This doesn't make the changes any better. It's still making it nigh impossible to use the app to play using the 5E.14 ruleset. Why would I use the app if I have to reference the compendium? The entire USP of the app is that the spells are accessible in one place, now it's actually worse than just using a book or searching the spell on google.
Getting updated spells and magic items for free, without giving them a dime for it, does make the changes better. A lot better. Before, it seemed as though you were just up the creek without a paddle and had to homebrew to even make your character sheet functional. Now, it will just be replaced with the most up to date versions. Very different and much better.
No it absolutely does not. "updated" spells and magic items are a net NEGATIVE for me, free or not. I would rather get NOTHING then the 2024 versions.
Okay. Then I will amend my initial statement to say that it is better for anyone who would rather have something than nothing at all and that there are some who would rather they get nothing. That is a surprise for me.
It shouldn't be a surprise. I currently am using a system with a set of rules and integrated tools. I do not want these rules to change while I am in the middle of a game. The rules are going to be changed. That is something I don't want because a game when the rules suddenly change is bad so that is a negative. Therefore doing nothing and not changing the rules on me would be better. It's pretty simple really.
This doesn't address the crux of most people's problems, which is this breaks character sheets & other online tools (that until last April you were selling direct non-Compendium access too, so no "You got to keep what you actually bought"). This just.. reiterates what we already new as if the problem was we didn't understand the first changelog.
"No, see we're breaking your sheet for free", cool, nobody doubted that.
"The new game is better", subjective, but I wanted to play *this* game. Arguably Pathfinder is a better game & I don't need a "Master Sub" to share my Pathfinder books.
"It doesn't change much, it's errata", apparently $60 errata. You're definitely not selling me on a game if it's likened to an errata. Just trying to win an argument without regard to "is this product worth money".
I'm forced into this Frankensteined hybrid game limbo, that even if I wanted to use the *god awful* 'Homebrew' tools to escape (and I bought stuff specifically to *not* use them), I can't because I can't change invocations & other class features that rely on spells.
And even if I could this is not easier than filling out a PDF or pen & paper.
"But it's perfectly legal" is also not the winning argument people seem to think it is. After this why would I ever buy anything from WotC again? Not here or on Roll20 or any other venue that ends up directly paying WotC (who knows how long the WotC license will live there either?). This is such a common rebuttal that I have to genuinely wonder what the goal the people arguing it is other than being in an argument.
Anyone else remember that time Apple gave everyone that U2 album for free whether they wanted it or not?
Ah, man, I didn't just dream that? XD
But hey, give Apple a little credit here: at least they didn't delete all the songs in our library to force us to listen to U2, unlike SOME OTHER CORPORATIONS OUT THERE.
The reason I bought the books on DND Beyond is so I could use the content in character sheets and share them with other players in my campaigns. I already have physical copies. If you go through with this, I will have no reason to use DND Beyond anymore and will be canceling my subscription. I have ongoing campaigns that are going to be immediately inconvenienced by this update. You have the ability to incorporate both rule systems, so please do it.
"But it's perfectly legal" is also not the winning argument people seem to think it is. After this why would I ever buy anything from WotC again? Not here or on Roll20 or any other venue that ends up directly paying WotC (who knows how long the WotC license will live there either?). This is such a common rebuttal that I have to genuinely wonder what the goal the people arguing it is other than being in an argument.
So much this. There are lot of things that are perfectly legal but still abhorrent, reprehensible, untrustworthy, and generally just a bad idea if your trying to run a subscription service.
It shouldn't be a surprise. I currently am using a system with a set of rules and integrated tools. I do not want these rules to change while I am in the middle of a game. The rules are going to be changed. That is something I don't want because a game when the rules suddenly change is bad so that is a negative. Therefore doing nothing and not changing the rules on me would be better. It's pretty simple really.
Well, then it seems that we are not understanding each other because changing spells and magic items in the middle of the game is something I can easily agree is a net negative than changing nothing. That is not what had happened and it was never my position either. My position is that having those spells and magic items updated is better than having the old versions removed from the toolset and players having nothing but the compendium, to which you replied you would rather that be the case. Is that the message you meant to communicate?
I am in three games at the moment, each with DMs with a different level of commitment to the new rules. None of them have stated that they would rather have no D&D than an updated D&D though. It would be disappointing for me if they did, because all are games I am enjoying.
