The hombrew tools feel bad to use i dread opening them up. They are slow and prone to error and lack the polish a lot of the player tools have they almost feel like they are not for user side uses to me.
Id love to see a more visual tool with drop down boxes and search fields I don't want to have to type things in brakes. I just feel like this tool could be better and more fun to use brewing should be existing but the current tool is just frustrating and slow and turn in wondering why something is not working.
I really hope this tool gets some much needed love
They aren't for the user side. They're basically the dev tools. Users complained and begged for the ability to homebrew, but the devs didn't have the time to put into making practical homebrew tools, so they just made a user-facing version of their own tools. While they're behind on official book implementation, it's doubtful they'll get around to a more thorough and user-friendly version of the tools since there's already *something* available.
I want them to have a more friendly UI for homebrew tools as well, but I do not think it is going to happen anytime soon. As much as I want them to have a more user friendly homebrew tools, the current tools are easy enough to use for making minor adjustments of existing items. I want them to prioritize book releases and a few other features first since more people use them.
I feel like DMs are the ones that subscribe and buy the books...Id like if they payed attention to DM tools as well but I kinda of feel like wizards has also been neglecting DM tools
The issue is; why would they fix the homebrew tools when users are incentivised to purchase subscriptions so they can subscribe to someone elses hard work? Not having user friendly tools probably makes them more money in their eyes. It's why I refuse to subscribe to DnD Beyond, which is a shame, since maybe I would consider it if they gave a toss, which they clearly don't.
And don't give me that "oh they don't have time". Guys, they are a business, one that is probably making a lot of money. If a business can't provide the right tools while charging a monthly fee. Then I'm going to call them out on it. The subscription benefits are also a complete scam.
This isn't the issue at all.
Regardless of whether someone subscribes to use the public homebrew of others or if they create private homebrew themselves, someone has to enter the data. If you could enhance this feedback, please elaborate on what ' user-friendly tools' for homebrew would entail. As it is, the text fields and tags are readily available for creation.
The development team uses this exact system for inputting official WOTC content onto the site. If it were so tedious and hard to use, would they not have created something more efficient? Or would the "user-friendly" portion include making this process more time-consuming by adding in additional padding, informational notes, and error-checking?
TL;DR - The homebrew tools aren't left "as-is" because it forces individuals to purchase subscriptions. They exist as an efficient method to convert the published source material into the digital toolset. It appears this might just be a knowledge gap.
Guys, they are a business, one that is probably making a lot of money.
Please do not make unsubstantiated assumptions. I cannot stand people thinking they know how much a company makes without any experience or training in the relevant company or industry, or without at least attempting to do the most minimal of research on Google to look up a company's financial statements. And no, you will not find financial statements for Beyond by Googling it, or at least not that I can easily find. If you have some proper evidence to make claims about Beyond's finances, then please enlighten us. If you do not have any idea on how much it costs to hire people, rent out an office, run and maintain servers, pay license fees, etc., and you have no idea how much revenue a company generates either, then please refrain from making banal assumptions that businesses make a ton of profit just because they are a business.
In the absence of evidence, we can assume at best that Beyond is probably making a profit since they have been doing business for four years now, and that Fandom has not gotten rid of them when they acquired Curse from Twitch. We cannot assume Beyond is making a lot of profit because we have absolutely no idea how much it costs to run the businesss, and we have only have a tiny glimpse of what some of their revenue numbers are from their subscription numbers.
The issue is; why would they fix the homebrew tools when users are incentivised to purchase subscriptions so they can subscribe to someone elses hard work? Not having user friendly tools probably makes them more money in their eyes. It's why I refuse to subscribe to DnD Beyond, which is a shame, since maybe I would consider it if they gave a toss, which they clearly don't.
And don't give me that "oh they don't have time". Guys, they are a business, one that is probably making a lot of money. If a business can't provide the right tools while charging a monthly fee. Then I'm going to call them out on it. The subscription benefits are also a complete scam.
