I love the VTT in DDB, it brings all the character sheets, books, materials under 1 site... it gets better by the month and I'm sure it will become one of the best.
I don't know if those things have been requested before, I haven't seen them, but here are some improvements to the VTT that I would love to see:
1. ability to pin descriptions to rooms of a map. Issue: I have to work with several screens and tabs when DM-ing. I have Discord where I can see my players, then the VTT, then the adventure Book on DDB and another tab with the character sheets and another tab with the DM-map with the number of the rooms... Proposal: can we have the option to put a pin or a link (like we do with stickers) that is not visible to the players. The DM can see those links, click it and have the description of the room in a pop-up. No need to have a tab with the book and one with the number of the rooms.
2. upload our own assets (stickers, artwork, text) Issue: at the moment we can't upload any artwork or stickers. Linked to my previous question, if we can upload a textbox or images that we can show to the players when they enter a room. It's great to have the option of existing artwork, but would be even better if we could expand it. Proposal: I can understand that due to the sheer number of users it could cause a problem to the servers to be overloaded with artwork, but you could limit the space every user receives and for more storage, there could be an extra subscription. Maybe you could tie it to the number of players in a campaign. For example X MB or GB per player in the campaign with Master Tier.
3. AI-integration to make a summary of the session Issue: keeping track of the resources of the party is hard and sometimes abilities get reset between 2 gaming sessions. Proposal: have an AI-agent make a summary of the used resources during a session so the DM can keep track of it.
4. Music-integration Issue: background music or soundeffects are not available in the VTT Proposal: have an API that can be connected to Sirenscape or other service that offers background music/effects/... It would help the DM stay on 1 screen. Effects could be linked to certain tiles/occurances
1. ability to pin descriptions to rooms of a map. Issue: I have to work with several screens and tabs when DM-ing. I have Discord where I can see my players, then the VTT, then the adventure Book on DDB and another tab with the character sheets and another tab with the DM-map with the number of the rooms... Proposal: can we have the option to put a pin or a link (like we do with stickers) that is not visible to the players. The DM can see those links, click it and have the description of the room in a pop-up. No need to have a tab with the book and one with the number of the rooms.
I agree this would be good. Being able to add text labels would be a great addition. It's sort of possible now, since you can add letter-stickers and hide them, but adding enough to label all the rooms or add notes would be very tedious.
2. upload our own assets (stickers, artwork, text) Issue: at the moment we can't upload any artwork or stickers. Linked to my previous question, if we can upload a textbox or images that we can show to the players when they enter a room. It's great to have the option of existing artwork, but would be even better if we could expand it. Proposal: I can understand that due to the sheer number of users it could cause a problem to the servers to be overloaded with artwork, but you could limit the space every user receives and for more storage, there could be an extra subscription. Maybe you could tie it to the number of players in a campaign. For example X MB or GB per player in the campaign with Master Tier.
This is already on the roadmap and is planned for future.
3. AI-integration to make a summary of the session Issue: keeping track of the resources of the party is hard and sometimes abilities get reset between 2 gaming sessions. Proposal: have an AI-agent make a summary of the used resources during a session so the DM can keep track of it.
Hard pass. I'm not anti-AI but I think AI should only be used when it's really needed and this isn't a real need. Keeping track of resources and notes is the responsibility of DMs and players during play - this is why character sheets and the campaign page have sections specifically for notes. Even if as a DM you struggle to write notes during play - just record it, there's plenty of free tools that can let you record your session with very minimal computer requirements, and then you can just play it after the session and makes note as you listen through.
Trying to add in an AI tool for such a thing will be immensely complicated to code up and the limited dev teams are busy for stuff that requires their attention more. Then there's ethical concerns due to AI being an incredibly high-resource tool with actual environmental factors. This seems like an extreme overkill for a tiny inconvenience.
4. Music-integration Issue: background music or soundeffects are not available in the VTT Proposal: have an API that can be connected to Sirenscape or other service that offers background music/effects/... It would help the DM stay on 1 screen. Effects could be linked to certain tiles/occurances
While I have no direct opposition to this, other VTTs have this after all, the issue is if you're already using other service for voice, such as DIscord, you already have this function. There's APIs for music integration for Discord, for instance - there's direct integration natively for Spotify and for Syrinscape there's Kenku FM which lets you use it through Discord. If you're using Discord, which you stated you are, then you already have this feature available to you. There's even ones for sound effects. I'm not sure why the devs need to include it into Maps VTT?
