are selling product. Another one sounds like they'll be releasing another option in the near future.
> 
> So right now a 75% success rate out of released products (assuming I haven't missed one), is pretty darn good. The fact that other companies are still jumping in with new products is another good sign. Obviously they see an opportunity to make money with their product.




I think we need to be very specific here, the first company failed, the next four are all low revenue companies most of which are all trying to sell products in the exact same market to the exact same 0 growth consumer pool.  So I don't think "success" is the word I'd use to describe anything other than maybe DriveThruRPG since it's print on demand is driving down Ebay prices.

Meanwhile...WOTC refused to license Planescape to InXile to make a sequel to a highly respected video game, which would've actually made money unlike their current strategy.  IIRC they also refused Margaret Weiss and Tracey Hickman's pitch for a new Dragonlance trilogy, which again would've actually made money.  

Honestly, this is ridiculously bad marketing strategy.  Who thought giving PDF/Digital licenses to three or four companies all on the same platforms, most of whom have 0 name recognition was a good idea?



> Also note that with a product like D&D, the usual rules of competition don't apply. For example, you can complain that they haven't released PDFs, but if you want to play D&D with the PHB, DMG, and MM, then you have to purchase one of the options they provide (unless you want to pirate a copy).




As we saw with 4th edition, the usual rules of competition very much apply and if WOTC doesn't pull it together and actually start releasing a smattering of content that is basically the same products they released 40 years ago almost all set in a single setting that isn't universally liked, the Paizo is going to take their market away from them again.  If they want to succeed, they need to actually try to make money.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

darjr said:


> 4e was released on drive thru in PDF. In fact they took it down citing piracy. https://m.slashdot.org/story/116889



Oh yeah I recall that now. It didn't last that long, did it?


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## kenmarable (Sep 27, 2017)

Rygar said:


> I think we need to be very specific here, the first company failed, the next four are all low revenue companies most of which are all trying to sell products in the exact same market to the exact same 0 growth consumer pool.  So I don't think "success" is the word I'd use to describe anything other than maybe DriveThruRPG since it's print on demand is driving down Ebay prices.




Cool, I didn’t realize they had all released their sales numbers, revenue information, and market reports. I’m curious how much Curse has made from the release of D&D Beyond. Do you have a link to that revenue information?


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

Rygar said:


> I think we need to be very specific here, the first company failed, the next four are all low revenue companies most of which are all trying to sell products in the exact same market to the exact same 0 growth consumer pool.  So I don't think "success" is the word I'd use to describe anything other than maybe DriveThruRPG since it's print on demand is driving down Ebay prices.




We don't know what these companies are making, but I find it not hard to believe that one or more goes belly up in the next few years, meaning that some of the rights purchased through those companies have a fairly high chance of being worthless. I know I would be... _unamused_ if I bought content on one of these platforms and it closed up in early 2019. So much so that I'm sitting on my cash and won't by anything at all now due to too much perceived risk. How many people are like me? No clue. 

I'm sure WotC did market research on it but this seems like a strategy which may well generate revenue in the short run but runs a big potential of angering customers and potential business partners who end up being left holding the bag. I wonder if the current brand management remembers just how hated TSR was at the end of its run for a number of really jerk moves they made? 




> As we saw with 4th edition, the usual rules of competition very much apply and if WOTC doesn't pull it together and actually start releasing a smattering of content that is basically the same products they released 40 years ago almost all set in a single setting that isn't universally liked, the Paizo is going to take their market away from them again.  If they want to succeed, they need to actually try to make money.




I assume you meant "isn't basically the same products"?  TSR and later WotC have been trying to recapture lightning in a bottle with the 40 year old classic content for years. 

I agree, the rules of competition will, indeed, very much apply. In the 1990s, TSR saw the rules of competition very much applying in the form of White Wolf, just as they did with Paizo's release of _Pathfinder_. D&D has a certain inelasticity built in due to being the market leader in a market with many small options but only a few realistic big ones due to the social nature of gaming, but, still. Cubicle 7 has been selling a fair number of copies of _Adventures in Middle Earth_, Paizo just released _Starfinder_ and sells _Pathfinder_....


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## Ilbranteloth (Sep 27, 2017)

Rygar said:


> I think we need to be very specific here, the first company failed, the next four are all low revenue companies most of which are all trying to sell products in the exact same market to the exact same 0 growth consumer pool.  So I don't think "success" is the word I'd use to describe anything other than maybe DriveThruRPG since it's print on demand is driving down Ebay prices.
> 
> Meanwhile...WOTC refused to license Planescape to InXile to make a sequel to a highly respected video game, which would've actually made money unlike their current strategy.  IIRC they also refused Margaret Weiss and Tracey Hickman's pitch for a new Dragonlance trilogy, which again would've actually made money.
> 
> ...




The first company failed to produce a product, yes.

The revenue of the companies is relative. They are a niche product in a niche market. To me the only question is whether they are profitable for themselves. It seems that way to me, although with small private companies we only have anecdotal evidence. Part of the evidence is that other companies are willing to jump in the ring. If there wasn’t money to be made, then that wouldn’t be the case.

Whether it’s a good marketing strategy really depends on what they are trying to accomplish. For example, the content being available within a virtual tabletop enables virtual play and can increase the player base and potentially your paying customers. Releasing PDFs doesn’t have the same potential, unless you really think there are a significant number of people that only play games available in pdf.

4th edition by the accounts I’ve seen was still a good seller. That it was potentially outsold by another company doesn’t mean that sales goals and such weren’t met. In many cases, especially in a niche market, a company selling another product expands the market as a whole, rather than takes sales away from another company. More importantly, though, that was a problem of their own making. For all practical purposes they were competing against a continuation of their own product line. One that appeared to be more popular than their then-current product.

While that is theoretically possible, I think the sales numbers and new marketing strategy shows that the game is growing and sales are better than they have been in 20 years. So no, I don’t see a repeat of that scenario. And part of that marketing strategy is their digital content approach. 

