I was wondering if there is a way to add unearthed arcana subclasses into dnd beyond. There are quite a few that my players want to play but dnd beyond does not have them available, I could not find them in the homebrew section and had to make some to the best of my ability in my own homebrew folder. Would it be possible for me to post them to the homebrew section of the website or, because of their “intellectual copyright” by the wizards of the coast am I legally not allowed to do so? I was just wondering if I could do this to help others on this site. If I can not will dnd beyond be adding the unofficial and not released unearthed arcana subclasses at a later date? Some of these being the sea, earth, phoenix sorcerers, and the pact of the raven queen and others such as these that haven’t been added to dnd beyond.

I understand that they will post only unearthed arcana from 2018 and onwards but does that rule out the possibility of the community creating replicas of them on the homebrew section?

Quote from Stormknight >>

Hi there Swansong64,

all subclasses, race, feats or other content that Wizards of the Coast publish as part of Unearthed Arcana remains their property.

As per the Homebrew Rules & Guidelines, you may not publish homebrew that someone else created (is the copyright holder for) - this includes Unearthed Arcana articles.

You are however welcome to create homebrew for this to use personally within your own campaigns and share with players within those campaigns.

 
I get that it's their property and it's up to them to decide what they want to do with that, including nothing.

I'm wondering if you would know if this particular call (including the January 2018 cutoff) was something that DDB negotiated with Wizards and is a *conscious* decision?
Or is it just a matter of DDB saying "well, we're not doing it, and WOTC hasn't yet told us that YOU can, so for now its a no-go."

It seems strange to me that you can't *pay* for it by the normal means, nor do you allow it to be recreated by the community.  It doesn't feel like a decision that WOTC or DDB would make on their own. Is there any extra context you can offer or find around the decisions made? Might make it an easier pill to swallow. 

WotC has decided what UA content they want published on DDB, which is where the cutoff comes from.

All other UA content is still property of WotC and therefore cannot be published as public homebrew.

The latter is a rule for all homebrew, you can't public share the IP of someone else, this goes for WotC content, UA, 3rd party or older D&D IP that is owned by other groups (such as some Greyhawk stuff).

In other words, if it's not yours, it can't go public.

Quote from Davedamon >>

WotC has decided what UA content they want published on DDB, which is where the cutoff comes from.

 Thanks, this was the bit I was missing. Does anyone know "why" they picked Jan 18? It seems like such an arbitrary line to draw. I've heard the "archiving" but that doesn't really hold much water. 

I'm also curious from a business perspective why WOTC would want to cut its players off from its old UA. I'm not saying they aren't within their rights to do it, but it's a bit confusing that they do.

I guess perhaps it's to keep the OGL a bit more restrictive to push people into the "paid version" of the game? But then why not make the old UA available for purchase?

Typically old UA stuff never passed the test. Either they were unbalanced or didn't get enough approval or it wasn't enjoyable. If it had passed the test it would be official content by now.

To further what Emmote said, the validity period for UA is about a year. After that it is either published (like gloom stalker into Xanathar's Guide to Everything) or abandoned as not where they want to go (the skill expertise feats)

I believe part of the equation in deciding on January 2018 as the starting point was that the agreement between WOTC and DDB to include UA here was finalized near the end of 2017–or maybe it was even January of 2018.  If memory serves, there wasn’t much in the way of UA player options late in 2017 that hadn’t already been published (or was expected to be published soon).  What there was of 2017 UA material that wasn’t published was considered by WOTC to be archived/inactive, even though individual tables can still continue to use it.

With very few exceptions, you can homebrew “archived” UA and use it here; you just can’t publish it.  (And you don’t need to publish it for it to be available to characters in your campaigns.)

I believe part of the equation in deciding on January 2018 as the starting point was that the agreement between WOTC and DDB to include UA here was finalized near the end of 2017–or maybe it was even January of 2018.  If memory serves, there wasn’t much in the way of UA player options late in 2017 that hadn’t already been published (or was expected to be published soon).  What there was of 2017 UA material that wasn’t published was considered by WOTC to be archived/inactive, even though individual tables can still continue to use it.

With very few exceptions, you can homebrew “archived” UA and use it here; you just can’t publish it.  (And you don’t need to publish it for it to be available to characters in your campaigns.)

Quote from ArwensDaughter >>

I believe part of the equation in deciding on January 2018 as the starting point was that the agreement between WOTC and DDB to include UA here was finalized near the end of 2017–or maybe it was even January of 2018.  If memory serves, there wasn’t much in the way of UA player options late in 2017 that hadn’t already been published (or was expected to be published soon).  What there was of 2017 UA material that wasn’t published was considered by WOTC to be archived/inactive, even though individual tables can still continue to use it.

With very few exceptions, you can homebrew “archived” UA and use it here; you just can’t publish it.  (And you don’t need to publish it for it to be available to characters in your campaigns.)

 Thanks for the timeline info -that's helpful.

with regards to homebrewing archived UA- that's kinda my point. I'm fine to recreate UA for my player's games as needed. I just don't understand why WOTC have chosen to restrict (directly or indirectly) the "publishing" of the UA. I'd prefer if I could save other DM's who aren't as savvy with the tool the effort of trying to create it for themselves. If you can do it anyway, why not let ppl share it. It's not like people are gaining financial benefit for posting homebrew on DDB. And its not like the PDFs aren't still available free on the WOTC website, so again, it seems a really arbitrary line to draw. 

But it's WOTC's content and it's up to them how they want it used.

It sounds as though I've gotten all the answer I'm going to get though, which is fine.