Suggestion to show when content is Homebrew.

Unearthed Arcana content is clearly marked (UA) for feats, spells, etc. I am proposing a similar label (HB) for Homebrew content.

Particularly in groups with multiple campaigns it can be confusing to keep track of what Homebrew has been approved or not, especially when there is no way to tell it apart from official content. For instance, I am planning on running the Humblewood campaign and have added spells, races, etc to my accounts Homebrew content. But due to content sharing those items show up in any campaign I'm in, regardless of if I'm the DM or not. This meant a Humblewood spell ended up accidentally getting cast by our druid in another campaign because the spell wasn't clearly marked as Homebrew (and thus may have needed DM preapproval prior to being cast).

But "you can just turn Homebrew content off" you may say. Well the aforementioned campaign had other Homebrew content related to it that needed to accessible to players. Having ALL Homebrew content labeled (HB) will save a lot of time and confusion.

+1

Homebrew equipment and spells have a 'Version' field that shows up in the sidebar, which helps, once you know to look for it, but it's easy to miss. And not all homebrew has this field show up, so it's not consistent -- for example, it doesn't show up with feats. I like the suggestion to add a content marker like (HB) rather than adding the Version field to any sidebar descriptors that don't already have it as it's easier and quicker to spot.

So I honestly don't know how to access the version field like you're mentioning from the character sheet. So if you can provide some specific instructions I'd love to know cause that may help in the meantime. But here I'll insert a screenshot of my lvl 9 Paladin's spell list.

"Invoke the Amaranthine" is Humblewood spell but there is no way to tell that from the spell selection section. If you look down the list though, "Spirit Shroud" is clearly labeled UA. If I hadn't downloaded the Humblewood spell myself I may have thought it was official content, maybe from a new source book I was unfamiliar with.

Preparing the spell and then clicking it to expand it does not provide any additional information (such as the "author" of the spell).

The 'version' field would be accessible to whoever made the homebrew spell. Being able to see it is simply how you know that a spell is homebrew and not official. No official material will have the 'Version' field in DND Beyond. I don't know if you can tell who made it, but if you search the homebrew spells listing, that gives you a couple possibilities, but it also could have made by anyone in the campaign, as that's automatically shared. Note, also, that I'm pretty sure these spells shouldn't be available as homebrew like this, I'm pretty sure that's a copyright violation.

I own the Humblewood book. Either I manually add everything from the book by hand to DnDBeyond so my players have access to it on their character sheets. Or I search to see if anyone else already did that same thing. TBH you need the book to be able to search for the campaign specific races, feats, etc. You can't just search "Humblewood" in homebrew content and download everything with a single click.

It was also just an example to show that Homebrew content is insufficiently labeled, especially from a player's perspective. If the "version" field only shows up for the creator, then it's useless to anyone that downloads it or plays with it. What I'm proposing is that all Homebrew content, regardless of who made it, should be clearly labeled, just like Unearthed Arcana is.

You can create homebrew and it will automatically be shared in your campaign without publishing it. Homebrew that is copyrighted by someone else and is published is likely to be taken down when staff notices it, as it violates copyright law.

The version field shows up for everyone, just like it does in your screencap. Only the person who created it can edit it, but anyone can see that field when selecting spells or equipping items. My point in my first post on this thread was that it doesn't show up in every type of homebrew -- it doesn't show up on feats for example. Hence my agreeing that there needed to be something like what you were suggesting.

The version field is in my screencap? Where? Sorry I guess I don't know what I'm looking at here

Look in the middle section of the description. There are the following lines:

Casting Time

Range/Area

Components

Duration

Version

If you were looking at a piece of homebrewed equipment, it'd say Weight/Cost/Version.

still, a +1 to adding an (HB) tag to anything coming from homebrew, private or public, since clearly the system can tell what is and is not homebrew by not letting it show up via the homebrew content filter for the character sheets.

The Version field is typically the 2nd field right next to the name of the homebrew you're creating.

I'm going to vote for adding some kind of visible prefix as well. Simply adding a * before the specific homebrew in whatever dropdopwn on the character builder/character sheet would be enough of an indicator that that thing is not official source.

It would be helpful if homebrew authors stuck by a common best practice of prefixing all of their homebrew content, which would help this problem as well.

Quote from Mairondil >>

 

It would be helpful if homebrew authors stuck by a common best practice of prefixing all of their homebrew content, which would help this problem as well.

 If homebrew authors stuck by a common best practice of extensive playtesting and editing over the course of several months prior to publication it would also solve lots of problems. 🙄