Their approach is also very consistent with the current business trends - leverage your existing IP. Acererak, Strahd, Against the Giants, the Temple of Elemental Evil and the Forgotten Realms all have “star power” in the RPG world. There is a lot of nostalgia, but people also want new things. Making new things with existing IP is often easier than selling new things with new entirely new content. This has been shown consistently over things like comics and related movies. A new Superman comic sells far more than a new comic with new characters. The big characters sell more movie tickets than the niche characters (although starting the niche characters in a movie with the big characters is a good way to increase their own star power before releasing their own movies).

Again, from what we know about sales numbers, it seems to be a winning strategy right now. As far as I know, every AP is selling in quantities that are considerably higher than most adventures in the past 20 years. 

RPG releases tend to have a shelf-life. Although I’m working off numbers in a similar hobby, in a niche like this, you tend to sell 80%+ of a title in the first year. Releasing things too quickly cannibalizes those sales, not giving the last release its full sales arc. Going back to what we know about sales numbers, again the strategy seems to be a solid one. 

The digital market for TTRPG is an emerging market, not a well established one. As a part of the gaming market it’s a very small niche, but with lots of growth potential. Competition is a great way to fuel growth, and growth in a new market means more sales. WotC is not a digital product developer. Letting companies that specialize in the product and making the content available for them to purchase seems like a very strong long term strategy in this space. In fact TSR might be seen as a pioneer for this approach. D&D and AD&D products were some of the earliest licensed IP in the video game market, and like attaching Mike Tyson’s name to a video game, the D&D name can make a big difference in the sales of a new video game. It’s exactly what no-name developers can use to make a product viable.


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## guachi (Sep 27, 2017)

So it's the 2e problem reimagined.

Rather than too many settings dividing up a limited pool of dollars it's too many websites offering the same products dividing up a limited pool of dollars.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

guachi said:


> So it's the 2e problem reimagined.
> 
> Rather than too many settings dividing up a limited pool of dollars it's too many websites offering the same products dividing up a limited pool of dollars.




Yes, that's my feeling. 3.X had this too with the eventual D20 glut. I suspect that it's an inherent part of the business. The big difference here is that WotC has offshored the risk to other companies and the consumer, a trend that started in 3.X. From their perspective that's a win, at least for now. From the other companies and the consumer? Obviously some companies think there's enough money to be made that it's worth the risk.


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## kenmarable (Sep 27, 2017)

guachi said:


> So it's the 2e problem reimagined.
> 
> Rather than too many settings dividing up a limited pool of dollars it's too many websites offering the same products dividing up a limited pool of dollars.




One useful difference now, however, is that it's not product vs product, but distributor vs distributor. WotC is getting a percentage of PHB sales whether it is sold at a FLGS, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, D&D Beyond, this new Reader app, etc. So from WotC's perspective, there's no real cannibalization. 

In fact, some people will likely buy some products more than once, and some who might not have bought it at all might make that purchase when it's in a format they like. So for WotC, it's actually better this way (with some complications about prit run sizes and digital sales impacting print sales, but so far print products still seem to be doing fine).

The real issue is between Roll20, FG, DDB, etc. They are in a situation like 2e with competing product lines. But also, they are likely smaller operations (or like Amazon - far larger), so they can make the numbers work. But the biggest risk is at their level, not WotC. WotC gets your dollars either way.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

kenmarable said:


> One useful difference now, however, is that it's not product vs product, but distributor vs distributor. WotC is getting a percentage of PHB sales whether it is sold at a FLGS, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, D&D Beyond, this new Reader app, etc. So from WotC's perspective, there's no real cannibalization.




There might be if a bunch of consumers lose access when one of those outlets goes bust without a method for transferring rights. "Lifetime access" sounds impressive but what it really refers to is "lifetime of the company" not "lifetime of the consumer" or even "lifetime of the game." 




> The real issue is between Roll20, FG, DDB, etc. They are in a situation like 2e with competing product lines. But also, they are likely smaller operations (or like Amazon - far larger), so they can make the numbers work. But the biggest risk is at their level, not WotC. WotC gets your dollars either way.




They're not getting much of my money anymore. That level of cynical exploitation just doesn't sit well with me. They're behaving like a monopoly. Combine with the fact that most of what they release is "get on the bandwagon" APs, their books are larded with content I don't use, and that their print quality is dubious (I'm not hard on books and have had to replace my PHB after 2 years, with the new one falling apart already). _Xanthar's_ might well be the last product I buy from them, depending on what's in it. I guess the business has just changed out from under me.


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## dropbear8mybaby (Sep 27, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> That level of cynical exploitation just doesn't sit well with me.




Providing loads of options that suit different uses and people is cynical exploitation?

People really do love to complain about nothing.


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## fantasmamore (Sep 27, 2017)

guachi said:


> So it's the 2e problem reimagined.
> 
> Rather than too many settings dividing up a limited pool of dollars it's too many websites offering the same products dividing up a limited pool of dollars.




I thought of that too, but it's not the case. Everybody now has the same rules and the same content. The DM chooses the vtt / service that fits his needs and the players follow. I have bought the Starter Set from Roll20 so we played using my subscription in Roll20 and I am currently using Fantasy Grounds so my players are going to play in FG using, again, my subscription. It's not that one of my players is using Roll20, another one DDB etc. It's not the same as "we are playing Dark Sun so you can't be a cleric" or "we are playing Advanced so you can't use your Basic books" type of thing. 
The content is always the same for everyone.


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## kenmarable (Sep 27, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> There might be if a bunch of consumers lose access when one of those outlets goes bust without a method for transferring rights. "Lifetime access" sounds impressive but what it really refers to is "lifetime of the company" not "lifetime of the consumer" or even "lifetime of the game."




Exactly, and that's something buyers definitely need to be aware of. Caveat emptor and all that.




Jay Verkuilen said:


> They're not getting much of my money anymore. That level of cynical exploitation just doesn't sit well with me. They're behaving like a monopoly. Combine with the fact that most of what they release is "get on the bandwagon" APs, their books are larded with content I don't use, and that their print quality is dubious (I'm not hard on books and have had to replace my PHB after 2 years, with the new one falling apart already). _Xanthar's_ might well be the last product I buy from them, depending on what's in it. I guess the business has just changed out from under me.




