In Which The Warlock Becomes a Doomsayer...

When Wizards of the Coast first announced their Digital Initiative, I was skeptical at best. It was hard to believe that a company so focused on print role-playing materials could put forwards a quality online application that effectively summarized their work.

However, upon closer review, I was pleasantly surprised. The downloadable Character Builder and the later Monster Builder quickly became invaluable tools for me, as I both ran and played D&D. Character generation time dropped from the hours it had become in 3.5e, down to mere minutes. I’ve often been quoted as stating that I could make a 30th level character, fully-equipped, playable, and reasonably optimized, within a 20 minute timeframe. The Monster Builder, similarly, allowed me to print out sheets with chosen creatures—both custom-made and pregenerated—reducing the amount of time that I spent preparing for games.


RIP--The Downloadable Character Builder (11-16-2010)

The down side to this functionality was the reliance on updates. As August and September rolled on with no update—and no word of an update—DDI customers grew frustrated. The revised version of Dark Sun came out in hardback…but had no support via DDI. Whole articles and books were being left out of DDI, with no word from Wizards of the Coast on why or when.

Then, the announcement: Wizards of the Coast would no longer be supporting the downloadable Character Builder software, choosing instead to implement an online-only toolset. The online-toolset debuted yesterday to much outcry amongst the gaming community.

With that in mind, I’d like to get on record now this thought: If the D&D brand is set to fail within the next decade, it will be because of Wizards of the Coast’s utter refusal to commit to either a set online plan and, through that, their customers.

Having examined the new Character Builder, it has several fundamental flaws that not only defeat its design intent, but also harm the gaming community as a whole.

• The Character Builder is online only. This is the biggest problem, yet one that WotC refuses to address. The company line is currently one that states that the online-functionality of the CB software makes it accessible from anywhere that has an Internet connection. There are two flaws with this logic: not only does this make the CB harder to access, but it also makes it less available overall.

o Online-only MEANS online-only: For some people this may not seem to be a problem, but when thought through thoroughly, cracks emerge. If I go to play at any of my 3 local game stores, there’s no wi-fi available. My characters, saved on my computer, would be inaccessible, whereas with the Downloadable CB, they were at my fingertips. Similarly, if the WotC website goes down or crashes, my characters are inaccessible. This limits access, rather than making it more available.

o Silverlight is left in the dark. The new CB runs on the Silverlight framework, put out by Microsoft. That’s all well and good, but most mobile devices—including the iPad, most palmtop computers, and any smart-phone that doesn’t use Windows 7—can’t run Silverlight. Considering that these were the target users of the new CB, this design precept is utterly a failure.

• Your characters are no longer yours. This, as a writer and blogger, angers me beyond belief. Not only does the new CB have an absurdly-low limit of 20 characters, WotC has now made it expressly clear that the characters—despite the fact that you, as a player, assembled them—are not yours. With no ability to export a character to your hard drive (and no ability to even view it, once you have done so!), you will have absolutely no access to your own creations, should you choose to cancel your subscription. As someone who runs D&D at conventions and uses pregenerated characters, this limit is crippling—with 6 seats at a table, a mere 3 games fills out the limit, and that doesn’t even count any ‘home’ characters that I might have!

WotC has framed this as the ability to store these characters “in the Cloud”, implying that storing them on a hard drive or flash drive is somehow an inconvenience. Such is not the case. Again, it’s much easier to port over a character via a USB drive than have to log into a website, which may or may not be available/functioning.

 

Maybe this can tell me why new the CB crashed 4 times in 15 minutes...

• The Character Builder is buggy beyond belief. Admittedly, it just debuted yesterday, but when WotC already has a fully-functional product that performs the same function, the idea of having basic, fundamental sections of the new version unworkable. The current “Known Issues” list on the WotC Character Builder site reads like a laundry list, with basic class features—such as the use of a weapon as a implement, which is core to classes like Assassin, Swordmage and Warlock—left to be totally unworkable. When a product already exists that fills this niche—one already produced by WotC—switching horse midstreams is foolhardy at best.

• WotC’s Track Record: Promise Much, Produce Little. We’re told, through the occasional forum post or the CB FAQ, that the ability to export characters will be incoming. We’re told that core components of the game, such as the ability to house rule items, to include inherent bonuses, and to modify the character sheet on a fundamental level…all that “has not yet been implemented,” but it’s on the horizon. We’re told that all of this is coming.

