Hah, I just copied the xml from the CharacterFile part of the Debug tab at vecna.wizards.com and saved it as a .dnd4e file in my old character builder save directory... and loaded it up just fine in the old character builder, well, to an extent, all the new powers and such are missing from the character sheet, but hey, at least it shows that it should be easy enough for things like iplay4e to update for the new characters, assuming wotc doesnt remove this ability right away.
Online Character Builder is LIVE!
- Thread starter captainspud
- Start date
Dannager
First Post
This isn't the first time we've seen this line of "reasoning", and it won't be the last. This is the consumer mentality at its worst. WotC doesn't need customers who think along these lines, anyway. I wouldn't fret over it.
tuxgeo
Adventurer
I am so glad that I didn't try out this piece of <redacted> today.
Yes.
Thanks to everybody who did try it out, however.
(Better that you should suffer through BETA 0.01 instead of I.)
Today, I had fun with the Classic CB: My spoiled, imperious human child-Sorcerer, Sarah, just went from being a Dagger Sorcerer to being a Staff Sorcerer instead (because the better Ral Partha mini* that is still in the mail is sculpted as brandishing a Staff instead of a Dagger), and she thereby began having even more boatloads of fun, as follows:
Without limiting her choices by imagining that "Ensorcelled Blade" had any positive value, I freed her to take "Dragonfrost" instead! And by leaving off the "Toughness" feat, I was able to give her the "Melee Training" feat at Level 1 for an actually respectable Melee Basic Attack using Quarterstaff, instead of -1 tohit with her Dagger and a STR value of 8.
It's Win-Win, so I'm now willing to share with you Sarah's current, reflavored At-Will powers:
(1) "Flame Wave." Yes, Wizards had called it "Burning Spray." What do they know, right? Sarah's rewritten flavor text for this power is:
"I wrote down what this does on a scroll, but the scroll got burned up!"
(2) "Madhammer." Yes, Wizards had called it "Chaos Bolt." What do they know, right? Sarah's rewritten flavor text for this power is:
"A gust of vacillating vagary leaps from your hand to inveigle their minds."
(3) "Snowball." Yes, Wizards had called it "Dragonfrost." What do they know, right? Sarah's rewritten flavor text for this power is:
"You're kidding, right? You want me to describe a snowball? REALLY?!? If I hit them with the snowball, they have to stagger away! Duh!"
And there you have it: You dedicated souls were bug-testing a Beta product while I was away having fun by mocking their flavor text. Thanks for letting me off the hook for any of that work, guys!
*Edit: FYI: "Ral Partha: Fantasy Adventures FA47 Sorceress" -- look for it at an online reseller of obsolete products near you today, if it matters to you. . . .
Yes.
Thanks to everybody who did try it out, however.
(Better that you should suffer through BETA 0.01 instead of I.)
Today, I had fun with the Classic CB: My spoiled, imperious human child-Sorcerer, Sarah, just went from being a Dagger Sorcerer to being a Staff Sorcerer instead (because the better Ral Partha mini* that is still in the mail is sculpted as brandishing a Staff instead of a Dagger), and she thereby began having even more boatloads of fun, as follows:
Without limiting her choices by imagining that "Ensorcelled Blade" had any positive value, I freed her to take "Dragonfrost" instead! And by leaving off the "Toughness" feat, I was able to give her the "Melee Training" feat at Level 1 for an actually respectable Melee Basic Attack using Quarterstaff, instead of -1 tohit with her Dagger and a STR value of 8.
It's Win-Win, so I'm now willing to share with you Sarah's current, reflavored At-Will powers:
(1) "Flame Wave." Yes, Wizards had called it "Burning Spray." What do they know, right? Sarah's rewritten flavor text for this power is:
"I wrote down what this does on a scroll, but the scroll got burned up!"
(2) "Madhammer." Yes, Wizards had called it "Chaos Bolt." What do they know, right? Sarah's rewritten flavor text for this power is:
"A gust of vacillating vagary leaps from your hand to inveigle their minds."
(3) "Snowball." Yes, Wizards had called it "Dragonfrost." What do they know, right? Sarah's rewritten flavor text for this power is:
"You're kidding, right? You want me to describe a snowball? REALLY?!? If I hit them with the snowball, they have to stagger away! Duh!"
And there you have it: You dedicated souls were bug-testing a Beta product while I was away having fun by mocking their flavor text. Thanks for letting me off the hook for any of that work, guys!
*Edit: FYI: "Ral Partha: Fantasy Adventures FA47 Sorceress" -- look for it at an online reseller of obsolete products near you today, if it matters to you. . . .
Last edited:
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
I can't speak for Stormtower, but anyone is certainly free to stop buying anything that they ever want to stop buying for any reason under the sun.
If someone feels like quitting 4e and picking up Pathfinder is the best way to express their displeasure/restore their joy, then they are free to do so.
WotC is not owed anyone's money for any reason.
I imagine there's plenty of folks who, if they can't use the CB, won't bother with playing 4e.
Doesn't matter if it's the most "logical" chain of events.
If this hiccup gets someone to try out new games and new ideas for a month or two, ideas that they can bring back when the CB isn't quite such a bitter pill, the hobby as a whole rejoices.
Glad to see WotC makes enough money out of thin air that it can forgo actual human beings with all their messiness as customers.
Naah, really, everyone who wants customers needs to deal with the messy complexity of human beings, which can include: "This experience does not meet my needs, so I will consider patronizing a competitor until such a time as I feel like it may."
Which really isn't that crazy, anyway.
