I want to love D&D Beyond, sadly the app and website are far from the paper and pencil. The concept sadly is currently a wet dream at this point and very slow at improving. I have personally bought the Legendary Bundle and a year of DM subscription, meaning I dropped $500 to support this. Here is my review, after using both the app and website for a while now. The developers keep promising good things to come. Yet, the subscription perks suck and the app is crap. I might revisit this at the end of my subscription. The website is okay, far from subscription good. I will need to bring some epic things for me to renew mine. I would love to see improvement in subscription perks, God Level app, interface important, ability to make homebrew classes. Honestly, this list is crazy long and probably nothing they haven't already heard. I'm hopeful this will improve quicker, I love the concept and sadly that is all it is right now. I'm willing to be a test subject for new content. Yet, I'm assuming this will just be overlooked and left to rot. Oct 2019
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
The app is sort of secondary to the site. It is in open beta and not claimed to be a finished product.
The subscription perks do kind of suck, no argument there. The only thing it is really needed for is content sharing. As more tools get added (encounter builder, monster builder, etc) subs will get perks related to those.
Many homebrew tools are planned. Homebrew was not something they prepared for from the beginning so what we have is kind of jank. They plan to put a lot of work into this as a big update.
In terms of using official content to make a character, look up rules, and run a campaign DDB is pretty great.
Been playing D&D since 1984 don't think there is a setting I haven't DMed. I'm well aware of how to play the game and have probably forgotten more about the game than I remember. I want D&DB to succeed. The idea is great but I feel that it is still so young and far from a workable solution. Maybe they will give us something more than eye candy and face the Dragon that is Homebrew Classes one day.
I suggest a lot more content for the subscription. Make subscription more appealing, thus more income to push towards the content subscribers want. I have read through these forums. Your client base is huge and willing to throw money at you. So much potential for a company to grow into. I hope this can rival the old school paper and pencil one day. Sadly that day is very far away. In a game where imagination is the driving force, D&DB makes me feel limited.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Funny - in my opinion it's brilliant *for what it does*.
Character sheet management that lets you access all official content in one location without carrying around a dozen books, including automatically calculated skill check bonuses, saving throws, to-hit bonuses, damage bonuses, spell list management with "hover" spell descriptions and automatic upcast damage calculations, wildshape management for druids, special ability use tracking, short and long-rest resets, etc. WAY more convenient than pen and paper.
Compendium content that's searchable and cross-linked conveniently? WAY faster than digging through multiple books to find the stats for that one monster or spell.
Is it campaign management software? No, but it's on the developer roadmap. Until then, I have OneNote that I can embed links straight to maps, monster stats, loot, etc. and pull it all up in multiple tabs from DDB.
Does it support homebrew well? Again, no, but it's on the developer roadmap. Do I really care? No - there's already (almost) more races and classes available than I even need. Minor changes can just be flavor-reskinned on existing chassis. If something needs a major homebrew, then there's pen-and-paper.
(But personally, as a player I'm in this for the story and the fun, not the combat munchkin crunch. I can just tweak an existing dragonborn and go about my day - I don't care if the old half-dragon template used to be "better".)
I see both of your points and give them credit. I just feel a bit cheated with the amount of money I dropped into this. I'm not trying to start an argument. I'm only voicing my opinion and I'm well aware of how valuable my opinion is to others. My point is that subscription perks need to be more appealing. Compared to other subscriptions that I pay at equal cost DDB is not measuring up. Better perks would make it more attractive to others in the future. It is anyone's right to not agree with me. I suggest looking into different subscription costs of other stuff and compare the perks. Plus compare subscription to none-subscription to pencil and paper. At that point, if you do not see my point, so be it.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Purely talking about the subscription, I can see what you mean. It's basically just removing the limit on # of characters you can create, letting you content-share in campaigns, and giving you access to the encounter-builder (which, from what I've seen so far, is fairly good).
But at that point it's just a case of is it worth $4.60 per month to you to be able to content-share with the players in a campaign so they have access to all the races / classes / spells / items, etc. from anywhere without carrying a lot of books around. To me? Yes. That's like one trip per month to Taco Bell, and Taco Bell isn't that good. :)
The app at this stage is basically a portable monster/spell lookup tool (and a reader if you want to go over the published modules). But pretty much anywhere I play has wifi, so it's easier just to log into the site with a browser, even on a phone or tablet, if I: need the character sheet and other tools. But again, the app is free, so that's not bad until they build in character sheet support and dice-roller functionality.
