Wasn't there supposed to be a big errata push?

[Adso]

Glad to hear it Stephen. Thanks for the update. I think most people are really concerned with the errors that affect the playability of items in a book. Yes, errors in the text like mis-spellings, incorrect grammar and stat blocks that are off by one or two points, are annoying, but most of the time they don't stop you from using the book or item in question.

However, when feats, classes, monsters, etc., have errors in them that leave them open to abuse or are unclear in exactly how they work, it makes it harder to use (or want to use) that product. Adventures with confusing or erroneous maps also fall into this category. If you can fix most of these issues up then I don't really care about the other stuff.

Just my 2 cents.

Olaf the Stout

Sounds like you and I see eye to eye on the whole errata thing. I guess that's a good sign.

 

[JoeGKushner]

What aren’t you going to find in these documents? Nagging little math errors in stat blocks, ...

In terms of the stat block errors, and I'm not trying to be a smart a here, but with a huge percent of things being fixed based on type, size, and stat bonuses, how is it possible that there isn't an excel sheet or something that just does all the math right away or something along those lines? Outside of feats, almost everything else is pure amount of hit die * type for bab, saving throws, and hit points and modified by stats.

Are things being turned in on soiled sheets that are only handled by chop sticks and read from across the room straight into a word pad file?

 

[Bacris]

In terms of the stat block errors, and I'm not trying to be a smart a here, but with a huge percent of things being fixed based on type, size, and stat bonuses, how is it possible that there isn't an excel sheet or something that just does all the math right away or something along those lines? Outside of feats, almost everything else is pure amount of hit die * type for bab, saving throws, and hit points and modified by stats.

As a computer programmer by day and an RPG developer by night, I can tell you that it's not that easy.

Any type of standardized program to facilitate that would have to be quite complex and constantly evolving. When you continue to add different bonus types that can be included, it makes it hard to just use an Excel spreadsheet.

Size modifiers, ability modifiers, racial modifiers, circumstance modifiers, synergy modifiers, etc, etc.

Now, I'm not saying such a thing is impossible, nor am I saying that incorrect stat blocks are acceptable, but what I am saying is that from a database creation perspective and GUI design perspective, neither is it quick and dirty Not if you want it to be scalable to new products and systems, otherwise you're re-inventing the wheel anytime a new mechanic or bonus type is introduced.

 

[JoeGKushner]

As a computer programmer by day and an RPG developer by night, I can tell you that it's not that easy.

Any type of standardized program to facilitate that would have to be quite complex and constantly evolving. When you continue to add different bonus types that can be included, it makes it hard to just use an Excel spreadsheet.

Size modifiers, ability modifiers, racial modifiers, circumstance modifiers, synergy modifiers, etc, etc.

Now, I'm not saying such a thing is impossible, nor am I saying that incorrect stat blocks are acceptable, but what I am saying is that from a database creation perspective and GUI design perspective, neither is it quick and dirty Not if you want it to be scalable to new products and systems, otherwise you're re-inventing the wheel anytime a new mechanic or bonus type is introduced.

I agree that there is a lot there but things like circumstance modifiers wouldn't be in the database as they are... well, circumstance modifiers. Other things like the old racial and synergy are one time entries no?

On the other hand, I can see feats being a huge PIA as they are inconsistent in many areas and may require some type of over ride ability. But this isn't first or second ed D&D where stats meant different things for different scores or different classes and size modifiers don't change once the size modifier is set.

Heck, I'm not even talking about the hand waving of the CR/ELC system.

But then again, your arguement indicates that D&D might be 'too' complex.

 

[Bacris]

But then again, your arguement indicates that D&D might be 'too' complex.

I'm a very logic / math oriented individual (hence being a computer programmer...), and even I find parts of D&D 3.5 complex

So I agree with you there

The point is that with Feats, Classes, and then alternate systems such as Skill Tricks, Reserve Feats, and the new stat blocks that WotC likes to use, it becomes incredibly complex to create auto-generating stat blocks - unless you keep it simple, at which point you're doing yourself a bit of a disservice, because you then can't make full use of your own products!

And there have been precedents for circumstance bonuses in stat blocks - Hide modifiers in Tall Grass or natural creature environment, for example. Or where a creature uses one stat isntead of another for some skill - such as Dex for Climb.

