Players Race to Cancel D&D Beyond Subscriptions as WotC Delays Planned Announcement, Per Insider Leaks

Yesterday D&D Beyond subscribers raced to cancel their descriptions after a purported insider leaked info about WotC’s OGL announcement.

If an insider source is to be believed, yesterday was the day Wizards of the Coast would have made a big announcement about the new OGL, now titled the OGL 2.0. However, amid fan backlash, the gaming giant canceled their plans to make the announcement — and only their plans to make the announcement. The saga of the OGL is far from over, it seems.

Reports of a message from a reported insider started circulating early yesterday morning. The Twitter account DND_Shorts posted a message that claimed to be from someone at WotC and that they had verified it.

Gizmodo also reported on this, stating that according to io9 sources:

“[T]he new OGL, now known as OGL 2.0, was supposed to go live on Thursday afternoon, along with a detailed FAQ explaining changes and addressing fan concerns.”

But that was before this letter started making the rounds in the RPG community.

WotC Insider Reportedly Leaks New OGL Info

Here’s a picture of the letter in full:

After establishing the poster’s supposed bona fides, (which others seem to have verified), the message listed a number of salient details about WotC leadership. Notably:

• They are briefly delaying the rollout of OGL changes due to the backlash
• Their decision-making is based entirely on the provable impact on their bottom line
• Specifically, they are looking at DDB subscriptions and cancellations as it is the quickest financial data they currently have
• They are still hoping the community forgets, moves on, and they can still push this through

This led fans and creators to start the trending hashtags #StopTheSub and #DNDBegone because D&D fans are nothing if not pithy. But word quickly circulated among influencers, including Ginny Di, who is notable in this instance because she herself hosted the very presentation during which the upcoming “One D&D” was announced.

#DnDBegone Trends as Fans Cancel D&D Beyond Subscriptions

In a tweet aimed at helping those looking to push back on WotC, she mentioned canceling D&D Beyond subscriptions. Though she was far from the only one doing this, there’s no denying the weight of it.

And people rushed in droves to cancel their D&D Beyond subscription, so much so that the D&D Beyond Subscription Manager page was overwhelmed with requests and was down briefly throughout the day:

But it wasn’t just D&D Beyond subscriptions being canceled. As makers of D&D notebooks, character sheets, and frequent Critical Role advertisers The Rook and the Raven backed out of any negotiations with WotC.

And according to io9’s sources at WotC, all of this “has caused upper management to scramble to adjust their messaging around the situation, leading to the delays in the OGL release.”

WotC Leadership has come under fire in recent days. The message from the purported insider contains some particularly damning sentiment. Notably, that management views customers “as obstacles between them and their money.”

And that the DDB team has heard nothing from leadership about the OGL until 1/11/23. Even in this meeting, “they blamed the community for over-reacting.”

Which is why so many have canceled their subscriptions. But WotC maintained silence throughout the day. And has yet to share anything or attempt to answer the community’s questions.

D&D, it seems, is at a crucial crossroads.

Author: J.R. Zambrano

Bell of Lost Souls Staff Writer and DM, J.R. covers RPGs of all stripes and on occasion eats sandwiches. You can ask him about either at [email protected]