Maybe Beyond actually wants to improve their homebrew tools because they do not want to lose customers to competitors like Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds? Maybe the reason why they are not improving their tools right now is because they do not have the resources and manpower to do so? Maybe there are hundreds of other vocal customers screaming at the top of their lungs to get Beyond to prioritize other features first?
Or you know, maybe there are also some vocal customers like me who missed some of the pre-order perks but want some way to get them? I would have just out right pay for them, but Beyond is giving them out via subscription. I might not get all the missing perks immediately, but since I am already a subscriber, I am basically getting them for free eventually.
I am not particularly happy with Beyond's slow pace of development either, but there is no need to attribute that to malice when it can be adequately explained by more probable reasons.
While homebrew is not as high on my most wanted features list, as a GM, I still want homebrew to be worked on too. There is a difference between showing frustration via constructive feedback and showing frustration via misinformation and obnoxiousness. Most of us users agree the UI is ugly, and many casual users also agree it is daunting and not very intuitive. However, we do not need to make unfounded statements about a company's finance, especially when the statements are not even sound when subjected under a little more scrutiny and contributes little to the discussion.
I want homebrew UI to be broken up a bit more into easier to digest pieces, like how the character builder spreads out the process over several tabs. While homebrew technically does kind of break up the process into different sections and pieces, I am not sure how to explain it more technically, but it is just a lot more clunky than the character builder.
While homebrew is not as high on my most wanted features list, as a GM, I still want homebrew to be worked on too. There is a difference between showing frustration via constructive feedback and showing frustration via misinformation and obnoxiousness. Most of us users agree the UI is ugly, and many casual users also agree it is daunting and not very intuitive. However, we do not need to make unfounded statements about a company's finance, especially when the statements are not even sound when subjected under a little more scrutiny and contributes little to the discussion.
I want homebrew UI to be broken up a bit more into easier to digest pieces, like how the character builder spreads out the process over several tabs. While homebrew technically does kind of break up the process into different sections and pieces, I am not sure how to explain it more technically, but it is just a lot more clunky than the character builder.
I disagree with your view that stating "...is probably making a lot of money", as constituting "...misinformation and obnoxiousness". I agree that the current Hombrew UI is clunky and improvements would be useful. As users and not owners/devs we can all only guess why it's not been updated before now.
I think users should be allowed some scope to explore their views without being instantly jumped on in terms of what another user feels is relevant and misreading opinion/supposition as fact. Exploring the possible motivation for not improving the UI is within the context of the thread in my view. Nothing stated was stated as fact; it's subjective opinion. Profitability or return of investment is not a motivator we should be afraid of suggesting is part of a businesses decision making process.
It feels fair to say that new releases will take priority on updating something like the UI as it will be what (here is where I feel the need to say 'in my opinion' lest someone interprets this as me masquerading this as 'fact') the majority of users will want and get most use out of. I'm comfortable with that as a priority; I can make the current UI work for me. Perhaps an official feedback/wishlist thread would help them gauge the desire from subs to have time spent on developing the UI?
Keep in mind that there really isn’t any “Homebrew UI” at all for DDB, we just get user level privileges to the official content builder:
Introduction
Before you start creating homebrew, please be aware that you have access to the same tool that the development team use to create content. This means it is both powerful and complex - and can be confusing at first.
The staff team have provided release notes, which are worth reading before you delve into these tutorials.
Keep in mind that there really isn’t any “Homebrew UI” at all for DDB, we just get user level privileges to the official content builder:
Introduction
Before you start creating homebrew, please be aware that you have access to the same tool that the development team use to create content. This means it is both powerful and complex - and can be confusing at first.
The staff team have provided release notes, which are worth reading before you delve into these tutorials.
The issue is; why would they fix the homebrew tools when users are incentivised to purchase subscriptions so they can subscribe to someone elses hard work? Not having user friendly tools probably makes them more money in their eyes. It's why I refuse to subscribe to DnD Beyond, which is a shame, since maybe I would consider it if they gave a toss, which they clearly don't.