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3. AI-integration to make a summary of the session Issue: keeping track of the resources of the party is hard and sometimes abilities get reset between 2 gaming sessions. Proposal: have an AI-agent make a summary of the used resources during a session so the DM can keep track of it.
I'm also a hard pass on AI-integration. As already mentioned, there are significant environmental impacts; it should be used only where appropriate, the "AI" kick has gotten out of control. Additionally, it has financial impacts (look up the impacts the data centers are having on the electrical grid and how that's already inflating the price of electricity for the general consumer). And on top of the general financial impacts, those services are not free. Whether they try to implement their own "AI" or use paid services, that fee will be passed along to us.
Another problem is I feel like there is so much low-hanging fruit they could work on to provide extreme value for minimal effort, and I'm not seeing that being done. Which brings me to an item or two I would like to add to the list:
Map Organization: Any organization other than "last added, last in the list" would be great at this point. However, here are some ideas roughly organized from least effort to most effort to help provide organizational tools (combining some of them would provide added benefit):
Sort the list of maps alphanumerically
This is an exceptionally simple change (speaking from experience in the industry) and would provide immense value
The only real downside is that users who carefully created their maps "in order" will have them shuffled once this is implemented; this issue could be avoided/mitigated by allowing the sorting to be turned on/off (slightly more complicated) and/or introducing #2 (map renaming) at the same time (this would at least allow users to fix the order, if an on/off toggle isn't an option)
Allow maps to be renamed after initial creation
This should have been there since day one - also a very easy implementation considering they already have functionality built to delete from the menu (meaning the supporting API already exists and they just need a new/modified endpoint for the edit)
Introduce "Folders" or "Categories"
The intention here is to allow maps to be separated into smaller groups in some way to allow for easier categorization and searching
This could be implemented as named expandable/collapsible sections in the existing menu, or an altogether redesign of the interface (Similar to how my wish-list here is broken into categories (1, 2, 3, etc.) with sub-bullets)
Another option would be to just add a second drop-down for categories to select from. This would also need to be integrated into the map creation process, so that you can put it into a category at that point-in-time. Then, of course, it would be nice to be able to move existing maps between categories.
This one is definitely a heavier lift than the first two, but would be a great stretch goal (while the first two provide quick and simple quality of life improvements to tide us over)
In-Map Notes: This is just some ability to add notes on the map itself, with the ability to toggle visibility. This would be great for providing information to players as well as giving the DM basic reminders relevant to areas in the map or encounters. This can be as simple as adding the ability to draw text areas on the map and drag them around. I was astounded when I realized this was not an option (with all of the other features already included). I've taken to using creature tokens as notes and using the creature name field to write simple notes to myself; this works, but is not optimal (especially when adding all tokens to an encounter will then add my notes as well).
This is kind of a simplified version of OP's point #1, both would be nice to have
I have other nice-to-have suggestions, but I'd like to start with these.
Considering the amount of money most users put into this site between subscriptions, source books (often both physical and then virtual to allow dnd beyond integration...so buying them twice), etc., I would really love to at least get some of these exceptionally basic issues sorted out. I hate to say it, but the only reason it is passable in its current state (compared to similar sites) is the stranglehold they have on the easy-integration of source material. D&D Beyond has the makings of a great set of tools, they just need focus on some of the key areas to make it feel like a polished tool.
3. Players would like to have the "View Stat Block" functionality so they don't have to have separate tabs open when playing.
Why would players need to be able to see the stat block of a monster? If it's pet/mount/summon they'd have the stat block in their extras section of the character sheet
I love the VTT in DDB, it brings all the character sheets, books, materials under 1 site... it gets better by the month and I'm sure it will become one of the best.
I don't know if those things have been requested before, I haven't seen them, but here are some improvements to the VTT that I would love to see:
1. ability to pin descriptions to rooms of a map.
Issue: I have to work with several screens and tabs when DM-ing. I have Discord where I can see my players, then the VTT, then the adventure Book on DDB and another tab with the character sheets and another tab with the DM-map with the number of the rooms...
Proposal: can we have the option to put a pin or a link (like we do with stickers) that is not visible to the players. The DM can see those links, click it and have the description of the room in a pop-up. No need to have a tab with the book and one with the number of the rooms.
2. upload our own assets (stickers, artwork, text)
Issue: at the moment we can't upload any artwork or stickers. Linked to my previous question, if we can upload a textbox or images that we can show to the players when they enter a room. It's great to have the option of existing artwork, but would be even better if we could expand it.