Really, the cost of the legendary bundle doesn't figure into the analysis for me. That's paying for the time DDB spends to digitize and cross-link everything in all those books, plus keeping it all updated to newly-released errata.
Purely talking about the subscription, I can see what you mean. It's basically just removing the limit on # of characters you can create, letting you content-share in campaigns, and giving you access to the encounter-builder (which, from what I've seen so far, is fairly good).
At this point, encounter builder access is not limited to subscribers. It was limited to subscribers during the alpha testing period, but now that it's in beta, everyone has access to it.
I believe the point behind not gating most of the website behind a subscription is so that DMs who purchase the Legendary Bundle, like yourself, can get their players on DDB and making sheets even if they've never spent a dime. You sunk five hundred bucks into DDB, which is a huge gorram hit for most folks. Wouldn't it suck royal donkey ass if each of your players also needed to chunk five hundred bucks into the service before they could play in your game?
It'd be nice if there were more subscriber perks, yeah. I wouldn't want them to be super lucrative or divisive. Things like subscriber-specific character sheet skins/backgrounds, perhaps a standing five-percent discount on new content to make it easier for me to add new content to my games for everyone to enjoy. Perks, rather than must-have necessary services. I would absolutely, categorically be against anything that requires my players to pay a dime to access something in my game. One of the great things about DDB is how generous they are with content sharing and tools that allow one player to share their purchases with others so everybody can play together. We don't need to be taking swings at that philosophy.
I can very much understand not liking the mobile app, I don't think I've ever used it in my life. I'm also an anachronistic weirdo who hates apps in general, but I get it. I also chafe at how janky and restrictive the current homebrew system is, but as someone who can't run/attend in-person games, and whose two current ongoing campaigns are online Discord games with my friends from around the country?
DDB is the only reason we can play at all. Pen and paper has unlimited freedom...but it's hard to read somebody's character sheet from a thousand miles away.
I'm perfectly happy with the subscription as is. I have bought almost everything except one adventure and of the two on pre-order I have one bought already. The sub lets me share all of it with .. I think the limit is 30 people? That's a lot of people who get completely free access to this content. For such a tiny amount of money it's more than worth it. Also, it doesn't have to be you who bought the content, it takes only 1 person to get the sub and turn it on, and everything bought by everyone in the campaign is fully shared. This makes it easy for a group : one buys the rulebooks, another buys the adventure, another buys the sub and everyone gets the benefit.
Furthermore, if all I wanted was so they could use something on their sheets - then I wouldn't even need a sub at all! I could just create a homebrew copy of that race/subclass/feat/whatever it just a few clicks and instantly it's shared with them - no sub required. I still prefer the sub, just so it makes it easier, they can play with making different characters to see builds, and so they can read the books like Tome of Foes or the extra character options and tables in Xanathar's for making backstories.
I would really understand the need for more if the sub was expensive but... it's like the price of a starbucks coffee. I could afford it even when I was on welfare. Hell, I could have afforded with just pocket money as a kid. It's a very small amount, so, I'm fine with what I get from it.
The sub is also some security for D&D Beyond - the books are all 1-time purchase, so to keep a consistent income they would be in a constant need for new people to sign up and buy. The subs offer a more stable bit of income to make things easier and develop a semblance of a safety net during a slow sale period.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond. Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ thisFAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Very good points. I'm glad you all are happy. Like I said before, I want DDB to succeed and I agree with some of the points made. For what it is currently, I bow down as a job well done and is the whole reason I bought everything. I own it all and bought all the pre-ordered stuff. I also paid for a year's worth of subscription upfront. I see it as money well spent to support a game I have loved for the majority of my life.
I mainly started this forum to let them know my opinion and suggestions to improve the subscription base. Steady income instead of the one-time ebook buy. More content for subscription and maybe up the price to the cost of two Taco Bell meals.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Don't think anybody's telling you your opinion is wrong. Heh, folks're simply offering their own opinions. Trust me, if I could sit down with a DDB dev for twenty minutes to air my concerns and have a discussion over what I'd like to see improve? It would basically consist of twenty minutes of me repeating "Make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking...", pausing only long enough to take a breath to keep going with. The current homebrew editor is a nightmare wasteland of counterinuitive badness and it needs needs needs to be better.
