DDI, 6 months later: changing my mind

[mhensley]

I do this with the online d20 srd and it's free.

 

[WampusCat43]

* stares slackjawed at the encounter builder *

I'd forgotten that thing was there. Bought the .pdf version of the MM and had been copying/pasting from that. What a great tool!

* bangs head on wall *

 

[maddman75]

I do this with the online d20 srd and it's free.

Not the same thing. There's nothing missing from DDI, and everything from WotC's books and dragon and dungeon are included, whether you bought the book or not.

 

[Dracorat]

I had been teetering on buying the subscription for a while now (I got really jaded when they originally floated a 15$ a month price and never really came down from that.)

Based on this thread, I'll be doing so.

 

[UniversalMonster]

The SRD doesn't have 4th edition.

Anyhow, the SRD is a cool concept, and one I used plenty.. but in the long run, it's just a pale, pale comparison. DDI does more, it's configurable, and it builds stat blocks out of not only the standard sources, but also out of every monster in an LFR module, Dragon, and every Dungeon adventure.

And anyhow, that's only a single tool compared to the archives of Dungeon and Dragon material. PLUS the monster builder, the bonus tools, character builder, the Rules Compendium (not sure how I ever lived without this kind of tool, really), Plus all the other stuff.

 

[Halivar]

I do this with the online d20 srd and it's free.

Don't get me wrong; I love the d20 on-line SRD. Used it almost everyday. But imagine that online d20 SRD with every monster, magic item, NPC, class, feat, etc., ever published by WotC, in any book, magazine, or web enhancement. With an encounter builder. And a monster creator.

And all that for the cost of a monthly Big Mac Value Meal(tm). In terms of cost-benefit ratio, DDI wins.

 

[OchreJelly]

that was my original hesitation with DDI. I was used to mining the SRD for free, although I had to severely edit the stat blocks to make it easier to run at the table.

That said I think there's a real value added to the DDI compedium. Just looking at monsters alone, I performed a wide-open search on the monster category and there's already 1437 results returned this early in the game's cycle! It's drawing from every Dragon article, Dungeon adventure, published adventure, and every source book sans Open Grave.

 

[Echohawk]

Still, the Mac issue rears its ugly head again. I use a Mac, so what parts of this great functionality would I be missing out on if I wanted to get a subscription?

To confirm what darjr said; right now you'd only be missing out on the Character Builder. Everything else is web-based, or (in the case of the magazines) PDFs.

That said, I use a Mac, and I confess to buying VMWare and a copy of Windows XP just to be able to use the character builder.

 

[Echohawk]

It's drawing from every Dragon article, Dungeon adventure, published adventure, and every source book sans Open Grave.

Open Grave will probably be added next week, assuming they stick to their monthly update cycle.

 

[Halivar]

That said, I use a Mac, and I confess to buying VMWare and a copy of Windows XP just to be able to use the character builder.

Hrmm... OSX is built on a BSD clone... I wonder if the Wine emulator will compile and run on it...