And don't give me that "oh they don't have time". Guys, they are a business, one that is probably making a lot of money. If a business can't provide the right tools while charging a monthly fee. Then I'm going to call them out on it. The subscription benefits are also a complete scam.
Homebrewing is not at all the sufferfest you're laying it out to be. I am far from a technically savvy person, but I've never had a problem creating homebrew in DDB. Moreover my "hard work" can't be shared as my homebrewing is more often than not me taking the hard work of some third party press or other content creator for use in my games, and we're not allowed to publish that stuff to the community.
There's a very capable community of homebrewers available to help you learn how to homebrew pretty much anything on here, using not some "broken" or "throttled" form of homebrew, but rather the same system that the Devs use to code official content into the DDB toolset.
I'm sorry your experience on DDB has put you into a mindset evidentially contemptuous of DDB itself as well as its users, but as pointed out it seems the portrait you're mad at is very inaccurate.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
I disagree with your view that stating "...is probably making a lot of money", as constituting "...misinformation and obnoxiousness". I agree that the current Hombrew UI is clunky and improvements would be useful. As users and not owners/devs we can all only guess why it's not been updated before now.
I think users should be allowed some scope to explore their views without being instantly jumped on in terms of what another user feels is relevant and misreading opinion/supposition as fact. Exploring the possible motivation for not improving the UI is within the context of the thread in my view. Nothing stated was stated as fact; it's subjective opinion. Profitability or return of investment is not a motivator we should be afraid of suggesting is part of a businesses decision making process.
It feels fair to say that new releases will take priority on updating something like the UI as it will be what (here is where I feel the need to say 'in my opinion' lest someone interprets this as me masquerading this as 'fact') the majority of users will want and get most use out of. I'm comfortable with that as a priority; I can make the current UI work for me. Perhaps an official feedback/wishlist thread would help them gauge the desire from subs to have time spent on developing the UI?
I am sick and tired of people thinking businesses make a ton of money just because they charge a subscription, are based online, or whatever other reason they can come up with to devalue another person's work, and they do so with little to no knowledge of how business works. Everyone who has access to Beyond also has access to thousands of years of humanity's accumulated knowledge via the internet, so it is not difficult to do a teensy tinsy bit of research before continuing to contribute to the misconception that businesses are money trees. Spreading misinformation from willful ignorance is just as bad as spreading misinformation from deceptive intent, and it greatly irritates me when people do so maliciously to cast their target in a negative light.
I do not mind people voicing their frustration and dissatisfaction. I am just as frustrated and dissatisfied as they are, and I am happy others a speaking up about it to keep Beyond on their toes. However, implying Beyond makes a lot of money and insinuating Beyond is maliciously doing so crosses the line.
Beyond already has an official feedback/wishlist "thread", as this whole subforum is basically that, and they know how much users want better homebrew in general. In terms of priority outside of implementing books, as far as I know, it seems like feats-like options are up next after the inventory rework.
So it's okay for you to make an assumption, but not me? Wow what a hypocrite you are. Now I can only imagine the mental gymnastics you needed to come up with your argument.
I can see what kind of person you are by the way you tell us how something you are paying for is "free eventually". No silly, you are paying money, that's not what free means.
If you still do not get it, there is a big difference between implying Beyond making a lot of profit with little to no evidence, and me saying we have no meaningful idea how much profit makes due to a lack of evidence, and with what minimal evidence that we do have, we can at best assume Beyond is making some kind of profit. Back your statements up.
Beyond could very well not offer preorder perks via subscription and just sell them like dice and Tactical Maps Reincarnated, and I personally prefer it that way since I can get stuff I want immediately. However, they are offering those additional preorder perks at no extra cost to subscribers, which is not ideal, but I do not mind either since I do not have pay extra for them. Are the preoder perks technically free? No, they are not. But that is like saying the second item in a buy-one-get-one-free offer is not technically free.
There's a very capable community of homebrewers available to help you learn how to homebrew pretty much anything on here, using not some "broken" or "throttled" form of homebrew, but rather the same system that the Devs use to code official content into the DDB toolset.
