WotC stops selling PDFs (seppuku?)

[RosenMcStern]

WotC halts sale of pdf's through RPGNow/DriveThruRPG - RPGnet Forums

I did not even know this had happened, but I just received a message from OneBookShelf that said "We'll survive even without them." Experience tells that these means of protecting oneself from piracy do not work (the best way to go is just to treat your customer as an honest person, that's all). It is entirely possible that WotC has just voluntarily self-bitten off a large chunk of its advantage on the market. A lot of people is really pissed off by this.

Thougths anyone? I confirm that BRP Rome will be available also as a printed book, as is Stupor Mundi, but Alephtar Games clearly relies on PDF sales more than on dead tree versions. Not having D&D around as competition on DriveThru any more is a.... pleasant thought!

Comments anyone? Anyone else seeing this as a big, unexpected boost for BRP?

[rust]

I do not exactly have a good opinion of the current leadership of WotC, but

with this ... strange ... decision they managed to surprise even me. >:->

An attempt to fight piracy in this way would be completely unrealistic, since

modern pirates find it not more difficult to scan a printed book than to copy

a PDF. Therefore there are many proposals for other reasons for the decision

on the net, from an attempt to boost D&D 4.0 by making all earlier versions

of D&D unavailable to a sinister plan to harm competitor Paizo and then open

WotC's own online shop in the near future, but I am almost certain that it

was just plain stupidity.

I do not know whether it will help BRP or other roleplaying games in general,

but I have no doubt that it has harmed - and will continue to harm - WotC

severely, both through the loss of the income from the PDFs sold legally and

through a deep dent in the corporation's reputation.

[Rurik]

A surprising move yes. I doubt it will have a great effect on their RPG Dominance though.

Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if there down the road some electronic format of WotC books became available, though only direct from them, possibly with some unique to them DRM or client needed.

They must know this will do little to combat piracy. They also must have weighed the cost (lost pdf revenue) vs. benefit (reduced piracy and/or increased print sales?) and decided it was the right thing to do. The cost/benefit thing doesn't seem to make sense to me which is why I suspect there may be more to it.

Maybe not though - perhaps it is a knee jerk reaction to poor numbers among suits at Hasbro. A possible scenario follows:

Grey Suit: "Why are sales down in the RPG division?"

Voice of Reason (Offstage, not present, and apparently unheard): "The economy you friggin idiots."

Gray Suit: "It is no fault of ours sir - it is Pirates"

Grey Suit: "Do you mean to say that Somali's are hijacking shipments of our books?"

Gray Suit: "Err, no sir. People take electronic versions of our books and give them to other people for free on file sharing sites on the internet."

Grey Suit: "Can we sue this 'internet'?"

Gray Suit: "Err, no sir."

Grey Suit: "Where do they get these electronic copies?"

Gray Suit: "We sell them sir"

Grey Suit: "Well stop selling them then, damnit!"

[cjbowser]

If there is good, quality product out there that fills the void created by WoTC pulling of material, especially the old-school content, BRP might gain some customers.

Also, advertising...

[Harshax]

Here's what I've noticed about WotC Products:

1. All 4th edition rulebooks have appeared illegally on download sites before they were officially released.

2. Document Sharing portals like scribd, have allowed their members to host WotC material for download by anyone.

3. The entire pre 4E library has been available via torrents for years.

4. I've seen at least one attempt to take the goodies out of 4E, and adopt them for professional publication in 3E products.

In my opinion, WotC has a serious issue. People are blatantly ripping them off. Considering point 1, some of those people work for them! Considering point 2, it's like you don't even need to hoist the Jolly Roger to get access to these files.

4E is probably not doing as well as WotC would like. I don't yet see a plethora of 3rd party support, at least not the kind of support I saw when the two previous editions came out.

How pulling Original, 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 3rd.5 edition material from the virtual shelves will help them solve sales problems with 4th is beyond me. My only theory is that they realise they can't not sell digital versions of 4th edition products if they still offer previous editions, because they have proof that digital/online purchases account for the majority of their sales. So not providing digital 4E might make potential customers just stick with the gaming products that are on line.

