Dear DDi subscribers...

[doctorhook]

Yep, it's a ton of stuff for $5/month! It might be a better value than some of the printed products, especially if you're patient about the fact that the tools are still in development and that WotC is still resolving technical issues.

The editing quality of the magazines is a negative, in my mind, but it's not much worse than some of the books so far. I'm still hoping this will improve with time.

 

[Kelanen]

The content has been great and I am very happy that I purchased it.

 

[avin]

Just subscribed, MONSTERS! Now I'm happy.

 

[Caliber]

The Compendium got monsters too?

Indeed it does! It has pretty much everything you would expect from the 3.x SRD, except for actual rules (like how to determine cover, frex)

The upside, of course, is it has all the details from every book published PLUS dragon AND dungeon (so all those monsters/traps in dungeon are sitting there, waiting for your search)

It's a very nifty feature.

 

[davethegame]

I noticed a couple of days back that the compendium also has monsters that haven't actually been statted fully, such as the kir-lanan voice (its abilities and level are mentioned in the kir-lanan entry in the FR campaign book, but there isn't a full statblock). That's another bonus.

I've noticed some errors with monsters too- I ran an Otyugh out of the compendium, and a friend in the game who also DMs said to me afterwards "shouldn't it have had an aura?" Sure enough, it had it in the MM but not in the compendium, though other versions of it in the compendium had it.

 

[Ktulu]

Love the dragon articles, haven't done much other than mine the dungeon articles.

The compendium has been invaluable!! I look up what I need, copy it into a dual-column word file and header it with the encounter name, footer it with Xp & loot and voila! It makes editing monsters sweet and easy. My entire game has only humans and Yuan-Ti in it. As it turns out, a few changes to a Succubus and you have a Yuan-Ti snake Charmer that works perfectly. Using the word file I can save these creatures for future use, as well.

I don't know about using the compendium "during" a session since I don't need it. With the GM Screen and my word notes, I am now 100% pc free while running the game.

With the compendium it takes me less than 10 minutes to put together my battles. Just 'cos I know you all want to know, here's my steps:

1. Decide the major badguy/theme, locate creature, copy/paste, edit to PC level.
2. Search for additional creatures (brutes, minions, skirmishers), Copy/paste, edit to PC level
3. Search for magic items & copy/paste

I spend more time working on my plot, terrain, or skill challenges thanks to the Compendium. (PS, if you have Word 2k7, set the copy default to keep only text and you'll get editable text without any background from the compendium. Makes it very nice for printing)

 

[Nahat Anoj]

DDI has been great so far, well worth the $10 "spent" so far. If you're thinking of getting it, try to make up your mind this month, so that way you have an easier time of getting October's issue (I believe you only have an extra month before it's gone).

The compendium, to cut and paste monsters, powers, etc in putting together all encounter info on 1-2 pages.

I really like doing this, too. The only way the encounter builder could be better would be if it was possible to print out the stat blocks of the monsters along with the other encounter information. That would cut down on copy/paste time even more. Hopefully a Wizards person will see this and pass the request along. Incidentally, where would we go to make a request like this?

 

[Shroomy]

I really like doing this, too. The only way the encounter builder could be better would be if it was possible to print out the stat blocks of the monsters along with the other encounter information. That would cut down on copy/paste time even more. Hopefully a Wizards person will see this and pass the request along. Incidentally, where would we go to make a request like this?

You'd probably want to try WotC Customer Service or the DDI Discussion Boards on the WotC website.

 

[Ktulu]

While I could find use in that [print button] using the monsters as is, I have spent a lot more time custom tailoring my monsters with this edition thanks to the compendium.

I'm waiting for the monster builder to include the templates + solo/elites and then I'll be set.

 

[Jack99]

It's been well worth my money so far.