Proposal: I can understand that due to the sheer number of users it could cause a problem to the servers to be overloaded with artwork, but you could limit the space every user receives and for more storage, there could be an extra subscription. Maybe you could tie it to the number of players in a campaign. For example X MB or GB per player in the campaign with Master Tier.
3. AI-integration to make a summary of the session
Issue: keeping track of the resources of the party is hard and sometimes abilities get reset between 2 gaming sessions.
Proposal: have an AI-agent make a summary of the used resources during a session so the DM can keep track of it.
4. Music-integration
Issue: background music or soundeffects are not available in the VTT
Proposal: have an API that can be connected to Sirenscape or other service that offers background music/effects/... It would help the DM stay on 1 screen. Effects could be linked to certain tiles/occurances
I agree this would be good. Being able to add text labels would be a great addition. It's sort of possible now, since you can add letter-stickers and hide them, but adding enough to label all the rooms or add notes would be very tedious.
This is already on the roadmap and is planned for future.
Hard pass. I'm not anti-AI but I think AI should only be used when it's really needed and this isn't a real need. Keeping track of resources and notes is the responsibility of DMs and players during play - this is why character sheets and the campaign page have sections specifically for notes. Even if as a DM you struggle to write notes during play - just record it, there's plenty of free tools that can let you record your session with very minimal computer requirements, and then you can just play it after the session and makes note as you listen through.
Trying to add in an AI tool for such a thing will be immensely complicated to code up and the limited dev teams are busy for stuff that requires their attention more. Then there's ethical concerns due to AI being an incredibly high-resource tool with actual environmental factors. This seems like an extreme overkill for a tiny inconvenience.
While I have no direct opposition to this, other VTTs have this after all, the issue is if you're already using other service for voice, such as DIscord, you already have this function. There's APIs for music integration for Discord, for instance - there's direct integration natively for Spotify and for Syrinscape there's Kenku FM which lets you use it through Discord. If you're using Discord, which you stated you are, then you already have this feature available to you. There's even ones for sound effects. I'm not sure why the devs need to include it into Maps VTT?
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond.
Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ this FAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
I'm also a hard pass on AI-integration. As already mentioned, there are significant environmental impacts; it should be used only where appropriate, the "AI" kick has gotten out of control. Additionally, it has financial impacts (look up the impacts the data centers are having on the electrical grid and how that's already inflating the price of electricity for the general consumer). And on top of the general financial impacts, those services are not free. Whether they try to implement their own "AI" or use paid services, that fee will be passed along to us.
Another problem is I feel like there is so much low-hanging fruit they could work on to provide extreme value for minimal effort, and I'm not seeing that being done. Which brings me to an item or two I would like to add to the list:
Map Organization: Any organization other than "last added, last in the list" would be great at this point. However, here are some ideas roughly organized from least effort to most effort to help provide organizational tools (combining some of them would provide added benefit):
In-Map Notes: This is just some ability to add notes on the map itself, with the ability to toggle visibility. This would be great for providing information to players as well as giving the DM basic reminders relevant to areas in the map or encounters. This can be as simple as adding the ability to draw text areas on the map and drag them around. I was astounded when I realized this was not an option (with all of the other features already included). I've taken to using creature tokens as notes and using the creature name field to write simple notes to myself; this works, but is not optimal (especially when adding all tokens to an encounter will then add my notes as well).
I have other nice-to-have suggestions, but I'd like to start with these.
Considering the amount of money most users put into this site between subscriptions, source books (often both physical and then virtual to allow dnd beyond integration...so buying them twice), etc., I would really love to at least get some of these exceptionally basic issues sorted out. I hate to say it, but the only reason it is passable in its current state (compared to similar sites) is the stranglehold they have on the easy-integration of source material. D&D Beyond has the makings of a great set of tools, they just need focus on some of the key areas to make it feel like a polished tool.
Just tried DnD Maps tonight with an experienced group and have the following requests/suggestions.
1. players/DM Need to be able to size player Tokens for when a character changes their size.
2. There needs to be a chat function to help keep side bar conversations down
3. Players would like to have the "View Stat Block" functionality so they don't have to have separate tabs open when playing.
Why would players need to be able to see the stat block of a monster? If it's pet/mount/summon they'd have the stat block in their extras section of the character sheet
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D&D StaffLots of great ideas and requests in this thread! Lots of things that are already in our pipeline.