But the tool is still the only reason I can play, and I approve of the overall direction the company and tool both seem to be taking. Provided they get to work on making homebrew stop sucking at some point :P
An improvement to the user interface would be a great start. Along with a hover window that defines what each thing will alter. LOL, homebrew has to be a nightmare to the programmers.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Don't think anybody's telling you your opinion is wrong. Heh, folks're simply offering their own opinions. Trust me, if I could sit down with a DDB dev for twenty minutes to air my concerns and have a discussion over what I'd like to see improve? It would basically consist of twenty minutes of me repeating "Make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking...", pausing only long enough to take a breath to keep going with. The current homebrew editor is a nightmare wasteland of counterinuitive badness and it needs needs needs to be better.
But the tool is still the only reason I can play, and I approve of the overall direction the company and tool both seem to be taking. Provided they get to work on making homebrew stop sucking at some point :P
The homebrew system isn't a "real" homebrew system. It is a variant of the tools the devs had to add official content into the system. People really wanted a homebrew system and did not want to wait so they opened some of these tools as a public version and this is the homebrew system we now have.
Basically, the homebrew system we use was never intended or set up to be a homebrew system. This is why it is limited.
They are overhauling this to provide a proper homebrew system - it is on the roadmap. It may take some time to rework the system so we get a decent system but they also have to consider everything made on the current system so having that "backwards compatibility" is going to be a challenge and will cause it to take longer.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond. Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ thisFAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Believe me, I'm well aware of the scope of the project. Heh, nevertheless. As Arx pointed out, pen and paper's most significant advantage over DDB is the fact that you can do anything on P&P. Beyond's gotten better about this, but there's still a ton of limitations in the tools that put limitations on the game in turn if you want to try and take advantage of, or even simply continue living inside, the toolset.
It's still impossible to attach a custom action to a magical item, which lets out an enormous number of really cool magical items people come up with. yeah, you can just describe the action in the item's text section and tell players to wing it, but at that point why are you using an expensive digital character sheet designed to update in real time and keep all your stuff for you, instead of just a Word document? And that's just one example of the million and three things I keep finding myself unable to do in the system, or having to do with seven different interlocking kludgy workarounds.
They go out of their way to create a Playable Class Blood Hunter for Critical Role. This tells me that a section exists within the code to create classes much like the current way to create items and other homebrew stuff. They are not allowing that class creation section to be opened up for us common players. I say open it up to direct subscribers only! (Use us to test the section) Part of me wonders if WoC has told them not to allow us to create homebrew classes. That line of thought still doesn't compute because the homebrew classes will still be tied to the rules of D&D.
I could be wrong about this feeling and I hope I am. This site is starting to feel mainly adapted to help out the big games like Hero of the Vale, & Critical Role. *$ INCOME $* As they need things in their games it is quickly added to this site. Sadly this site probably started off as the Gaming Cave and those in charge still have that mentality.
I could be wrong about all of this... After all, I haven't finished my coffee.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Given how nightmarishly difficult and counterintuitive simply creating a subclass is, I'm inclined to believe DDB when they say that the tools they use to create their classes are complicated, weird, and often require code hacking on the backend to work. The Blood Hunter and Gunslinger went up as part of their promotional deal with Critical Role (and because Molly, gods keep his soul), but note that the Cobalt Soul subclass Marisha uses on Beau is specifically not available.
They need to fix the system before they open the floodgates. And mildly in their defense, the Public Homebrew section of the website is a fantastic example of why you don't allow most players to be game developers. I shudder to think what sort of twisted horrors the community would birth upon the unsuspecting Internet with access to homebrew class creation, and I give my thanks every day that my table intrinsically understands that DDB public homebrew is not to be trusted, and must be thoroughly vetted before one even thinks about using it.
I agree the majority of homebrew classes created would be broken and flat out wrong. On the same point many things would be created that would be amazing. Using the "Add to My Collection" button for existing homebrew content would aid in what someone would allow in a campaign. Essentially vetting it into DM approved content. Searching by upvote counts help in weeding out the trash in the existing homebrew stuff.
On the same note: Playing a truly broken class is a right and can be fun. Broken games exist and should be allowed. A few really fun campaigns I have played in my 35 years were truly broken but a load of fun. The new Rick and Morty thing coming out is a perfect example of this.
