A Technical Look at D&D Insider Applications

Apparently, no one at WotC has ever purchased a used book from a hobby shop. With a unique code, that content won't be available to the new owner of said book.

Why not just have the PDFs downloadable for free if you're a DnD Insider?!

Scott_Rouse said:

The codes will be unique to each book and you will not need to be a D&D Insider subscriber to activate the E-Book version.

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I wonder if there is a way to tie in the hard copy's unique code for the ebook with a serial number imprinted in the hard copy. So when you register for the ebook you need to enter the unique serial number of the book too and if they don't match up then the unique ebook code doesn't work.

I don't mind paying a couple additional bucks (a couple!) for digital access.

And if the feat has an effect on mechanics that would be reflected on your character sheet, it will also not get figured in? or will it and it just doesn't explain why it changed...

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I find the latter likely. For a lot of abilities, this would probably still mean you need the exact descriptions (and adjucate their effects manually), since they don't directly affect your numbers.
Spells rarely give a fixed bonus that is constant about time. Many feats give a numerical bonus, but often they add more - Improved Disarm adds +4 to your Disarm roll, but you don't provoke AoOs when disarming now, either.

epochrpg said:

This burns me. In my group, and I am sure 99.9% of gaming groups, not every person owns their own individual copy of each and every book. On person had the complete series, I had spell compendium and bo9s, someone else had the races series, etc. As a GROUP we had a pretty complete collection, but as individuals it was fragmentary. It wasn't a problem making characters-- we'd just look at each other's books.

But this online thing you each have to have your OWN copy to get access to the updates for your character. Don't have the 4e version of Complete Warrior? Oh well, your fighter cannot have spiffy feat/presige class-- but we'll tell you what book it is in.

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You are misunderstanding (or I am, but I think I'm right) how the ebook/character generator interacts. The way I understand how it will work is this:

You buy a hardcopy of the book, and you can "activate" an ecopy for a nominal fee.

SEPARATE from that is the character generator. The character generator will be the same for everyone, and everyone can create a character with the same feats, prestige classes, etc.

To take your Complete Warrior example, once that comes out for 4E, the character generator will be updated, and everyone can make characters using the rules from Complete Warrior. If there is a feat called "Super Power Attack" in that book, everyone who subscribes can make characters who have that feat. The only difference for people who bought and activated the book is that while in the character generator they can read the rules for "Super Power Attack." People who did not activate the book (either becasue they didn't want to pay the nominal fee, or because they didn't buy it) only see "Super Power Attack," and can't read the rules for it within the program.

Source: Unofficial D&D 4th Edition Info Page

Unofficial D&D 4th Edition Info Page said:

Q: Will my players need to own the book and activate it to use those options in the character generator?

Answer: We already have mentioned that owning the E-version of a published book will allow to see the details of the book content within the D&DI applications, if you are a D&DI subscriber.
Now you will still be able to build a character using features from a published book even if you do not own the E-Version of that published book. You will not be able to see the detailed descriptions of the resources you have used from that published book, though.

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Moniker said:

Apparently, no one at WotC has ever purchased a used book from a hobby shop. With a unique code, that content won't be available to the new owner of said book.

Why not just have the PDFs downloadable for free if you're a DnD Insider?!

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So you're expecting to pay a fixed monthly fee, and get free access to all published materials? Methinks you're expecting a little much there. The unique code lets WotC confirm (in theory) that you are in fact the legit owner of the book. If you buy a used book, caveat emptor.

Scholar & Brutalman said:

Wizards have mentioned the fee before. They said "Nominal" means "about the price of a cup of coffee."

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By Starbucks pricing that means like $5.99, right?

So am I right in reading that the nominal fee will preclude me from buying just a digital copy for a nominal fee?
Also I'm wondering if being able to see details in the character sheet tool means that your printout will include those details?

Mercule said:

I don't remember the full context (it was on ENWorld), but I made a statement along the lines of "$1-2 and I'm all there, but $5+ I'm definitely out" and someone from WotC (Scott, maybe?) was kind enough to tell me that I wouldn't definitely be out. I'm actually left with the impression that I was told I would be happy, but can't remember the exact response. Nor can I search.

My guess is that $2.50 is about the upper end that they're considering. Which is, pleasantly enough, the upper end of what I'd consider.

Edit: Crap. Should have read the second page. Scott popped in and gave the official answer.

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I would rather Wotc stick another dollar on the book price and another dollar on teh subscription price(or perhaps two dollars on the subscription price and none on the book) than keep paying bits and pieces for every little thing.

carmachu said:

I would rather Wotc stick another dollar on the book price and another dollar on teh subscription price(or perhaps two dollars on the subscription price and none on the book) than keep paying bits and pieces for every little thing.

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Not singling you out, you're just the latest to post this

While it *is* almost literally nickel-and-diming (actually, it's ten to twenty times worse!), it's also one of the only sensible ways to do this.

The only sensible/kind place to charge for the electronic version of a book is in the electronic service; it's probably a fairly common pattern for someone to buy a book but be unable to access a pdf: a child prohibited from making unsupervised online purchases (like anything associated with the DI, say), or a book given as a gift, or so on.

Once they do that, they can either charge more for the service monthly, or once per book.
If they charge monthly, then you have to pay, whether you've bought this month's book or not. That's a terrible model, really, because I know that I only buy a few D&D books/year, and none in the last two years (though I've had a few given to me by *very* considerate friends!)

If they charge per book, then you only pay for what you use. Win!

It looks like they're not tying the book downloads to gleemax accounts, which actually annoys me a little bit from a security standpoint: computers crash, credit cards change, and people change their names, but a login on the wizards' own site, with whatever security they have in place, is ostensibly forever. (alpha test notwithstanding )
It'd allow tracking legitimate loss of .pdfs, people stealing books, and so on, *really* easily.

My consulting fee is really cheap, Scott. Consider contacting me.
I'm definitely less desperate than Klaus.
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>_>