[UPDATED!] D&D Beyond: An Official D&D Digital Toolset & Character Builder

D&D Beyond has just been announced! Coming this summer, and billed as "Your digital D&D source", it has a compendium of official content, character builder and manager, the ability to use home-brew content, D&D forums, and is usable on any device. A 1-minute announcement trailer can be seen below. D&D Beyond is produced by a company called Curse Inc, owned by Twitch. Right now, there's a signup for the Beta version. More info as/when it becomes available! [UPDATES: The D&D Beyond folks have offered some more info, which I have included below; I will be chatting with them later this week, with luck!]

"We are excited to announce development of D&D Beyond, an official digital toolset for use with the Dungeons & Dragons fifth edition rules. We have partnered with Curse to take D&D players beyond pen and paper, providing a rules compendium, character builder, digital character sheets, and more—all populated with official D&D content. D&D Beyond aims to make game management easier for both players and Dungeon Masters by providing high-quality tools available on any device, empowering beginners and veterans alike!" goes the official description.

"D&D Beyond speaks to the way gamers are able to blend digital tools with the fun of storytelling around the table with your friends,” said Nathan Stewart, Senior Director of Dungeons & Dragons. "These tools represent a way forward for D&D, and we’re excited to get them into the hands of players soon!"

The company, Curse Inc., is owned by Twitch, and is based in San Francisco, with offices in various countries. They produce tools and communities for gamers - up until now, mainly video games. They started as a way to organise the founder's World of Warcraft add-ons about 10 years ago, and grew into a multinational company from there. The company makes a desktop app called the Curse Client, along with community driven wikis, tools, guides, and databases for games like Minecraft, Diablo, Countersrike, Overwatch, and more. In 2016, it was announced that Twitch would acquire Curse.

Features, from the website, include:

• D&D Compendium with Official Content
• Create, Browse, & Use Homebrew Content
• Manage Characters - Build, Progress, & Play
• D&D News, Articles, Forums, & More
• Access Anywhere, Anytime, on Any Device

That last item makes it sound like it'll work offline, which will be a popular move. And the home-brew content mention is also important, especially because WotC supports DMs Guild.

UPDATES: I checked with WotC's Greg Tito who confirmed "D&D Beyond will work without an internet connection. That's a big deal for the devs!"

Adam over at D&D Beyond confirmed a little about the pricing model:

"At launch, players will be able to access SRD content and build and view a small number of characters with a free D&D Beyond account.

We don’t have exact pricing nailed down, but you will also be able to buy official digital D&D content for all fifth edition products with flexible purchase options. You can pay only for the D&D content you need. If you only play fighters, for example, you’ll be able to just pick up the stuff you need to track swinging that giant two-handed sword.

A small monthly subscription will be needed to manage more than a handful of characters and to enable more advanced features, like homebrew content integration. At this time, we don’t know exactly how much the subscription will cost."

He also confirmed that the pricing structure is not about microtransactions: "I'm about to get on a plane so I've got to be brief, but I wanted to check in and make it clear that "microtransactions" were not mentioned and are not what the model is about."

And also that D&D Beyond is definitely not a Virtual Game Table (VTT): "D&D Beyond is intended to enhance gameplay around a table (virtual or otherwise) - we intend this to be completely complementary and have no intention of creating a VTT."

[video=youtube;Dn8Kpmm_aJA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn8Kpmm_aJA[/video]

SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave
SaveSave​

 

[freeWeemsy]

I really hope the pricing structure here isn't terrible. As a DM who uses digital means to track everything this could be invaluable.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Since WotC have stats on just how many people are willing to pay a subscription fee, and I'm fairly certain it was never in the hundreds of thousands, the price they ask for and the quality of the product, is very much a concern for both them and for consumers. IIRC, there was something like 10,000 subscribers to DDI at its height. The figures are out there but it's been long enough that I can't remember the details and can't be bothered to look. But I'm sure it wasn't anywhere close to even a 100,000, let alone hundreds of thousands.

Point is, I think people do care. I think they care very much. And I think you're the outlier in this instance, not the majority.


I wouldn't call it bad luck, I would call it bad management on the part of Hasbro. They put people into roles who have no understanding of the things they're in charge of. They expect one person to know everything about everything and pay them diddly to do it. So you get people who know nothing about project management of a digital product, initiating tenders and projects for digital products. And so in turn you get companies who take on projects that are far beyond their capabilities. Trapdoor quite obviously bit off far more than they could chew, and the same happened for the 3D virtual table program during 4e.

As for the guy who died, I think that was actually a suicide and he wasn't the head of the company but rather a project lead or other programming position within the company. I can't recall exactly.


If they allow homebrew at all, then you can absolutely guarantee that there will be PHB clone files out in the wild. I think this is why they're putting homebrew behind the paywall.


