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| #1byzaneNov 19, 2014 9:54:00 | I have found that I prefer not to own physical books anymore. As I have a tablet and load all my PDF books there. Its so nice to go to the game with 1 tablet instead of lugging 30# + of books.
Will Wizards joing the modern age and start also selling PDF's or are they going to continue to refuse to be of aid and sell PDF's to those who prefer that medium?
With the way the site is being done, it seems that whatever will make it as difficult as possible will be the end solution. But I thought I would ask anyway.
Please advise. |
| #2melloredNov 19, 2014 10:01:31 | They said they would have an electonic version somehow.
Though the deal with dungeonscape seems to have fallen though, so it's hard to say what their doing next. |
| #3ShasarakNov 19, 2014 11:45:12 |
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| #4Azzy1974Nov 19, 2014 16:37:45 |
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| #5Torg_SmithNov 19, 2014 17:42:21 | They have not ruled out PDFs. The Dungeonscape was a propiatory software with authentication server if you want to install it on a new device. We will have to wait and see what they choose to do. They will only say that there will be a digital version and might not look as nice as the print books. |
| #6CCSNov 19, 2014 17:49:10 | Why WoTC has chosen to forgo taking $ from people willing to hand it over as far as simple PDFs are concerned is anyone's guess...... Low Wisdom score maybe??? |
| (Reply to #6)AaronOfBarbaria |
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| #8setiNov 19, 2014 18:11:23 | I prefer the hard covers, but I can understand why people want more digital copies. It is 2014.
My advice: If WotC won't take your money for official D&D pdfs... Find them elsewhere. No one can stop you from buying a book, taking an x-acto knife and scanner to it, and making your own PDF for personal use, for one example.
A subscription-based thing (like they did with 4e, Dungeon/Dragon mags, and the character builder) might happen, but I know I won't pay for that again. I'll just live with what I have. Although, that's easy for me to say...I DM out of my own home, I don't go to cons or LGS's. |
| #9DungeonKrusherNov 19, 2014 19:08:25 | I would pay the same money for a pdf of the books -- but I'm sure I'm in the minority on that. Why not include a download code, a la Ultra Violet movies? Somebody will scan the books and get them around in pdf form; the world is too digital to ignore it completely. It would behoove Wizards to get something out of it. There are still enough honest people who would pay for it, if given the option. |
| #10lawrencehoyNov 19, 2014 20:51:50 | Unlike VUDU, which only recently added the option to download the movie for offline viewing and is still not shareable, PDFs are easily shared illegally. WotC isn't worried about the honest people, they want to make it as hard for the dishonest people as possible.
Additionally, as Aaron has said, they don't want to negatively impact the sales of the paper product. I don't foresee a PDF version being available for 6-12 months after release; and then, only once they've determined a method of doing so that has the least amount of risks.
Either that or they might decide on a more proprietary digital format; which I wouldn't mind seeing, especially if it has advanced features for searching, printing and displaying. |
| #11ankiyavonNov 19, 2014 22:19:54 |
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| (Reply to #11)seti |
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| #13FFSAANov 19, 2014 23:40:44 | They want you to feel the same feels people in the 1970s felt getting their first D&D book. Tablets don't have new-book smell.
Seriously though, tablets are good enough now that they do books better than books do books. |
| #14hunterian7Nov 20, 2014 1:33:49 |
I imagine that WotC will eventually have PDF versions of 5th edition books.
Given the small staff WotC currently has, PDF versions of their books is probably on their hit list but not a high priority at this moment. |
| #15hunterian7Nov 20, 2014 1:36:35 |
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| #16CFKNov 20, 2014 2:19:43 |
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| #17ShasarakNov 20, 2014 2:29:04 |
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| #18lawrencehoyNov 20, 2014 3:31:12 |
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| (Reply to #16)SilentSin |
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| #20lawrencehoyNov 20, 2014 3:59:48 |
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| #21edwin_suNov 20, 2014 4:30:09 |
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| (Reply to #10)Azzy1974 |
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| #23QmarkNov 20, 2014 9:06:44 |
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| #24byzaneNov 20, 2014 10:22:22 | I am totally pro supporting the brick and mortar store. I think they are important to the gaming community as a whole and I tend to go in and spend money just to further support the place. I would love for them to sell a download code perhaps at a discounted rate from Drive thru RPG or something. And I am willing to pay for a PDF version of the book over a hard copy any more.
