Only had a few minutes to go over it, but MAN this is amazing. I think the UI is fine--probably some will want more images, but I like being able to locate items/spells/monsters by name quickly or through some other filter if I'm planning a game.
I can see this plus an iPad becoming standard issue for DMs. That's certainly my plan.
Very simple which makes things like searching very easy. The black text on white background kind of messes with me and I would really appreciate an option to turn on a "night mode" where the background is dark and the text is light, but otherwise very intuitive UI.
The look and feel of the site is 9/10 imo. One thing I'm not particularly fond of is the harmonica menus for items, spells and monsters, and the way the descriptions are. I don't know if that makes any sense, but it's too long horizontally, and too short vertically. Makes reading odd, seeing as all other D&D material is pretty much always in two columns, and monsters, even homebrew, usually have a specific table styling. I'd not want to see the exact same style, but the same format.
We've gone back and forth on the two columns point a good bit - thanks for sharing the feedback. I feel a poll coming up where we present the two options and get general feedback.
The UI is super slick. I think everything is organized super well. The Magic Items has got to be my favorite section, with the Compendium a close section. Having all the important rules handy, without having to flip through the book, is a huge life saver.
Magic Item page should list weight. Doesn't have to be on the main table, but when you click on the item to get the details there should be some information on the item's weight. Especially for things like armor and weapons.
I know not everyone plays with strength carry rules, but plenty enough groups do that it's important.
Spell should be searchable by school. Wizards have a lot of rules that apply to specific schools of magic and it's also important for DM's to be able to quickly search through evocation or necromancy spells to use for a villain, or divination spells for an oracle, etc.
Spell should be searchable by school. Wizards have a lot of rules that apply to specific schools of magic and it's also important for DM's to be able to quickly search through evocation or necromancy spells to use for a villain, or divination spells for an oracle, etc.
Spell should be searchable by school. Wizards have a lot of rules that apply to specific schools of magic and it's also important for DM's to be able to quickly search through evocation or necromancy spells to use for a villain, or divination spells for an oracle, etc.
TekDragon,
if you click on the 'Advanced Filters' label under the four primary filters, you will see you can filter spells by so much more - including spell school. I know that Advanced Filter text is a little too ambiguous at the moment. We will be updating it visually, tomorrow.
Having used a lot of unofficial references, I can safely say this is better than all of them. Top quality presentation - it's slick, it's clean and it's uncluttered.
As a suggestion I would really like the ability to display more spells/things per page.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I would love it if you could fix the 'Casting Time' of Spells. I noticed this pretty quickly. When looking at the Spells you can click to change the order of spells to their casting time, but it does not differentiate between Actions and Bonus Actions, seemingly only registering the numerical value at their beginning.
Example: I go into Spells, select Bard and Ranger spells, then click on Casting Time to put them in Highest to Lowest:
10 Minutes is clearly not longer than 8 Hours to us, but it is to this database. It appears to recognize that a Minute is longer than an Action, you say, looking between 8) and 9), but that's actually just due to its secondary order being alphabetical. The Alarm spell, taking 1 Minute, is also 2) if reversed into Lowest to Highest casting time.
All I really wanted was see which spells take 1 Bonus Action to cast, with the intent to check what I can combo with my weapon attacks. I had thought to find them separate as the lowest 'Cast Time'.
- Having tested it for this post, this somewhat applies to anything with a numerical value we need. Looking at the Range/Area column, I can try to order it via that but Self and Self (Sphere 10ft) and Self (Sphere 5ft) have no order, purely going by the alphabet for anything that is Self - and that isn't so bad on its own. The same for Touch. But then the actual distant ranges in ft defer to the alphabet no matter what - 30 ft, 120 ft, then 60 ft. That isn't right by any stretch of the imagination.
Other than that? Thank you and keep up the great work!
The UI is clean, on brand, and fairly intuitive. The information is easy to read.
But, so far there is not much to it. Currently, there are plenty of apps available that provide the same information and with equally good UIs. Until we get to Phase Two or Phase Three, it is difficult to make any kind of determination if this is an improvement on other options. This said, I'm not particular fond of browser based applications. In the age of Twitch, Roll20, and many others, having to have yet another browser window open during a session only serves to clutter my desktop.
All told, I think this is a strong start if a late one. I'm looking forward to trying it along with other apps I use to see how it compares.