But, I ask this: what about the rest of the functionality that was promised us? What about the rest of the Monster Builder updates, which have gone untouched? What about the much ballyhooed Virtual Tabletop, which would allow you to play with your friends across the country, with full chat utilities and stylized virtual minis? What about open communication, within the gaming community? Anyone remember GleeMax, WotC’s utter travesty of a social networking site?

So, how long did GleeMax last?  6 months?  A year?  Did anyone care?

All of this adds up to bad news in my eyes. It’s been mentioned—unofficially, of course—that WotC made this move to keep more nefarious gamers from cracking and subsequently bit-torrenting hacked version of the downloadable CB. If this is the case, though, it’s a paranoid attempt to deal with a minority of the gaming community, which only harms the majority’s ability to enjoy a product as a paying customer.


WotC has dropped a fully-functional, smooth program in favor of trying to rebuild their image. This, on a fundamental level, is a misstep. While I doubt that this would bring the D&D brand on the whole to a collapse, it does make for poor tidings for the world’s most popular RPG.

I, for one, will not be witness to this pratfall. Upon the completion of my already-paid year of DDI subscription, I’ll be cancelling.

In Which The Warlock's MasterPlan is Revealed...

GMing is hard work, cats and kittens.

Depending on the system, each game has its own rigors. D&D involves minis, tactical combat, and a keen eye for strategy, in addition to knowledge of both characters and monsters. Call of Cthulhu and other horror games take deep gravitas and a powerful establishment of mood that, if done right, won't ever let up. Heroes Unlimited requires...well, let's be honest: Hereoes Unlimited requires a straightjacket and men in white coats.

Hell's bells, I've even worked up a sweat when GMing WEGS, if for no other reason than the fast paced frenzy of Spoint-slinging across the table.

Needless to say, when I come across something to make my GMing job easier, I pick it up. This started with finding ways to organize my minis--while I first used small plastic Sterilite bins, I've upgraded to a multi-tiered tackle box, with a bottom section big enough to fit a random assortment of Dungeon Tiles and other game necessities.

Oh, yes. The Dungeon Tiles. I've gotta say, Wizards of the Coast has me under their thumb with these. It's so easy to throw down a few tiles on top of the battlemat to add some 'scenic hazards' for the PCs.

However, all of this pales in comparison to my latest discovery. By Mighty Cthulhu, this latest bit blows them out of the water like a scrapped German U-Boat.

Ladies and gentlemen, for your gaming pleasure: MasterPlan

I can't even take credit for finding this gem--if not for the folks over at RPG.net, I'd have never heard of it.

MasterPlan is a massive utility, building in an encounter generator, a campaign workbook, mapping software, and just about everything else that a potential GM could want. I've barely scratched the surface on this tool after downloading it last night, and I already have a bajillion ideas on how to use it.

When Wizards of the Coast announced their D&D Insider initiative, they experienced quite a bit of scepticism, due to poor implementation.

Quite simply, MasterPlan is today everything that D&D Adventure Tools hopes to someday be.

Just to get some practice with the system, I generated a few "Random Delves"--the stereotypical, 3-encounter dungeons made famous by WotC. Quite literally, everything is editable, in an easy-to-use, simple format. Generating a 15th level delve for 8 PCs with 2 encounters and multiple traps? Done in about 45 seconds. It's that simple.

And the best part? If you have an Insider account, MasterPlan will access the compendium, adding in everything that's already there. All 12,000 odd classes, monsters, traps, skill challenges, and magic items--they're already loaded! By the Nine Hells, that's convenient!

I definitely need some more time to explore MasterPlan to run it through its course, but it's easily the most comprehensive, most usable, most useful GMing software I've ever seen.

It makes one wonder, though, what happens next with it! With d20Pro getting nominated for an Origins Award this year (despite "incompatibility" with 4th Edition D&D), where will this leave the MasterPlan? And, once WotC hears of this...one can only wonder...

Get it while you can, children! It's astounding!

In Which The Warlock Succumbs to the Inevitable...

When D&D 4e came out, one of their largest pushes was for the traditionally table-top game to take a step into the digital world, in a large way. Dungeon and Dragon, the flagship magazines of role-playing, were taken out of circulation, only to be replaced with online editions as part of something enigmatic known as "D&D Insider". At the announcement, other nebulous features were shown off...a 'virtual miniature' generator, an online table utility with chat functions, a character generator, and several other features.

And it was met, by and large, with a resounding "WTF?!"

