What's Next For D&D? Live From Origins - D&D Beyond

Enevhar Aldarion · Jun 19, 2017

I only have two thoughts about the audio pronunciation guide using voice actors. Are they going to do the pronunciations as close to accent and funny voice free as possible, so that we know what they are saying? Or are they going to be pronouncing things the way the native speakers of the language the words and names come from? Personally, I hope we get the fully neutral pronunciations of all the words and then get some of them said with the appropriate accent or "funny voice" that would fit the native speakers who originated the word.

Demetrios1453 · Jun 19, 2017

Enevhar Aldarion said:
I only have two thoughts about the audio pronunciation guide using voice actors. Are they going to do the pronunciations as close to accent and funny voice free as possible, so that we know what they are saying? Or are they going to be pronouncing things the way the native speakers of the language the words and names come from? Personally, I hope we get the fully neutral pronunciations of all the words and then get some of them said with the appropriate accent or "funny voice" that would fit the native speakers who originated the word.

I would have to believe that the most important part of their remit would be pronounce things as WotC would want them pronounced. Why would WotC allow it any other way?

Secondly, as both are part of Critical Role, they would have respect for the game and would want to pronounce things correctly.

Thirdly, they are professional voice actors. They would know when to be serious (i.e. when doing an official pronunciation guide) and when to be goofy. If they didn't know that by now, they would have stopped getting gigs a long time ago.

Really, what a strange thing for people to get up in arms over...

Enevhar Aldarion · Jun 19, 2017

Demetrios1453 said:
I would have to believe that the most important part of their remit would be pronounce things as WotC would want them pronounced. Why would WotC allow it any other way?

Secondly, as both are part of Critical Role, they would have respect for the game and would want to pronounce things correctly.

Thirdly, they are professional voice actors. They would know when to be serious (i.e. when doing an official pronunciation guide) and when to be goofy. If they didn't know that by now, they would have stopped getting gigs a long time ago.

Really, what a strange thing for people to get up in arms over...

They are voice actors, so of course most of their work is doing goofy voices. Now if Matt were reading his lines in the voice of Goofy, I would be amused. ;-)

afdarcy · Jun 19, 2017

Enevhar Aldarion said:
I only have two thoughts about the audio pronunciation guide using voice actors. Are they going to do the pronunciations as close to accent and funny voice free as possible, so that we know what they are saying? Or are they going to be pronouncing things the way the native speakers of the language the words and names come from? Personally, I hope we get the fully neutral pronunciations of all the words and then get some of them said with the appropriate accent or "funny voice" that would fit the native speakers who originated the word.

You can listen for yourself - they did a demo during the announcement on Stream of Annihilation:

[video=youtube_share;yD0pr7uOCF0]https://youtu.be/yD0pr7uOCF0?t=12m45s[/video]

I've even skipped past nearly 13 minutes of the other fluff for you.

[sblock]It's going to be neutral pronunciations[/sblock]

ExploderWizard · Jun 19, 2017

DrGerm said:
And, why am I supposed to take "Matt Mercer and Marisha Ray" (whoever they are) as a definitive source for pronunciation? I assume these are online celebrities, so how does this clear up the pronunciation of classic monsters such as ixitxachitl or Blibdoolpoolp?

How do you pronounce Blibdoolpoolp?

Some advice from a player who did so in her presence- CORRECTLY!

Dausuul · Jun 19, 2017

I'm old-school when it comes to character building--my customary character sheet is a piece of note paper covered in pencil smudges--but there are folks in my gaming group who would definitely be interested in an online character builder.

The DM tool is more interesting to me. I do a lot of homebrewing of monsters; I would love a tool which would a) streamline that process, b) allow me to plan encounters with a mix of homebrew monsters and by-the-book ones, and c) give me a way to flip quickly between the chosen statblocks during an encounter.

Even more useful--but very challenging to design, UI-wise--would be a hit point/condition tracker that could efficiently handle large encounters. I judge combat trackers by the John Henry test: When there are 15 monsters, and the party wizard hits 10 of them with a fireball, can the combat tracker process this event (roll 10 saving throws, apply full or half damage as appropriate to all 10 targets) faster than me with a pencil and a piece of paper?

