Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 8365353" data-attributes="member: 177">How a system &quot;should work&quot; is based on the patterns present in the game.&nbsp; The problem with UA is that it frequently breaks patterns, without warning, and that's a big software system design problem.&nbsp; D&amp;D Beyond is in an unenviable position, as software providers, in having NO SAY in what gets developed.&nbsp; In well-functioning software shops, when the product people come up with an idea, they allow the software engineers to review and assess it, and give some indication of how easy or difficult it is to do, and have some negotiation with the product people over exactly what will happen, and when.D&amp;D Beyond doesn't get to do that with D&amp;D content.&nbsp; The game is designed by someone else, and as far as we are aware, the publication timeline is set by someone else.&nbsp; At least with the major publications, each user pays for the content (and thus the development around it).&nbsp; UA was a series of freebie, short-notice design/implementation challenges from the D&amp;DB perspective.&nbsp; So, yes, I can see the decision to stop supporting them.Especially when WotC has said they are increasing their rate of publication.&nbsp; There's more official, paid work to be done, so yes, resources will get moved to that.No, we can't rule it out.&nbsp; But on the other hand, if your opening gambit is insulting, well, we shouldn't hope for much out of this, should we?At this moment, getting resources is hard.&nbsp; Hiring and keeping software engineering talent has been a challenge for the past six months and more.Yes, so, what you are telling us is that they've put developers on projects that might get paid for, rather than those that don't.&nbsp; And you want to position this as something they shouldn't do?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Umbran, post: 8365353, member: 177"] How a system "should work" is based on the patterns present in the game. The problem with UA is that it frequently breaks patterns, without warning, and that's a big software system design problem. D&D Beyond is in an unenviable position, as software providers, in having [I]NO SAY[/I] in what gets developed. In well-functioning software shops, when the product people come up with an idea, they allow the software engineers to review and assess it, and give some indication of how easy or difficult it is to do, and have some negotiation with the product people over exactly what will happen, and when. D&D Beyond doesn't get to do that with D&D content. The game is designed by someone else, and as far as we are aware, the publication timeline is set by someone else. At least with the major publications, each user pays for the content (and thus the development around it). UA was a series of freebie, short-notice design/implementation challenges from the D&DB perspective. So, yes, I can see the decision to stop supporting them. Especially when WotC has said they are [I]increasing[/I] their rate of publication. There's more official, paid work to be done, so yes, resources will get moved to that. No, we can't rule it out. But on the other hand, if your opening gambit is insulting, well, we shouldn't hope for much out of this, should we? At this moment, getting resources is hard. Hiring and keeping software engineering talent has been a challenge for the past six months and more. Yes, so, what you are telling us is that they've put developers on projects that might get paid for, rather than those that don't. And you want to position this as something they [I]shouldn't[/I] do? [/QUOTE]

Verification