My position is that having those spells and magic items updated is better than having the old versions removed from the toolset and players having nothing but the compendium, to which you replied you would rather that be the case. Is that the message you meant to communicate?
I've screwed up the formatting of the quotes but I think it's still clear. In short yes that's my position. As a DM I don't see a practical difference between deleting a spell and replacing it for free with a different version. Both of those have the end result that I can no longer trust the content I'm looking at to be the same as it has been so an unasked for change "updated" is just as bad as removing the spell "nothing".
Clarification. I prefer nothing because at least then we know a change happened. Free updates is 100% going to have my players asking "wait... why didn't the spell work this way two months ago" in the middle of a combat.
So you are adding nothing and should just stop commenting because you are actively adding nothing
My comments have added to this conversation in that I have reiterated a frequently misunderstood point, which is that I have only stated that no one is losing content, it is being updated to the current rules and this is better than simply losing the content entirely. Some people do not like that and they are free to express that dislike. But to say that it is the same as getting nothing is not correct. The change log is addressing a major issue for many people. There are hundreds of people in the previous thread that came away with a very different understanding which had caused them a lot of pain, who would now be less so or even not angry at all. In fact, there are several posts in this thread of users expressing relief, even if they are small in number compared to those who are still unhappy. Those people have feelings that are just as valid as those who are still angry.
You are not the arbiter of what I can post. If I am off topic, you should flag me.
Losing the ability to use the 2014 content in the character builder as a result of our purchases of the books is absolutely losing content. The compendium access isn't all that was purchased as part of D&D Beyond purchases. So to say no one is losing content is 100% a lie.
This “clarification” is extremely tone deaf. It was announced weeks ago that we would be getting access to the new basic rules.
There are many angry people. People aren’t angry because they didn’t know they’d be able to see the new information. People aren’t angry because they didn’t know they’’d still be able to access the old rules in the compendium.
People are angry because the toolset - the character builder, the character sheets, the things that made people pay for digital books instead of just buying physical copies, and pay for subscriptions instead of just buying the books, digital or otherwise, is suddenly changing. For many people, this will happen mid campaign. If we wanted to look up rules all the time we wouldn’t be using DnDBeyond in the first place. We use DnDBeyond so that it’s all there in the character sheet.
I get that WOTC want everyone to switch to the new rules and buy the new books. But the community is angry about the way you are doing it, and this clarification has completely ignored the actual issue. Don’t patronise us with clarifications as though we all misunderstood, and refuse to engage with us on what we are saying.
This is pretty ridiculous, I actually only bought into the 2024 ruleset by preordering the core books because my players use dndbeyond and I wanted the option to use it myself, and to read the books.
So, instead, our campaign of several years is either going to involve a whole lot of item and spell duping (a burden most of my players have no time or technical knowledge to do), or go back to pen and paper.
I think I'll see if I can cancel my 2024 preorder, like I just cancelled my dndbeyond sub. What a terrible, terrible business plan you have here.
I am in three games at the moment, each with DMs with a different level of commitment to the new rules. None of them have stated that they would rather have no D&D than an updated D&D though. It would be disappointing for me if they did, because all are games I am enjoying.
Now imagine if you're in a big play-by-post west march discord server with dozens of players and they each have multiple PCs. I use 3 campaigns to hold my players, and that's just the folks who use this site... The compounding nightmare that is caused when rules change and you have to explain all of the changes and help them update their sheets to work with the 2014 standards you wish to keep. Mostly because I want it stay on par it with other homebrewed races/classes/subclasses/spells we have already added. The last thing i want is for things to be forced in rather than making my graceful transition.
Most of my players use this site cause it makes character creation super easy. Some are more clever and use dicecloud for homebrewed classes and races. I might just have all the clever ones teach the more reluctant. However i have quite a few players upset at the prospects of losing dndbeyonds ease of access that it offers once its no longer compatible with my setting. I might lose my players over the idea of moving to another service.
I don't hate 5e24, I just want to be to able to stick with all 5e14 features on character sheets. I look forward to playing new rules at the smaller tables I run sometimes.
Please stop pretending you don't know what the issue is. I don't care about being able to look my stuff up in the compendium - the whole point of having my entire character sheet - spells, magic items and all - integrated into DDB is to not have to bother with looking everything up! Please don't mess with my 2014 characters, we're right in the middle of a bunch of campaigns. The sub will stay cancelled until you fix this.
Are we losing access to the 2014 versions of material on our CHARACTER SHEETS? Or will there be the option (like a toggle, like the one used for legacy content) that allows us as consumers to use either or?