To each their own. I'm sorry their current business methods aren't to your liking. On the flip side, I'm buying more WotC products since 3.x. Stuck with Pathfinder rather than 4e, and even early 5e just got the core books and Out of the Abyss cuz it sounded cool and might have stuff to re-use but still mostly played PF. 

However, with the greater options to purchase products, I've fully bought into DDB with their Legendary Bundle so that I can help my son's group have access to any of the content they want (and I have easier access to everything than my physical copies), and with some former co-workers who moved away, we are starting a Roll20 VTT game and I will likely buy one of the adventures there as well because of the massive time saving and utility of being able to play it online with them with less prep time for me. For me, it's not "cynical exploitation", it's giving me more useful tools.

So WotC's business methods have moved me from buying zero WotC products since... I dunno, Book of 9 Swords or maybe Spell Compendium to now buying the core rulebooks twice, all of the adventures and other sourcebooks, and quite likely buying an adventure a second time (or third time if Roll20 ever releases OotA!). So I'm a very happy customer with the direction they are going in. With Xanathar's I'm debating whether to get it on DDB only, or since it's a Player-focused sourcebook and my wife like physical books for character building but I prefer DDB, possibly getting it twice.

Some business methods will work for some customers and not for others. I'm happy it's aligning well with my needs and interests. I'm sorry it doesn't work for you. But it's also bonus if they are focusing more on long-term viability as they appear to be rather than getting as much product out there every month to spike short term revenue like in 3.x days, that's even better.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> Providing loads of options that suit different uses and people is cynical exploitation?
> 
> People really do love to complain about nothing.



Options don't bother me one bit. What I'm highly dubious about is the pricing model that offshores all risk onto partners and the consumer and are strongly premised on multiple purchases of the same content.


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## kenmarable (Sep 27, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> Options don't bother me one bit. What I'm highly dubious about is the pricing model that offshores all risk onto partners and the consumer and are strongly premised on multiple purchases of the same content.




I wouldn't say they are "strongly premised on multiple purchases". You only need to buy them once. The only reason you might *need* to buy them more than once is because these other formats come out later than the original physical books. But that was certainly not WotC's master plan and a strong premise of their business plans. 

Now that there are so many options are out there, there is no need to buy anything more than once going forward. Zero. From here on, buy it in your preferred format. I'm not sure how giving consumers what they want to such a terrible thing. The biggest gripe I can maybe sympathize with is still not releasing them as PDFs or some other non-proprietary format as many others have pointed out.

But giving consumers what they want is exploiting them is... well... a weird notion.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

kenmarable said:


> I wouldn't say they are "strongly premised on multiple purchases". You only need to buy them once. The only reason you might *need* to buy them more than once is because these other formats come out later than the original physical books. But that was certainly not WotC's master plan and a strong premise of their business plans.




There are other reasons: Players (and especially DMs) may well need to purchase multiple times if they're in a game on Roll20 and another on Fantasy Grounds. So WotC gets multiple purchases of the same content as opposed to, in the past, people buying lots of new content, and it's content they have to do nothing for but collect rents on. 



> Now that there are so many options are out there, there is no need to buy anything more than once going forward. Zero. From here on, buy it in your preferred format. I'm not sure how giving consumers what they want to such a terrible thing.




That's assuming that content providers will survive to ensure access to the content. 



> The biggest gripe I can maybe sympathize with is still not releasing them as PDFs or some other non-proprietary format as many others have pointed out. But giving consumers what they want is exploiting them is... well... a weird notion.




Well, yeah. Even PDFs won't have the lifetime of a good quality hardback book, but they are likely to last longer than "lifetime access" to some content delivery service (except perhaps Amazon). I understand WotC's gripe about piracy, but I really wonder. Many other companies give PDFs out for free or at reduced price (e.g., Paizo) and they're making it work. Of course they're in a different market.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

kenmarable said:


> Exactly, and that's something buyers definitely need to be aware of. Caveat emptor and all that.




Exactly. I don't think many buyers are particularly aware of it. 




> To each their own. I'm sorry their current business methods aren't to your liking. On the flip side, I'm buying more WotC products since 3.x. Stuck with Pathfinder rather than 4e, and even early 5e just got the core books and Out of the Abyss cuz it sounded cool and might have stuff to re-use but still mostly played PF.
> 
> However, with the greater options to purchase products, <snip> Some business methods will work for some customers and not for others. I'm happy it's aligning well with my needs and interests. I'm sorry it doesn't work for you. But it's also bonus if they are focusing more on long-term viability as they appear to be rather than getting as much product out there every month to spike short term revenue like in 3.x days, that's even better.




You're an example of someone for whom their current business model works very well, evidently! 

I would be happier if they released things I was interested in and felt solid about. E-content to me I really don't. I am OK with streaming though for a long time I was just a buyer but now consider paying a streaming service monthly fee to be essentially a rental service for access (and simultaneously a way for me not to have to have the ridiculous amount of RL storage for a collection). That's premised on my feeling that those streaming services are likely to survive but even if they don't, I won't have a big one-time purchase down and I can cancel when I want. Maybe if I amortized the cost over time it might make sense. However, their proliferation of possible delivery services feels like it's setting up for multiple purchases, some of which are likely to disappear when the inevitable contraction happens. If I was loving their content I might go... eh, OK, and buy. But I'm not. 

Part of my resistance here comes from my own professional life experience where a market leader software vendor (SPSS, now owned by IBM) pulled similar ploys by going from a comprehensible and straightforward licensing model in the late 1990s and over the course of the 2000s made it progressively more arcane, meanwhile raising prices and/or messing with licensing terms as they transitioned from a company adding value to being a rentier. They felt they had a lock on the market due to user loyalty....


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## Mistwell (Sep 27, 2017)

FG and Roll20 service all RPGs, not just D&D. In fact I think both were profitable before 5e was even a majority of their games. I seriously doubt either is going away any time soon. 

D&D Beyond and this app are certainly dependent on D&D. However, D&D Beyond is a Twitch Interactive company, which itself is a subsidiary of Amazon, one of the largest companies on the planet.