Now I'm more inclined to believe that illegal downloads represent a small fraction of owners of D&D material. I believe most people pay money for them - it's a chicken/egg argument - in that, I see the stuff in the stores, I see the stuff is lavishly illustrated, has a large staff of writers, is high page count, therefore they must be making money. However, when sales decline, you have to increase demand. Even if sales are down because of the poor US economy, lack of jobs, increased cost of living, you'd be a fool to ignore some rather blatant attempts to distribute your property illegally.

This is especially true if you were use to seeing X number of units flying off the shelves or downloaded from drivethru rpg, and now you're only seeing Y. Even if the number of illegal downloads (Z) hasn't changed, your profit margin is still down. If you also have statistics that show your lusciously illustrated, well bound, high quality, high production dead-tree book is outselling your PDF products, then you might as well drop the PDF line - - -

Especially because the biggest reason for PDF sales is for the convience of savvy laptop owning gamers who commute to work, or who prepare games at work, and you; being WotC; have just invested many developement hours into an online digital library/GM Tool/Character Manager that costs just a few dollars a month in subscription fees. Maybe you've also been convinced by recent tv commercials, that 3G and pure mobile internet is becoming common, so why not dump dead-pixel versions of your product and invest whole-hog into online applications that index and correlate all your products and errata.

I guess I did have a theory. However rambling.

[RosenMcStern]

4E is probably not doing as well as WotC would like. I don't yet see a plethora of 3rd party support, at least not the kind of support I saw when the two previous editions came out.

But this is a consequence of their licensing policy which changed from zero to 5000 bucks per license.

being WotC; have just invested many developement hours into an online digital library/GM Tool/Character Manager that costs just a few dollars a month in subscription fees. Maybe you've also been convinced by recent tv commercials, that 3G and pure mobile internet is becoming common,

As the proud owner of three 3G modems I can confirm you that this is the truth.

so why not dump dead-pixel versions of your product and invest whole-hog into online applications that index and correlate all your products and errata.

I hope this is the truth. This would be commercially unwise enough to send WotC belly up. But given the fact they have not announced anything yet, I doubt it.

[Thalaba]

Harshax: You win my "Industry Guru of the Week" for your answer!

I'm out of my element in this discussion compared to you guys, but I would add that WOTC has better distribution of physical product than any other RPG out there. You can buy them at every game store, on Amazon, at many comic book stores, and even at the local chain of bookstores, which (around here, anyway) doesn't sell ANY other RPG products except WOTC.

As such, PDFs probably form a smaller part of their revenue stream than for any other RPG company.

I doubt it will result in many new clients for BRP. I think the unpopularity of 4E would have done more to tip the balance, and I'm not sure if even that had much effect.

Thalaba

[kaddawang]

I don't think seppuku was the primary idea when they did this. We'll probably see WotC's own PDF-central in a short time.

The way they shut down the downloads however is, in lack of a better word, moronic.

Potensial D&D-buyers might be tempted to check out other games instead. BRP will not be chief among those. Primarily because Chaosium only sells through their own web-site.

[Al.]

Deja-Vu all over again?

T$R - dominant markeet position, rabid fan base (and some good books) then lose it all with bizarre (seemingly) anti-fan strategies. Taken over by a newboy which made its first fortune through a new rpgish hobby

So who's gonna buy WoTC from Hasbro then? And how will they make the stake money?

Al

Edited April 15, 2009 by Al.
incompetent typing and typos

[Rurik]

WotC is big enough to take whatever hit this does to them. I suspect Harshax is right, it is probably designed to 'coerce' people to use their D&D Insider website. The subscription model works - just ask WoW.

I hadn't really paid much attention up until now as frankly I could give a rat's ass about D&D but their online Rules Compendium is pretty slick - a search-able database that includes all rulebooks, supplements, and magazines (by WotC of course) - you don't need to own the books, just pay the monthly site membership. Way more convenient than searching through 20+ pdf files.

The next generation of gamers is going to be a lot less resistant to such a model. So will this change hurt them some in the short term? Probably.

Is it all that poorly thought out and the very seeds of their doom and destruction? I highly doubt it.

And honestly folks, we shouldn't be wanting them to fail. They bring more gamers into the hobby than all the other game publishers combined could hope to, and when some of those gamers realise there are other games out there they cross over to other systems. Is Chaosium going to get Borders and Barnes & Noble to prominently display BRP? Are they going to take out ads in popular comic books? They can't even afford to seduce potential customers with nice full color plates of mail bikini clad elfin maidens hacking hordes of koborkflingoids to bloody pieces. I know that we all have brought someone into the hobby directly with a game that is not D&D, but we are are a minority for sure. Like it or not - they are the gateway drug into our hobby. Kind of like D&D is pot to BRP's crack (bad analogy acknowledged).

