The search bar (not necessarily searching within monsters/spells specifically, but just generally through the website) is next to worthless at the moment. It spews up a ton of results in no discernible order and only has category filters which can still leave results very broad. For example, if you select compendium, it pulls from all sourcebooks and adventures, meaning that every reference of a particular word comes up instead of just potentially relevant results.
Just as an exercise, let's say I want to look up the wording for material spell components because a player in my session has a question. I type in the phrase "Material spell components" into the search bar, and I get the following results:
First: A puzzle from Tasha's that has, in it's description, "You find an old piece of paper bearing a list of spells and components." (and earlier references material components for the puzzle/another puzzle in the same section." Second: Collecting Spell Components from Strixhaven, which describes a particular scenario where you search for spell components. Third: A *handout* from Tasha's regarding the earlier puzzle. Fourth: Spell Gem (Amber), because its description talks about material components once. Fifth: Emerald Pen, because it allows you to cast a spell without material components. Sixth: Ruby Weave Gem, the first entry in this list to actually feature the words "Material spell components" in sequence (as "a spell's material components" but still close enough). Next are a ton more spell gems, the Inspired (Kalaraq variant) because they can cast arcane eye "without material components" and then finally the first potentially relevant entry, a component pouch. At this point I might figure out that I'm not getting what I want, but that's fine, I can just filter by compendium content and it will find the rules I'm looking for, right? And it does, six entries down the list, tucked behind the first three entries from a general search and both component pouch and pouch.
Now, let's say I make an oops (assuming that you count this as an accident and not just the way you might search for the term) and type "Component" instead of components. This, in most modern search engines, will result a pretty similar result. Results will vary slightly in priority, but typically it will yield the same general results as a whole. Well, the good news is, I no longer get the compendium entries from Tasha's, because those used the word "components" specifically. Now I get a whole lot of creatures with spellcasting features that don't use a material component. I still get entries for pouch and component pouch, which is fine, but no compendium entries at all except for one for pouch. If I filter for compendium, lo and behold, I actually find what I'm looking for third... behind a sage advice question, which is far more specific than the general question I had, yet slides in ahead of the basic rules entry.
All that long rambling to say, the search feature, as it is now, doesn't yield particularly useful results. How can we fix that?
1. Add some basic expression support. If I searched "Material spell components" with quotation marks, in most search engines, it gives me exact phrase matches. Now, obviously, if the phrase is never printed in that exact wording, I would get no results, but that's fine. I'm looking for that exact result. D&D Beyond doesn't need all the complex search modifiers that other search platforms have, but exact matching would mitigate the atrocious searching method. 2. Search by sourcebooks, adventures, or select sources when searching. I might not want to get results from adventures when I'm looking up a particular thing. Being able to at least search *only* sourcebooks or *only* adventures might help find specific things without all the clutter of a general search. 3. Better result sorting. I have a hard time believing that a specific magic item from Out of the Abyss is more "important" by any normal search metric (popularity, exactness, etc.) than, say, component pouches would be in the example above, yet it was the top result in my second search.
Implementing at least a modicum of features to make the search feature more consistent and useful would be great. D&D Beyond has expanded a lot over the years, and what worked back then is just not sufficient anymore.
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The search bar (not necessarily searching within monsters/spells specifically, but just generally through the website) is next to worthless at the moment. It spews up a ton of results in no discernible order and only has category filters which can still leave results very broad. For example, if you select compendium, it pulls from all sourcebooks and adventures, meaning that every reference of a particular word comes up instead of just potentially relevant results.
Just as an exercise, let's say I want to look up the wording for material spell components because a player in my session has a question. I type in the phrase "Material spell components" into the search bar, and I get the following results:
First: A puzzle from Tasha's that has, in it's description, "You find an old piece of paper bearing a list of spells and components." (and earlier references material components for the puzzle/another puzzle in the same section."
Second: Collecting Spell Components from Strixhaven, which describes a particular scenario where you search for spell components.
Third: A *handout* from Tasha's regarding the earlier puzzle.
Fourth: Spell Gem (Amber), because its description talks about material components once.
Fifth: Emerald Pen, because it allows you to cast a spell without material components.
Sixth: Ruby Weave Gem, the first entry in this list to actually feature the words "Material spell components" in sequence (as "a spell's material components" but still close enough).
Next are a ton more spell gems, the Inspired (Kalaraq variant) because they can cast arcane eye "without material components" and then finally the first potentially relevant entry, a component pouch.
At this point I might figure out that I'm not getting what I want, but that's fine, I can just filter by compendium content and it will find the rules I'm looking for, right?
And it does, six entries down the list, tucked behind the first three entries from a general search and both component pouch and pouch.
Now, let's say I make an oops (assuming that you count this as an accident and not just the way you might search for the term) and type "Component" instead of components. This, in most modern search engines, will result a pretty similar result. Results will vary slightly in priority, but typically it will yield the same general results as a whole.
Well, the good news is, I no longer get the compendium entries from Tasha's, because those used the word "components" specifically. Now I get a whole lot of creatures with spellcasting features that don't use a material component. I still get entries for pouch and component pouch, which is fine, but no compendium entries at all except for one for pouch. If I filter for compendium, lo and behold, I actually find what I'm looking for third... behind a sage advice question, which is far more specific than the general question I had, yet slides in ahead of the basic rules entry.
All that long rambling to say, the search feature, as it is now, doesn't yield particularly useful results. How can we fix that?
1. Add some basic expression support. If I searched "Material spell components" with quotation marks, in most search engines, it gives me exact phrase matches. Now, obviously, if the phrase is never printed in that exact wording, I would get no results, but that's fine. I'm looking for that exact result. D&D Beyond doesn't need all the complex search modifiers that other search platforms have, but exact matching would mitigate the atrocious searching method.
2. Search by sourcebooks, adventures, or select sources when searching. I might not want to get results from adventures when I'm looking up a particular thing. Being able to at least search *only* sourcebooks or *only* adventures might help find specific things without all the clutter of a general search.
3. Better result sorting. I have a hard time believing that a specific magic item from Out of the Abyss is more "important" by any normal search metric (popularity, exactness, etc.) than, say, component pouches would be in the example above, yet it was the top result in my second search.
Implementing at least a modicum of features to make the search feature more consistent and useful would be great. D&D Beyond has expanded a lot over the years, and what worked back then is just not sufficient anymore.