DM Minion: Digital Encounter\Combat Managment Tool for the iPad and Android Tablets

goathead82 · Apr 4, 2012

DM Minion is a easy to use and robust combat tracking tool for D&D4e!

Get it on the app store: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dm-minion/id512682896?ls=1&mt=8

For more infomation visit: http://goatheadsoftware.com/DmMinionInfo
or check out these reviews from your very own En World and NeuroGlyph Games

FEATURES:
Download .DND4e and .MONSTER XML for import via the myMinion website (Requires Internet Access)
Manage Players, Monsters and Encounters
Manage all aspects of a 4e combat (Initiative, HP, Powers, Conditions, and more...)
Manage players Rests and milestones outside of combat
Dice roller
Save your Adventure state on your device, for use outside of WIFI or Internet areas.

Feetz · Apr 4, 2012

Any plans for an android version?

goathead82 · Apr 4, 2012

Feetz said:
Any plans for an android version?

Yes, For Android Tablets only. There are just so many more devices and resolutions to support the testing phase are much longer for droid.

Infiniti2000 · Apr 4, 2012

1. Those things aren't cheap. There's not a lot to go on prior to spending the money for (comparatively) expensive iPhone and iPad apps. On the other hand, there's not much competition out there, so maybe this is reasonable.
2. That quick guide is horrendously formatted. It has a horrendous font, no page numbers, and the text does not mesh well with the images (e.g., page 6). Maybe you think you're being artsy, but it's almost unreadable. Switch to a standard font and get your information across rationally. Spend your time on your application instead of trying to be cute. I'm also not a big fan of landscape. ALL CAPS IS PROBABLY REALLY WHY THE FONT SUCKS WIND, THOUGH.

goathead82 · Apr 4, 2012

Infiniti2000 said:
1. Those things aren't cheap. There's not a lot to go on prior to spending the money for (comparatively) expensive iPhone and iPad apps. On the other hand, there's not much competition out there, so maybe this is reasonable.

I understand they are not cheap and I will provide any assistance I can help you make a better decision on purchasing or not.

2. That quick guide is horrendously formatted. It has a horrendous font, no page numbers, and the text does not mesh well with the images (e.g., page 6). Maybe you think you're being artsy, but it's almost unreadable. Switch to a standard font and get your information across rationally. Spend your time on your application instead of trying to be cute. I'm also not a big fan of landscape. ALL CAPS IS PROBABLY REALLY WHY THE FONT SUCKS WIND, THOUGH.

Reworked the font and format a bit. Hope it is more readable now.

Thanks for the feedback!

Infiniti2000 · Apr 4, 2012

Fast response, thanks! MUCH better guide. I know you're starting out, so let me offer some really quick tips to make things look a little more professional:

1. Being professional is not about being colorful or trendish. (The blue is okay, I'm not complaining; this is just a general point.) Professional sells much better than cool.

2. Give the guide a revision label (I recommend a number of some sort). Reference the product by name AND version that it describes within the document.

3. Have section numbers and page numbers. This will always help. It helps you in pointing out to people what to do and helps them in describing what they've done and what might've gone wrong. This probably means you should consider label the pictures as figures (and perhaps centering them).

4. Include an Introductory section and describe your product. Include in here perhaps the blurbs from the website and/or iTunes page. Maybe a Table of Contents?

5. Include links to your website and iTunes download pages. Include perhaps contact info (e-mail address).

6. Crop the screen captures to remove the Windows borders. I can understand why you took the screen captures this way, but it won't fill everyone with confidence when they say debug!

All in all, the above probably shouldn't take you more than an hour or two and I can guarantee about a 68% improvement.

Infiniti2000 · Apr 4, 2012

goathead82 said:
I understand they are not cheap and I will provide any assistance I can help you make a better decision on purchasing or not.

That's a good answer. I'm sure you spent a considerable amount of time on determining the prices of the products and sticking by your decision I hope has to be the right choice. Unfortunately, I don't know anything about marketing these types of apps so can't help you justify the purchase for others. For me, I'd like to hear from someone who has it and has used it. Even though I don't personally own an iPad, I'm still thinking of getting this for a friend's iPad that I can then borrow.