So far, the answer has always been a resounding "no." The tracker always ends up slowing me down rather than speeding me up. But I sure would like to see a "yes." If D&D Beyond can crack this nut, I will be a loyal customer indeed.

Hurin70 · Jun 19, 2017

Shasarak said:
The 4th edition character builder was pretty good.

Indeed, but everything 4th edition did, whether for good or ill, had to be sacrificed on the altar of nostalgia that is 5e. So we all had to take a step back in time to the stone age, and watch WotC issue cease and desist orders to people just for posting their homebrew online character sheets.

And there will be people on these boards who will defend that.

Dausuul · Jun 19, 2017

Hurin88 said:
Indeed, but everything 4th edition did, whether for good or ill, had to be sacrificed on the altar of nostalgia that is 5e.

Oh, come off it. The offline 4E character builder was pretty decent for an initial effort; but then they killed it and replaced it with an online one which was barely usable. This has nothing to do with 4E (which I ran and played extensively, and quite enjoyed) and everything to do with the fact that it was crushingly slow, hiccupy, nearly impossible to customize for a given campaign, and all-around a clunky piece of crap. (Speaking as a web developer: Silverlight? Really? For an application that was 90% text, 10% static images, and 0% animation? Whose brainwave was that?)

Not that there was anything unusual about this. With the exception of 4E's short-lived offline character builder, D&D's history of "official" online tools is a catalog of train wrecks; the most recent being when Morningstar lived up to its name by plummeting into an abyss of utter failure.

None of this means D&D Beyond is doomed. I'd be a lot more concerned if WotC were doing it in-house; but WotC, whether through painfully earned wisdom or simple budgetary limits, is outsourcing the job, and this sort of thing is actually in Curse's wheelhouse, so I think there's a good chance we end up with a solid product.

Still, Curse is trying to overcome, well, a curse.

I wish them the best.

Istbor · Jun 19, 2017

ExploderWizard said:
How do you pronounce Blibdoolpoolp?

Some advice from a player who did so in her presence- CORRECTLY!

For anything distinctly Kuo Toan(?) I take a large sip of water, and then do my best not to spit on anyone or too much of the table. Usually, I feel it hit close to home.

Edit: Also helps if you are wearing a bib.

Hurin70 · Jun 19, 2017

Dausuul said:
Oh, come off it. The offline 4E character builder was pretty decent for an initial effort; but then they killed it and replaced it with an online one which was barely usable. This has nothing to do with 4E (which I ran and played extensively, and quite enjoyed) and everything to do with the fact that it was crushingly slow, hiccupy, nearly impossible to customize for a given campaign, and all-around a clunky piece of crap. (Speaking as a web developer: Silverlight? Really? For an application that was 90% text, 10% static images, and 0% animation? Whose brainwave was that?)

Not that there was anything unusual about this. With the exception of 4E's short-lived offline character builder, D&D's history of "official" online tools is a catalog of train wrecks; the most recent being when Morningstar lived up to its name by plummeting into an abyss of utter failure.

None of this means D&D Beyond is doomed. I'd be a lot more concerned if WotC were doing it in-house; but WotC, whether through painfully earned wisdom or simple budgetary limits, is outsourcing the job, and this sort of thing is actually in Curse's wheelhouse, so I think there's a good chance we end up with a solid product.

Still, Curse is trying to overcome, well, a curse. I wish them the best.

I think you misunderstand my comment. In no way was I defending the decision to move the 4e character builder to online only and put it behind a pay wall. That was atrocious. But the offline builder was a great tool. I have friends who haven't played DnD in years who downloaded it and made characters in it just for fun. It was a bit buggy, sure, but it was a triumph.

But when 5e began, they tried to erase virtually everything about 4e, and that meant the good was thrown out with the bad. They encouraged us to use pencil and paper for our character sheets, refused to put out an online one, and issued cease and desist orders for anyone who tried to make it easier to create an electronic version of the character sheet. That was equally atrocious, and WotC deserves to be called out on it.

What's Next For D&D? Live From Origins - D&D Beyond

Enevhar Aldarion

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Demetrios1453

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Enevhar Aldarion

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afdarcy

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ExploderWizard

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Dausuul

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Hurin70

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Dausuul

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Istbor

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Hurin70

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