Currently, this is how I use my DDB subscription for making a character with a unique class. I go through the steps until I get to the export to PDF. From there I edit the PDF to say what I want. This allows me to get the class I want yet puts me back to pencil and paper for leveling up.
I want DDB to flourish and become the epic thing I envision it could be. Doing a simple Google search for "5e homebrew classes" brings a plethora of good classes mixed with crap. Why not adopt this and allow such crap and true treasures to exists here?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Given how nightmarishly difficult and counterintuitive simply creating a subclass is, I'm inclined to believe DDB when they say that the tools they use to create their classes are complicated, weird, and often require code hacking on the backend to work. The Blood Hunter and Gunslinger went up as part of their promotional deal with Critical Role (and because Molly, gods keep his soul), but note that the Cobalt Soul subclass Marisha uses on Beau is specifically not available.
While I will agree with on the most part, just clarifying that the reason why Cobalt Soul is not available has nothing to do with the homebrew system. Gunslinger and Blood Hunter were released much earlier onto DMs Guild and can be available for free there, so there was no problem getting them available on here. The Cobalt Soul however, is a bit different. It was released officially as part of the Tal'dorei Campaign Setting under Green Ronin Publishing which means for D&D Beyond to be able to make it available they would have to make a deal with Green Ronin Publishing, Matt Mercer and WotC. It's a bit complicated. They have been trying, but no deal has been agreed on and it's possible these negotiations have fallen to the wayside now. We may see new efforts if they rethink their stance on having 3rd party content on here but until then D&D Beyond cannot gain the legal right to make it available. It kinda sucks because the Tall'dorei campaign rocks and it would be amazeballs to have it available on D&D Beyond, but oh well. Maybe one day.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond. Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ thisFAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
I didn't see the option to view the road map in extended detail. In what I could see there was nothing on the road map for homebrew classes. All I've been able to do is search the forms and compare dates of when homebrew classes were first requested and how many times it has been requested since. Then compare the replies and today's date. Which adds up to many MANY requests and more than a long wait.
Time is on there side in this case. Glad they have things planned. Guess we can compare how long it takes to get these things to this and past posts?
Please, let the conversation adapt to whatever it becomes. Carry on.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I want to love D&D Beyond, sadly the app and website are far from the paper and pencil. The concept sadly is currently a wet dream at this point and very slow at improving. I have personally bought the Legendary Bundle and a year of DM subscription, meaning I dropped $500 to support this. Here is my review, after using both the app and website for a while now. The developers keep promising good things to come. Yet, the subscription perks suck and the app is crap. I might revisit this at the end of my subscription. The website is okay, far from subscription good. I will need to bring some epic things for me to renew mine. I would love to see improvement in subscription perks, God Level app, interface important, ability to make homebrew classes. Honestly, this list is crazy long and probably nothing they haven't already heard. I'm hopeful this will improve quicker, I love the concept and sadly that is all it is right now. I'm willing to be a test subject for new content. Yet, I'm assuming this will just be overlooked and left to rot. Oct 2019
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
The app is sort of secondary to the site. It is in open beta and not claimed to be a finished product.
The subscription perks do kind of suck, no argument there. The only thing it is really needed for is content sharing. As more tools get added (encounter builder, monster builder, etc) subs will get perks related to those.
Many homebrew tools are planned. Homebrew was not something they prepared for from the beginning so what we have is kind of jank. They plan to put a lot of work into this as a big update.
In terms of using official content to make a character, look up rules, and run a campaign DDB is pretty great.
Been playing D&D since 1984 don't think there is a setting I haven't DMed. I'm well aware of how to play the game and have probably forgotten more about the game than I remember. I want D&DB to succeed. The idea is great but I feel that it is still so young and far from a workable solution. Maybe they will give us something more than eye candy and face the Dragon that is Homebrew Classes one day.
I suggest a lot more content for the subscription. Make subscription more appealing, thus more income to push towards the content subscribers want. I have read through these forums. Your client base is huge and willing to throw money at you. So much potential for a company to grow into. I hope this can rival the old school paper and pencil one day. Sadly that day is very far away. In a game where imagination is the driving force, D&DB makes me feel limited.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Funny - in my opinion it's brilliant *for what it does*.