I imagine abandoning the OGL with 4e was a worse move than this one. At least most of that small publisher/largely pdf market was in support of their system before they made the cost of entry so prohibitive to many small publishers.

[RosenMcStern]

Potensial D&D-buyers might be tempted to check out other games instead. BRP will not be chief among those. Primarily because Chaosium only sells through their own web-site.

It might be a good moment to put BRP on DriveThru then (even if this is against my personal interests).

It will certainly benefit RuneQuest, though. Mongoose is still there. You can buy all of their D&D products, but not D&D. Or you can buy all of their RQ products - and RuneQuest!

[cjbowser]

It might be a good moment to put BRP on DriveThru then (even if this is against my personal interests).

It will certainly benefit RuneQuest, though. Mongoose is still there. You can buy all of their D&D products, but not D&D. Or you can buy all of their RQ products - and RuneQuest!

I do wonder why you can buy CoC material there, but not BRP material. I also wonder why there is CoC material on OBS that is not on Chaosium's site. I had to get Curse of the Cthonians from OBS instead of sending the money straight to Chaosium.

[Jason D]

This is only armchair quarterbacking, but these are my predictions:

Ultimately, it will hurt the rest of the industry. Other .pdf vendors who sold 4E material produced by WotC will lose that income, and other producers of .pdfs will see a dip in their sales when 4E buyers stop frequenting .pdf vendors. Many smaller companies rely on being the .pdf equivalent of the rack of impulse buy items (candy, gum, magazines, etc.) next to the checkout line.

WotC will see a small dip in revenue, but they'll eventually come up with an alternate mode of distribution (other than .pdfs) that'll fill the same niche. My suspicion is a subscription-based model of online access to electronic files. I fully expect them to make an unpopular and extremist decision regarding DRM out of their ineffectual zeal to stave off piracy.

I don't see it affecting BRP sales much at all. BRP isn't sold through alternate .pdf vendors (so far as I know), and I can't see someone eager to buy a .pdf of 4E going "Hmmm... can't buy 4E as a .pdf... maybe I'll pick up BRP in .pdf instead."

Ultimately, though, my suspicion is that this edition of D&D is the poorest-selling and will likely be the last. I'd be happy to be wrong (losing the most visible product in the industry can only hurt it), but I think that eventually Hasbro will decide that D&D isn't profitable enough as an RPG. I'm sure that it'll exist as an IP, but as a pen-and-paper game, it likely has a lower profit margin than anything else Hasbro produces.

[Atgxtg]

I think Jason's right,

I don't consider this to be an ant-piracy move, more an anti-competitor move.

I consider this an indication that the OGL thing backfired on WotC. I think what they were shooting for was an early 80s model, with only a small percentage of D&D stuff being produced by 3rd parties. Instead, some companies can actually produce more d20 product than WotC can.

Taking D&D/D20 off the net means that most gamers, instead of buying whatever is available on-line, will probably continue buying WotC stuff, and thus be exposed to (and possibly buy) less third party stuff.

It won't hurt BRP much, if at all, since we aren't the kind of gamers who follow the D&D set anyway. It will hurt the small companies that make their money by selling d20 support material in PDF format.

[Harshax]

Let's back up a second. WotC can't, and didn't, take d20 off the market. They can (and did) take all Wizards of the Coast products off the PDF market. This is kind of an important distinction.

Many of the big 3/3.5 d20 Publishers out there decided they would not support 4E. Aside from being cost prohibitive ($5000 licensing fee), there was the additional requirement that you drop sale and support of all previous edition products. One of their biggest channels (Paizo), not only refused to follow 4E, they launched a huge year long playtest to build their own OGL (Pathfinder - and it's pretty neat).

Somewhere, someplace, their is a group who thinks that D&D's largest customer base is composed largely of brand-loyalty gamers. They'll play anything, if it is called Dungeons & Dragons, and is populated by copyrighted Githyanki, Vecna, Tharizdun, and Flumphs. That group might be right.