Simple question. If you can't answer for legal or policy reasons, just say so. It tells us more than whatever it is you just posted.
So, thanks for nothing. This sure was an expensive lesson.
I sunk a ton of money into this site in the expectation to be able to use what I bought _in the app_. I don’t need the rule books. I have those. I certainly don’t need beyond to get a substandard version of a pdf, that forces me to use an app with a crappy UI.
Why not just implement a legacy toggle that allows us users to decide if we want to use the old 2014 5e rule set or the new one in the app, ie character sheets and encounters, etc.?
What you’re describing makes your product mostly useless going forward. I’m certainly not going to continue my subscription and coming back here to read “compendium” is going to be a continual reminder of the overall negative experience D&D has become these past years.
I had hoped we could at least finish the campaigns we started, maybe even play the ones I bought but haven’t played yet. This is terribly disappointing.
On the other hand, it’s nice to be able to play actual pen and paper again. Old school. So thank you for that, at least.
So, still making it harder to access the 2014 edition? Why not just give us the ability to toggle between 2014 and 2024 on the character sheets instead of forcing this change on people mid campaign? It's being done for the other things so why not the spells? Is it really that hard to code it?
"While we're (Hasbro) releasing the 2024 Core D&D materials, we'll be removing any and all spell and magic item descriptions from the 2014 Rules and materials. We won't remove the content of the relating 2014 D&D materials and content, but despite this fact (and not using logic or common sense of offing a toggle function) we will be removing 1/3 of the mechanics of the game."
That's what we're all hearing. To be completely honest, I'm 97% tempted to renounce my Master Tier subscription to this site. But, I'd be losing hundreds of dollars and years of characters to two corporations that are allergic to common sense, actual customer feedback, and money (the very thing Hasbro cares about). 😑
So you are adding nothing and should just stop commenting because you are actively adding nothing
My comments have added to this conversation in that I have reiterated a frequently misunderstood point, which is that I have only stated that no one is losing content, it is being updated to the current rules and this is better than simply losing the content entirely. Some people do not like that and they are free to express that dislike. But to say that it is the same as getting nothing is not correct. The change log is addressing a major issue for many people. There are hundreds of people in the previous thread that came away with a very different understanding which had caused them a lot of pain, who would now be less so or even not angry at all. In fact, there are several posts in this thread of users expressing relief, even if they are small in number compared to those who are still unhappy. Those people have feelings that are just as valid as those who are still angry.
You are not the arbiter of what I can post. If I am off topic, you should flag me.
Losing the spells in the character sheet IS losing content. The whole point of this service is the character sheet. If it doesn't work in the sheet because they've intentionally made it so, that's losing content by definition. Why are you white-knighting for a corporation that doesn't care about you?
My worry comes down to what is not included. Will this shift to 2024 spells and magic items be instantaneous? Or are, as a group, gonna have to delete and rebuild the character sheets? That just seems like a drawn out process you've forced us into.
Secondly, what if something we have is not covered by the new lists? Do my players just lose access to certain magic items because they did not include it?
It just seems like such an intense change. A toggle would have been way easier. We need more clarification on how intuitive this is. We also don't know how much the new spells or magic items will mesh with 5e stuff.
This still does not answer the question of what about if you bought things al a cart for just the character sheets. I cannot access those spells in the compendium, I can only access them through the character sheet. I want to be able to use the things I paid for or I want a refund, simple as that
Like in the encounter builder there's like two versions of everything because I bought Mordekainen's Tome. Why not just do that with spells? "Fireball (Legacy) "Fireball - Player's Handbook 2024" it's that easy. Would it be a little messy? Yes. But so doable.
And they're doing it for everything else so idk why that wasn't an option.
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Aubrey Pressley
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It shouldn't be a surprise. I currently am using a system with a set of rules and integrated tools. I do not want these rules to change while I am in the middle of a game. The rules are going to be changed. That is something I don't want because a game when the rules suddenly change is bad so that is a negative. Therefore doing nothing and not changing the rules on me would be better. It's pretty simple really.
This doesn't address the crux of most people's problems, which is this breaks character sheets & other online tools (that until last April you were selling direct non-Compendium access too, so no "You got to keep what you actually bought"). This just.. reiterates what we already new as if the problem was we didn't understand the first changelog.
"No, see we're breaking your sheet for free", cool, nobody doubted that.