It is great that we have a great community of homebrewers, but I think the end goal for homebrew tools improvement should be to eliminate the need for casual users to seek the homebrew subforum for help. While we still get questions from time to time on using the character builder (usually the similar ones that could be solved by toggling sources on or buying the option), that seems to pale in comparison to the help people need for homebrew (the questions generally seem a lot more varied). The proces of using the character builder is just smooth in a way that the homebrew tools just is not, if that makes sense.
I doubt DNDBeyond is purposely keeping the homebrew tools hard to use to incentivize subscriptions. The devs have mentioned on the dev updates many times that the homebrew tool is not up to par even for official content. I mention the official content due to them using near identical tools and obviously they aren't able to implement all of the official content with it let alone obscure homebrew.
I'm positive they bring in what the average person/small business owner would consider a large amount of revenue. Whether that revenue gets eaten up by expenses or there's a ton of profit end of year being bonused out/sitting there we don't know. I would personally venture a guess they have ample funds to pursue whichever reasonable direction of development they choose without having to worry too much about cash flow. But to be fair I have no clue and we likely won't ever know. They do also have fandom's backing and fandoms devs who as mentioned on the dev update can sometimes work on dndbeyond stuff at special events like the 2 day event for underdark mode.
I'll admit it's a huge undertaking to make something better for both them and us. I get that they are doing it bits at a time and yes I agree the pace feels abysmal at times with development here. Some of that perception (in my case at least) could be not being able to see behind the curtain at all with Dndbeyond. By this I mean not showing us the incremental progress or telling us where they've hit snags on the dev updates. At the very least it's extremely rare we see or get that information. I don't think it's a money problem but I don't think they are purposefully holding development back.
I for one hope we get a full homebrew revamp (a bit at a time) in the next couple years. Only because at this point I know it's unreasonable to expect better than that.
I mention the official content due to them using near identical tools and obviously they aren't able to implement all of the official content with it let alone obscure homebrew.
Not “near identical tools,” nor even “identical tools.” They use the exact same tool.
I mention the official content due to them using near identical tools and obviously they aren't able to implement all of the official content with it let alone obscure homebrew.
Not “near identical tools,” nor even “identical tools.” They use the exact same tool.
I say near identical tools because they obviously have a public publish button and a way to link that content to books/individual purchases. We've also seen on the dev update testing environments we don't have access to. They can also create/publish classes and we can't. So near identical is correct. Similar to approaching zero in math but not zero.
It's also how they've described it on the dev update. Maybe you're talking about something else like the specific area's of the homebrew tools we have access to (which would be identical to the corresponding parts in the back end) vs where I was talking about the content creation tools as a whole in that sentence. They obviously have access to more than we do hence "near identical".
Also "identical" and "exact same" are the same thing in this context. As I'm sure they don't use the front end "My Homebrew" to publish official content and they have a back end that was replicated for us to use. Had I said identical or exact same I'm sure someone would have come at me with the above about how they aren't identical. People love to pick at one or two words on these forums. As a comparison for understanding you might be wearing identical pants but if the rest of your clothes are different your outfit isn't identical and they aren't the exact same pants but exactly alike.
They have Admin privileges, we only have User privileges to the exact same toolset. Like, how Mods & Staffers can edit posts in forums. They are using the same forum, they just have higher level access. Or how a player or their DM can see an entire character sheet here, but the other players and the rest of us can only see certain parts of a character sheet. We use the same content builder they do, we just only have limited access. They let us borrow their tools basically.
They have Admin privileges, we only have User privileges to the exact same toolset. Like, how Mods & Staffers can edit posts in forums. They are using the same forum, they just have higher level access. Or how a player or their DM can see an entire character sheet here, but the other players and the rest of us can only see certain parts of a character sheet. We use the same content builder they do, we just only have limited access. They let us borrow their tools basically.
Cool we agree then. They have access to more and replicated their backend for us to use for homebrew therefore near identical is still correct in the context of what I was saying.