This app is made by Dialect. Dialect, while not as huge as Amazon of course, is still a much larger and more stable company than just their D&D stuff. They work with Logitech, Mass Effect, Eve Online, etc.. I don't think their company is dependent on this product.

So no, I don't think this is a situation where any of these four companies are going anywhere or are dependent on D&D for their survival. Each started out as not primarily a D&D company and each has sources of revenue independent of D&D products.


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## darjr (Sep 27, 2017)

OK I’m a die hard PDF kinda person. However, if curse pulls off integration with FantasyGrounds and their promise of an offline app I’m probably in. 

Also the dragon+ app, notoriously slow and buggy for me, on the latest iPad is kinda amazing. Night and day. I went back and tried it again on my old phone/tablet and it was just as bad as always. If their new thing is as good on my iPad I’ll definitely give it a look.


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## Jay Verkuilen (Sep 27, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> > So no, I don't think this is a situation where any of these four companies are going anywhere or are dependent on D&D for their survival. Each started out as not primarily a D&D company and each has sources of revenue independent of D&D products.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## seebs (Sep 27, 2017)

CapnZapp said:


> I'm curious - what do you want out of PDFs?




Compared to hardcovers:

Searchable. I can carry everything they've ever published in a jacket pocket, instantly navigating to desired pages (assuming they do a table of contents, which is pretty normal). So instead of having a twenty-pound stack of books, I have a less-than-one-pound object, and yet it's got all the books, I can turn to any page of any book instantly, I can keep places in all of them, I can have annotations... Basically they're better in every conceivable way. But! If I have a PDF, I have a PDF forever. I can open it whenever I want. I can open it on any device that displays PDFs. If I get a brand new device, and it reads PDFs, I can read the book on that too. I don't have to wait for support. I don't have to worry that the vendor will have something that works on most things but doesn't work on the resolution this particular tablet uses, or that it'll render poorly, because I have *choices*.

Compared to a proprietary app: I have no idea which of the functionality I want it provides, but since it doesn't provide it in a way I can count on having access to and control of in the future, none of it matters.


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## fantasmamore (Sep 28, 2017)

seebs said:


> Compared to hardcovers: [...]




*+* copy - paste the text in vtt / programs, apps etc
*+* extract images, maps and handouts (not always, some pdfs are locked)

A book or an app on your phone may be able to do some things better than pdf (reading is not that fun if you have to zoom in - out every 5 seconds on your mobile device, at least for me) but on the table a pdf is more useful in my opinion.


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## JetstreamGW (Sep 28, 2017)

Maybe one of these days, WotC will actually act like they want my money.


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## seebs (Sep 28, 2017)

fantasmamore said:


> *+* copy - paste the text in vtt / programs, apps etc
> *+* extract images, maps and handouts (not always, some pdfs are locked)
> 
> A book or an app on your phone may be able to do some things better than pdf (reading is not that fun if you have to zoom in - out every 5 seconds on your mobile device, at least for me) but on the table a pdf is more useful in my opinion.




Yeah. For instance, if I had gotten the various adventures as PDFs, I could use the maps from them on roll20 without having to separately buy copies for roll20, or use a scanner.


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## Ovinomancer (Sep 28, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> Maybe one of these days, WotC will actually act like they want my money.



Well, they've put out a lot of products so far and seem to be okay not getting your money so far, but hope springs eternal, right?

People need to understand that companies do not pander to individual preferences with products.  If you aren't motivated by the offerings of a given market, then you might want to consider that that market isn't very interested in you.  Companies build products they think will sell, and aren't very concerned about who is buying on an individual level.  Being angry about this doesn't change anything.


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## Mistwell (Sep 28, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> Maybe one of these days, WotC will actually act like they want my money.




I am unclear on whether this is actually a WOTC product, or a Dialect product, or a joint venture?


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## JetstreamGW (Sep 28, 2017)

Ovinomancer said:


> Well, they've put out a lot of products so far and seem to be okay not getting your money so far, but hope springs eternal, right?
> 
> People need to understand that companies do not pander to individual preferences with products.  If you aren't motivated by the offerings of a given market, then you might want to consider that that market isn't very interested in you.  Companies build products they think will sell, and aren't very concerned about who is buying on an individual level.  Being angry about this doesn't change anything.




Companies do, however, pander to their shareholders and often make pants-on-head decisions based upon  information. Especially old, calcified companies like Hasbro. They're huge, slow to adapt to change, and generally seem to not "get it" in a lot of circumstances.

They're leaving money on the floor by not offering digital products, and now they're rectifying that error in a confusing, overly complicated way.



Mistwell said:


> I am unclear on whether this is actually a WOTC product, or a Dialect product, or a joint venture?




Meh. Once you get to the top level, it's a Hasbro product, that's all that really matters.


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## Ovinomancer (Sep 29, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> Companies do, however, pander to their shareholders and often make pants-on-head decisions based upon  information. Especially old, calcified companies like Hasbro. They're huge, slow to adapt to change, and generally seem to not "get it" in a lot of circumstances.
> 
> They're leaving money on the floor by not offering digital products, and now they're rectifying that error in a confusing, overly complicated way.
> 
> ...



No, it's pretty understandable.  I clearly understand what DDB is, and know there's some other app based reader being developed with details to follow.  I know about roll20 and fantasy grounds.  These things aren't very confusing at all.

Unless, of course, you think the only real solution is the one you prefer, in which case I can see some confusion existing.  My 7 year old daughter, for instance, experiences some confusion when the world doesn't pander to her whims as well.


----------



## JetstreamGW (Sep 29, 2017)

Ovinomancer said:


> Well, they've put out a lot of products so far and seem to be okay not getting your money so far, but hope springs eternal, right?
> 
> People need to understand that companies do not pander to individual preferences with products.  If you aren't motivated by the offerings of a given market, then you might want to consider that that market isn't very interested in you.  Companies build products they think will sell, and aren't very concerned about who is buying on an individual level.  Being angry about this doesn't change anything.






Ovinomancer said:


> No, it's pretty understandable.  I clearly understand what DDB is, and know there's some other app based reader being developed with details to follow.  I know about roll20 and fantasy grounds.  These things aren't very confusing at all.
> 
> Unless, of course, you think the only real solution is the one you prefer, in which case I can see some confusion existing.  My 7 year old daughter, for instance, experiences some confusion when the world doesn't pander to her whims as well.