"The new game is better", subjective, but I wanted to play *this* game. Arguably Pathfinder is a better game & I don't need a "Master Sub" to share my Pathfinder books.
"It doesn't change much, it's errata", apparently $60 errata. You're definitely not selling me on a game if it's likened to an errata. Just trying to win an argument without regard to "is this product worth money".
I'm forced into this Frankensteined hybrid game limbo, that even if I wanted to use the *god awful* 'Homebrew' tools to escape (and I bought stuff specifically to *not* use them), I can't because I can't change invocations & other class features that rely on spells.
And even if I could this is not easier than filling out a PDF or pen & paper.
"But it's perfectly legal" is also not the winning argument people seem to think it is. After this why would I ever buy anything from WotC again? Not here or on Roll20 or any other venue that ends up directly paying WotC (who knows how long the WotC license will live there either?). This is such a common rebuttal that I have to genuinely wonder what the goal the people arguing it is other than being in an argument.
Because Robots.
Ah, man, I didn't just dream that? XD
But hey, give Apple a little credit here: at least they didn't delete all the songs in our library to force us to listen to U2, unlike SOME OTHER CORPORATIONS OUT THERE.
The reason I bought the books on DND Beyond is so I could use the content in character sheets and share them with other players in my campaigns. I already have physical copies. If you go through with this, I will have no reason to use DND Beyond anymore and will be canceling my subscription. I have ongoing campaigns that are going to be immediately inconvenienced by this update. You have the ability to incorporate both rule systems, so please do it.
So much this. There are lot of things that are perfectly legal but still abhorrent, reprehensible, untrustworthy, and generally just a bad idea if your trying to run a subscription service.
Well, then it seems that we are not understanding each other because changing spells and magic items in the middle of the game is something I can easily agree is a net negative than changing nothing. That is not what had happened and it was never my position either. My position is that having those spells and magic items updated is better than having the old versions removed from the toolset and players having nothing but the compendium, to which you replied you would rather that be the case. Is that the message you meant to communicate?
I am in three games at the moment, each with DMs with a different level of commitment to the new rules. None of them have stated that they would rather have no D&D than an updated D&D though. It would be disappointing for me if they did, because all are games I am enjoying.
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I've screwed up the formatting of the quotes but I think it's still clear. In short yes that's my position. As a DM I don't see a practical difference between deleting a spell and replacing it for free with a different version. Both of those have the end result that I can no longer trust the content I'm looking at to be the same as it has been so an unasked for change "updated" is just as bad as removing the spell "nothing".
Clarification. I prefer nothing because at least then we know a change happened. Free updates is 100% going to have my players asking "wait... why didn't the spell work this way two months ago" in the middle of a combat.
Losing the ability to use the 2014 content in the character builder as a result of our purchases of the books is absolutely losing content. The compendium access isn't all that was purchased as part of D&D Beyond purchases. So to say no one is losing content is 100% a lie.
This “clarification” is extremely tone deaf. It was announced weeks ago that we would be getting access to the new basic rules.
There are many angry people. People aren’t angry because they didn’t know they’d be able to see the new information. People aren’t angry because they didn’t know they’’d still be able to access the old rules in the compendium.
People are angry because the toolset - the character builder, the character sheets, the things that made people pay for digital books instead of just buying physical copies, and pay for subscriptions instead of just buying the books, digital or otherwise, is suddenly changing. For many people, this will happen mid campaign. If we wanted to look up rules all the time we wouldn’t be using DnDBeyond in the first place. We use DnDBeyond so that it’s all there in the character sheet.
I get that WOTC want everyone to switch to the new rules and buy the new books. But the community is angry about the way you are doing it, and this clarification has completely ignored the actual issue. Don’t patronise us with clarifications as though we all misunderstood, and refuse to engage with us on what we are saying.
This is pretty ridiculous, I actually only bought into the 2024 ruleset by preordering the core books because my players use dndbeyond and I wanted the option to use it myself, and to read the books.
So, instead, our campaign of several years is either going to involve a whole lot of item and spell duping (a burden most of my players have no time or technical knowledge to do), or go back to pen and paper.
I think I'll see if I can cancel my 2024 preorder, like I just cancelled my dndbeyond sub. What a terrible, terrible business plan you have here.
