3 years after release and 26,000 downloads later, my adventure Bulette Storm has finally got a Copper medal on the DMs Guild - which means out of 26k+ people, 50 chose to pay for this.

This, for me, illustrates the key difference between the OBS sites and itch.

When I first started on the Guild, people told me PWYW "doesn't work". I was adamant that it DOES. It works for me on Bandcamp. It's worked for me elsewhere. Why wouldn't it work on the Guild?

Turns out, I was wrong. People don't pay for PWYW products on the DMs Guild, as demonstrated here. And yet on itch people tip freely and generously, even when the product is available for free.

I don't understand it, but this is one of the main reasons I don't produce much DMs Guild content anymore.

Anyway you should go get Bulette Storm because a) it's free and b) it does things with the PDF I've not seen anyone else do since.

Is it perfect? No. Am I proud of it? Fuck yes.

https://www.dmsguild.com/m/product/215571

#ttrpg #dnd5e #dmsguild

Addendum, because my brain is still working on this.

This is what I like about the Community Copies initiative on itch. It sends a much clearer signal of "I think this is worth paying for, but if you genuinely can't afford it you can have it for free" than pure PWYW does.

As a customer you're forced to ask yourself, can I afford this? If I take it for free when I can afford it, am I depriving somone else?

As a creator I'm able to say "please pay me if you're able", which is distinct from "maybe pay me?"

What OBS really needs (on top of all the other things it needs) is the ability to set for creators to set a minimum price >0 and allow customers to pay more if they wish. Currently your options are Free, Set Price, or PWYW - which customers interpret as Free.

If I can do that with a basic WooCommerce site there's absolutely 0 reason for OBS not to implement it.

Christ.

2 people so far have hopped into my DMs to say "no way you've had 26k downloads when you've only got a Copper medal".

Yeah. You're right. I'm lying for clout.

Jog on.

And just to head this off at the pass - there's no complaint here. I had an active Patreon at the time I put Bulette Storm out and made a conscious decision to release it for free. I didn't put it out to make money, because Patreon paid for it.

This thread is just an observation about something I thought was interesting.