"Confusing" in the sense of "why the hell would you do this," not "I don't know what it is." Obviously.

There's already a delivery method for this sort of product, it's proven, it works, and people like it. The only reason to do it this way is if you want to keep a stranglehold on an IP. Which they can't, and have already failed to do.

Thus their decision is confusing. Because it doesn't make any sense.

On another note, if you could cease being condescending, that would be _amazing._


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## Mistwell (Sep 29, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> Companies do, however, pander to their shareholders and often make pants-on-head decisions based upon  information. Especially old, calcified companies like Hasbro. They're huge, slow to adapt to change, and generally seem to not "get it" in a lot of circumstances.
> 
> They're leaving money on the floor by not offering digital products, and now they're rectifying that error in a confusing, overly complicated way.
> 
> ...




No really, it's not. Dialect is not a Hasbro company in any way. They are a complete other company, a third party. If all this is, is a license to Dialect, then it's not WOTC "doing" anything other than giving them a license.

I also think you have some misconceptions about how Hasbro works with regard to WOTC, and how WOTC works with regard to the D&D division. Hasbro makes no internal decisions for WOTC beyond a budget, and some extreme high level things like the movies. WOTC makes only the highest level decisions for the D&D division, like sharing some accounting and HR people. For the most part, the D&D division of WOTC makes their own decisions on how to apply their budget, and they are almost entirely free of any direct Hasbro intervention. There is no stockholder issue in play - neither the D&D division nor WOTC have their own stock, and D&D has literally only made it into the stockholders quarterly report I think twice at this point. There is no stockholder influence on the internal workings of the D&D division...they are WAY WAY WAY too small for any of that. They are a rounding error for Hasbro.

As for confusion over their digital products, I am not sure what the confusion is. They've licensed to some other companies, mostly digital table tops. They've licensed to an Amazon company, which is mostly a character sheet and rules look-up service. And now they are possibly licensing or possibly issuing their own Kindle-like app. Nobody here seemed confused by any of that. What's the confusion?

[Edit - I see while I was typing you said it was confusion over you not understanding why they are doing it this way. To which I say...so? They've said many times why they didn't go with PDFs and nobody seems to accept what they said (it was a retail request). So who cares if you don't understand why they are doing it this way? They've been incredibly successful so far with this edition. You have no experience doing what they've so far been very successful doing. Why can't you just trust that they might know what they are doing without them doing it the way you'd have done it?]


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## darjr (Sep 29, 2017)

Dude, there’s like what? Two? Three? Successful D&D digital things/products/initiatives for the rpg. You’d have to make a far stretch to claims fantasy grounds is a failure. Or roll20. Or DMsGuild. They are wildly successful. DDB might be as well.


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## DEFCON 1 (Sep 29, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> Maybe one of these days, WotC will actually act like they want my money.




Nope, they don't want your money.  You'll just have to hold onto it and spend it on something else.  Try not to get too upset over it.


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## Ovinomancer (Sep 29, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> "Confusing" in the sense of "why the hell would you do this," not "I don't know what it is." Obviously.
> 
> There's already a delivery method for this sort of product, it's proven, it works, and people like it. The only reason to do it this way is if you want to keep a stranglehold on an IP. Which they can't, and have already failed to do.
> 
> ...



Then you have much in common with my daughter, who also can't imagine how the world doesn't work the way she wants it to.


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## rknop (Sep 29, 2017)

So, no amazement here.


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## Jan Bernd ten Berg (Sep 29, 2017)

TDarien said:


> So I just tweeted the author asking if this was different from the Beyond apps.  He said it was.  If that's the case I really don't understand it, because it then just sounds like a less useful version of the D&D Beyond Compendium.



 I agree. I haven't paid for any of the books for things like Roll20, but wen D&D Beyond was launched, decided to make a go at it. And I'm quite pleased with what D&D Beyond offers thus far. The character builder is quite decent (though still not half as good as ForgedAnvil's spreadsheet character sheet) and getting better all the time. But the true revelation are the books. I bought the basic books (PHB, DMG, MM) and some of the more interesting parts of other books (playable character races from Volo's, and spells from Sword Coast Adventurers' Guide). And looking up things in these digital books is a delight, on any device. It is easy, quick, and efficient. (There's no true search function in D&DB, but I think it'll come.) Another thing I bought was Tomb of Annihilation. (For $ 24.99 on the day it came out.) And I'm going to run that campaign without actually buying the physical book. From what I now have gleaned, the D&DB version of Tomb will be more than enough to run the game. Maybe I'll buy some of the maps from the Mike Schley directly, so that I can print them and blow them up. Because the maps in D&DB are ridiculously small scale and not very good to scale up and print. But otherwise very pleased with D&DB. So why would I go to a new app, which can do basically the same thing and has less functionality than D&DB?


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## Echohawk (Sep 29, 2017)

Jan Bernd ten Berg said:


> Because the maps in D&DB are ridiculously small scale and not very good to scale up and print. But otherwise very pleased with D&DB.



I think clicking on the maps usually brings up a larger scale version, which you can then right click to save.


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## DEFCON 1 (Sep 29, 2017)

Jan Bernd ten Berg said:


> So why would I go to a new app, which can do basically the same thing and has less functionality than D&DB?




You wouldn't.  Which is fine.  They're not expecting every customer to buy every single electronic thing that comes out.

But there are thousands of people who didn't buy Beyond, and quite possibly some of them will want the books in an electronic format that doesn't have all the bells and whistles of Beyond.  And thus they'll perhaps buy this app.  Which is fine.


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## Ilbranteloth (Oct 1, 2017)

guachi said:


> So it's the 2e problem reimagined.
> 
> Rather than too many settings dividing up a limited pool of dollars it's too many websites offering the same products dividing up a limited pool of dollars.




Vastly different.

In 2e there were too many products released. Each product has a production cost that must be recouped before you start making a profit on that product. In a great many cases, none of the products recouped their cost, they were cannibalizing their own sales.

