On the State of Digital Aids for D+D/D20/OGL

[iwarrior-poet]

I returned to gaming almost five years ago after a 13 year absence. I jumped from first edition to 3.0. I was lured back by the heavenly Baldur's Gate computer games. One of the most enjoyable part of the games was leveling up/equping my PC. I bought the 3.0 PHB and tried the the Chargen Demo---slick interface---though a bit limited and buggy. Its interface was somewhat like the Baldur's Gate interface. When you equiped chain mail, you heard a nice little clink---plate armor?---a nice little clank. You could quickly zip through feats, skills, classes, race. It captured one of the real joys of D+D---the excitement and creativity that occurs when you get to level up a PC---one of the true tests of a good chargen. Not the frustration and delays that happens with any of the current solutions.

So it was with some anticipation that I looked forward with relish to the forthcoming "Master Tools" (now E-Tools). It was going to be the Swiss Army knife of D+D Software: PC Generation/managemant, Campaign Management, Mapping, Encounter/Melee management... You name it---it was going to do it. I visited the WoTC boards with hopeful anticipation. In the meanwhile I began to use PCGen. It was clunky and very slow (and still remains so), but it was free and (back then) included all the WoTC material.

Then began the dark days... Master Tools was pared down to E-Tools---it would only be a PC generator/manager. Then, shortly after E-Tools was released, WoTC ordered PCGen to stop including WoTC data (in order to help launch E-Tools into the market). E-Tools was dismal, virtually no one bought it. Some PCGen folks rallied and got a contract to revamp E-Tools and produce WoTC data for both PCGen and E-Tools. I continue to use PCGen, but am increasingly frustrated with it incalculable slowness (particulalry when loaded with more than five datasets). CMP also touted their own Swiss Army Knive program (RPGTK)---my hopes were buoyed---for the time being.

I tried using some of the other ones out there---I think I tried DM Genie and RPGXplorer---I was somewhat enthused by their interfaces----but their full versions were expensive---particularly if I wasn't going to be able to access any WoTC data...

Then it happened again---WoTC stops allowing CMP to produce datasets. There has been much speculation that this is due to a new web-based application they will be premiering at the Winter Fantasy convention in February. Now we are left with no access to WoTC datasets---and only speculation about any future software that will give us that access. Also---I really don't like the limits that a web-based application would put on the average gamer. Wanna bring your laptop to manage your PC/Game? Better make sure you have fast internet access! Ready for an crazy allnight session to finally smoke that pesky Balor? Oops!! to bad the WoTC server is down...

Soooo, there's the history. Now, can I just say that the general state of D+D game aids is HORRENDOUS when you consider what they could be?

There is plenty of blame to go around, WoTC and CMP in particular have really fallen down.

CMP has been working on its new software for well over two years (maybe even three, I've lost track)---and they do not appear even close to finishing. Also---they too seem to have pared down their software to just a character generator/manager---and now they won't even have access to WoTC datasets. I personally believe that if they had finished their software in a timely fashion they would be THE success story of this market. Instead they are just another company with virtually no product and a very murky future.

WoTC has been silent and has not shown any initiative or leadership in this field. When you consider the typical D+D consumer---it is simply atrocious that no good comprehensive software is out there.
Where's the program that lets me create a quick map, generate four 3rd level orcs with a fifth level orc seargeant, whip out a more detailed NPC wizard, and throw together some interesting treasure?---All the while allowing me to either use WoTC and other publishers' data or to easily create my own (within the UI---so I don't have to pretend I am a coder and crack an .lst file or something even more nasty...)????

WHERE IS THE GOOD SOFTWARE?!? We deserve it!!!

 

[kingpaul]

Then, when it was released, WoTC ordered PCGen to stop including WoTC data (in order to help launch E-Tools into the market).

Ummm...no. WotC sat down with PCGen at GenCon '02 and informed PCGen that its inclusion of WotC datasets was not fair use, as we understood it, but was copyright infringement. eTools was already out in the marketplace.

 

[Glyfair]

Also---they too seem to have pared down their software to just a character generator/manager---and now they won't even have access to WoTC datasets.

I don't believe it was every supposed to be much more than a character generator/manager, at least initially. Also, I remember that' MasterTools wasn't going to be much more. However, more and more non-character oriented things kept getting added (sounds for monsters) even as WotC personnel were saying that it wasn't to be a tool for online play. It was clear the left hand and right hand weren't on the same page, at least to me.

