I really appreciate the work that has gone into the app and I am excited to see what the future brings with the new combination of DnD Beyond and WotC. Congratulations to everyone and their hard work! Now on to the requests.
Universal Search: As a new(ish) player, my number one struggle is finding information contained in the titles that I have access to in the library. The greatest improvement to the app, in my humble opinion, would be to create a Universal Search of the library that searches the library titles and the content within those titles. The current Library Search function is simply not that valuable. I know some customers are going to have a large list of content in the library. I will concede that the ability to search for a title might prove useful, but the customer has to already know what title they want to look at or need (more on this in a bit). On the other hand, a newb like myself, when I am searching for something, I do not remember what title I saw the information in, or worst yet, may not know that another title has relevant information to what I am searching for. I come across this a fair bit with subclasses and archetypes. So I am forced to open a title, search, "nope...not this one...", back out, find another title, search, "nope...not this one...", rinse and repeat. It's a time sink and one that bites. I am also going to guess the first suggestion to sort of work around this is bookmarks. Bookmarks are great, but they do not address the issue of not knowing that a title contains relevant information. Plus, new players in particular, probably do not know what information they will want to keep referencing until much later when they start character creation or playing. Therefore, they will still have to go through the one book at time process at least once to create those bookmarks.
Bookmark Synchronization: I like the bookmark feature a lot, especially combined with the folder option, but I feel it is missing one tiny little bonus action. I have to admit, most people might not take advantage of this, or even notice it, but an account synchronization option would be pretty sweet. I use my iPad most of the time, but I also use my iPhone on occasion. I have the app on both, but the bookmarks are only saved on the device where I created them (I am guessing they are saved locally.) I know this a complicated ask, but if the bookmarks were somehow sync'd back to the cloud, then sync'd across devices, that would be awesome. The search feature on the website works well enough that bookmarks may not be needed, but adding custom bookmarks to the site might be a neat addition. I have not switched devices yet either, but if I do, do I lose my bookmarks? I hate to even say it...but...this would be a good feature to add some real value to a subscription. There. I said it out loud. Moving on...
Sort Options Tweak: The library has several sort options such as All, Downloaded, etc. How about a slight upgrade and "sort" those titles alphabetically? Again, in my humble opinion, this tweak would clean things up a bunch and make finding the book the user wants way more efficient, especially if they already know what title they want. Even if the customer has access to a large list of titles, or even all of them, the user could simply scroll to the appropriate letter first, quickly, then get the title wanted. Currently, it is a slow scroll reading each title to try and find the one we need.
Thank you for taking the time to read the wall o'text. I hope my suggestions are well received and keep up the good work!
Thank you very much for all these thoughts and very detailed feedback.
The good news is that all these items are on our radar. I added your descriptions to these items in our backlog for consideration when we start planning them in detail.
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I really appreciate the work that has gone into the app and I am excited to see what the future brings with the new combination of DnD Beyond and WotC. Congratulations to everyone and their hard work! Now on to the requests.
Universal Search:
As a new(ish) player, my number one struggle is finding information contained in the titles that I have access to in the library. The greatest improvement to the app, in my humble opinion, would be to create a Universal Search of the library that searches the library titles and the content within those titles. The current Library Search function is simply not that valuable. I know some customers are going to have a large list of content in the library. I will concede that the ability to search for a title might prove useful, but the customer has to already know what title they want to look at or need (more on this in a bit). On the other hand, a newb like myself, when I am searching for something, I do not remember what title I saw the information in, or worst yet, may not know that another title has relevant information to what I am searching for. I come across this a fair bit with subclasses and archetypes. So I am forced to open a title, search, "nope...not this one...", back out, find another title, search, "nope...not this one...", rinse and repeat. It's a time sink and one that bites. I am also going to guess the first suggestion to sort of work around this is bookmarks. Bookmarks are great, but they do not address the issue of not knowing that a title contains relevant information. Plus, new players in particular, probably do not know what information they will want to keep referencing until much later when they start character creation or playing. Therefore, they will still have to go through the one book at time process at least once to create those bookmarks.
Bookmark Synchronization:
I like the bookmark feature a lot, especially combined with the folder option, but I feel it is missing one tiny little bonus action. I have to admit, most people might not take advantage of this, or even notice it, but an account synchronization option would be pretty sweet. I use my iPad most of the time, but I also use my iPhone on occasion. I have the app on both, but the bookmarks are only saved on the device where I created them (I am guessing they are saved locally.) I know this a complicated ask, but if the bookmarks were somehow sync'd back to the cloud, then sync'd across devices, that would be awesome. The search feature on the website works well enough that bookmarks may not be needed, but adding custom bookmarks to the site might be a neat addition. I have not switched devices yet either, but if I do, do I lose my bookmarks? I hate to even say it...but...this would be a good feature to add some real value to a subscription. There. I said it out loud. Moving on...
Sort Options Tweak:
The library has several sort options such as All, Downloaded, etc. How about a slight upgrade and "sort" those titles alphabetically? Again, in my humble opinion, this tweak would clean things up a bunch and make finding the book the user wants way more efficient, especially if they already know what title they want. Even if the customer has access to a large list of titles, or even all of them, the user could simply scroll to the appropriate letter first, quickly, then get the title wanted. Currently, it is a slow scroll reading each title to try and find the one we need.
Thank you for taking the time to read the wall o'text. I hope my suggestions are well received and keep up the good work!
Thank you very much for all these thoughts and very detailed feedback.
The good news is that all these items are on our radar. I added your descriptions to these items in our backlog for consideration when we start planning them in detail.