I do understand that attitude. Although I don't quite share it (I'm still a DDi subscriber and play 4E, and don't plan to stop anytime soon) the character builder was the tipping point amongst systems for some of my friends. If they don't have access to the character builder the way they like to use it, there's nothing really tying them to this system over other systems.
Actually, yeah, yeah it is. Basically he is abandoning a perfectly functional game system to go to a competitor out of spite. Its further made absurd when you learn that hero labs has 4th Edition support. Changing to Pathfinder is an act of pure spite meant to punish WotC for not meeting his demands. Of course, such an action means almost nothing since spending money somewhere else hurts a company no more than if the money was not spent at all. Its irrational and stupid.
There is also the fact that, as Mac user, I can safely say that the Compendium is more than functional as a character building tool: I should know since I've been using it for three years now. Yes, the new builder is a buggy piece of
, and, yes, the loss of the character builder is lame (you know, for those who got to actually use, and particularly for those who got to abuse it), but its not the end of the game or the hobby. Most of the perpetual chicken littles and rage-quiters don't really have a leg to stand on, and the threats of running to pathfinder more or less confirm suspicious I've had for a while that some of the characters act as they do not out of an objective judgement but merely out of spite. Yes, WotC screwed the pooch big time, but most people act like Mike Mearls personally invaded their homes and snapped the neck of their favorite pet while whistling "Singing in the Rain." Its a software accessory for a hobby game.Get over it.
Jan van Leyden
Adventurer
Tried it in the evening at home, running Opera on Win7-64 with a 4k DSL.
On the plus side:
+ was able to load characters made with the old CB
+ a home-ruled item survived the transfer intact and is represented via a card
+ Recover function seems to work rather reliably
+ clear reminder of one selection missed during generation
On the minus side:
- slow. Makes me think whether something is broken.
- hangs when importing a house-ruled character. Can be recovered, though
- print-out character sheet not configurable
- generated PDF is too big and of bad quality. The PDF generated with FreePDF is 2.5MB whereas the same character yields a 350k PDF in the old CB. Looks like the thing sends an image only; text items are blurry
- some text is cut off
Questions:
* can one open multiple instances of this thing? I like having my players' characters open on my laptop and don't want to suffer this ugly PDFs
* will software updates go live only with the regular (I know. that's a strecth) monthly updates or more often?
So the first impression isn't favourable. Let's see how competently WotC will react.
On the plus side:
+ was able to load characters made with the old CB
+ a home-ruled item survived the transfer intact and is represented via a card
+ Recover function seems to work rather reliably
+ clear reminder of one selection missed during generation
On the minus side:
- slow. Makes me think whether something is broken.
- hangs when importing a house-ruled character. Can be recovered, though
- print-out character sheet not configurable
- generated PDF is too big and of bad quality. The PDF generated with FreePDF is 2.5MB whereas the same character yields a 350k PDF in the old CB. Looks like the thing sends an image only; text items are blurry
- some text is cut off
Questions:
* can one open multiple instances of this thing? I like having my players' characters open on my laptop and don't want to suffer this ugly PDFs
* will software updates go live only with the regular (I know. that's a strecth) monthly updates or more often?
So the first impression isn't favourable. Let's see how competently WotC will react.
Mustrum_Ridcully
Legend
I had to laugh at the person using that "WotC has fired me as a customer" meme. I can only call it meme because I can't take it seriously to say something like that.
But that's probably the only really funny about this. I am very disappointed by this.
As a whole, the new Character Builder takes out the entire fun of building a character.
You make a selection? A modal dialog opens. I am very constrained. I have to make this choice now, I can't just quickly move to another area of the software.
And then, I finally make a selection? It takes 10 seconds or so until it finishes.
So I am contrained and slowed down. I can't just "quickly" update something. I have to open the modal dialogue, then wait the Gary-Gygax Memorial minute, and finish it.
Occassionally, the app crashes. Someone said -1 for crash, +2 for crash recovery? That would be a net positive. Nope, it's -3 for crash and +1 for crash recovery. It's still sucks that it happens and crash recovery can dampen the disappointment, but it can't eliminate it.
At least the 20 character limit is no real problem - I don't really feel compelled to create 20 characters on the online builder.
As a sum, it's not just that the performance is low or that some features I'd hope for are still missing, it's also that the UI design is weak and the app is buggy and unstable.
I think I just renewed a few weeks back for a year, so there is not much that I can actively do on my end, but I can say that I am disappointed. I am not sure where to go from here. Maybe at least a symbol disabling of auto-renewal. Maybe a customer support letter.
But that's probably the only really funny about this. I am very disappointed by this.
As a whole, the new Character Builder takes out the entire fun of building a character.
You make a selection? A modal dialog opens. I am very constrained. I have to make this choice now, I can't just quickly move to another area of the software.
And then, I finally make a selection? It takes 10 seconds or so until it finishes.
So I am contrained and slowed down. I can't just "quickly" update something. I have to open the modal dialogue, then wait the Gary-Gygax Memorial minute, and finish it.
Occassionally, the app crashes. Someone said -1 for crash, +2 for crash recovery? That would be a net positive. Nope, it's -3 for crash and +1 for crash recovery. It's still sucks that it happens and crash recovery can dampen the disappointment, but it can't eliminate it.
At least the 20 character limit is no real problem - I don't really feel compelled to create 20 characters on the online builder.
As a sum, it's not just that the performance is low or that some features I'd hope for are still missing, it's also that the UI design is weak and the app is buggy and unstable.
I think I just renewed a few weeks back for a year, so there is not much that I can actively do on my end, but I can say that I am disappointed. I am not sure where to go from here. Maybe at least a symbol disabling of auto-renewal. Maybe a customer support letter.
See? They totally expected this
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