I'm also excited about better campaign management tools. But I'd strongly advise against anyone buying into an electronic product for 'future features'. That way often lies frustration. Such features may not be what you expected and not be delivered on a timeline with which you are satisfied. Which, if you bought primarily with the promise of those features, will just make you angry. Sure, maybe Curse will deliver above your expectations (I hope so!) and very quickly (I hope so!). But experience tells me that software often takes longer to develop than hoped. And the 'hypothetical product you expected' often doesn't quite match what actually comes out (Not because of company dishonesty but because people create high expectations around a currently empty space).
So, if it were me, I'd wait to buy in till DDB has the features you want. Even if that means you lose a discount.
Of course, I find that the current tools make it plenty valuable to me, so I'll be buying in some early (core books and such). Maybe more (adventures and such) as the tools develop.
Not trying to be negative really, but this is my point.
We've seen toolsets before with 'more to come' and it just fizzles. Investing in this now IS unwise until they provide clarity as to timelines and difined features... if they did this I would happily enjoy a sub as things develop.. but since they haven't - they're leaving themselves an out (and effectively no obligation - which would seem just as likely that history could repeat itself) .. this forum exactly the place to put pressure on a full product and speak up about its importance.
Unfortunately if they're getting the subscriptions already and this isn't clearly defined before the subs all flood in there isn't a lot of incentive to reach a feature complete state. So could just as likely end up as in the past.
Not trying to be negative really, but this is my point.
We've seen toolsets before with 'more to come' and it just fizzles. Investing in this now IS unwise until they provide clarity as to timelines and difined features...
until then it's just history repeating itself .. this forum exactly the place to put pressure on a full product and speak up about its importance.
Unfortunately if they're getting the subscriptions already there isn't a lot of incentive to reach a feature complete state. So could just as likely end up as in the past.
We completely agree! If the current offering is not enticing enough for you and you want to wait until your plate is full of goodies, then give it a lil time and check back later. :)
Yeah. Even defined 'timelines' and 'definitive planned features' isn't really enough in my opinion. Timelines change unexpectedly (especially in software development) and features aren't alway implemented as you expect.
Buy the product (or don't buy the product) for what it is. Not for what you're hoping it will eventually be. Just my two cents.
Have any of you used Tiddly Wiki? That was the best Campaign manager I ever used. So simple, so powerful because of it's tagging features. That is what I want... really agnostic wiki style with macros to link to characters, monsters, items, and the like from DnDbeyond
Have any of you used Tiddly Wiki? That was the best Campaign manager I ever used. So simple, so powerful because of it's tagging features. That is what I want... really agnostic wiki style with macros to link to characters, monsters, items, and the like from DnDbeyond
I haven't :/ but from what I've seen so far they've already implemented macro linking. It just only includes current content, Kobold for example. It would be nice to have this feature include tooltips for towns, npc's, etc. So if someone tags Baldur's Gate or Elturel it gives some basic information, such as population, size, a small map, basic stuff, but then a link to read more information about the city.
If the state of the toolset on 8/15 isn't enough to justify spending money on, for you, then please don't. Continue to use the free parts, provide feedback, enjoy the community.
As you see us continue to roll out features and improvements in the upcoming months, spend money on the product then, if it eventually meets your needs.
The dev staff are all D&D players. I, personally, have bee playing since 1984. This is an extremely dedicated team, and we take this project extremely seriously.
However, I also have been burned in the past by promised digital projects, and agree about being cautious. Full campaign management is on our roadmap, but our roadmap priorities are not set in stone because we want to remain as flexible as possible to community feedback. That is the main reason we don't talk about our timelines. Once we are closer to having campaign management features ready to show, BadEye will be sure to start talking about doing a beta for those and getting the community involved.
I greatly appreciate everyone's feedback and interest in the product, and the desire to help make this a great product for the D&D community.