Character sheet management that lets you access all official content in one location without carrying around a dozen books, including automatically calculated skill check bonuses, saving throws, to-hit bonuses, damage bonuses, spell list management with "hover" spell descriptions and automatic upcast damage calculations, wildshape management for druids, special ability use tracking, short and long-rest resets, etc. WAY more convenient than pen and paper.
Compendium content that's searchable and cross-linked conveniently? WAY faster than digging through multiple books to find the stats for that one monster or spell.
Is it campaign management software? No, but it's on the developer roadmap. Until then, I have OneNote that I can embed links straight to maps, monster stats, loot, etc. and pull it all up in multiple tabs from DDB.
Does it support homebrew well? Again, no, but it's on the developer roadmap. Do I really care? No - there's already (almost) more races and classes available than I even need. Minor changes can just be flavor-reskinned on existing chassis. If something needs a major homebrew, then there's pen-and-paper.
(But personally, as a player I'm in this for the story and the fun, not the combat munchkin crunch. I can just tweak an existing dragonborn and go about my day - I don't care if the old half-dragon template used to be "better".)
I see both of your points and give them credit. I just feel a bit cheated with the amount of money I dropped into this. I'm not trying to start an argument. I'm only voicing my opinion and I'm well aware of how valuable my opinion is to others. My point is that subscription perks need to be more appealing. Compared to other subscriptions that I pay at equal cost DDB is not measuring up. Better perks would make it more attractive to others in the future. It is anyone's right to not agree with me. I suggest looking into different subscription costs of other stuff and compare the perks. Plus compare subscription to none-subscription to pencil and paper. At that point, if you do not see my point, so be it.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Purely talking about the subscription, I can see what you mean. It's basically just removing the limit on # of characters you can create, letting you content-share in campaigns, and giving you access to the encounter-builder (which, from what I've seen so far, is fairly good).
But at that point it's just a case of is it worth $4.60 per month to you to be able to content-share with the players in a campaign so they have access to all the races / classes / spells / items, etc. from anywhere without carrying a lot of books around. To me? Yes. That's like one trip per month to Taco Bell, and Taco Bell isn't that good. :)
The app at this stage is basically a portable monster/spell lookup tool (and a reader if you want to go over the published modules). But pretty much anywhere I play has wifi, so it's easier just to log into the site with a browser, even on a phone or tablet, if I: need the character sheet and other tools. But again, the app is free, so that's not bad until they build in character sheet support and dice-roller functionality.
Really, the cost of the legendary bundle doesn't figure into the analysis for me. That's paying for the time DDB spends to digitize and cross-link everything in all those books, plus keeping it all updated to newly-released errata.
At this point, encounter builder access is not limited to subscribers. It was limited to subscribers during the alpha testing period, but now that it's in beta, everyone has access to it.
Trying to Decide if DDB is for you? A few helpful threads: A Buyer's Guide to DDB; What I/We Bought and Why; How some DMs use DDB; A Newer Thread on Using DDB to Play
Helpful threads on other topics: Homebrew FAQ by IamSposta; Accessing Content by ConalTheGreat;
Check your entitlements here. | Support Ticket LInk
I believe the point behind not gating most of the website behind a subscription is so that DMs who purchase the Legendary Bundle, like yourself, can get their players on DDB and making sheets even if they've never spent a dime. You sunk five hundred bucks into DDB, which is a huge gorram hit for most folks. Wouldn't it suck royal donkey ass if each of your players also needed to chunk five hundred bucks into the service before they could play in your game?
It'd be nice if there were more subscriber perks, yeah. I wouldn't want them to be super lucrative or divisive. Things like subscriber-specific character sheet skins/backgrounds, perhaps a standing five-percent discount on new content to make it easier for me to add new content to my games for everyone to enjoy. Perks, rather than must-have necessary services. I would absolutely, categorically be against anything that requires my players to pay a dime to access something in my game. One of the great things about DDB is how generous they are with content sharing and tools that allow one player to share their purchases with others so everybody can play together. We don't need to be taking swings at that philosophy.
I can very much understand not liking the mobile app, I don't think I've ever used it in my life. I'm also an anachronistic weirdo who hates apps in general, but I get it. I also chafe at how janky and restrictive the current homebrew system is, but as someone who can't run/attend in-person games, and whose two current ongoing campaigns are online Discord games with my friends from around the country?