The hombrew tools feel bad to use i dread opening them up. They are slow and prone to error and lack the polish a lot of the player tools have they almost feel like they are not for user side uses to me.
Id love to see a more visual tool with drop down boxes and search fields I don't want to have to type things in brakes. I just feel like this tool could be better and more fun to use brewing should be existing but the current tool is just frustrating and slow and turn in wondering why something is not working.
I really hope this tool gets some much needed love
They aren't for the user side. They're basically the dev tools. Users complained and begged for the ability to homebrew, but the devs didn't have the time to put into making practical homebrew tools, so they just made a user-facing version of their own tools. While they're behind on official book implementation, it's doubtful they'll get around to a more thorough and user-friendly version of the tools since there's already *something* available.
I want them to have a more friendly UI for homebrew tools as well, but I do not think it is going to happen anytime soon. As much as I want them to have a more user friendly homebrew tools, the current tools are easy enough to use for making minor adjustments of existing items. I want them to prioritize book releases and a few other features first since more people use them.
Check Licenses and Resync Entitlements: < https://www.dndbeyond.com/account/licenses >
Running the Game by Matt Colville; Introduction: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-YZvLUXcR8 >
D&D with High School Students by Bill Allen; Season 1 Episode 1: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52NJTUDokyk&t >
I feel like DMs are the ones that subscribe and buy the books...Id like if they payed attention to DM tools as well but I kinda of feel like wizards has also been neglecting DM tools
Wizards of the Coast doesn’t own or operate this website, Fandom does.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I am aware I meant wizards was also participating in a pattern
Ahh, ha ha. Gotcha.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
This isn't the issue at all.
Regardless of whether someone subscribes to use the public homebrew of others or if they create private homebrew themselves, someone has to enter the data. If you could enhance this feedback, please elaborate on what ' user-friendly tools' for homebrew would entail. As it is, the text fields and tags are readily available for creation.
The development team uses this exact system for inputting official WOTC content onto the site. If it were so tedious and hard to use, would they not have created something more efficient? Or would the "user-friendly" portion include making this process more time-consuming by adding in additional padding, informational notes, and error-checking?
TL;DR - The homebrew tools aren't left "as-is" because it forces individuals to purchase subscriptions. They exist as an efficient method to convert the published source material into the digital toolset. It appears this might just be a knowledge gap.
Please do not make unsubstantiated assumptions. I cannot stand people thinking they know how much a company makes without any experience or training in the relevant company or industry, or without at least attempting to do the most minimal of research on Google to look up a company's financial statements. And no, you will not find financial statements for Beyond by Googling it, or at least not that I can easily find. If you have some proper evidence to make claims about Beyond's finances, then please enlighten us. If you do not have any idea on how much it costs to hire people, rent out an office, run and maintain servers, pay license fees, etc., and you have no idea how much revenue a company generates either, then please refrain from making banal assumptions that businesses make a ton of profit just because they are a business.
In the absence of evidence, we can assume at best that Beyond is probably making a profit since they have been doing business for four years now, and that Fandom has not gotten rid of them when they acquired Curse from Twitch. We cannot assume Beyond is making a lot of profit because we have absolutely no idea how much it costs to run the businesss, and we have only have a tiny glimpse of what some of their revenue numbers are from their subscription numbers.
Maybe Beyond actually wants to improve their homebrew tools because they do not want to lose customers to competitors like Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds? Maybe the reason why they are not improving their tools right now is because they do not have the resources and manpower to do so? Maybe there are hundreds of other vocal customers screaming at the top of their lungs to get Beyond to prioritize other features first?
Or you know, maybe there are also some vocal customers like me who missed some of the pre-order perks but want some way to get them? I would have just out right pay for them, but Beyond is giving them out via subscription. I might not get all the missing perks immediately, but since I am already a subscriber, I am basically getting them for free eventually.
I am not particularly happy with Beyond's slow pace of development either, but there is no need to attribute that to malice when it can be adequately explained by more probable reasons.