We have a game store in the region that has been around since the beginning (I'm talking about Games Plus out in Mount Prospect, IL). I asked one of the owners about how well D&D 3.x sold compared to previous editions, and what he said was absolutely shocking. He asserts that the no single D&D book has sold more units in his store than the Unearthed Arcana (1st Edition). He also asserts that D&D never regained the same popularity it held in the early 80's.

If that's the truth, then cancelling WotC PDF sales and enforcing Online Subscription and dead-tree sales can only help them, since the statistics imply that WotC's core customer has always been brand-loyal, second generation gamers (post OD&D Grognards).

I admit a great sentimentality for D&D. However, it isn't so blind that I would follow D&D to its fourth incarnation automatically. While I've purchased a few of the old gems (modules, books), I have acquired most of my originally-purchased dead-tree books in electronic format from a variety of other sources.

Now, the d20 OGL has done more than open D&D 3.0 and 3.5 to 3rd party publishers. It opened many people's eyes to the realization that you can't copyright game mechanics. Systems like OSRIC and Basic Fantasy Roleplay have already captured the essence of OD&D, D&D, and AD&D gameplay. As previously speculated, this is the largest customer fanbase of Dungeons & Dragons. By selling PDF's of old edition material, WotC is directly supporting a system that they receive no income from, or have inadvertently marginalized themselves with remedial sales by offering PDF's of OOP material - which are already highly pirated.

In the end, this move won't kill Wizards. I foresee a stronger push toward MMORPG gameplay powered by D&D 4E rules. Tools that allow DM's to create purely digital scenarios, without a degree in graphic arts. 3rd Party Licensees of a 4E digital game engine, and an incidental market for players who insist on taking 4E to the kitchen table with paper and pen.

The rest of us will still play D&D the way it has always been played. With or without WotC's permission.

[HANZO]

I think its WOTCs loss in the end. There are tons of PDFs that I got, than later picked up the book too. Not that I was interested in 4E, but I do play true20 and have ran modern20 atleast once now and still would have picked up a few more 3.5 they had on PDF.

If a company offers PDFs for a good price its like putting a quickstart out. Since most the time atleast a main rule book is still perfered in dead tree edition.

Most of my green ronin titles I own in both book and PDF. 3rd party true20 books and mutants and masterminds Iv got all in PDF and a few in dead tree. Same with savage worlds. Im working on my second flash drive, going to most likely fill it up to.

I like to think that im some thing close to the average RPG consumer. (In attitude maybe not in volume of material I own) I like to reference PDFs and make notes for my games. I like to print and binder smaller publications since it saves me money. But I also love to have larger works and all my main rules books in dead tree.

I dont share my PDFs, but some games I play my print outs and books are the only matterial my group uses. Some games just dont require every one to own the main book.

I dont pirate out of respect for the companies, I dont play or buy games from companies I dont respect. I think if a company puts them selves in there work and are not just money grubbing they have a lot less to worry about piracy.

I think the discussion on the game's the thing hit the nail on the head.

The Game's the Thing

[RosenMcStern]

Many of the big 3/3.5 d20 Publishers out there decided they would not support 4E. Aside from being cost prohibitive ($5000 licensing fee), there was the additional requirement that you drop sale and support of all previous edition products. One of their biggest channels (Paizo), not only refused to follow 4E, they launched a huge year long playtest to build their own OGL (Pathfinder - and it's pretty neat).

And this is the important point. First they extort $5000 and the commitment to desupport previous products (and old PDF products do produce revenue at no cost and risk, something that small companies really like). Then, with the indie's money already on their back account, they take their products off the e-stores, thus drawing away attention from this kind of distribution.

Some companies actually paid the $5000 because they relied on WotC being in the market and adding to the 4th Ed. D&D hype on the Internet. They will not like this move: WotC just withdrew what they paid for, and still has the right to withdraw another part of what they purchased. I doubt any more companies will ever pay for a 4th Ed. license with these premises.

Now, what will indie publisher do now? Rely on D&D with this degree of uncertainty, or just change system and struggle to continue publishing?

[Conrad]

. One of their biggest channels (Paizo), not only refused to follow 4E, they launched a huge year long playtest to build their own OGL (Pathfinder - and it's pretty neat).