DDB is the only reason we can play at all. Pen and paper has unlimited freedom...but it's hard to read somebody's character sheet from a thousand miles away.
Please do not contact or message me.
I'm perfectly happy with the subscription as is. I have bought almost everything except one adventure and of the two on pre-order I have one bought already. The sub lets me share all of it with .. I think the limit is 30 people? That's a lot of people who get completely free access to this content. For such a tiny amount of money it's more than worth it. Also, it doesn't have to be you who bought the content, it takes only 1 person to get the sub and turn it on, and everything bought by everyone in the campaign is fully shared. This makes it easy for a group : one buys the rulebooks, another buys the adventure, another buys the sub and everyone gets the benefit.
Furthermore, if all I wanted was so they could use something on their sheets - then I wouldn't even need a sub at all! I could just create a homebrew copy of that race/subclass/feat/whatever it just a few clicks and instantly it's shared with them - no sub required. I still prefer the sub, just so it makes it easier, they can play with making different characters to see builds, and so they can read the books like Tome of Foes or the extra character options and tables in Xanathar's for making backstories.
I would really understand the need for more if the sub was expensive but... it's like the price of a starbucks coffee. I could afford it even when I was on welfare. Hell, I could have afforded with just pocket money as a kid. It's a very small amount, so, I'm fine with what I get from it.
The sub is also some security for D&D Beyond - the books are all 1-time purchase, so to keep a consistent income they would be in a constant need for new people to sign up and buy. The subs offer a more stable bit of income to make things easier and develop a semblance of a safety net during a slow sale period.
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond.
Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ this FAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Very good points. I'm glad you all are happy. Like I said before, I want DDB to succeed and I agree with some of the points made. For what it is currently, I bow down as a job well done and is the whole reason I bought everything. I own it all and bought all the pre-ordered stuff. I also paid for a year's worth of subscription upfront. I see it as money well spent to support a game I have loved for the majority of my life.
I mainly started this forum to let them know my opinion and suggestions to improve the subscription base. Steady income instead of the one-time ebook buy. More content for subscription and maybe up the price to the cost of two Taco Bell meals.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Don't think anybody's telling you your opinion is wrong. Heh, folks're simply offering their own opinions. Trust me, if I could sit down with a DDB dev for twenty minutes to air my concerns and have a discussion over what I'd like to see improve? It would basically consist of twenty minutes of me repeating "Make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking, make homebrew stop sucking...", pausing only long enough to take a breath to keep going with. The current homebrew editor is a nightmare wasteland of counterinuitive badness and it needs needs needs to be better.
But the tool is still the only reason I can play, and I approve of the overall direction the company and tool both seem to be taking. Provided they get to work on making homebrew stop sucking at some point :P
Please do not contact or message me.
An improvement to the user interface would be a great start. Along with a hover window that defines what each thing will alter. LOL, homebrew has to be a nightmare to the programmers.
Just thinking in words.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
The homebrew system isn't a "real" homebrew system. It is a variant of the tools the devs had to add official content into the system. People really wanted a homebrew system and did not want to wait so they opened some of these tools as a public version and this is the homebrew system we now have.
Basically, the homebrew system we use was never intended or set up to be a homebrew system. This is why it is limited.
They are overhauling this to provide a proper homebrew system - it is on the roadmap. It may take some time to rework the system so we get a decent system but they also have to consider everything made on the current system so having that "backwards compatibility" is going to be a challenge and will cause it to take longer.
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond.
Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ this FAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Believe me, I'm well aware of the scope of the project. Heh, nevertheless. As Arx pointed out, pen and paper's most significant advantage over DDB is the fact that you can do anything on P&P. Beyond's gotten better about this, but there's still a ton of limitations in the tools that put limitations on the game in turn if you want to try and take advantage of, or even simply continue living inside, the toolset.
It's still impossible to attach a custom action to a magical item, which lets out an enormous number of really cool magical items people come up with. yeah, you can just describe the action in the item's text section and tell players to wing it, but at that point why are you using an expensive digital character sheet designed to update in real time and keep all your stuff for you, instead of just a Word document? And that's just one example of the million and three things I keep finding myself unable to do in the system, or having to do with seven different interlocking kludgy workarounds.
Please do not contact or message me.