Hi - putting aside the sound advice of "buy what it is, not what you wish it to be," is there a place to offer thoughts on what we do wish campaign management to be? A built in notepad is nice, but pretty bare bones. I use Trello at the moment, but there is so much potential for integration here with the content unlocked.
Ive got a couple of key boards - story threads, pathways (how I keep track of what's happening in the world), locations/encounters, NPCs, Monsters. What I really want is a room-by-room encounter manager for the adventures with the stat blocks for the monsters built in. I don't want to write down o type thenmonsters ahead of time, I don't want to search for them when the battle starts. I want to just pull up the dungeon during prep, flip through, decide whether to tweak numbers or strength of monsters, add or delete treasure and be ready to rock and roll.
A scratch pad to track battle is also helpful, but I don't mind scribbling down hp to track it.
If I can integrate a player-shareable map, also cool.
If I can then link that into my story threads and NPCs, good.
Cant stand doing halfsies whe recording campaign details, I agree the campaign manager is where it's at.
For me, it's being able to keep my books at home, nice and safe, away from grubby fingers and the risk of damage, while taking my notebook to the games and running a game almost entirely from it. Currently I can do that, but it's incredibly awkward and requires multiple sites, all with clunky interfaces, several PDFs open which are horrid to browse through and reference (though better than physical books), and a couple of... umm... not technically legal sources.
But with DDB I can throw 90% of that out the window and use one site with one interface. And when the campaign manager kicks into high gear and the combat manager comes along, I'll be able to get rid of the other 10% as well. That makes my job much easier and it's something I've been waiting for since 1996 when this horrid monstrosity came out and I realised how convenient and cool it would be to run a game from a laptop.
We've seen toolsets before with 'more to come' and it just fizzles. Investing in this now IS unwise until they provide clarity as to timelines and difined features... if they did this I would happily enjoy a sub as things develop.. but since they haven't - they're leaving themselves an out (and effectively no obligation - which would seem just as likely that history could repeat itself) .. this forum exactly the place to put pressure on a full product and speak up about its importance.
I've said this a few times now but I feel it bears repeating: I've watched DDB develop from the sidelines as a casual observer from the beginning. My join date is even before the site went live, so I can assure you, my interest was pretty keen from the get go. I've also been very critical of things due to the aforementioned burnout from prior digital D&D offerings. But having witnessed it from that point, what I've personally seen is a very passionate and dedicated and professional group of talented people creating the best product they can while working with the community to an almost unprecedented degree to give people what they want in a way they want it while still maintaining a viable business model.
What about all of that gives you the impression that they're suddenly going to go, "Welp, we got a million-billion subs, let's retire to the Caymans and drink mai-tai-lattes for the rest of our lives, yay!"?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
Cant stand doing halfsies whe recording campaign details, I agree the campaign manager is where it's at.
For me, it's being able to keep my books at home, nice and safe, away from grubby fingers and the risk of damage, while taking my notebook to the games and running a game almost entirely from it. Currently I can do that, but it's incredibly awkward and requires multiple sites, all with clunky interfaces, several PDFs open which are horrid to browse through and reference (though better than physical books), and a couple of... umm... not technically legal sources.
But with DDB I can throw 90% of that out the window and use one site with one interface. And when the campaign manager kicks into high gear and the combat manager comes along, I'll be able to get rid of the other 10% as well. That makes my job much easier and it's something I've been waiting for since 1996 when this horrid monstrosity came out and I realised how convenient and cool it would be to run a game from a laptop.
We've seen toolsets before with 'more to come' and it just fizzles. Investing in this now IS unwise until they provide clarity as to timelines and difined features... if they did this I would happily enjoy a sub as things develop.. but since they haven't - they're leaving themselves an out (and effectively no obligation - which would seem just as likely that history could repeat itself) .. this forum exactly the place to put pressure on a full product and speak up about its importance.
