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When Wizards Of The Coast Tried To Be A D&D Landlord (The Jimquisition) (Patreon)

Published:
2023-01-16 14:47:01
Imported:
2023-01

Content

I had a ton of requests to cover this one. While not strictly videogame related, the situation with Wizards of the Coast and Dungeons & Dragons is a perfect example of everything this show talks about. So let's talk about how Wizards and Hasbro tried to become some D&D landlords.

Files

When Wizards Of The Coast Tried To Be A D&D Landlord (The Jimquisition)

http://www.thejimporium.com http://www.patreon.com/jimquisition http://www.twitch.tv/jimsterling I had a ton of requests to cover this one. While not strictly videogame related, the situation with Wizards of the Coast and Dungeons & Dragons is a perfect example of everything this show talks about. So let's talk about how Wizards and Hasbro tried to become some D&D landlords. #WizardsOfTheCoast #DungeonsAndDragons #Hasbro #Controversy #Money #Tabletop #TabletopGaming #Backlash #Capitalism #JimSterling #Jimquisition #JamesStephanieSterling #CommanderSterling #Games #Gaming #Videogames

Comments

Luna

Oh, hey. Look at that. Hasbro are walking back their more outrageous OGL 1.1 changes. For now. Anyone taking bets on how long they wait until they implement the next step, i.e. introducing a weaker version to build up to what they originally wanted (which is worse than the leaked version)? They've got until 2024 if they meet their schedule for the next edition of D&D. Funny, does anyone remember them saying that 5e was going to be the last one? Kind of like a live service...

Anonymous

Great coverage, Steph! Also wanted to add that your makeup and hair looked awesome in that video!

KB

I didn't bug you about this because I figured everyone and their Gma was emailing you lol. But it was great to get your take on this. Been watching this show so long it was easy to tell what tactics Wizards would try to pull, because despite being a different industry capitalists are always greedy buggers. Still expect them to try and push this shit again in 6 months or so, because like you said the greedy buggers still want those cookies. Also the hair is lovely, and that wrestling clip was stellar. Smacked him flat on the mat! Hope your shoulder gets better soon.

Luna

I hate to say it, but I saw this coming. No, really. Look at the Terms of Service for the DMs Guild site. Even years before this announcement, Wizards required you to sign away rights to your content when you upload it there. The same goes with D&D Beyond; from the start Wizards hid a similar clause in the TOS. It's the same wording as in the OGL 1.1. This isn't a brand new thing; this is just an evolution of what they were doing previously but no one knew / talked about because no one reads the TOS.

Anonymous

But there's this article: https://www.them.us/story/dungeons-dragons-owners-suing-racist-transphobic-rpg/amp. In this case a hateful group was/is going to make material that would have had dnd's brand on it. All companies are bastards, but are we sure this isn't a loki meets Kang moment? A big big big worry of mine is that most conservative commentary on the matter agree with your take on things. I've come to learn that whenever a bunch of repubs agree with me that I'm in the wrong frame of mind.

Luna
>>99744437

Racist fucks are going to do what they want regardless of what the rules are. Source: 2020 election

Anonymous

But do you want those racist fucks to do it with your brand on it? Just how much might you initially overstep to properly trademark yourself to prevent your personal image from getting the pepe treatment? If you had the lawyers at your disposal, how hard would your knee jerk reaction be to an event like "Luna Sophia's confederate flag clearance sale"? It's less of a matter of "what they'll do anyway" vs "how hard you gonna fight when they do?" The steps dnd was thinking of taking, were they strong enough to force the fuckheads out? And if not, would we have held them so accountable as we are now?

Anonymous

This has nothing to do with video content, but my Mom (middle aged, asian immigrant if that helps paint a picture of her demographic) was in the room while I watched today and she found all of Steph's bits on camera hilarious. She didn't watch the actual content of the video and she has no idea who you are, but she found you charming and hilarious. She also exclusively used she/her pronouns, and since she's never seen you before I'd say your no-wig videos are flawlessly showing off your fab femme energy, so keep feeling confident in your beautiful locks!