Have you done any kind of market comparison? For example, the DND4E Combat Manager is a nice tool and probably contains more features than what you have. The plus side is that it is Donateware (i.e., essentially free). The downside is that it doesn't load .MONSTER files and therefore is completely useless to me. If your tool was at least comparable to CM and you are as responsive as you seem to be in this thread, then I would likely buy it despite the lack of an iPad. (I have an iPhone, so might get the player minion anyway.)

goathead82 · Apr 4, 2012

Infiniti2000 said:
Fast response, thanks! MUCH better guide. I know you're starting out, so let me offer some really quick tips to make things look a little more professional:

1. Being professional is not about being colorful or trendish. (The blue is okay, I'm not complaining; this is just a general point.) Professional sells much better than cool.

2. Give the guide a revision label (I recommend a number of some sort). Reference the product by name AND version that it describes within the document.

3. Have section numbers and page numbers. This will always help. It helps you in pointing out to people what to do and helps them in describing what they've done and what might've gone wrong. This probably means you should consider label the pictures as figures (and perhaps centering them).

4. Include an Introductory section and describe your product. Include in here perhaps the blurbs from the website and/or iTunes page. Maybe a Table of Contents?

5. Include links to your website and iTunes download pages. Include perhaps contact info (e-mail address).

6. Crop the screen captures to remove the Windows borders. I can understand why you took the screen captures this way, but it won't fill everyone with confidence when they say debug!

All in all, the above probably shouldn't take you more than an hour or two and I can guarantee about a 68% improvement.

Infiniti2000, Thank you for your advice. I have updated the document taking it into account. Documentation composition obviously our best asset.

goathead82 · Apr 4, 2012

That's a good answer. I'm sure you spent a considerable amount of time on determining the prices of the products and sticking by your decision I hope has to be the right choice. Unfortunately, I don't know anything about marketing these types of apps so can't help you justify the purchase for others. For me, I'd like to hear from someone who has it and has used it. Even though I don't personally own an iPad, I'm still thinking of getting this for a friend's iPad that I can then borrow.

We spend considerable amount of time determining the best price point based on our features and what is currently available on the tablet market.
For tablets there are very few products out there, most of which have average ratings.

We are also considering a free demo version of the app but are still in the infant phases of determining the feature set and useability of what that would entail.

Have you done any kind of market comparison? For example, the DND4E Combat Manager is a nice tool and probably contains more features than what you have. The plus side is that it is Donateware (i.e., essentially free). The downside is that it doesn't load .MONSTER files and therefore is completely useless to me. If your tool was at least comparable to CM and you are as responsive as you seem to be in this thread, then I would likely buy it despite the lack of an iPad. (I have an iPhone, so might get the player minion anyway.)

We did research on many of the free tools that are available out there, We do think that we are close as far as features go. We also spent time designing a more action driven combat screen, which I think is unique to our software. As with any software there is always room for improvement and adding new features from the user base is a key factor in that.

Unwise · Apr 5, 2012

If I can offer some marketting suggestions...

Frankly I can't ever picture myself paying that amount for a product, unless I can directly picture how it will help me. To that end, I suggest that you make a youtube video with a screen capture of the ipad and a voice over explaining each of the features.

I would make the video run like a small section of a real game, not just a list of features. It all comes back to the old teaching/marketting adage "Don't tell me, show me". If I can watch you using the program to run a game, then I can picture how it will help me and decide on purchasing accordingly.

The product summary is just not good IMO. When I first stumble across the program, I do not care about its specs, or the nitty gritty. What I want is for you to tell me why I should buy it. How will it change my game? Reading the initial summary, I am not even really sure what it does or how I would use it in my games.

"DMMinion is a encounter and combat management tool for D&D 4e" that is all that is telling me what the product does, the rest is telling me how it does it. Explain what an "encounter and combat management tool" is and why you would want to use one. Then explain why yours is better than others with the nitty-gritty.

P.S. What about a demo version, where players cannot enter stuff in for themselves, but they can see a completed adventure? So I download the demo, can see the layout, see how I would roll the dice, take HP off the monsters etc. I would even publish a quick adventure with it, something simple with just a few linked encounters. Hold the buyers hand and show them the adventure and let them see for themself how to use it.

In addition, I would suggest that the retail tool have a couple of stored adventures as well (if it doesn't), so new users can get use to it and see how things should be set up.