I own a copy of the book currently but really want a PDF.
I would love to hear if WotC thoughts on the PDF but I imagine its quite unlikely. The tablet has made gaming life so much easier. Rather than go to the LARP or a friends house with a huge weight of books. I take the tablet and its quite comfortable to carry and allows me to have literally hundreds of books at my fingertip versus just the few I could carry in comparison.
thanks for the input everyone, I am glad I am not alone in my desire for the PDF. -)
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| #25cowleymenNov 20, 2014 10:49:43 |
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| #26QmarkNov 20, 2014 12:39:30 | Theives will continue to be thives. The real question is, why drive paying customers into becoming thieves? |
| #27ShasarakNov 20, 2014 12:43:45 |
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| #28Torg_SmithNov 20, 2014 16:57:37 | WotC is doing a lot of third party licensing and may be holding off on the PDF releases for a licensing reason. One of the down sides of doing licensing is coordinating with all the other businesses. |
| #29QmarkNov 20, 2014 18:37:34 |
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| (Reply to #18)LupusRegalis |
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| #31AaronOfBarbariaNov 20, 2014 19:07:00 | it's not as black and white as it seems where the potential sales vs. the increased ease of piracy is concerned.
A digital product being available for purchase provides an opportunity for people to legitimately procure such a thing, yes, but it also makes piracy work faster and with a better quality result - and that means a potential for lost sales among the potential customers that purchase the physical book because they want the material now rather than later (their patience wearing out before a pirated version becomes available) and among the potential customers that are only avoiding pirated products because they can't stand the low quality.
As for knowing whether the sales earned would out-weigh the sales lost from those categories - that's something where the only option is either to have faith, or play it safe, and WotC has so far elected to play it safe (since that time they did have faith and things went sour on them). |
| (Reply to #27)DungeonKrusher |
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| #33raleelNov 20, 2014 19:28:06 | it's simply an access problem, and the lack of PDFs is hurting them. Simple as that. I'm their target audience. I've been playing for years and years and years. I want a pdf. I don't want another physical book. I have an iPad. It does the job great. I've been buying PDFs of gaming books for a decade. I have spent hundreds on it. I have like 50 gigs of gaming books in legal PDFs. My archive on DTRPG is a couple of pages.
and yet, I can't get a legal pdf of the PHB or the MM. I'd buy them. I have the income. I have the history. I KNOW where to get good PDFs illegally. I know a dozen sites to do it. And I still would rather buy them. Particularly if they are high quality and book marked and indexed and hyperlinked.
I used to pirate music too. Then I stopped with the convenience of iTunes. No reason when I could download and it would pop into my app and sync with all my stuff. I've nto downloaded an illegal MP3 in years. There is just no reason if it is available via legal means... My income isn't that tight.
People who steal it don't have the cash to buy, and thus aren't a sale, or don't trust that it is a good quality product. Fear of good quality can be overcome with things like the basic rules and excellent production values. Don't charge and arm and a leg. People won't pay full book price for a pdf, regardless of what the book production cost actually is.
i will be highly unpopular with this last bit, but I don't particularly have any loyalty to my FLGS not do I think they deserve any special treatment. Lots of people love them, but it's a dying business model. It has been for years. |
| (Reply to #16)DungeonKrusher |
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| (Reply to #32)Azzy1974 |
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| (Reply to #29)CCS |
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| #37kalilNov 20, 2014 21:38:01 |
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| #38Orc_BarronsNov 23, 2014 14:16:05 | I’ve removed content from this thread because advocating illegal activities is a violation of the Code of Conduct. You can review the Code of Conduct here: http://company.wizards.com/conduct Please keep your posts polite, on-topic, and refrain from making personal attacks.You are welcome to disagree with one another but please do so respectfully and constructively. If you wish to report a post for Code of Conduct violation, click on the “Report Post” button above the post and this will submit your report to the moderators on duty. |
| #39The_JesterNov 23, 2014 18:17:48 | Piracy very rarely costs physical book sales, at least for gaming books. Novels are different as they're consumed once and then put down. A gaming product will be used again and again, and PDFs might be a secondary purchase. Realistically, physical books should be the money maker for WotC. If they're not making a profit off physical books then they have a larger problem.
So piracy and PDF piracy is effectively a non-issue financially.
