Starting September 16, in time with the release of Heroes of the Borderlands, all D&D Beyond registered users can run games on the Maps virtual tabletop (VTT) —no subscription required.
The core experience will be made available to everyone: If you own a map, module, or adventure on D&D Beyond, you can use it on Maps and invite your friends to play. Period.
Our Master Tier subscription will unlock more customizability for DMs who need it. You’ll be able to upload homebrew maps, custom tokens, and access exciting tools built just for you.
While this statement is a great step forward in making the VTT more usable, it fails to address one of the biggest hurdles people have to even signing up for a DM Tier subscription.
The subscription itself isn't that much, but people who do sign up, quickly find that the content others in their group is inaccessible to them as the DM when using the Maps VTT. None of the materials shared in the campaign tied to the specific game can be used unless the DM specifically owns it. It's clear that you have access to the ownership details, because you can deny someone access if they don't own something, so enabling the campaign shared elements should be a relatively trivial change in what access grants use.
One of the major elements of the VTT roadmap is "Campaign Console", so it's clear you want to roll all those elements into the VTT (possibly why someone jumped the gun on the campaign notes length), but Campaign Sharing is one of the most important parts of any group's ability to keep playing. The DM can't be responsible for buying everything, and if someone is putting down $60 on a book, they don't want to have to give it to the DM to put on the DM's account instead. Providing the VTT for everyone also gives new people a chance to dip their toes into DM'ing. But it's an attempt that will stall and fail, if those people then have to go an re-buy the Monster Manual and other content to get those tokens.
Before September 16th when this change goes live, can you please confirm whether this will also include campaign sharing content being available in the VTT.
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While this statement is a great step forward in making the VTT more usable, it fails to address one of the biggest hurdles people have to even signing up for a DM Tier subscription.
The subscription itself isn't that much, but people who do sign up, quickly find that the content others in their group is inaccessible to them as the DM when using the Maps VTT. None of the materials shared in the campaign tied to the specific game can be used unless the DM specifically owns it. It's clear that you have access to the ownership details, because you can deny someone access if they don't own something, so enabling the campaign shared elements should be a relatively trivial change in what access grants use.
One of the major elements of the VTT roadmap is "Campaign Console", so it's clear you want to roll all those elements into the VTT (possibly why someone jumped the gun on the campaign notes length), but Campaign Sharing is one of the most important parts of any group's ability to keep playing. The DM can't be responsible for buying everything, and if someone is putting down $60 on a book, they don't want to have to give it to the DM to put on the DM's account instead. Providing the VTT for everyone also gives new people a chance to dip their toes into DM'ing. But it's an attempt that will stall and fail, if those people then have to go an re-buy the Monster Manual and other content to get those tokens.
Before September 16th when this change goes live, can you please confirm whether this will also include campaign sharing content being available in the VTT.