The Business: You Underestimate The Wizards' Ability To Pull Off The Big Move

If Wizards of the Coast are abandoning Tabletop for Vidya, what does that mean?

Remember all that talk about the Modern Audience? That idea; WOTC seeks replace the hobbyist audience for something far more Normie-friendly. The Normie does not want the Fantasy of Agency and all that it entails. He doesn't want the Clubhouse. He wants, as Revealed Preferences showed over 50 years, a far more Consumerist mode of engagement; this is why Vidya got Normie acceptance while Tabletop has always struggled- and every single time a subset of Conventional Play got into the Normiesphere, Conventional Play diminished in direct proportion.

Yes, this means that Normies playing for the psuedo-boardgame aspect quit as soon as Heroquest and Dungeon got in their sights, and so on.

The problem has been figuring out how to monetize it, and that's where the retention of a certain subset of the hobbyists comes into play: getting them to make the stuff that Normie Consumers devour. Behold the proprietary VTT.

Normies ain't going to do this. That's going out of their way, and they don't do that. Hobbyists do; give them a cut and they will make stuff like this all day everyday. WOTC outsources bespoke content to those willing to get paid pennies on the dollar for it (because most will be bot-generated slop, which Normies have proven that they will consume), Normies get Endless Product Slop that they don't have to go out of their way to consume, and WOTC gets to rent-seek both ways with minimal costs.

You think that's absurd? D&D Beyond exists. This is going to become the next iteration of that business model, and it will take off once it goes live and monetization is announced. The Mammon Mobsters in C-Suite have got to be over the moon at how the Line Will Go Up once this is live; they will have succeeded in their aims in going after the OGL, reinforced the gatehouse keeping Normies from the wider hobby (to the point of it being impractical to even try to pierce the Normiesphere), and replaced Hobbyists for Normies as the audience.

"But we-"

ARE. NOT. THE. TARGET. AUDIENCE.

Literally not made for you. This is made to be shoved into the faces of Normies who want a fun fantasy boardgame to play for a few hours, with no ongoing commitment, and fully able to be trivialized by swiping your card. Yes, Normies LOVE Pay To Win. If casinos weren't so heavily regulated, you'd see them selling microtransactions to boost your odds of winning and the size of payouts and they would make more than enough to justify doing so.

You will be able to use this on your PC, your tablets, your snitchbricks, your consoles, your Internet Of Things fridge, and I wouldn't be surprised to see that if you wait a bit you can even be able to play via telling Alexa what to do while you eat the pizza delivered to your door.

That's where this is going.

"But that's not what I want."

Good. Normies do. That's why it's going to happen, and it's why WOTC gives no fucks about books sales, retail, or anything else in the legacy audience realm.

You are seeing what Official D&D will look like after the Big Move. Not yet final, but man you can see it from here. Are you getting it yet? This is bifurcation in action, after which Normies will become nigh-impossible to bring to your table (if you stick to Conventional Play) because there is nothing at all you offer that this does not do better while catering to Normie expectations and sensibilities about what Is and Is Not acceptable for entertainment.

Y'know, just like how Normies did for videogames before that.

You'd think after 50 years of this that hobbyists would get the memo, but they keep yeeting the Scroll of Truth out of their sight no matter how many times it smackes them in the face.

Clubhouse, Walled Garden, or Quit. That's what you've got. That colony drop can't be stopped.