Every gamer I talk to prefers Pathfinder to 4e. I'd prefer to run Sword & Spell (when it is published)than any version of D&D though.

In the end, this move won't kill Wizards. I foresee a stronger push toward MMORPG gameplay powered by D&D 4E rules. Tools that allow DM's to create purely digital scenarios, without a degree in graphic arts. 3rd Party Licensees of a 4E digital game engine, and an incidental market for players who insist on taking 4E to the kitchen table with paper and pen.

The rest of us will still play D&D the way it has always been played. With or without WotC's permission.

D&D as a mainly online game looks like a good prediction to me.

Edited April 16, 2009 by Conrad

[Skunkape]

WotC halts sale of pdf's through RPGNow/DriveThruRPG - RPGnet Forums

I did not even know this had happened, but I just received a message from OneBookShelf that said "We'll survive even without them." Experience tells that these means of protecting oneself from piracy do not work (the best way to go is just to treat your customer as an honest person, that's all). It is entirely possible that WotC has just voluntarily self-bitten off a large chunk of its advantage on the market. A lot of people is really pissed off by this.

What surprises me about this is the thought that because Wizards produces PDFs of their books for sale, now game books are being pirated. When I was in college, I knew guys who took gaming books to copy machines and made copies of them, but that was almost 30 years ago and the gaming industry survived.

I think in the end, the removal of the PDFs will hurt Wizards more so than any pirated PDFs would have, but not enough to put them out of business. Personally, while I like to have a PDF around for quick referencing, I prefer to have the dead tree copy for most of my uses. The PDF is nice to have so that I can carry it with me while gaming or to work so that if I have to look up a fact that I can't remember, I can do it quickly without carrying 60+ pounds of books!

[rust]

The PDF is nice to have so that I can carry it with me while gaming or to work so that if I have to look up a fact that I can't remember, I can do it quickly without carrying 60+ pounds of books!

Yep, and I also like the ability to use the search function and the copy and

paste function, because they enable me to "mine" PDFs for ideas and mate-

rial to insert into my own material for my setting and campaign, for example

to create handouts for the players.

[Rurik]

I think in the end, the removal of the PDFs will hurt Wizards more so than any pirated PDFs would have, but not enough to put them out of business. Personally, while I like to have a PDF around for quick referencing, I prefer to have the dead tree copy for most of my uses. The PDF is nice to have so that I can carry it with me while gaming or to work so that if I have to look up a fact that I can't remember, I can do it quickly without carrying 60+ pounds of books!

Yep, and I also like the ability to use the search function and the copy and

paste function, because they enable me to "mine" PDFs for ideas and mate-

rial to insert into my own material for my setting and campaign, for example

to create handouts for the players.

But they have already replaced this functionality on their website. Take a look at their Rules Compendium on the D&D Insider web site. A good search interface that searches all 4E books, supplements, and magazine articles and gives you all the rules text, printable, copyable, latest errata and everything automatically included - and you don't need to own the books - all you have to do is pay your $5 a month. To me this makes buying a book like PHB2 optional at best, as you have access to all the Races, Classes, Feats, Skills, Spells, etc without having to fork out for the Hardcopy if you don't want to. Easier than searching through a bunch of separate PDF's. Not a bad carrot at all.

I personally like books. I much prefer them for use at the table and even for just reading. I like pdf files for searching and while creating content. The Compendium does that. I'd pay $5 month for something like that if I played D&D as my main game system. If Chaosium offered such a service for BRP I'd do it in a heartbeat.

This model however does not play well with Third Party publishers, or support old rules sets. I suspect their recent moves in licensing and now pdf sales have more to do with supporting their new online model than anything to do with piracy.

My first reaction was some that the pdf thing was some dumb knee-jerk reaction but I doubt that now. I suspect that claiming to protect their IP was deemed less a hit PR wise than outright saying they were trying to limit legal digital access to their site. Legal being a key phrase. They have to know that they cannot and will not stop or even significantly dent piracy. Digital distibution works because while piracy is simple, a majority of people choose to buy their music/movies/books/games legitimately. Despite the whining and complaining and lawsuits from the RIAA I don't see Eminem or Kelly Clarkson or Metallica going hungry anytime soon. Piracy isn't new to the digital age - remember the cassette tape? (or, has been mentioned, photocopying game books)?. WOTC knows that they don't get money from pirates anyway, so they are concerned with how people who choose to pay for thier IP access it, and that model is a D&D Insider subscription.