I've said this a few times now but I feel it bears repeating: I've watched DDB develop from the sidelines as a casual observer from the beginning. My join date is even before the site went live, so I can assure you, my interest was pretty keen from the get go. I've also been very critical of things due to the aforementioned burnout from prior digital D&D offerings. But having witnessed it from that point, what I've personally seen is a very passionate and dedicated and professional group of talented people creating the best product they can while working with the community to an almost unprecedented degree to give people what they want in a way they want it while still maintaining a viable business model.
What about all of that gives you the impression that they're suddenly going to go, "Welp, we got a million-billion subs, let's retire to the Caymans and drink mai-tai-lattes for the rest of our lives, yay!"?
I would also like to offer the point that we are launching with exactly what we have said all along would be the launch functionality. This is even one of the reasons we had the three "phases" of functionality on the front page for so long in the beta - to make sure there were no misconceptions about what would be there at launch.
Part of the issue here is that you could ask 100 people what "campaign management" means and you'd have 80 different responses. This is why in interviews and here in the forums I accompanied that messaging early on that "campaign management" for us meant an initial skeleton upon which future functionality would be built, with the exception of the incredibly cool (and generous) Master Tier content sharing feature.
In other words, we are delivering the "full" product for launch. We have made it clear from the beginning that many of the requested features I see being discussed here are for in the future.
The proof will continue to be in the pudding, but I feel we have strongly established so far that we have done what we say we're going to do. One of the reasons I won't reveal timelines for future functionality is that I don't want to fail on commitments. In software development, no one in a right state of mind gives out dates until they are 90% certain because things can and do go wrong. Instead of dates, the prioritization of the roadmap can be shared. I have shared this already too.
As Hartlessd20 mentioned, those priorities can also change based on the pulse of the community. We're making this for players to use after all - we want what's best for the playerbase and will continue to make the main thing the main thing.
I know that this community (of which I am a part!) has been burned for years. All we can do is continue to steadily reach out our hand and hope that we can make some believers out there.
The proof will continue to be in the pudding, but I feel we have strongly established so far that we have done what we say we're going to do. One of the reasons I won't reveal timelines for future functionality is that I don't want to fail on commitments. In software development, no one in a right state of mind gives out dates until they are 90% certain because things can and do go wrong. Instead of dates, the prioritization of the roadmap can be shared. I have shared this already too.
Out of curiosity, do you guys plan to post the current priority list, or are you waiting until after launch to get the next round of content push's lined up for development?
The proof will continue to be in the pudding, but I feel we have strongly established so far that we have done what we say we're going to do. One of the reasons I won't reveal timelines for future functionality is that I don't want to fail on commitments. In software development, no one in a right state of mind gives out dates until they are 90% certain because things can and do go wrong. Instead of dates, the prioritization of the roadmap can be shared. I have shared this already too.
Out of curiosity, do you guys plan to post the current priority list, or are you waiting until after launch to get the next round of content push's lined up for development?
Love what I've seen so far and plan to purchase the legendary bundle with a subscription. I saw the survey results and generally agree with the results. Once you go live would suggest you take another survey of your paying customers, most of whom will be DMs, around two general areas. 1) Repeat the previous general survey. 2) Campaign Management feature set survey.
That way those that are investing in this great tool, can help mold it into something really special.
Ha! Ya, you may have read more into my reply, I've stated I don't doubt their intetions (or previous attempts). Projects can and have habit of falling far short of their potential or fail due to a variety of pitfalls.
The priority list linked after your reply in this thread is a good example of all the other stuff on their plate they need to look at before or after what is discussed here. It's not at all intended to imply THIS development team isn't up to the task - but MY priorities won't match others. If the community wasn't a dice roller before we get the ability to build and track custom pantheons then I'm sol :) and only time can tell if things run out of steam before the campaign stuff gets done..
since you asked though of my impressions, the reason I posted was due to the phrasing of the OP causing concerns as to how feature rich we should expect this tool to be.
if there are almost no tools currently except some home brew content and a notepad - it's concerning when this thread begins by asking 'how it can be improved?' rather than simply 'what would you like from a campaign management tool?'
