WotC's D&D Virtual Table Cancelled

Steel_Wind · Jul 11, 2012

Blue said:
I did this a bunch of years ago when...

I'm glad it works for you, but my experiences differ.

I am suggesting to you that the technological maturity of this technology "a bunch of years ago" compared to the camera quality, bandwidth and software tools available *now* makes all the difference in the world.

Your experience "a bunch of years ago" is out of date.

Janx · Jul 11, 2012

Blue said:
There's been talk about real OGL for D&D Next. Does that mean that we will be able to see real rules-embedded 3rd party VTTs?

If so, then stopping spending on progressing with that to put that effort elsewhere is something that I can accept, even if it feels like "yet another WotC letdown".

What I'm surprised at is that WotC kept trying to get it working themselves (using contractors apparently). VTTs have been done multiple times. Heck, in a few short months, Roll20.net has come up with something very slick, very fast as a Kickstarter project.

WotC should have LICENSED somebody's existing work.

As somebody else mentioned earlier, they could have required a DDI subscription and worked on a simple API to handle authentication. Much less work, and it leverages existing products.

Janx · Jul 11, 2012

Steel_Wind said:
I am suggesting to you that the technological maturity of this technology "a bunch of years ago" compared to the camera quality, bandwidth and software tools available *now* makes all the difference in the world.

Your experience "a bunch of years ago" is out of date.

you are right here. Faster net, better cams = works pretty good for most people now.

However, be mindful that your setup with multiple cameras, tripods and good microphones is also considered "bunch of years ago" technology.

roll20.net for instance has done an excellent job of using web-cams, shared battlemat to do VTT with less clutter and complexity than RPtools and others (though admittedly less automated rules features).

Your way isn't the only way to go, and the technology supports multiple ways now.

Glororhan · Jul 11, 2012

GameTable Online picking up the VT management

I am with GameTable Online, the developers of the D&D Virtual Table. While Wizards is dropping the VT, we are trying to take over hosting it. While both of our companies are on board with the idea, the legal and tech arrangements still have to be worked out. You can read more about what is going on at <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w

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mudbunny · Jul 12, 2012

Janx said:
What I'm surprised at is that WotC kept trying to get it working themselves (using contractors apparently). VTTs have been done multiple times. Heck, in a few short months, Roll20.net has come up with something very slick, very fast as a Kickstarter project.

WotC should have LICENSED somebody's existing work.

They did. Originally, they had it completely contracted out to a company called Radiant Machine. They did not provide anything useful and, from what I have been able to determine, WotC ended up scrapping everything that they did and starting over, completely in-house. That provided the Compendium, Character Builder and Monster Builder.

At some point in time, WotC realized that they could not put out a VT solely with in-house programmers. Thus, they went to GameTable Online and licensed their platform for the VT. They grabbed it and did a fair number of modifications to allow the VT to pull data directly from the cloud saves from the CB and MB, as well as macros derived from the powers that the monsters and PCs had.

They then recently (I would guess between a month and 2 weeks ago) decided that the number of users actually using the VT wasn't enough for WotC to continue to devote man-hours on attempting to bring it out of beta, so they decided to cancel it.

avin · Jul 12, 2012

I would license it to a solid established tabletop company, like Fantasy Grounds, and get a part of the package's selling.

"Official D&D support", not the model Wotc tried so far.

mudbunny · Jul 12, 2012

avin said:
I would license it to a solid established tabletop company, like Fantasy Grounds, and get a part of the package's selling.

"Official D&D support", not the model Wotc tried so far.

I would rather they just provide an API combined with a standard format for the exporting of data so that 3PPs could access the data and use it however they want. Hook in a key or something attached to the 3PP so that if it is found that they are breaking the API rules the program is disabled.

darjr · Jul 12, 2012

mudbunny said:
I would rather they just provide an API combined with a standard format for the exporting of data so that 3PPs could access the data and use it however they want. Hook in a key or something attached to the 3PP so that if it is found that they are breaking the API rules the program is disabled.

I thought this already existed? Isn't it how some of the 3pp projects out there now use it? Doesn't Masterplan use it?

It's been a long while since I played 4e or used masterplan but I was sure it used something like this.

UngainlyTitan · Jul 13, 2012

mudbunny said:
I would rather they just provide an API combined with a standard format for the exporting of data so that 3PPs could access the data and use it however they want. Hook in a key or something attached to the 3PP so that if it is found that they are breaking the API rules the program is disabled.

Totally agree with this. And the same for char builders and such. All Wizards should build is the compendium and the associated api's