With the current approach, it's providing the same content (no additional cost of production) to new channels. For WotC it's entirely profit. They've already produced the content and paid for it's production.

The companies producing the digital tools are taking on the expense of developing and supporting the product, and the risk of failure. 

This is new channels for the same content. That's very different from too much content.


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## Ilbranteloth (Oct 1, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> I am unclear on whether this is actually a WOTC product, or a Dialect product, or a joint venture?




Best I can tell (which is a lot of speculation so far) is that it's a Dialect product. I am skeptical with WotC current staffing and direction that they would be developing an "official" or "in-house (even if outsourced)" digital delivery system for D&D. That would be a direct move against their existing (and potential future) digital providers.

While it's a niche market, it's also a relatively inexpensive market to enter, if all you have to do is pay a royalty on each sale of WotC content.


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## Ilbranteloth (Oct 1, 2017)

JetstreamGW said:


> "Confusing" in the sense of "why the hell would you do this," not "I don't know what it is." Obviously.
> 
> There's already a delivery method for this sort of product, it's proven, it works, and people like it. The only reason to do it this way is if you want to keep a stranglehold on an IP. Which they can't, and have already failed to do.
> 
> ...




Unless it's a different company (that is, it's not a WotC product) that wants to take part in the business.

Dialect is a company that makes digital content delivery products.
Dialect sees that WotC has content that people want delivered in a digital product.
Dialect sees other companies that have released digital products with that content, and several seem to be successful.
Dialect thinks they can do it better, or at least well enough that they can make a profit by adding another line of digital content to their offerings.

I think that makes perfect sense. If I was a decent developer, I'd jump in the ring personally, because I have yet to see a product that does what I want it to do.


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## Ilbranteloth (Oct 1, 2017)

Jay Verkuilen said:


> Options don't bother me one bit. What I'm highly dubious about is the pricing model that offshores all risk onto partners and the consumer and are strongly premised on multiple purchases of the same content.




Of course, in the past they were much better, only producing physical books and expecting that somebody else would take all of the risk and expense of, you know, opening a book store.

Most books nowadays are available in print, ebook (sometimes multiple competing formats), and audiobook. This isn't really any different, other than they are allowing other companies to share in the profits of their work too.

In business, accepting risk also allows you to potentially participate in the profits too.

Best I can tell, WotC is collecting a royalty on each sale, instead of requiring a lot of money up front. Making it possible for small companies to either leverage their existing product, or develop a new delivery system that they think is different or better. Even more important, if I were a developer, I'd drop any possibility of developing a product is WotC was funding one of my potential competitors. 

They seem to have a very fair approach.

I don't see how they are premised on multiple purchases. If you use Roll20, then purchase it once. No need to purchase it more than once. There's no content that is held back. If you want a hard copy, then it's probably easiest to buy the book(s) too, but it's certainly not required. Roll20 could certainly opt to be a reseller of the books too, and offer a package book/digital deal, for example.

WotC is, at its heart, a publisher, a creator of content. They could opt to be the only source of that content. Then if they decide a digital delivery system is something, they'd do it. If not, then no digital content for you. Or they design a digital delivery system that you don't like. With no alternatives, you're stuck.

I also suspect that the folks that own/work for D&D Beyond, Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, etc., are probably pretty happy that they can provide D&D content for their products. I would guess they have much higher sales (and profitability) than without.


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## CapnZapp (Oct 1, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> With the current approach, it's providing the same content [] to new channels.
> 
> This is new channels for the same content.



A-HA!

I'm gonna tell that to the "no, you aren't buying the same content three times" crowd right away! 

*runs out of thread*



Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app


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## DEFCON 1 (Oct 1, 2017)

Sure, you're buying the content three times... unless you happen to realize you don't NEED to buy it three times, at which point you won't.

Now if you happen to have the inane belief that if you buy something once it means you should therefore receive every single other iteration of it for perpetuity at no cost, you're going to be utterly flummoxed when the world laughs at you for holding that belief.  

Sent from my SM-J320V using EN World mobile app


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## Remathilis (Oct 1, 2017)

DEFCON 1 said:


> You wouldn't.  Which is fine.  They're not expecting every customer to buy every single electronic thing that comes out.
> 
> But there are thousands of people who didn't buy Beyond, and quite possibly some of them will want the books in an electronic format that doesn't have all the bells and whistles of Beyond.  And thus they'll perhaps buy this app.  Which is fine.




Even if they didn't want the "bells and whistles" of Beyond's databases, character generator, and the like, Reader is still a poor choice because you can buy the compendium-only option for each book (which is just the book text/art, and nothing else) for $20 per book on Beyond, a full 10 dollars less than Dialect is selling it at. 

All I gotta say is; hope Dialect's UI is worth $10 more per book.


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## Ilbranteloth (Oct 1, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Even if they didn't want the "bells and whistles" of Beyond's databases, character generator, and the like, Reader is still a poor choice because you can buy the compendium-only option for each book (which is just the book text/art, and nothing else) for $20 per book on Beyond, a full 10 dollars less than Dialect is selling it at.
> 
> All I gotta say is; hope Dialect's UI is worth $10 more per book.




Well, I haven’t seen D&D Reader yet, but a better UI than D&D Beyond is worth more to me than tools I won’t use. Of course, D&D Beyond’s mobile apps may provide what I need too. Well just have to wait until the products are out to see.

And although the interview mentioned prices, it doesn’t mean that Dialect can’t ever change them or provide discounts. Again, until the product is actually released...


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## Ovinomancer (Oct 1, 2017)

Ilbranteloth said:


> Well, I haven’t seen D&D Reader yet, but a better UI than D&D Beyond is worth more to me than tools I won’t use. Of course, D&D Beyond’s mobile apps may provide what I need too. Well just have to wait until the products are out to see.
> 
> And although the interview mentioned prices, it doesn’t mean that Dialect can’t ever change them or provide discounts. Again, until the product is actually released...




This is crazy talk.  Of course the reader is locked into being only the extremely limited feature set talked about in the interview.  There absolutely can't be anything else added, ever never.  The information we have now is utterly compete and immutable.

