Proposal

[Velmont]

I'm thinking like Kalidrev on that one.

Anyway, I'm not a judge, so it isn't me you have to convince. I think I made my opinion and I will tell it is an shy no I would give on that proposal.

 

[Kalidrev]

The Assassin was never "debut" material. It was official from the time it was released on DnDi. It never had a "debut" article where it showcased ONE build. When it came out, both builds were shown immediately just like any other class has been published in hardback. The psionic classes that are debut material have only been showcased. We're still missing some important pieces of the puzzle, and while, sure, you could create a character from the options showcased in the debut material, you're really limited. But maybe that is more of a personal preference situation and not so much a "this is not official material", so I guess I'll concede there.

And now that I think back on it... all of the articles (such as the artificer, barbarian, invoker, etc) that were not the official material WERE labeled as playtest, weren't they?

Here's what will seal a YES from me:

Answer the following:
Is there at least a single case where material that has been inside of the character builder, and labeled as "debut", has ended up different than what was published in hardcover?

If the answer is NO, then I would agree to allow debut material. If it is a YES, then I would have to say that it should not be allowed.

 

[renau1g]

Found this on the WOTC website. Have there been any debut material released before these articles for PHB3?

Player's Handbook 3 Debut Content

We recently announced that debut content was coming to D&D Insider. As a D&D Insider, you're going to start receiving fully developed and edited, ready-to-publish material from key 2010 titles way ahead of their official publication dates. This isn't playtest material. It isn't half-finished, partially formed, sneak peeks. Nope. It's just like what appears in every physical product we produce. What's the difference? The difference is that, because you're a D&D Insider, we want you to be able to start playing with this material right now. That's the same kind of access to new stuff that we get here in R&D. What could be more Insider than that?

This debut content, which becomes available on D&D Insider up to a year before it sees physical publication, populates the D&D Character Builder and the D&D Compendium, making it immediately useful in play. That's huge. We're starting out by debuting key material from next year's biggest physical product, Player's Handbook 3. As a D&D Insider, you're going to get to start playing with the psionic power source way earlier than the rest of the D&D gaming world. In July, the psion player character class debuts, complete and fully loaded in theD&D Character Builder so you can dive right in and start making psion characters for your next game session.

Starting in July and continuing each month until the release of the physical book next March, we'll roll out distinct and complete chunks of the book. By the time the book sees print, D&D Insiders will have gotten over 100 pages of material early. That's about 50 percent of the book. You're going to see one build from up to five new classes, a few new races, feats, and other surprises from Player's Handbook 3. And that's only the beginning. Later this summer, we'll start rolling out debut content from a second key 2010 title, continually building and expanding the program as the year progresses. This is exciting stuff, and almost instant gratification for the creative teams here at D&D R&D. After all, in the Old Days, stuff we worked on wouldn't see the light of day for months if not years after we finished working on it. Now, for this debut content, that delay will be much, much less.

 

[Kalidrev]

Well, I think that sufficiently answers my question

In light of r1's informative post, I vote YES to allowing DEBUT material to be auto-accepted 1 month from the day it is put into DnDi Compendium/Character Builder.

 

[stonegod]

I think we're all in agreement that on no playtest material.

My concern is that the stuff marked "debut" aren't really. Yes, the final version that's on paper right now is fixed (where ever it is in the printing process); but that not necessarily what is online right now (regardless of what the DDI says). I'm not convinced right now that the monk that is "debut" will be the same as the monk that's going to be printed (regardless of what WotC says, as the debut material is a marketing move, not a Design/Dev move).

Of course, the proof of that statement won't be for another month, and the proposal is now. I'll ponder a bit more before voting.

 

[Velmont]

Just a thought.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I think there was two reasons why we are waiting 1 month after the release.

1) To see if there is anything broken and have time to say No to it.
2) Allow anyone without a D&DI account to have a chance to buy the material.

In the case of 1), it's easy for debut material to do the same.
In the case of 2), it become a bit more problematic... but we could also argue that the Assassin is not available to those people too (and will never be).

 

[renau1g]

Well technically by waiting a month they can buy the material, just need to subscribe for 1 month at a price less than any book and they can right? I know some people had major issues with WoTC (elec) and losing passwords, but at the same time it's really no different than allowing PHB2 as if someone doesn't want to buy DDI then that's fine but they don't get to use that source, same as if someone doesn't buy PHB2 they can't play a barbarian.

 

[KarinsDad]

I think we're all in agreement that on no playtest material.

My concern is that the stuff marked "debut" aren't really. Yes, the final version that's on paper right now is fixed (where ever it is in the printing process); but that not necessarily what is online right now (regardless of what the DDI says). I'm not convinced right now that the monk that is "debut" will be the same as the monk that's going to be printed (regardless of what WotC says, as the debut material is a marketing move, not a Design/Dev move).

Although I consider this a valid point, I'm not sure that it is a major concern.

There are two possibilities:

1) WotC gets it right. In that case, no worries.

2) WotC gets it wrong. In that case, it's very possible that nobody will catch the error in a reasonable time frame anyway.

As a judge, when you check someone's PC, do you open up 5 books to ensure that everything they wrote is correct? Or do you click on their feat and item links and check their powers via Compendium? Obviously, the second way is much faster.

So the chances of you catching a mistake in Compendium / Character Builder is slim. In order for such an error to get caught, someone in the gaming community at large would typically have to find it. Then, it would still be some time before WotC fixes the problem online.

So even if #2 were to occur pre-this proposal, it is likely that a PC would get approved with the mistake anyway in our current system. The only time it would not get approved is if a) someone in the community found the mistake after the book came out and b) one of the judges found out about it. The likelihood of this occuring right away is probably fairly slim and of course, the same problem could occur anyway without voting in this new proposal.

Invalid online material could always creep into a PC here if WotC does not have good processes for keeping their online material up to date.

 

[renau1g]

As a judge, when you check someone's PC, do you open up 5 books to ensure that everything they wrote is correct? Or do you click on their feat and item links and check their powers via Compendium? Obviously, the second way is much faster.

Well I know that I really don't use physical books for a variety of reasons, including the fact that there's been so much errata to them I find the books fairly out of date. I review using the CB, often creating the PC myself and checking that way. Helps with the wording of the powers, etc.

 

[stonegod]

There are two possibilities:

1) WotC gets it right. In that case, no worries.

2) WotC gets it wrong. In that case, it's very possible that nobody will catch the error in a reasonable time frame anyway.

The problem w/ approach 2 is that debut material hasn't been errata'd before the book comes out. So, since we get material 6+ mo before the book comes out (as we did w/ PHIII), we won't see any errata until then. So, while WotC does generally get to fixing, debut material seems to have a much larger lead in to such fixes.

The counter to my counter, of course, is that its taken WotC 6+ mo before to get to errata'ing printed material. They do seem to getting better at this, though.