As many have said the compendium needs a search function. Also, hyperlinking everywhere! Sometimes you need to check something really quick in the middle of a paragraph and then go right back. Ideally, the eventual app would allow you to take the monster info page and quick print a card for an encounter.
I'm interested to know whether material from the PHB that is not in the SRD will be added in any way? It would be nice to be able to run a full game through this system, but as it stands a ranger would need access to a separate physical PHB copy for information on the Lightning Arrow spell. It is rather inconvenient to look in a compendium only to realise that the entry you are looking for is omitted, and then need to track it down in a book.
Amazing UI, I feel that it is missing a site wide search function, and obviously the compendium search everybody said already.
Also, I'm seeing so much black and white, I feel we're missing on images, gifs, using the technology on our favor here, we should get more than just the same text that we woudl get on the books, yeah I get it that it is easier to navigate and find everything, and that's great, but we should be able to to go further and have access to more images, specially in spells and compendium, we can have visuals of combat iterations, full blown images of how tricky spells operate (imagine a cloudkill moc=ving through the battlefield).
I don't think it woudl clutter to have more media as a option, not a standard, on the info
The look and feel of the site is 9/10 imo. One thing I'm not particularly fond of is the harmonica menus for items, spells and monsters, and the way the descriptions are. I don't know if that makes any sense, but it's too long horizontally, and too short vertically. Makes reading odd, seeing as all other D&D material is pretty much always in two columns, and monsters, even homebrew, usually have a specific table styling. I'd not want to see the exact same style, but the same format.
We've gone back and forth on the two columns point a good bit - thanks for sharing the feedback. I feel a poll coming up where we present the two options and get general feedback.
I checked and it's perfect on mobile for monsters. Exactly what I wanted to see - the familiar book like format in the style and feel of this beautiful looking website. I'd love to see some improvement on the desktop version, though admittedly, despite having a lot of experience with web design, I'm not sure I can see how. 10/10 on mobile version though.
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We are paratroopers, private. We are supposed to be surrounded.
First thought, I like the interface. But. I'd like to have an option to use a more compressed interface. So far, I've only opened it on the pc, not a mobile device, so I can't speak for how the interface looks on those.
In terms of the listings, having an option to control how many items appear on one page would be nice. I'm the kind of person who will always opt for 'show all' when there's any kind of choice in the matter. I'd rather have one long long page than have to keep switching to the different pages.
I'm very impressed with the available filters. It makes it quick and easy to get a list of allowed spell choices for a class like the eldritch knight, who can only choose spells off a certain list from certain schools of magic.
I like the UI, it is easy to find what you want if you know what your are looking for. The spells are descriptive and complete, making for easy casting.
Unfortunately, the items are not complete. I know that +3 armor gives a +3 bonus, but I always get mixed up on what the base item gives. Can we get the entire item in the description? It will do me little good to find a magic item on my phone just to open my PHB to find the other half of it.
I love the simplicity and ease of navigation!
---Architect of Worlds, Destroyer of Dreams
Loving what I've seen so far. It shows that the full DDB experience is going to be excellent. Seriously looking forward to everything they'll offer.
Only had a few minutes to go over it, but MAN this is amazing. I think the UI is fine--probably some will want more images, but I like being able to locate items/spells/monsters by name quickly or through some other filter if I'm planning a game.
I can see this plus an iPad becoming standard issue for DMs. That's certainly my plan.
Very simple which makes things like searching very easy. The black text on white background kind of messes with me and I would really appreciate an option to turn on a "night mode" where the background is dark and the text is light, but otherwise very intuitive UI.
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D&D Beyond FoundersThe UI is super slick. I think everything is organized super well. The Magic Items has got to be my favorite section, with the Compendium a close section. Having all the important rules handy, without having to flip through the book, is a huge life saver.
The Items Link straight to "Magic Items" What if i want the quick AC for Studded leather armor? I can't find that on here?
Magic Item page should list weight. Doesn't have to be on the main table, but when you click on the item to get the details there should be some information on the item's weight. Especially for things like armor and weapons.
I know not everyone plays with strength carry rules, but plenty enough groups do that it's important.
Spell should be searchable by school. Wizards have a lot of rules that apply to specific schools of magic and it's also important for DM's to be able to quickly search through evocation or necromancy spells to use for a villain, or divination spells for an oracle, etc.
I am the Inquisitor Imperitus. I am judge, jury, and executioner. Draw your last breath now, as I send you to the Nine Hells.
Having used a lot of unofficial references, I can safely say this is better than all of them. Top quality presentation - it's slick, it's clean and it's uncluttered.