Check Licenses and Resync Entitlements: < https://www.dndbeyond.com/account/licenses >
Running the Game by Matt Colville; Introduction: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-YZvLUXcR8 >
D&D with High School Students by Bill Allen; Season 1 Episode 1: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52NJTUDokyk&t >
I want homebrew UI to be broken up a bit more into easier to digest pieces, like how the character builder spreads out the process over several tabs. While homebrew technically does kind of break up the process into different sections and pieces, I am not sure how to explain it more technically, but it is just a lot more clunky than the character builder.
Check Licenses and Resync Entitlements: < https://www.dndbeyond.com/account/licenses >
Running the Game by Matt Colville; Introduction: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-YZvLUXcR8 >
D&D with High School Students by Bill Allen; Season 1 Episode 1: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52NJTUDokyk&t >
I disagree with your view that stating "...is probably making a lot of money", as constituting "...misinformation and obnoxiousness". I agree that the current Hombrew UI is clunky and improvements would be useful. As users and not owners/devs we can all only guess why it's not been updated before now.
I think users should be allowed some scope to explore their views without being instantly jumped on in terms of what another user feels is relevant and misreading opinion/supposition as fact. Exploring the possible motivation for not improving the UI is within the context of the thread in my view. Nothing stated was stated as fact; it's subjective opinion. Profitability or return of investment is not a motivator we should be afraid of suggesting is part of a businesses decision making process.
It feels fair to say that new releases will take priority on updating something like the UI as it will be what (here is where I feel the need to say 'in my opinion' lest someone interprets this as me masquerading this as 'fact') the majority of users will want and get most use out of. I'm comfortable with that as a priority; I can make the current UI work for me. Perhaps an official feedback/wishlist thread would help them gauge the desire from subs to have time spent on developing the UI?
Keep in mind that there really isn’t any “Homebrew UI” at all for DDB, we just get user level privileges to the official content builder:
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Yeh, absolutely correct, and they'll be expert at using it. Good point to reinforce the message about how it's been delivered. 😊
Homebrewing is not at all the sufferfest you're laying it out to be. I am far from a technically savvy person, but I've never had a problem creating homebrew in DDB. Moreover my "hard work" can't be shared as my homebrewing is more often than not me taking the hard work of some third party press or other content creator for use in my games, and we're not allowed to publish that stuff to the community.
There's a very capable community of homebrewers available to help you learn how to homebrew pretty much anything on here, using not some "broken" or "throttled" form of homebrew, but rather the same system that the Devs use to code official content into the DDB toolset.
I'm sorry your experience on DDB has put you into a mindset evidentially contemptuous of DDB itself as well as its users, but as pointed out it seems the portrait you're mad at is very inaccurate.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
I am sick and tired of people thinking businesses make a ton of money just because they charge a subscription, are based online, or whatever other reason they can come up with to devalue another person's work, and they do so with little to no knowledge of how business works. Everyone who has access to Beyond also has access to thousands of years of humanity's accumulated knowledge via the internet, so it is not difficult to do a teensy tinsy bit of research before continuing to contribute to the misconception that businesses are money trees. Spreading misinformation from willful ignorance is just as bad as spreading misinformation from deceptive intent, and it greatly irritates me when people do so maliciously to cast their target in a negative light.
I do not mind people voicing their frustration and dissatisfaction. I am just as frustrated and dissatisfied as they are, and I am happy others a speaking up about it to keep Beyond on their toes. However, implying Beyond makes a lot of money and insinuating Beyond is maliciously doing so crosses the line.
Beyond already has an official feedback/wishlist "thread", as this whole subforum is basically that, and they know how much users want better homebrew in general. In terms of priority outside of implementing books, as far as I know, it seems like feats-like options are up next after the inventory rework.
If you still do not get it, there is a big difference between implying Beyond making a lot of profit with little to no evidence, and me saying we have no meaningful idea how much profit makes due to a lack of evidence, and with what minimal evidence that we do have, we can at best assume Beyond is making some kind of profit. Back your statements up.
