D&D 5E New WotC Survey! Learn About A New D&D Product!

WotC has launched a new survey about the future of D&D. This survey includes an NDA (which some people have not taken to well!) halfway through, which asks you not to talk about the survey on pain of being tracked down and fined, but it's about an upcoming (unannounced) new D&D product. You can find out what it is by taking the survey (or it's all over social media aready).

 

[sevenbastard]

Well, I didn't get to see the new product. But at least I got to complain that too many races have darkvision, so overall it was ok

I also fought the good fight against darkvision. The scourge of 5e.

I would houserule it out of my campaign but over 100 sessions in its too late.

 

[darjr]

I also fought the good fight against darkvision. The scourge of 5e.

I would houserule it out of my campaign but over 100 sessions in its too late.

Have a world shattering event! A THIRD kind of darkness that only appears in dim light and picks and chooses those it afflicts. The god of “no you can’t see in the dark”

Or a half failed plot of shar or father llymic

 

[jgsugden]

WotC has not shown itself to be competent in the software field where D&D is concerned. I mean... Gleemax?

DOP NOT DISRESPECT THE FOAM BRAIN!

 

[Parmandur]

What do you mean? Are you referring to the fact that it might be a subscription-based service?

Look to the survey if you want details, because the video goes into some interesting things.

On another topic, Wizard's of the Coast has a Magic client, Magic Arena, that uses a Freemium model, where you don't need to buy anything to play, and actually play a lot.

 

[darjr]

DOP NOT DISRESPECT THE FOAM BRAIN!

Whatever happened to that guy? Or the software guy who seemed to interject in every support thread making everyone angry.

 

[jgsugden]

I also fought the good fight against darkvision. The scourge of 5e.

I would houserule it out of my campaign but over 100 sessions in its too late.

In my homebrew I have Darkvision, Low Light Vision (treat dim as bright, and create a wider 'sub dim zone' that low light treats as dim), Ultravision (primarily used in the Underdark and by arcane spellcasters), Infravision (you switch it on, like putting on night vision goggles) that a PC can take as an alternative to Darkvision. Certain races default to these other visions (like orcs, who have Infravision). You can work things like this in easily, even in established campaigns.

 

[Maxperson]

I also fought the good fight against darkvision. The scourge of 5e.

I would houserule it out of my campaign but over 100 sessions in its too late.

Do you use the rule that visual perception checks made while using darkvision are made with disadvantage? As soon as I started enforcing that rule, the players started lighting torches and using light spells again.

 

[Umbran]

You raise valid points, but I think both are genuinely answerable.

Yes, they are answerable. But until they demonstrate that they've answered it, there's no reason for confidence.

1)...

The first positive sign was with DNDBeyond, when the abandoned working with the previous (incompetent) company trying this and move to the Beyond people, who, despite some concerns about their pricing model, have actually put out a very good product with only a couple of serious issues.

If we had evidence that choice came from understanding the domain, instead of just luck, that would be a good sign.

And since then we've seen a lot of successes - BG3 is looking good (the script has Larian issues, but that's par for the course), Dark Alliance is looking surprisingly non-awful (and is developed by a WotC-owned studio), and even if it's a bit mediocre, it'll be a stepping stone.

None of these are actual successes yet. They are projects that haven't yet failed. There's a difference. A success is good code that ships, not things that are not-awful in previews.

2) The product DNDBeyond is putting out is actually surprisingly close to a lot of stuff I work with, in that it's essentially a big-ass database which has to be very user-friendly and accessible, is commercial in nature, and has users viewing stuff as well as inputting different stuff, and so on.

Fundamentally nothing that they're doing there is hard or complex to do, nor is it expensive to run something like that.

So, you're not the only one who works in software around here, so I'm going to push back a bit on that - it is complicated and complex. Yes, many companies do similar work, but also many fail to do it. Moderate data complexity plus moderate customization per user, millions of users, three-nines uptime and a reasonable UX design is not a cakewalk of a project.

The number one way to make sure a project blunders is to be overconfident about it.

On top of that, they have to go with WotC's release dates. You seem to be thinking of this like the WotC D&D devs will just go on their merry way, like the digital offering doesn't exist, that they won't give long-range heads-ups on systems, or even change systems, to make them work in digital.

As soon as you have two systems in active development become dependent on each other, things start to suck, fast. "You can't release that physical book that you've already sent off to the printer because we've got persistent issues implementing a class on the software side," is NOT a conversation we want them to have to have.

I think I would prefer to not see the software side have a lick of input into the RPG game development. I am still more than willing to use paper and pencil, so I want game developers to go with whatever works for the game, without concern of how hard it may be on the software side. As soon as they are linked, you're apt to see game design hobbled to the digital implementation.

 

[Nikosandros]

Look to the survey if you want details, because the video goes into some interesting things.

I did and that's what I got from it, but I understand if you don't want to discuss this further.

 

[Umbran]

DOP NOT DISRESPECT THE FOAM BRAIN!

Hey, I occasionally larp with people from Foam Brain.

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