As a suggestion I would really like the ability to display more spells/things per page.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I would love it if you could fix the 'Casting Time' of Spells. I noticed this pretty quickly. When looking at the Spells you can click to change the order of spells to their casting time, but it does not differentiate between Actions and Bonus Actions, seemingly only registering the numerical value at their beginning.
Example: I go into Spells, select Bard and Ranger spells, then click on Casting Time to put them in Highest to Lowest:
1) 10 Minutes
2) 10 Minutes
<snip>
6) 10 Minutes
7) 8 Hours
8) 1 Minute
9) 1 Action
10 Minutes is clearly not longer than 8 Hours to us, but it is to this database. It appears to recognize that a Minute is longer than an Action, you say, looking between 8) and 9), but that's actually just due to its secondary order being alphabetical. The Alarm spell, taking 1 Minute, is also 2) if reversed into Lowest to Highest casting time.
All I really wanted was see which spells take 1 Bonus Action to cast, with the intent to check what I can combo with my weapon attacks. I had thought to find them separate as the lowest 'Cast Time'.
- Having tested it for this post, this somewhat applies to anything with a numerical value we need. Looking at the Range/Area column, I can try to order it via that but Self and Self (Sphere 10ft) and Self (Sphere 5ft) have no order, purely going by the alphabet for anything that is Self - and that isn't so bad on its own. The same for Touch. But then the actual distant ranges in ft defer to the alphabet no matter what - 30 ft, 120 ft, then 60 ft. That isn't right by any stretch of the imagination.
Other than that? Thank you and keep up the great work!
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The UI is clean, on brand, and fairly intuitive. The information is easy to read.
But, so far there is not much to it. Currently, there are plenty of apps available that provide the same information and with equally good UIs. Until we get to Phase Two or Phase Three, it is difficult to make any kind of determination if this is an improvement on other options. This said, I'm not particular fond of browser based applications. In the age of Twitch, Roll20, and many others, having to have yet another browser window open during a session only serves to clutter my desktop.
All told, I think this is a strong start if a late one. I'm looking forward to trying it along with other apps I use to see how it compares.
Creator, writer, and producer of Heroes Not Included
As many have said the compendium needs a search function. Also, hyperlinking everywhere! Sometimes you need to check something really quick in the middle of a paragraph and then go right back. Ideally, the eventual app would allow you to take the monster info page and quick print a card for an encounter.
I'm interested to know whether material from the PHB that is not in the SRD will be added in any way? It would be nice to be able to run a full game through this system, but as it stands a ranger would need access to a separate physical PHB copy for information on the Lightning Arrow spell. It is rather inconvenient to look in a compendium only to realise that the entry you are looking for is omitted, and then need to track it down in a book.
Put me in the so far so good camp. Simple UI is easy to read. Will see how I feel when I need to get something done vs just looking around.
Amazing UI, I feel that it is missing a site wide search function, and obviously the compendium search everybody said already.
Also, I'm seeing so much black and white, I feel we're missing on images, gifs, using the technology on our favor here, we should get more than just the same text that we woudl get on the books, yeah I get it that it is easier to navigate and find everything, and that's great, but we should be able to to go further and have access to more images, specially in spells and compendium, we can have visuals of combat iterations, full blown images of how tricky spells operate (imagine a cloudkill moc=ving through the battlefield).
I don't think it woudl clutter to have more media as a option, not a standard, on the info
Of monsters and men the world is full
We are paratroopers, private. We are supposed to be surrounded.
First thought, I like the interface. But. I'd like to have an option to use a more compressed interface. So far, I've only opened it on the pc, not a mobile device, so I can't speak for how the interface looks on those.
In terms of the listings, having an option to control how many items appear on one page would be nice. I'm the kind of person who will always opt for 'show all' when there's any kind of choice in the matter. I'd rather have one long long page than have to keep switching to the different pages.
I'm very impressed with the available filters. It makes it quick and easy to get a list of allowed spell choices for a class like the eldritch knight, who can only choose spells off a certain list from certain schools of magic.
So, first thoughts, very nice.
I like the UI, it is easy to find what you want if you know what your are looking for. The spells are descriptive and complete, making for easy casting.
Unfortunately, the items are not complete. I know that +3 armor gives a +3 bonus, but I always get mixed up on what the base item gives. Can we get the entire item in the description? It will do me little good to find a magic item on my phone just to open my PHB to find the other half of it.