Now imagine if you're in a big play-by-post west march discord server with dozens of players and they each have multiple PCs. I use 3 campaigns to hold my players, and that's just the folks who use this site... The compounding nightmare that is caused when rules change and you have to explain all of the changes and help them update their sheets to work with the 2014 standards you wish to keep. Mostly because I want it stay on par it with other homebrewed races/classes/subclasses/spells we have already added. The last thing i want is for things to be forced in rather than making my graceful transition.
Most of my players use this site cause it makes character creation super easy. Some are more clever and use dicecloud for homebrewed classes and races. I might just have all the clever ones teach the more reluctant. However i have quite a few players upset at the prospects of losing dndbeyonds ease of access that it offers once its no longer compatible with my setting. I might lose my players over the idea of moving to another service.
I don't hate 5e24, I just want to be to able to stick with all 5e14 features on character sheets. I look forward to playing new rules at the smaller tables I run sometimes.
Please stop pretending you don't know what the issue is. I don't care about being able to look my stuff up in the compendium - the whole point of having my entire character sheet - spells, magic items and all - integrated into DDB is to not have to bother with looking everything up! Please don't mess with my 2014 characters, we're right in the middle of a bunch of campaigns. The sub will stay cancelled until you fix this.
Are we losing access to the 2014 versions of material on our CHARACTER SHEETS? Or will there be the option (like a toggle, like the one used for legacy content) that allows us as consumers to use either or?
Simple question. If you can't answer for legal or policy reasons, just say so. It tells us more than whatever it is you just posted.
So, thanks for nothing. This sure was an expensive lesson.
I sunk a ton of money into this site in the expectation to be able to use what I bought _in the app_. I don’t need the rule books. I have those. I certainly don’t need beyond to get a substandard version of a pdf, that forces me to use an app with a crappy UI.
Why not just implement a legacy toggle that allows us users to decide if we want to use the old 2014 5e rule set or the new one in the app, ie character sheets and encounters, etc.?
What you’re describing makes your product mostly useless going forward. I’m certainly not going to continue my subscription and coming back here to read “compendium” is going to be a continual reminder of the overall negative experience D&D has become these past years.
I had hoped we could at least finish the campaigns we started, maybe even play the ones I bought but haven’t played yet. This is terribly disappointing.
On the other hand, it’s nice to be able to play actual pen and paper again. Old school. So thank you for that, at least.
So, still making it harder to access the 2014 edition? Why not just give us the ability to toggle between 2014 and 2024 on the character sheets instead of forcing this change on people mid campaign? It's being done for the other things so why not the spells? Is it really that hard to code it?
Just here to have fun and for the memes.
So, in other words:
"While we're (Hasbro) releasing the 2024 Core D&D materials, we'll be removing any and all spell and magic item descriptions from the 2014 Rules and materials. We won't remove the content of the relating 2014 D&D materials and content, but despite this fact (and not using logic or common sense of offing a toggle function) we will be removing 1/3 of the mechanics of the game."
That's what we're all hearing. To be completely honest, I'm 97% tempted to renounce my Master Tier subscription to this site. But, I'd be losing hundreds of dollars and years of characters to two corporations that are allergic to common sense, actual customer feedback, and money (the very thing Hasbro cares about). 😑
Losing the spells in the character sheet IS losing content. The whole point of this service is the character sheet. If it doesn't work in the sheet because they've intentionally made it so, that's losing content by definition. Why are you white-knighting for a corporation that doesn't care about you?
Er ek geng, þat er í þeim skóm er ek valda.
UwU
My worry comes down to what is not included. Will this shift to 2024 spells and magic items be instantaneous? Or are, as a group, gonna have to delete and rebuild the character sheets? That just seems like a drawn out process you've forced us into.
Secondly, what if something we have is not covered by the new lists? Do my players just lose access to certain magic items because they did not include it?
It just seems like such an intense change. A toggle would have been way easier. We need more clarification on how intuitive this is. We also don't know how much the new spells or magic items will mesh with 5e stuff.
Aubrey Pressley
This still does not answer the question of what about if you bought things al a cart for just the character sheets. I cannot access those spells in the compendium, I can only access them through the character sheet. I want to be able to use the things I paid for or I want a refund, simple as that
Why didn't they just do this!
Like in the encounter builder there's like two versions of everything because I bought Mordekainen's Tome. Why not just do that with spells? "Fireball (Legacy) "Fireball - Player's Handbook 2024" it's that easy. Would it be a little messy? Yes. But so doable.
And they're doing it for everything else so idk why that wasn't an option.
Aubrey Pressley