Don't you know how the internet works?

[/poeslawdisclaimer]


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## Remathilis (Oct 1, 2017)

Ovinomancer said:


> This is crazy talk.  Of course the reader is locked into being only the extremely limited feature set talked about in the interview.  There absolutely can't be anything else added, ever never.  The information we have now is utterly compete and immutable.
> 
> Don't you know how the internet works?
> 
> [/poeslawdisclaimer]




Then they need to get their PR people out there explaining why $30 spent on DDR is worth as much as $30 spent on DDB, or worth more than the $20 to go Compendium Only on DDB. 

Personally, if all I wanted was the book in an app; I'd be far better off waiting for DDB's app and paying $10 less than what they opted to show in the preview articles. "D&D books using Dragon+'s UI" isn't worth $10 extra compared to DDB's compendium only option.


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## fjw70 (Oct 1, 2017)

One thing to keep in mind is that when the question of whether DDR is connected to DDB has come up Curse has basically said no comment. As far as I know there has not been anything official from Dialect or WotC either. 

So there may be something with these products going on behind the scenes. Is Curse and Dialact partnering on this? Who knows. Only time will tell.


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## DEFCON 1 (Oct 1, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Then they need to get their PR people out there explaining why $30 spent on DDR is worth as much as $30 spent on DDB, or worth more than the $20 to go Compendium Only on DDB.
> 
> Personally, if all I wanted was the book in an app; I'd be far better off waiting for DDB's app and paying $10 less than what they opted to show in the preview articles. "D&D books using Dragon+'s UI" isn't worth $10 extra compared to DDB's compendium only option.




Well, that's on Dialect to make their case.  But people spend money in all manner of ways and are not concerned with getting the cheapest thing all the time.  So Dialect will do what Dialect will do.  If it works for them, great... if it doesn't, then it doesn't.  Why anyone would concern themselves over their work is beyond me.


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## Ovinomancer (Oct 1, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Then they need to get their PR people out there explaining why $30 spent on DDR is worth as much as $30 spent on DDB, or worth more than the $20 to go Compendium Only on DDB.
> 
> Personally, if all I wanted was the book in an app; I'd be far better off waiting for DDB's app and paying $10 less than what they opted to show in the preview articles. "D&D books using Dragon+'s UI" isn't worth $10 extra compared to DDB's compendium only option.



I'd agree with you if there was a service for sale right now.  Since its still in development and not for sale, I don't.  You can continue to think that Dialect should drop some marketing copy for a product they're still developing, but you're going to be awfully disappointed in the world.


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## Shasarak (Oct 1, 2017)

Jan Bernd ten Berg said:


> So why would I go to a new app, which can do basically the same thing and has less functionality than D&DB?




Look we are dealing with customers that think Players Handbook 2 is an updated version of Players Handbook 1.  We just have to accept that some people like to spend $20 for a product and some people like to spend $30.


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## Remathilis (Oct 1, 2017)

Ovinomancer said:


> I'd agree with you if there was a service for sale right now.  Since its still in development and not for sale, I don't.  You can continue to think that Dialect should drop some marketing copy for a product they're still developing, but you're going to be awfully disappointed in the world.




Then they had little business letting Mashable and Polygon in to write a preview article on it. Its not like they were responding to FOIA request, they LET writers in to preview the app, ask questions, and write about it. Furthermore, its set to release "this fall" as in the season we're in RIGHT NOW. If this was some alpha-level software being hinted at on Reddit or something, I'd agree with you; but if this a product that is slated for release between today and Christmas, they better have a DAMN SIGHT more put into this than "proof of concept" work.


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## Ovinomancer (Oct 1, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Then they had little business letting Mashable and Polygon in to write a preview article on it. Its not like they were responding to FOIA request, they LET writers in to preview the app, ask questions, and write about it. Furthermore, its set to release "this fall" as in the season we're in RIGHT NOW. If this was some alpha-level software being hinted at on Reddit or something, I'd agree with you; but if this a product that is slated for release between today and Christmas, they better have a DAMN SIGHT more put into this than "proof of concept" work.



Right, no, I get that you think businesses should operate their marketing according to how you think it should be done.  What I don't get is why you're so angry about them not doing it how you know it should be done.


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## Remathilis (Oct 1, 2017)

Ovinomancer said:


> Right, no, I get that you think businesses should operate their marketing according to how you think it should be done.  What I don't get is why you're so angry about them not doing it how you know it should be done.




Honestly, I don't care. Let the project fail and they can offer rebates to the dozen or so people who bought books on this before they realized there are cheaper or more robust alternatives. I just don't want to see yet-another failed D&D software project added to the list. 

I'd say I'm shocked how many people are willing to pay $30 for the same content they can get for $20 elsewhere, but I only need look at iPhones to realize how people are willing to pay top dollar for inferior products...


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## Morrus (Oct 1, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Let the project fail and they can offer rebates to the dozen or so people who bought books on this before they realized there are cheaper or more robust alternatives. I just don't want to see yet-another failed D&D software project added to the list.




I'm confused. You want them to fail, but you don't want to see another failed project?


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## Remathilis (Oct 2, 2017)

Morrus said:


> I'm confused. You want them to fail, but you don't want to see another failed project?




I don't want to see them fail, but if they think that is good business to charge $30 per book for the functionality bought elsewhere for $20, then they deserve to. 

To me, its simple. Either 

* Do something that can't already be done by D&D Beyond, or
* Lower their price to match D&D Beyond's Compendium Only pricing. 

So far, their unique market niche is: People who don't own already own the books, want a digital/app-based platform, only buy the material they need to play their character (race/class/background) and have no need for a character builder or VTT. That's a fairly small niche of a already small market. Any other option is better served in other ways.


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## Morrus (Oct 2, 2017)

[NU][/NU]







Remathilis said:


> That's a fairly small niche of a already small market. Any other option is better served in other ways.




You'd be surprised how well a small company can do servicing a tiny niche. You don't need to be the biggest; you just need to have a decent margin for your size to provide a small number of people a decent living.


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## SkidAce (Oct 2, 2017)

Sadly, I see it in retail all the time.

