D&D 5E Get The Vecna Dossier Free At D&D Beyond

WotC is offering a free product which you can claim by signing into D&D Beyond, including Vecna’s 5E statistics.

The dossier includes the stat block plus a half page or so of lore. Vecna's stat block is a CR 26 undead wizard, prior to the fallen paladin (and former bodyguard to the lich) Kas's betrayal. That means he still has his hand and eye, although he is a time traveller and can appear in different worlds and eras.

The archlich Vecna is one of the most iconic villains of Dungeons & Dragons lore. And now you can bear witness to his necromantic magic with the Vecna Dossier! Available at no cost with your D&D Beyond account, this thrilling supplement details the legacy and statistics of the Undying King himself!

This claim unlocks the contents of this promotional supplement for use with D&D Beyond, including the supplement in digital format in the game compendium and in the searchable listings, character builder, encounters, and digital sheet.

Claim The Vecna Dossier now! - D&D Beyond

www.dndbeyond.com

 

[dave2008]

That certainly is the truth. You're lucky and I'm not.

Because you are down on your luck I made this version for you: Vecna the Archlich

 

[gnarlygninja]

The range part I am not arguing. What I am arguing is that when the English is parsed correctly, the actual spell Counterspell and the writeup for Venca mean precisely the same thing.

I'm not Walter Strunk Jr. or E. B. White so I'm not going to declare myself Supreme Arbiter of Correct English, but it seems to me there's a bit of a difference between "you see a creature...casting a spell" and "a creature he can see that is casting a spell"

 

[MostlyHarmless42]

For my preferences, the experience is bad and confusing.
First thing, it was connected to Twitch, then was connected to other services. For some strange reason I had a Twitch account for DND Beyond, and then I couldn't sign in anymore with that, had to create a new account. And then I'm in there with multiple accounts, neither of which have access to all my content. Because the registration has been confusing.
It doesn't stay signed-in on my devices. I can't find out why, but literally every time I want to open it I have to try to sign in. Most of the time it won't acknowledge my password and I have to create a new one each time I sign in. As you can imagine, this isn't the best in the middle of running a D&D Game.
Navigation on the app doesn't feel right. I would expect hitting the back arrow to take me to the previous section. But, no, it takes you out of the entire app. And as I described above, about half the time that means I'm signed out. And then about half of those times I'm signed out (so about 25% of the time) I have to create a new password.
So that's what I don't like about the UI. (And I promise I do understand apps and technology. DND Beyond is just set up - weird.)

Another thing ... I have bad vision: bifocals barely do the trick. I don't want to read these books on my tiny cellphone screen. If I zoom in as much as I need to, I'm reading a couple words at a time, which really inhibits my comprehension. It's just not a pleasurable experience. I can handle PDFs (and actually like them) because I have more freedom with the content. I can print what I need, share what I want with my players, read on bigger screens, screen shot and make digital maps on VTTs, etc. DND Beyond is a bad experience all around. The only thing that isn't a drawback is that it's the only way you're getting digital D&D.

I hate that it's the gatekeeper to getting digital content. I can't even use 5e on Foundry VTT without it (meaning I'm not playing 5e online anymore).

As someone who actually deals with technology in a professional IT setting, I can concur with most of this. We've a saying for such illogical poorly thought out products that are more about the aesthetics than actual functionality of a product: "It's made by a designer or artist, not a programmer or engineer."

Their setup is absolutely terrible and bloated, is absolutely awful at handling homebrew content or ANY form of house rules, and it's completely asinine that their physical books don't come with codes for digital copies or pdf files on a subscription service, especially after Wizards has now direct purchased it. At the very least they should make it workable offine via some sort of download/browser cache options.

Frankly speaking their website reminds of the difference with apple macbooks and PCs: one is for people who foolishly think that purchasing a mediocre product at outrageous prices is borderline impossible to improve yourself yet offers a couple of "fun" ideas and brand recognition, while the other is for people who actually know what the hell they are doing. Frankly they can keep their website, I'll stick to using the physical books reference to piracy removed. And if like some are suggesting they are actually dumb enough to try and switch to electronic only the future then I guess I've found the d&d edition I'll just stop playing at, or give their competition a whirl again. I do so enjoy reminding them that pathfinder and paizo do still exist in their surveys any time they ask which editions of d&d I've played, while proudly leaving 4th ed unchecked.

 

[Mistwell]

As someone who actually deals with technology in a professional IT setting, I can concur with most of this. We've a saying for such illogical poorly thought out products that are more about the aesthetics than actual functionality of a product: "It's made by a designer or artist, not a programmer or engineer."