Are you sure about that? I thought it was much lower than that.

I doubt I could prove it, because the old wotc forums are gone, but there was a feature of DDI that let you see, indirectly but very accurately, how many subs there were. This was a topic of much debate at one point, but we all agreed that the number of subs was correct. we simply disagreed on what it meant, and how it compared to phb sales, and if it was enough to make up for lower phb sales, and whether high subs contributed to loss of print book sales, etc.

but the sub numbers were rarely disputed. I was able to find a post with no source link claiming that the verified minimum number of subs was about 66k, in 2012, but I very clearly remember 80k being the agreed upon number by the time the playtest was happening. And both figures are minimums, because it only includes DDI subscribers with active subscriptions AND forum accounts, which not all DDI subs had.

But even if we assume that 66k is the right number, and ignore the possibility of significantly more subs who didn't make forum accounts, that is, bare minimum, which means assuming every single sub was a yearly sub at an effective rate of 70$/year, 4.6 million a year. Sadly we will never know what percentage paid yearly, every three months, or monthly, and how common it was to sub for a few months, lapse, sub again a few months later, etc.

And again, that 66 was in 2012, not when 4e was at it's height, and 5e seems to be much, much more popular.

If they include support for older editions in the Beyond tools, I think we can easily expect a million subs or more. But even if we only get, say, twice what we know to be a minimum for 4e, ie 132k, and assume that you can do a year at the same price as before, ie 70$/yr, that is a yearly income of 9.2 million per year.

If they also put out a new printing of the core books, either in paperback like the 4e essentials books, or just a glossy reprint with errata and a better index, and keep putting out books that are worth buying for the fluff, like Volo's, and successful adventure modules, and spell cards, and minis, and those things remain close to as popular as they are, they'll be in better shape than they've been since the TTRPG golden days. If they aren't already.

 

[Kabouter Games]

Here's the main issue.

I've been a gamer for many years and I have spent tons of money on gaming products. Someone who says RPG's aren't expensive make it clearly obvious they don't know what they are talking about.

Speaking of not knowing what they're talking about:

I said they don't have to be expensive, that D&D 5e is essentially free to play. I also said that every other hobby I can think of is more expensive to start. Then I proved it.

Anyway, that's beside the point.

Yer durn tootin' it is.

I can bet you here and now that people would gladly spend more money for products they can actually hold in their hand versus a product they will never truly own. Gaming books are a one time investment that can be used for years to come, digital stuff doesn't always get that far.

There I think you have a point. I own the Pathfinder app on my iPad, which gives me everything. I don't know who actually owns that material. Is it all on my iPad, or on a cloud somewhere and my iPad pulls information into it? I think it's local, because it was a pretty large download and it's all text, no pretty. It cost me all of five bucks and is worth every penny. If it's not local, I'll be irritated if it goes away, because I also own the Pathfinder core rulebooks in PDF form. They're somewhat cross-referenced, but clunky to use. They're full-art, gorgeous. Those are on multiple drives as backup.

If Wizards or a licensee came out with a PDF of each of the core rulebooks, cross-referenced with links, I'd buy it and house it on a tablet for easier transport than the books. But I'm not sure I want an app like Beyond either, because I like to download all the data I've paid for. I totally share that concern.

Cheers,

Bob

 

[Kabouter Games]

Pretty sure I covered it actually with

The point being that it's a choice, it can be a bloody expensive hobby, or not, up to the individual.

You're absolutely right. You did. I misrepresented you.

What I should have said is that what you pointed out is true but irrelevant to my point.

Cheers,

Bob

 

[Jester David]

Unless they have a way of stopping folks from using the "create x" feature to effectively copy and paste phb options into the program, I rather doubt it.

The same could be said for HeroLabs. You don't need to buy the Pathfinder packs for each book, but people do. It's a time saver. You're paying for the convenience.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

You guys are both missing the point.


The SCA, for example, has gotten a lot better about its armor requirements. You can't get a helm for $100 anymore, at least one that a responsible marshal will approve. Besides, you're still talking about all the other armor as well as the helmet. That's a couple hundred bucks before you can even authorize, because you can't use loaner gear forever.
Bob

I don't care about, and wasn't commenting on the discussion of, how expensive dnd is. At all.


That said, to play dnd without spending money is the same as doing the SCA without spending money, or playing soccer without spending money. You can, but you're going to want to have your own stuff at some point, and it will cost money.

There are specific activities within a hobby that cost more money, like playing dnd at conventions, or going to SCA wars and fighting officially, or playing soccer in a league, but the actual activity itself can be done with nothing by borrowed gear. I was in the SCA for nearly a year before I spent a dime on anything other than the beer and food I brought to the parties after practice. At then I spent less than 200$, over the course of a few months, with most of that being the damn helmet. And yes, that 100$ helmet authorizes just fine.