If someone is interested enough in the book to actually consider buying it, the PDF is a poor substitute. This is very different from movies/TV and music where the legal copy and pirated copy are almost identical. When I play an MP3 on my iPod it does not matter if I ripped a CD, legally bough the song or torrented it. The experience is identical. When I'm looking at a physical book or a PDF on my screen, the experience is very different.
Piracy might cost PDF sales. That's an entirely different issue. There are people now who prefer digital books, prefer the speed of being able to search a digital book, or enjoy having their gaming library accessable digitally. I only bring my iPad to Pathfinder Society games because it's much easier than carrying four hardcover books that I only *might* need to reference. For example, since I do a lot of gaming writing, I like having PDFs so I can quickly check a rule or search for a particular phrasing to see if I'm writing a rule correctly. My gaming library is not in the same room as my computer, and I don't have enough table space for all my books. (Plus I often write a work when I don't have access to my books.)
Pricing is the tricky issue. You want PDF sales but you also don't want to give away books and make the maxiumum amount of money. But the value of the product needs to match what people are willing to pay. Because a PDF has lower production costs compared to a physical book, it feels odd charging the same amount. And, as mentioned above, they might be a secondary copy or quick reference copy. Charging full retail price for the PDF will result in less sales, while charging less will result in more sales. If the price is too high people won't pay and piracy will kick in. That's part of the convenience issue: if it's easier to find a pirated copy or the price is so much lower, piracy becomes a no brainer. This is really highlighted during the 4e era when it was often cheaper to get the physical books than the PDFs. People pirated the books because they wanted to see the books but not at the asked for price, either physical or digital. The value was not high enough. I did a poll looking at pricing a while back, over at ENWorld. And then I looked at the numbers (which have changed since that post). What I found was that you made the most selling the book at $15-20 rather than full price, because you sold more copies. Any higher and the fewer sales cost money, and any lower and the increased sales were offset by the lower price. (Just reran the numbers and it still works out the same. You make the most selling at $20-15.)
Honestly, I blame the upper management of WotC. I'm sure the D&D team knows people want PDFs, but convincing Mearls' boss and Mearls' boss' boss is harder. WotC is the MtG company. 95% of their money comes from MtG. Most of the staff works on MtG. And you can bet the people who have to sign off on any policy are mostly concerned with MtG. And selling cheap PDFs of Magic cards makes zero sense. They make their money on people buying random pack after random pack. A PDF would allow them to get what they want all at once. When you sleeve a card you cannot tell if it's a printout or nice cardstock version, so the effect on the consumer and play is negligible. PDFs for MtG are crazy stupid buisness. So, it's likely hard to convince these people that a PDF for D&D is good buisness, let alone one at a quarter of the price of a physical book.
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| #40DraconesNov 23, 2014 19:07:36 |
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| (Reply to #39)AaronOfBarbaria |
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| #42ShasarakNov 23, 2014 22:18:07 |
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| #43PhobosNov 24, 2014 7:45:21 | I prefer books with PDFs.
At the game table I prefer books. I find them faster and easier to use. I enjoy PDfs of these books for remote reading, esp at work, and for adventure printouts.
When I was a Paizo advnture subscriber, I LOVED the PDF released when my adventure shipped. By the time it arrived at my door, I was ready to play. I never once thought to look for a pirated copy, likey as a result. Even today, I can log in and grab a new copy of them as needed. |
| #44RastapopoulosNov 24, 2014 8:29:00 |
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| (Reply to #44)AaronOfBarbaria |
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| #46WebsterNov 27, 2014 19:58:57 | I never understood why people needed to bring every single book they own to the game. Character sheets, my friends. All the info on your character in one place.
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| (Reply to #46)LupusRegalis |
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| #48Torg_SmithNov 29, 2014 9:16:40 |
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| #49GattNov 29, 2014 21:40:10 |
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| #50The_JesterNov 30, 2014 9:30:12 |
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| #51The_JesterNov 30, 2014 9:45:19 |
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| (Reply to #50)AaronOfBarbaria |
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| #53The_JesterNov 30, 2014 16:32:25 |
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| #54Grinning-OniNov 30, 2014 17:05:10 | I live abroad. Shipping and storing physical books is a pain. I would like to buy PDFs I can read and use from my tablet or labtop, as I am able to do with nearly any other gaming company's product. I don't want a service, or a subscription, or anything fancy. Just PDFs. No PDFs, no money. Simple as that.
[edit: And the longer the wait for PDFs, the more likely my interest is to wane. Coming late to the game is never fun, wait too long and my money will go to other companies and other products.] |