They go out of their way to create a Playable Class Blood Hunter for Critical Role. This tells me that a section exists within the code to create classes much like the current way to create items and other homebrew stuff. They are not allowing that class creation section to be opened up for us common players. I say open it up to direct subscribers only! (Use us to test the section) Part of me wonders if WoC has told them not to allow us to create homebrew classes. That line of thought still doesn't compute because the homebrew classes will still be tied to the rules of D&D.
I could be wrong about this feeling and I hope I am. This site is starting to feel mainly adapted to help out the big games like Hero of the Vale, & Critical Role. *$ INCOME $* As they need things in their games it is quickly added to this site. Sadly this site probably started off as the Gaming Cave and those in charge still have that mentality.
I could be wrong about all of this... After all, I haven't finished my coffee.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
Given how nightmarishly difficult and counterintuitive simply creating a subclass is, I'm inclined to believe DDB when they say that the tools they use to create their classes are complicated, weird, and often require code hacking on the backend to work. The Blood Hunter and Gunslinger went up as part of their promotional deal with Critical Role (and because Molly, gods keep his soul), but note that the Cobalt Soul subclass Marisha uses on Beau is specifically not available.
They need to fix the system before they open the floodgates. And mildly in their defense, the Public Homebrew section of the website is a fantastic example of why you don't allow most players to be game developers. I shudder to think what sort of twisted horrors the community would birth upon the unsuspecting Internet with access to homebrew class creation, and I give my thanks every day that my table intrinsically understands that DDB public homebrew is not to be trusted, and must be thoroughly vetted before one even thinks about using it.
Please do not contact or message me.
I agree the majority of homebrew classes created would be broken and flat out wrong. On the same point many things would be created that would be amazing. Using the "Add to My Collection" button for existing homebrew content would aid in what someone would allow in a campaign. Essentially vetting it into DM approved content. Searching by upvote counts help in weeding out the trash in the existing homebrew stuff.
On the same note: Playing a truly broken class is a right and can be fun. Broken games exist and should be allowed. A few really fun campaigns I have played in my 35 years were truly broken but a load of fun. The new Rick and Morty thing coming out is a perfect example of this.
Currently, this is how I use my DDB subscription for making a character with a unique class. I go through the steps until I get to the export to PDF. From there I edit the PDF to say what I want. This allows me to get the class I want yet puts me back to pencil and paper for leveling up.
I want DDB to flourish and become the epic thing I envision it could be. Doing a simple Google search for "5e homebrew classes" brings a plethora of good classes mixed with crap. Why not adopt this and allow such crap and true treasures to exists here?
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"
While I will agree with on the most part, just clarifying that the reason why Cobalt Soul is not available has nothing to do with the homebrew system. Gunslinger and Blood Hunter were released much earlier onto DMs Guild and can be available for free there, so there was no problem getting them available on here. The Cobalt Soul however, is a bit different. It was released officially as part of the Tal'dorei Campaign Setting under Green Ronin Publishing which means for D&D Beyond to be able to make it available they would have to make a deal with Green Ronin Publishing, Matt Mercer and WotC. It's a bit complicated. They have been trying, but no deal has been agreed on and it's possible these negotiations have fallen to the wayside now. We may see new efforts if they rethink their stance on having 3rd party content on here but until then D&D Beyond cannot gain the legal right to make it available. It kinda sucks because the Tall'dorei campaign rocks and it would be amazeballs to have it available on D&D Beyond, but oh well. Maybe one day.
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond.
Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ this FAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
I don't know how this conversation devolved into "why hasn't DDB already done what they plan to do in the future?"
The answer is development takes time. Making the homebrew tools easy to use takes time. Making homebrew classes possible takes time.
DDB Road-Map
I didn't see the option to view the road map in extended detail. In what I could see there was nothing on the road map for homebrew classes. All I've been able to do is search the forms and compare dates of when homebrew classes were first requested and how many times it has been requested since. Then compare the replies and today's date. Which adds up to many MANY requests and more than a long wait.
Time is on there side in this case. Glad they have things planned. Guess we can compare how long it takes to get these things to this and past posts?
Please, let the conversation adapt to whatever it becomes. Carry on.
THAC0 means "To-Hit Armor Class 0", and depending on who you ask, it was either pronounced "thack-oh" or "thay-ko". When a -5 was amazing and an insult was asking, "What alignment are you again?"