Their setup is absolutely terrible and bloated, is absolutely awful at handling homebrew content or ANY form of house rules, and it's completely asinine that their physical books don't come with codes for digital copies or pdf files on a subscription service, especially after Wizards has now direct purchased it. At the very least they should make it workable offine via some sort of download/browser cache options.

Frankly speaking their website reminds of the difference with apple macbooks and PCs: one is for people who foolishly think that purchasing a mediocre product at outrageous prices is borderline impossible to improve yourself yet offers a couple of "fun" ideas and brand recognition, while the other is for people who actually know what the hell they are doing. Frankly they can keep their website, I'll stick to using the physical books and pdfs of their product whether the are official or not. And if like some are suggesting they are actually dumb enough to try and switch to electronic only the future then I guess I've found the d&d edition I'll just stop playing at, or give their competition a whirl again. I do so enjoy reminding them that pathfinder and paizo do still exist in their surveys any time they ask which editions of d&d I've played, while proudly leaving 4th ed unchecked.

It never ceases to amaze me how giving something valuable away for free triggers reactions like this.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

As someone who actually deals with technology in a professional IT setting, I can concur with most of this. We've a saying for such illogical poorly thought out products that are more about the aesthetics than actual functionality of a product: "It's made by a designer or artist, not a programmer or engineer."

Their setup is absolutely terrible and bloated, is absolutely awful at handling homebrew content or ANY form of house rules, and it's completely asinine that their physical books don't come with codes for digital copies or pdf files on a subscription service, especially after Wizards has now direct purchased it. At the very least they should make it workable offine via some sort of download/browser cache options.

Frankly speaking their website reminds of the difference with apple macbooks and PCs: one is for people who foolishly think that purchasing a mediocre product at outrageous prices is borderline impossible to improve yourself yet offers a couple of "fun" ideas and brand recognition, while the other is for people who actually know what the hell they are doing. Frankly they can keep their website, I'll stick to using the physical books and pdfs of their product whether the are official or not. And if like some are suggesting they are actually dumb enough to try and switch to electronic only the future then I guess I've found the d&d edition I'll just stop playing at, or give their competition a whirl again. I do so enjoy reminding them that pathfinder and paizo do still exist in their surveys any time they ask which editions of d&d I've played, while proudly leaving 4th ed unchecked.

Man you sound like you have a bit of a chip on your shoulder about this.

Also WotC only just purchased D&D Beyond, I could see future products coming with codes to unlock stuff on Beyond.

 

[JEB]

It never ceases to amaze me how giving something valuable away for free triggers reactions like this.

I don't think it's the free part that's bugging some folks; more that the free thing is tied to a specific service, and isn't something you can just download freely and use wherever. I don't recall such complaining about, say, the Plane Shift PDFs.

 

[Mistwell]

I don't think it's the free part that's bugging some folks; more that the free thing is tied to a specific service, and isn't something you can just download freely and use wherever. I don't recall such complaining about, say, the Plane Shift PDFs.

You can in fact just download it freely and use it wherever. You click Print in your browser, choose Print to PDF (which comes automatically these days if your computer runs Windows), and save it to your drive. That's it.

But really, even if you can't do that for some strange reason, why would it bug you that they're giving something away for free that you don't want for whatever reason?

 

[JEB]

You can in fact just download it freely and use it wherever. You click Print in your browser, choose Print to PDF (which comes automatically these days if your computer runs Windows), and save it to your drive. That's it.

Sure, but that's a workaround. It's like downloading a video from YouTube; certainly a thing that can be done with a little effort, but clearly not what YouTube wants people to do.

But really, even if you can't do that for some strange reason, why would it bug you that they're giving something away for free that you don't want for whatever reason?

Because they don't want it to be attached to a D&D Beyond subscription, I assume. They'd rather it be without strings attached.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Sure, but that's a workaround. It's like downloading a video from YouTube; certainly a thing that can be done with a little effort, but clearly not what YouTube wants people to do.

Who cares what the company "wants" you to do? Use the thing how you want to use it. Print off the information if you're going to use it in physical play.

Because they don't want it to be attached to a D&D Beyond subscription, I assume. They'd rather it be without strings attached.

It's not. You don't have to have a D&D Beyond subscription to get this content. You just need to have a D&D Beyond account. Which is really, really easy to make. And entirely free.

 

[JEB]

It's not. You don't have to have a D&D Beyond subscription to get this content. You just need to have a D&D Beyond account.

Right, that's what I meant. No difference to folks objecting, I suspect, access is still linked to the account, outside workarounds. (It also occurs to me that if D&D Beyond ever went away, workarounds would become the only way to access the information. Unlike a PDF or such.)