Beyond could very well not offer preorder perks via subscription and just sell them like dice and Tactical Maps Reincarnated, and I personally prefer it that way since I can get stuff I want immediately. However, they are offering those additional preorder perks at no extra cost to subscribers, which is not ideal, but I do not mind either since I do not have pay extra for them. Are the preoder perks technically free? No, they are not. But that is like saying the second item in a buy-one-get-one-free offer is not technically free.
It is great that we have a great community of homebrewers, but I think the end goal for homebrew tools improvement should be to eliminate the need for casual users to seek the homebrew subforum for help. While we still get questions from time to time on using the character builder (usually the similar ones that could be solved by toggling sources on or buying the option), that seems to pale in comparison to the help people need for homebrew (the questions generally seem a lot more varied). The proces of using the character builder is just smooth in a way that the homebrew tools just is not, if that makes sense.
Check Licenses and Resync Entitlements: < https://www.dndbeyond.com/account/licenses >
Running the Game by Matt Colville; Introduction: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-YZvLUXcR8 >
D&D with High School Students by Bill Allen; Season 1 Episode 1: < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52NJTUDokyk&t >
I doubt DNDBeyond is purposely keeping the homebrew tools hard to use to incentivize subscriptions. The devs have mentioned on the dev updates many times that the homebrew tool is not up to par even for official content. I mention the official content due to them using near identical tools and obviously they aren't able to implement all of the official content with it let alone obscure homebrew.
I'm positive they bring in what the average person/small business owner would consider a large amount of revenue. Whether that revenue gets eaten up by expenses or there's a ton of profit end of year being bonused out/sitting there we don't know. I would personally venture a guess they have ample funds to pursue whichever reasonable direction of development they choose without having to worry too much about cash flow. But to be fair I have no clue and we likely won't ever know. They do also have fandom's backing and fandoms devs who as mentioned on the dev update can sometimes work on dndbeyond stuff at special events like the 2 day event for underdark mode.
I'll admit it's a huge undertaking to make something better for both them and us. I get that they are doing it bits at a time and yes I agree the pace feels abysmal at times with development here. Some of that perception (in my case at least) could be not being able to see behind the curtain at all with Dndbeyond. By this I mean not showing us the incremental progress or telling us where they've hit snags on the dev updates. At the very least it's extremely rare we see or get that information. I don't think it's a money problem but I don't think they are purposefully holding development back.
I for one hope we get a full homebrew revamp (a bit at a time) in the next couple years. Only because at this point I know it's unreasonable to expect better than that.
Not “near identical tools,” nor even “identical tools.” They use the exact same tool.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I say near identical tools because they obviously have a public publish button and a way to link that content to books/individual purchases. We've also seen on the dev update testing environments we don't have access to. They can also create/publish classes and we can't. So near identical is correct. Similar to approaching zero in math but not zero.
It's also how they've described it on the dev update. Maybe you're talking about something else like the specific area's of the homebrew tools we have access to (which would be identical to the corresponding parts in the back end) vs where I was talking about the content creation tools as a whole in that sentence. They obviously have access to more than we do hence "near identical".
Also "identical" and "exact same" are the same thing in this context. As I'm sure they don't use the front end "My Homebrew" to publish official content and they have a back end that was replicated for us to use. Had I said identical or exact same I'm sure someone would have come at me with the above about how they aren't identical. People love to pick at one or two words on these forums. As a comparison for understanding you might be wearing identical pants but if the rest of your clothes are different your outfit isn't identical and they aren't the exact same pants but exactly alike.
They have Admin privileges, we only have User privileges to the exact same toolset. Like, how Mods & Staffers can edit posts in forums. They are using the same forum, they just have higher level access. Or how a player or their DM can see an entire character sheet here, but the other players and the rest of us can only see certain parts of a character sheet. We use the same content builder they do, we just only have limited access. They let us borrow their tools basically.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Cool we agree then. They have access to more and replicated their backend for us to use for homebrew therefore near identical is still correct in the context of what I was saying.