 

[JoeGKushner]

I'm a very logic / math oriented individual (hence being a computer programmer...), and even I find parts of D&D 3.5 complex

So I agree with you there

The point is that with Feats, Classes, and then alternate systems such as Skill Tricks, Reserve Feats, and the new stat blocks that WotC likes to use, it becomes incredibly complex to create auto-generating stat blocks - unless you keep it simple, at which point you're doing yourself a bit of a disservice, because you then can't make full use of your own products!

And there have been precedents for circumstance bonuses in stat blocks - Hide modifiers in Tall Grass or natural creature environment, for example. Or where a creature uses one stat isntead of another for some skill - such as Dex for Climb.

In terms of monsters, I'll disagree with you on principle on the classes. If the monster has to rely too much on class levels, then it's probably not a monster that needs it's own entry, unless we're talking about humanoids with class levels. Things like Skill Tricks, Reserve Feats, etc... are also limited in use and often repeated with the monster but the programing part would probably be off.

But in terms of most monsters, the various math offenders are generally things that SHOULD have been caught as opposed to, "Ops, forgot about obscure rule X." Heck, check out the errata for Monster Manual III. Almost all minor stuff but truly a "Yeah, we're a game publisher and editing falls way down on the list of things that are important." And heck, as a game buyer whose bought games from many companies, I'd have to say that is the prevailing mentality.

Seems to be that even when they admit that there are problems, that there's a few announcements of furious activity and nothing comes from it.

 

[Razz]

I don't mind typos. What I do mind is errors that do affect gameplay.

One example in Expedition to the Demonweb Pits is the Abyssal Giant's entry stating it has immunity to slashing weapons in the Knowledge Check sidebar, but it's not listed in the monster stats? Are they supposed to have immunity to slashing weapons or no? It also mentions they have abyssal resistances but that's not listed either.

Also, why can't they develop a program that automatically creates stat blocks and with plug-ins to "turn on" or "turn off" information from splat books like Complete Scoundrel's skill tricks or Complete Mage's reserve feats? Seems complex, yeah, but if Turbine can make a game like DDO: Stormreach, I'm sure they can make a program at WotC to make their job easier!

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

I don't mind typos. What I do mind is errors that do affect gameplay.

One example in Expedition to the Demonweb Pits is the Abyssal Giant's entry stating it has immunity to slashing weapons in the Knowledge Check sidebar, but it's not listed in the monster stats? Are they supposed to have immunity to slashing weapons or no? It also mentions they have abyssal resistances but that's not listed either.

Also, why can't they develop a program that automatically creates stat blocks and with plug-ins to "turn on" or "turn off" information from splat books like Complete Scoundrel's skill tricks or Complete Mage's reserve feats? Seems complex, yeah, but if Turbine can make a game like DDO: Stormreach, I'm sure they can make a program at WotC to make their job easier!

I imagine that it boils down to being unwilling to spend the money, because they (as they admit above), don't care about things like statblock errors. Putting together such a system would take a lot of person-hours and would itself need to be perfectly reliable if the goal is to eliminate errors. The constrution and testing would cost a fortune to implement in a reasonable amount of time, and this would need to be repeated on a smaller scale with each supplement. It probably looks like a bad use of resources, especially given that the books sell just fine when they ship full of errors.

 

[Glyfair]

I imagine that it boils down to being unwilling to spend the money, because they (as they admit above), don't care about things like statblock errors.

Actually, they aren't saying they don't care about statblock errors. They imply they do and don't like when they release a supplement with them. They are just saying it's not worth the effort for such minor payback.

Putting together such a system would take a lot of person-hours and would itself need to be perfectly reliable if the goal is to eliminate errors. The constrution and testing would cost a fortune to implement in a reasonable amount of time, and this would need to be repeated on a smaller scale with each supplement. It probably looks like a bad use of resources, especially given that the books sell just fine when they ship full of errors.

Also, think about the resources required. They would be spending the exact amount of rime and resources to create a character generation program that's sold to the public (probably slightly less because the UI wouldn't need to be polished), but only for them. And the expense to keep it up-to-date.

Of course, then you spend more money to get a good UI, and then sell it to get back that investment. After all, there are dozens of flawless character generators out there, right? It must be pretty easy

 

[Glyfair]

We have released some errata—very pressing bits—from Drow of the Underdark and Expedition to the Demonweb Pits since or around that original announcement. They’ve gone up as special articles on the Wizards of the Coast website.

Wouldn't the errata page be a better place to put them? You could at least link to them from there. I know when I'm looking for errata that's the first place I go.