Will that choice drive some former law abiding customers to piracy? No doubt. But their long term plan is obviously their subscription portal. Is that a better long term plan than the status quo? Time will tell. But the subscription model works - ask Blizzard how WoW has worked out for them. While I don't play any MMORPG's I do have a Netflix and Rhapsody subscription - I choose to even though I know how easy it to get music and movies for free and how to take precautions against getting caught.

How will this all play out? It will be interesting to see. I really don't suspect it will have a whole lot of effect in the long term on my part of the RPG world. I don't play D&D and so don't really support the third party D&D small publisher either (who is the one really hurt by WOTC). To me the market has always been D&D and non D&D. The D&D market is affected by WOTC's moves, but I think the other part of the market will be largely unaffected. Some third party D&D publishers will fold, some will move to other games, and those who think it is worth it will pay the $5000.

I also don't think they are evil and out to crush the little guy for sake of crushing the little guy (which is not say that they aren't evil for other reasons). They are the company behind the OGL after all. They thought that model was the best business model for their product at the time. Now that they have a new business model, they are doing what they think they need to to best support that model. Crushing the little guy is a result of adopting the digital portal, but not the reason they chose that model. Wizards is also not exactly new to this web based business model thing - MTGO Online is a very early and successful model for on online product and digital ownership.

[RosenMcStern]

But their long term plan is obviously their subscription portal. Is that a better long term plan than the status quo? Time will tell. But the subscription model works - ask Blizzard how WoW has worked out for them. While I don't play any MMORPG's I do have a Netflix and Rhapsody subscription - I choose to even though I know how easy it to get music and movies for free and how to take precautions against getting caught.

Your reasoning is perfect, save for one detail. Music and MMORPGs are products you enjoy while being online. Pen and paper RPGs are not. I do not think the comparison between Hasbro and Blizzard can stand up. Whatever their new platform's characteristics are, it will not work similarly to Battle.net or Steam. Okay, it is a fact that we two are a sort of exception to this rule because we play online a lot these days , but most players go tabletop and read their dead tree copies in bed (or worse), not online.

In the end, I think they have left a wide, albeit niche-shaped, gap for the other systems to thrive on, by pissing off their indie supporters and challenging the supremacy of the big online companies without having the strength or experience to do so. Remember, Hasbro has literally f***ed up the best PC game franchises of history with its insane policy after acquiring Microprose (Falcon 4, X-Com, Master of Magic, etc. etc.). Let me be doubt that it will do better this time with WotC.

[rust]

Take a look at their Rules Compendium on the D&D Insider web site. A good search interface that searches all 4E books, supplements, and magazine articles and gives you all the rules text, printable, copyable, latest errata and everything automatically included - and you don't need to own the books - all you have to do is pay your $5 a month.

The system makes sense if one intends to play the roleplaying game in ques-

tion for a year or two only, but it becomes quite expensive if one intends to

stick with it and use it for five years at least: 5,- USD per month over those

5 years are 300,- USD, probably a lot more than buying the printed books one

really wants to have would cost.

[Camillus]

$300 over five years is a lot for one person but one of the beauties of the subscription system from a consumers point of view is that only one person in a group needs it. A single login and password can easily be used by five or six people when they are not at the game table and when they are at the game table only one person needs to be logged in. Five bucks a month split five ways is nothing.

I'm sure that WoTC will not see ease of sharing as an advantage and will take measures to prevent it but there will be little they can do to prevent it in reality.

[HANZO]

Them pulling older suff off the PDF market just makes me think of how X-box pulled all support for X-box when the 360 came out. I think even if they do bring back 4E in pdf in their own store or in a format they feel is safer well never see 3.0 or 3.5 stuff from them again. Why support a rule system your compeditors are bolstering.

After all how was X-box going to make money by putting thet exact same game from X-box on the 360. Stop making the older version. Sadly a lot of eirly games were just that, older games in 360 format. While a lot of playstation games came out in both ps2 and ps3. And a lot of people didnt go to the ps3 because the same game was avalible in ps2. This held true till a lot more new format only games came out.

I think this is rather convenient way of pulling d20 and d20 support away from companies that have OGL/d20 based systems of their own.