Agree! These guys are on top of feedback, and I've said already - good direction, looking forward to seeing what they come up with.
ill include what I'm looking for since it's technically what this thread is for..
The bulk of which is this.. Tracking for site specific (like an inn) and regional (like a county or city district) locations, factions, pantheons, NPCs. Each with fields based on their context similar to typical campaign setting details. IE a region might outline import/exports or demographics whereas an inn might reference a typical inventory list or specific NPCs
tagging system to link quickly related content of the above with locations or events
Cultural event calendar, moon phase and weather travel tables (based on region)
customising races
custom tables for conversation trees,
A much larger ask.. Maps - Inkarnate does a good job of the regional maps. Would like to see a solid floor plan mapping tool
I would love to be able to create my own tooltip links so when I am looking at my own content I don't have to constantly click around to different sites to get pertinent information about the person or place I am referencing.
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The most memorable stories always begin with failure.
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Yeah, don't worry, I'm with Subs on this - we'll keep nudging staff about making the campaign tools as awesome as possible! :)
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I'm also excited about better campaign management tools. But I'd strongly advise against anyone buying into an electronic product for 'future features'. That way often lies frustration. Such features may not be what you expected and not be delivered on a timeline with which you are satisfied. Which, if you bought primarily with the promise of those features, will just make you angry. Sure, maybe Curse will deliver above your expectations (I hope so!) and very quickly (I hope so!). But experience tells me that software often takes longer to develop than hoped. And the 'hypothetical product you expected' often doesn't quite match what actually comes out (Not because of company dishonesty but because people create high expectations around a currently empty space).
So, if it were me, I'd wait to buy in till DDB has the features you want. Even if that means you lose a discount.
Of course, I find that the current tools make it plenty valuable to me, so I'll be buying in some early (core books and such). Maybe more (adventures and such) as the tools develop.
AD
Not trying to be negative really, but this is my point.
We've seen toolsets before with 'more to come' and it just fizzles. Investing in this now IS unwise until they provide clarity as to timelines and difined features... if they did this I would happily enjoy a sub as things develop.. but since they haven't - they're leaving themselves an out (and effectively no obligation - which would seem just as likely that history could repeat itself) .. this forum exactly the place to put pressure on a full product and speak up about its importance.
Unfortunately if they're getting the subscriptions already and this isn't clearly defined before the subs all flood in there isn't a lot of incentive to reach a feature complete state. So could just as likely end up as in the past.
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Yeah. Even defined 'timelines' and 'definitive planned features' isn't really enough in my opinion. Timelines change unexpectedly (especially in software development) and features aren't alway implemented as you expect.
Buy the product (or don't buy the product) for what it is. Not for what you're hoping it will eventually be. Just my two cents.
AD
Have any of you used Tiddly Wiki? That was the best Campaign manager I ever used. So simple, so powerful because of it's tagging features. That is what I want... really agnostic wiki style with macros to link to characters, monsters, items, and the like from DnDbeyond
If the state of the toolset on 8/15 isn't enough to justify spending money on, for you, then please don't. Continue to use the free parts, provide feedback, enjoy the community.
As you see us continue to roll out features and improvements in the upcoming months, spend money on the product then, if it eventually meets your needs.
The dev staff are all D&D players. I, personally, have bee playing since 1984. This is an extremely dedicated team, and we take this project extremely seriously.
However, I also have been burned in the past by promised digital projects, and agree about being cautious. Full campaign management is on our roadmap, but our roadmap priorities are not set in stone because we want to remain as flexible as possible to community feedback. That is the main reason we don't talk about our timelines. Once we are closer to having campaign management features ready to show, BadEye will be sure to start talking about doing a beta for those and getting the community involved.
I greatly appreciate everyone's feedback and interest in the product, and the desire to help make this a great product for the D&D community.
I am the Inquisitor Imperitus. I am judge, jury, and executioner. Draw your last breath now, as I send you to the Nine Hells.
