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Message: <blockquote data-quote="UngainlyTitan" data-source="post: 9209857" data-attributes="member: 28487">they are if their existence kills the business model of potential competitors. In software an API generally build out some foundational stuff that can be used to build more stuff that has value and is saleable. So, a data API brokers low level connection to a database and provides readymade data structures to navigate the stored data. That saves a developer the time and effort of creating their own.  A game engine (Unity or Unreal) builds out something very complex to develop and allows a small team to build some fairly sophisticated games on top of it.The putative D&DBeyond API is opening out the information and automation engine within D&DBeyond to third parties. Smiteworks and Roll20 derive some revenue from exactly this. They bundle the information in the D&D books and add automation and sell that on to the end users. This source of value added is now killed by that API.In fact, that is what Beyond20 does to Roll20. It takes D&Dbeyond's information and automation, serves tehm out to Roll20 and one can use the free Roll20 as a map handler.So, the question for VTT builders becomes how do I make some money to my application? This is actually a pertinent question right now with the D&DBeyond maps applet. Right now, the only thing preventing the D&DBeyond map tool from becoming a lightweight no frills VTT for any game is that the monsters are linked to the D&DBeyond monster database, and the characters are linked to D&DBeyond character sheets.Provide the ability to curate a custom token collection and it can be used for any game. Provide a system agnostic turn(initiative) tracker and it works as a bare bones VTT for any system.Add in a robust campaign management tool - which amounts to hyperlinked text files: a modified blog system could do it - and some threaded messaging or discord support and you can run anything within D&DBeyond.</blockquote>

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