Dylan Belcher

It may also be worth pointing out while on this topic, that boosters packs for CCGs were the original normalized loot boxes, targeted mostly at kids.

Kav

Like, obviously some of OGL 1.1 was unsalvageable, unacceptable and un... believably short-sighted stupidity but for me, you'd only have to tweak the core of it and add a few caveats to create something that made the shareholders happier without fucking anyone else over and potentially even improving things for the players. 1) Do away with the overreaching insanity of basically stealing people's intellectual property just because you lent them some of yours in its creation and roll it back out to whoever wants to use it rather than just book publishers. Damaging apps like Roll20 that open the game up to so many people who can't get their parties together is literally leaving money on the table given the people who exclusively use Roll20 will still be buying the core literature and that. 2) Base the tiers on profit, not revenue. Taking a flat chunk of a company's revenue might kill them if their profit margins are thin. Taking a cut only of the profit that they've made partially off your IP, and even then only if and when they're raking it in, is never going to kill them and seems way, way more reasonable. 3) Mandate in your company rules that every penny that is earned through OGL 1.1 goes into hiring new talent and creating new official content. Shareholder's don't need cash, they just need the company's value to grow, and it does that primarily by increasing its presence in the market. Ideally, go one better and commit to using the money to creating new content that broadens the appeal of D&D into new markets, making new fans, giving current fans new, interesting stuff to sink their teeth into, strengthening the brand and the company's market share, and even potentially giving new and existing third party companies bases for creating their own new stuff from which to profit. Keep it simple, stick to that, and pretty much everyone could win. I know it doesn't represent Wizards getting all of the money but their plan was never going to do that either. It was only ever going trash the brand. Did it not occur to them that this thing has stood for two decades for a reason? Did it not also occur to them that it's one of their only major USPs (eurgh, sorry, corporate speak) and is therefore likely a huge contributor making them the market leaders they are? I know I should be more angry at the greed than I am at the incompetence but, honestly? I think I'm more angry at the incompetence. Because, just occasionally, an opportunity will arise in which the more ethical solution is the one that'll make you more money and the idea that a company wouldn't leap at it hurts my brain.

Andrew L Butula
>>99768691

"Mandate in your company rules that every penny that is earned through OGL 1.1 goes into hiring new talent and creating new official content." Never going to happen. The entire point of this exercise has been to increase the amount of money they can squeeze out of D&D. Dicebreaker had a transcript of a recent investor call up for a while where one of the execs lamented the fact that the brand is undermonetized. She wasn't talking about the great opportunities for reinvesting in the game, she was talking about how to line shareholder pockets. Now that D&D has hit prime time and is bringing in serious money the higher ups at Hasbro will be more involved, and insist on bigger profits every quarter.

Thomas Halpin
>>99768691

Legal Eagle and at least one other Youtube Lawyer have done good videos on the 1.1 leak, the original OGL, and the company's reaction

Nate
>>99744437

Yeah, but they already sued the shit out of them without this Open License change. This was just more lies in their non-apology...

Kav
>>99768691

I mean, don't get me wrong, I know it's never going to happen but this is kind of my point. Divvying up profits as cash has never been the "classic" way of lining the shareholder pockets. The classic way to do it is to reinvest profits into new products, increasing the company's expected future revenue, thus increasing its market cap and therefore the value of its individual shares. That's just how normal, healthy companies operate - what I'm suggesting isn't in the least bit radical - publicly making a song and dance about doing it would just ease the PR blow while committing to something that would absolutely serve their intended purpose anyway.

Anonymous
>>99744437

Dnd has begun the process of suing publisher TSR LLC back in September 22 for their hateful content that happens to have some branding connections to dnd proper. But steph will be the first to tell you, this courtroom stuff goes on for YEARS. How much have we hamstringed their case now? In order to get rid of an infestation you often have to treat the whole house. But our community is asking for dnd to target just one corner of the house, and in a sane world that'd be great. However in a courtroom the judge is going to say, "you're not treating everyone equally" and the infestation is allowed to spread.