New Bluray for 29.99 somewhere, and the same thing at a different store for 19.99.

And the 29.99 sells...



Overall I see [MENTION=7635]Remathilis[/MENTION] ' point.  From the info they gave, they are designing something to do a thing that is done cheaper already elsewhere.  

While other people's points are valid, I honestly think there is going to be a point of "oops" or "hey did you know?" coming from Dialect and then changes in offering or prices.


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## Ovinomancer (Oct 2, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Honestly, I don't care. Let the project fail and they can offer rebates to the dozen or so people who bought books on this before they realized there are cheaper or more robust alternatives. I just don't want to see yet-another failed D&D software project added to the list.
> 
> I'd say I'm shocked how many people are willing to pay $30 for the same content they can get for $20 elsewhere, but I only need look at iPhones to realize how people are willing to pay top dollar for inferior products...






Remathilis said:


> I don't want to see them fail, but if they think that is good business to charge $30 per book for the functionality bought elsewhere for $20, then they deserve to.
> 
> To me, its simple. Either
> 
> ...




I am astounded by the amount of insider information you have on the exact feature set of this service still in development and also on your keen analysis and data on the current state of the market for this product.  How is it you're not making money as a sales/marketing adviser for these kinds of companies?  With this skill set and prognostication ability, you could do very well for yourself!

[/sarc]

Look, you're not the market.  Your tastes aren't the market.  You are a computer savvy, tech savvy, heavily engaged consumer of the material.  You're a member of the online D&D community (in various places, even) and are highly engaged.  You are a fringe member of the hobby and, frankly, probably require too much investment to meet your wants.  I am, as well, as are most people here at ENW.  But, 'the market' doesn't comment online about D&D, and rarely does more than be told by that guy in their group that does follow stuff that a new book is coming out.  Any of your tastes and preferences are not automatically the ones that are being targeted by companies wishing to sell in the D&D market.  Do not confuse your wishes and desires for what actually sells.


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## darjr (Oct 2, 2017)

If they provide an ebook/PDF easy reading experience that might make a parent or same pice with it. Fantasy Grounds, as much as I like it, doesn’t do this. Nor does anything else as f as I know.  So if they do that well, I’ll at least take a look.


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## mrm1138 (Oct 2, 2017)

Remathilis said:


> Then they need to get their PR people out there explaining why $30 spent on DDR is worth as much as $30 spent on DDB, or worth more than the $20 to go Compendium Only on DDB.
> 
> Personally, if all I wanted was the book in an app; I'd be far better off waiting for DDB's app and paying $10 less than what they opted to show in the preview articles. "D&D books using Dragon+'s UI" isn't worth $10 extra compared to DDB's compendium only option.




Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought $20 per book for the compendium content was a limited-time price for the launch of D&D Beyond and that it went up to $30 per book after the first seven days. Don't get me wrong, you get a lot more for your $30 through DDB than you do through DDR, but I thought the pricing was identical.


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## ArwensDaughter (Oct 2, 2017)

*D&amp;D Reader App Coming This Fall? [UPDATED]*



mrm1138 said:


> Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought $20 per book for the compendium content was a limited-time price for the launch of D&D Beyond and that it went up to $30 per book after the first seven days. Don't get me wrong, you get a lot more for your $30 through DDB than you do through DDR, but I thought the pricing was identical.




The founders week sale was $20 per core book, but included having the content available in the entire toolset. When the sale was over, price went up to $30.  The compendium only option was not on sale that week, and has been $20 from the beginning. 


Sent from my iPad using EN World mobile app


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## mrm1138 (Oct 2, 2017)

ArwensDaughter said:


> The founders week sale was $20 per core book, but included having the content available in the entire toolset. When the sale was over, price went up to $30 after the sale.  The compendium only option was not on sale that week, and has been $20 from the beginning.[/url]




Oh, I see. Up until now, I wasn't even aware that compendium-only content was even a thing.


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## Satyrn (Oct 3, 2017)

SkidAce said:


> Sadly, I see it in retail all the time.
> 
> New Bluray for 29.99 somewhere, and the same thing at a different store for 19.99.
> 
> ...



Aye, and numerous people have told Remathilis just that, that it's too early to consider the prices as the real prices.


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## Remathilis (Oct 3, 2017)

Satyrn said:


> Aye, and numerous people have told Remathilis just that, that it's too early to consider the prices as the real prices.



I hope so. But I can only go on what is in the article. Let's hope they change thier mind.


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## Nikosandros (Jan 8, 2018)

So, was this app released? I haven't heard any news about it in the last months.


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## kenmarable (Jan 8, 2018)

Nikosandros said:


> So, was this app released? I haven't heard any news about it in the last months.




Not that I have heard either and their website only mentions Dragon+ still. Not even any press releases from that media push in September. 



In other news, D&D Beyond is in testing of their app with some users (myself included). It does everything the news articles said the D&D Reader app would do except page flip animations (which is fine with me).


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## 5ekyu (Jan 8, 2018)

kenmarable said:


> Not that I have heard either and their website only mentions Dragon+ still. Not even any press releases from that media push in September.
> 
> 
> 
> In other news, D&D Beyond is in testing of their app with some users (myself included). It does everything the news articles said the D&D Reader app would do except page flip animations (which is fine with me).




Quick question - do you in their Byrond app have a high degree of font size control? 

i use beyond exclusively because my vision wont read WotC printed text for crap - too small, too artsy, low contrast - my eyes suck and have put a couple doctor's kids thru college by now even for what i have. 

I should maybe have replied to their app test invite.

thanks...


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## lkj (Jan 9, 2018)

5ekyu said:


> Quick question - do you in their Byrond app have a high degree of font size control?
> 
> i use beyond exclusively because my vision wont read WotC printed text for crap - too small, too artsy, low contrast - my eyes suck and have put a couple doctor's kids thru college by now even for what i have.
> 
> ...




The current alpha has three font options (small, medium, and large) and controls for line spacing, text alignment, and display style.

I'm afraid I don't have the skills to eye the fonts and tell you the style and the point size.  It's possible they are planning to add more fine scale control, as this is clearly an early iteration. I can ask on their feedback forum if you like.

AD


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