As it seemed, people didn't exactly like Wizards of the Coast futzing around with their beloved magazines. And who would need an online game table, when it's much more fun to sit around a real one? And there were tons of character generators out there--why pay for one?

Nerdrage poured forth like a rushing river, as WotC slowly trickled out updates to their "D&D Insider" and Gleemax--their failed attempt at a social networking site--bit the dust. And all of it was free, so every angry geek with a wi-fi connection could dance on the monolithic industry's corpse...or so it seemed to said weaselous buggers.

I'll admit--I wasn't happy when the two magazines went to online-only format, but I was relatively neutral in the wars between pro- and anti-Insider gamer geeks. That is, until recently.

Both L-train and I finally broke down and purchased 1 year memberships to D&D Insider--at just around $5 per month, it cost me approximately $60 for one year of content, which granted me access to the Character Generator software, issues of both online magazines, several online utilities, and all preview articles (only about half of which are accessible to non-Insider visitors).

I came across this somewhat skeptically, as I wasn't sure exactly what I was...wanting. I used HeroForge, primarily, for character generation, and the magazine articles did not seem to increase in quality compared to the days of Paizo.

I'll admit now, I was utterly wrong.

The official character generator--built from the online compendium (another benefit of Insider membership--is updated monthly, and features a database of selectable WotC products, usable by campaign. The generator is intuitive to use, and is graphically smooth, allowing you even to import your own photos to attach to characters. Even without going through any sort of tutorial or help system, I was able to create a 30th level character, complete with level-appropriate gear, in about 20 minutes.

20 minutes?! Hell's bells--I was ecstatic! This sort of thing would take me hours to do by hand, or even in HeroForge. And, what's more, the Generator tells you whether the character is RPGA legal, auto-calculates all of the math for you (which has led to some player-favoring error-solving in L-train's game), and creates a beautifully laid-out character sheet complete with character cards.

While the character generator does lack a "Create a Character of X Level" option, which would make it perfect, the leveling system is of sufficient speed and quality to make it almost unnecessary. Seriously--it's that good.

That alone would be worth my $60, considering that it updates with all WotC products each month, but the magazine articles have seriously been increasing in quality. One of my favorites has been the "Wish Upon A Star" article, beefing Star Pact Warlocks--Ia!--but there are numerous others that bear mentioning.

In all truth, I'm completely satisfied with my Insider subscription, and have no regrets on it whatsoever. I look forward to what comes next very eagerly...surrounding nerdrage notwithstanding.

In Which The Warlock Uses His Time Productively...

One of the nice things about being an English teacher is the fact that once you set your kids on a research project, your days are pretty much just troubleshooting. There's no real "lesson planning", per se; it's all much more of helping each kid at whatever step that they're at. Because of this, I've had a significantly larger amount of "free-ish time" during my teaching day...which I've put to good use, of course!

Firstly, I managed to get some of my revisions for Dungeon Slam! done. On the 4th draft now, I managed to re-build all of the character cards from scratch. One of the biggest problems with the current incarnation is the amount of tokens necessary for Health and Arcana. Rather than tracking them with tokens, though, I now have a slider at the top and bottom of each character card--one for each stat. So now, players only need one token, which they can slide to their current Health and Arcana, and adjust as necessary.

Also, I've been reformatting many of the skills. Some of them were just outright too damned good. Others, like the Alchemists' Unique Skill--Brewmaster--were utterly weak. I've worked towards balancing these, but the results have yet to show fruit--that's what playtesting is for, children!

That said, the easy part is over with. The (much) harder part is to rebuild the monsters, the items, and the skills. That comes next...proably over spring break!

Speaking of playtesting, though, I also managed to finish my work on something that's currently being referred to as WEGS SuperZ Alpha. While I can't say too much about this one, mainly due to some unsurity on how it exactly fits into El Willy's WEGS-verse and the like, I can say that the first playtest went swimmingly! We had some issues with the Braintrust character, who was way overpowered, using Napalm Blast over and over, as well as with the Health and Spoint regeneration General Skills, but by and large, the Arks were performing exactly as intended!

Finally, I managed to finally put together enough cash for a subscription to Dungeons and Dragons Insider--Wizards of the Coast's online initiative for D&D 4e. My first impressions, thusfar, have been really positive, particularly with the Character Generator, but I haven't had my subscription long enough to provide a full review--expect one next week, cats and kittens.

So, what have we learned? When your kids are pretty much autonomous, you can just let 'em roll and get on with what's important: gaming!