I personally believe that if they had finished their software in a timely fashion they would be THE success story of this market. Instead they are just another company with virtually no product and a very murky future.

I think they got distracted by side issues like eTools did. My impression was that what became RPGToolkit was going to be the replacement for eTools (since it was too hard to work around eTools issues). As time went one they added more and more systems that it was going to work with. Right now that's looking like a good move, since their D&D support will be very limited. However, if they had kept focused, maybe...

My own personal lamentation is the disappearance of the Eberron Interactive Atlas. In June ProFantasy stated that the maps were done and it should be out by GenCon. CMP stated that it wouldn't be out by GenCon. In fact, it never was released because of whatever delays they had.

 

[Ranger REG]

WHERE IS THE GOOD SOFTWARE?!? We deserve it!!!

The good software is when we don't get addicted to datasets because it's more convenient, especially datasets based on copyrighted non-OGC material.

 

[iwarrior-poet]

Response to Kingpaul---
Well, that might be the official version, but there was plenty of speculation (and good common sense) that indicated that WoTC gave PCGen notice about datasets because it wanted to open up the Market for E-Tools. PCGen had been including WoTC datasets for quite sometime before that and WoTC hadn't seemingly had any problem with it (until they probably realized that PCGen was competing with their new product). And the timing was very, very close between the release of E-Tools and the order to the PCGen folks.

 

[Ilium]

The current state of tools for d20/D&D says one thing to me:

This is really hard.

If it was easy, there would be several competitors with irresistable products having a price war. There aren't because doing this kind of software right (and by that I mean at a level comparable to something like OpenOffice) would take a LOT of time and effort that would be hard to recoup.

I think PCGen is pretty remarkable, considering that it's free.

 

[Taurendil]

Where's the program that lets me create a quick map, generate four 3rd level orcs with a fifth level orc seargeant, whip out a more detailed NPC wizard, and throw together some interesting treasure?---All the while allowing me to either use WoTC and other publishers' data or to easily create my own (within the UI---so I don't have to pretend I am a coder and crack an .lst file or something even more nasty...)????

WHERE IS THE GOOD SOFTWARE?!? We deserve it!!!

As others have said, it really isn't that simple. Writing software for D&D (and probably other RPG's) is extremely hard. I don't think it will ever be possible to make a simple interface for creating custom data unless you stick to a certain subset and limit some of the weirder abilities. There are just too many exceptions. Just about every rule in D&D/D20 gets broken by some supplement that thinks of an exception to the rule. In the end, there really aren't a lot of fixed rules in D&D.

That's why it's possible to make a fairly simple interface for the SRD, but the more books you want to add, the more complex it gets. It will always be a trade-off. See the PCGen thread for some excellent comments from the PCGen dev team.

 

[Glyfair]

AJust about every rule in D&D/D20 gets broken by some supplement that thinks of an exception to the rule.

In fact, I think that's the biggest hurdle. RPG designers don't think "will this rule work well in a character generator program" when designing rule or ability (and are probably wrong a lot even when they do). So, rules get regularly added that people want to use that require huge amounts of programming time and program resources.

 

[kingpaul]

RPG designers don't think "will this rule work well in a character generator program" when designing rule or ability (and are probably wrong a lot even when they do). So, rules get regularly added that people want to use that require huge amounts of programming time and program resources.

I'm not on the coding team, but its the exceptions to the rules that do cause headaches. I know that Vascant (of NPC Designers and Evolution fame) once commented (and I'm paraphrasing) that d20 was an exception based system. He's right. You have the core rules in the SRD/core 3, and then everything new offers twists off of that.

 

[Firzair]

I'm currently working on a program that shall do all these things because it is somewhat of a virtual mashine. It takes xml files as data and program code. So you can use it to code a todo-list or a character generator or a world generator.
My current vision is to create a character manager/generator that you can easily enhance to a party manager, city manager etc.
All objects are stored in the same database. They all can know each other. The architecture is easily expandable. If someone creates an item generator you could use it in your character generator. The character generator could be called from the house generator which was called by the city or street generator.
The objects are only loaded into memory if they are to be modified or are needed for some code execution. So it should be not too big in memory.
My plan is to release a new beta version next week which will include a customizable dice-roller as example program, documentation and many parts of the srd implementation I started (which is far from finished).
I will post here when it is ready. I have one big part to be done that is to implement a grid component for having a multi column list in the GUI.

It is planned to include a mapping component later on...

The current version 0.9.4 can be found here (it lacks a big part of the documentation).

Greetings
Firzair