Later I spent more on stuff like better garb, a set of rattan swords, a rattan glaive, hockey gloves for using the glaive safely, a shield I liked more than the loaners, a drinking horn, camp gear, etc. But for that first year, I didn't spend a dime on anything but entrance to events, and food and drink. Same as DND.

As for soccer, not a cent. Ever. Basketball I did have to buy a new ball, twice, because of bad luck, but I got 2 soccer balls from friends/relatives, and wore the same clothes I work out in, and went to a park with my friends.

I also like that in your first post you quote the starting price of playing dnd as the cost of the core books, and then once there are examples of hobbies that are just as cheap or cheaper, you changed it to the claim that you can play for free, "unlike any other hobby".

I'm sure you'll quote the cost of pencils and paper as a cost for drawing as a hobby that dnd doesn't share, even though they are easy to get for free and you need them for dnd as well.

Also whittling, found object sculpting, martial arts (whether this has a cost depends on whether you have friends or family that can teach you), singing, the fact that most musicians I know got second hand instruments for free, or less than the cost of two dnd core books, and played for years with those.

I have a few musician friends who still primarily play with their first instrument, though they have replaced strings and the like.

The point is, you made a silly claim about the cost of hobbies in general. Ie, that they are all more expensive than DnD. The claim is false.

I don't care about the context that lead to you making the claim, I'm just calling out the absurd claim.

As I literally started my last post by saying, I agree with the general point you were making, that DnD isn't expensive.

 

[dropbear8mybaby]

If they include support for older editions in the Beyond tools, I think we can easily expect a million subs or more. But even if we only get, say, twice what we know to be a minimum for 4e, ie 132k, and assume that you can do a year at the same price as before, ie 70$/yr, that is a yearly income of 9.2 million per year.

I'll be happy to be proven wrong. Despite my negativity, I would dearly love for this to be a great and successful product. I really loathe all the current options. But if this is true, then they are far better off charging a lower amount for more subscribers rather than a high amount that acts to turn people off the product entirely.

Take the Netflix example. Every other competitor charged far more for their product because they were operating off an old paradigm of controlling access to limited markets. Netflix came along and charged a much lower rate, and now they're a $60 billion dollar, global megalith. I pay $11.99 per month for a huge array of on demand video and an increasing library of original content. I would not, however, pay $11.99 per month for a campaign management and character creation tool. That level of subscription cost simply isn't justifiable in this day and age. Honestly, I would start to hesitate if it was more than $2 per month, unless it was a seriously great product that I decided I simply must have, then I might be able to justify up to $5 p/m. But it would have to really blow me away for that and be D&D equivalent, in my mind, to getting Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist, House of Cards, Orange is the New Black, etc.

 

[Kabouter Games]

As I literally started my last post by saying, I agree with the general point you were making, that DnD isn't expensive.

That's fair. I did move the goalposts. I like to think I did so after I realized/remembered that you really don't have to pay anything at all to have a full-fledged D&D experience. But you're right that there are a number of different hobbies and games which can be realized on the cheap, if not totally free.

No hard feelings?

Bob

 

[doctorbadwolf]

That's fair. I did move the goalposts. I like to think I did so after I realized/remembered that you really don't have to pay anything at all to have a full-fledged D&D experience. But you're right that there are a number of different hobbies and games which can be realized on the cheap, if not totally free.

No hard feelings?

Bob

Works for me.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I'll be happy to be proven wrong. Despite my negativity, I would dearly love for this to be a great and successful product. I really loathe all the current options. But if this is true, then they are far better off charging a lower amount for more subscribers rather than a high amount that acts to turn people off the product entirely.

Take the Netflix example. Every other competitor charged far more for their product because they were operating off an old paradigm of controlling access to limited markets. Netflix came along and charged a much lower rate, and now they're a $60 billion dollar, global megalith. I pay $11.99 per month for a huge array of on demand video and an increasing library of original content. I would not, however, pay $11.99 per month for a campaign management and character creation tool. That level of subscription cost simply isn't justifiable in this day and age. Honestly, I would start to hesitate if it was more than $2 per month, unless it was a seriously great product that I decided I simply must have, then I might be able to justify up to $5 p/m. But it would have to really blow me away for that and be D&D equivalent, in my mind, to getting Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist, House of Cards, Orange is the New Black, etc.

I think most people would pay at least 5$/mo for the suite of tools they've said will be included, especially if the combat tracker is any good, and you can access other people's homebrew material, create your own, build custom monsters, etc. if it gives you Compendium, CB, and encounter builder access to all the official content? I'll pay 70$ a year for that.