I don't doubt your (or development teams on prior projects) intentions and I would be disapointed if some of the team havent played as long.
I began in the late 80s myself and have followed/played on and off over the years since.
Thanks for your comments and looking forward to see what you guys come up with.
Hi - putting aside the sound advice of "buy what it is, not what you wish it to be," is there a place to offer thoughts on what we do wish campaign management to be? A built in notepad is nice, but pretty bare bones. I use Trello at the moment, but there is so much potential for integration here with the content unlocked.
Ive got a couple of key boards - story threads, pathways (how I keep track of what's happening in the world), locations/encounters, NPCs, Monsters. What I really want is a room-by-room encounter manager for the adventures with the stat blocks for the monsters built in. I don't want to write down o type thenmonsters ahead of time, I don't want to search for them when the battle starts. I want to just pull up the dungeon during prep, flip through, decide whether to tweak numbers or strength of monsters, add or delete treasure and be ready to rock and roll.
A scratch pad to track battle is also helpful, but I don't mind scribbling down hp to track it.
If I can integrate a player-shareable map, also cool.
If I can then link that into my story threads and NPCs, good.
But with DDB I can throw 90% of that out the window and use one site with one interface. And when the campaign manager kicks into high gear and the combat manager comes along, I'll be able to get rid of the other 10% as well. That makes my job much easier and it's something I've been waiting for since 1996 when this horrid monstrosity came out and I realised how convenient and cool it would be to run a game from a laptop.
What about all of that gives you the impression that they're suddenly going to go, "Welp, we got a million-billion subs, let's retire to the Caymans and drink mai-tai-lattes for the rest of our lives, yay!"?
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
― Oscar Wilde.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
― Oscar Wilde.
I believe it is by the looks of it thank you.
Love what I've seen so far and plan to purchase the legendary bundle with a subscription. I saw the survey results and generally agree with the results. Once you go live would suggest you take another survey of your paying customers, most of whom will be DMs, around two general areas. 1) Repeat the previous general survey. 2) Campaign Management feature set survey.
That way those that are investing in this great tool, can help mold it into something really special.
MadCar_1
Ha! Ya, you may have read more into my reply, I've stated I don't doubt their intetions (or previous attempts). Projects can and have habit of falling far short of their potential or fail due to a variety of pitfalls.
The priority list linked after your reply in this thread is a good example of all the other stuff on their plate they need to look at before or after what is discussed here. It's not at all intended to imply THIS development team isn't up to the task - but MY priorities won't match others. If the community wasn't a dice roller before we get the ability to build and track custom pantheons then I'm sol :) and only time can tell if things run out of steam before the campaign stuff gets done..
since you asked though of my impressions, the reason I posted was due to the phrasing of the OP causing concerns as to how feature rich we should expect this tool to be.
if there are almost no tools currently except some home brew content and a notepad - it's concerning when this thread begins by asking 'how it can be improved?' rather than simply 'what would you like from a campaign management tool?'
Agree! These guys are on top of feedback, and I've said already - good direction, looking forward to seeing what they come up with.
ill include what I'm looking for since it's technically what this thread is for..
The bulk of which is this.. Tracking for site specific (like an inn) and regional (like a county or city district) locations, factions, pantheons, NPCs. Each with fields based on their context similar to typical campaign setting details. IE a region might outline import/exports or demographics whereas an inn might reference a typical inventory list or specific NPCs
tagging system to link quickly related content of the above with locations or events
Cultural event calendar, moon phase and weather travel tables (based on region)
customising races
custom tables for conversation trees,
A much larger ask.. Maps - Inkarnate does a good job of the regional maps. Would like to see a solid floor plan mapping tool
I would like specific control of homebrew content, allow this but not that ect.. right now it seems i allow it or I do not are the only options.
I would love to be able to create my own tooltip links so when I am looking at my own content I don't have to constantly click around to different sites to get pertinent information about the person or place I am referencing.
The most memorable stories always begin with failure.