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WolfStar76 wrote:

I'd disagree that that introduces undue bias, however.

Depends on the question you are asking. If you are asking "What do our current customers want?" then you are right, the bias may well be exactly what you are looking for. If you are asking a wider question like "what do people who are interested in OR are playing what to see?" then you run into troubles.

I think it is a group that is omitted at peril. Why? Because to even get to the poll you had to be part of the wider gaming community. You may even be able to focus that down further. I just have a memory of it being opened up in places like Enworld and so on as well as the main D&D page.

WolfStar76 wrote:

If you're not currently playing SOME version of D&D - the odds of you having an informed opinion about 4th Edition, and especially about D&D Insider (which supports ONLY 4th Edition) are slim. I think, further, that the DDI toolset is intended to be a service for current players, and not (necessarily) a tool to entice new/lapsed players (see the analogies drawn by WotC to a DVD with bonus features. The DVD is D&D, the DDI is the bonus features).

And what if the reason that you are a lapsed player, or a player who has not yet begun D&D gaming, is due to a reason that the tools in DDi may specifically address? The moving away type lapsed player is a perfect example of this. Excluding people because they don't play now is, to my eyes, possibly worrying as it does not take account of why they don't play. People can and do stay informed about 4E without playing it.

WolfStar76 wrote:

The short version is - I don't see the harm, by far and large, of limiting out non-players.

On this, I am afraid, we will have to disagree. Fair enough though.

WolfStar76 wrote:

A quick googling produces this:http://www.experiment-resources.com/research-bias.html which I doubt is what you're referring to. I don't think you mean to imply undue pressure was applied?

No, not pressure. My query is based around what that page refers to as "Omission Bias".

PyroMancer2k wrote:

I don't think there is any borderline about it. Once anyone starts says "what _____ wants us to believe" they have crossed that line and are now deep in conspiracy theorist territory.

If you believe that you have absolutely no clue what a marketing department is. Their job IS to make you believe what they want you to believe.

Do you think there would be a McDonalds on every corner if they didn't have a marketing department?

"What I'm gonna stop for a hamburger that's not even made of beef? This crap is nasty tasting!"

I'm not a mathematician either (even though I had to take "discrete mathematics" as part of my college curriculum), I apologize if I unduly attacked someones math numbers. I could be wrong about the exact number. I used a tutorial I found on Google to get my numbers based on the information given out about the poll.

My only other gripe is that the questions didn't match the issue.

Issue: What software product should we work on next.

Poll Questions: Which software products would be useful to you [list of potential products].

The problem is that the issue can only have one clear software product as an answer. The poll on the other hand lets you check off as many things that might potentially one day be useful to you. Which is why you get all of the weird percents (I mean weird in that they don't add up to 100%).

I suggest for the next poll, that they do this:

"Which software product would you like to see WotC produce next?
a. Game Table - Allows D&D play over the internet with people spread across the globe.
b. Character Visualizer - Can be used to create 3D models of characters including their gear.
...etc etc...(for choices)

Which would you like to see after that?
a. Game Table - Allows D&D play over the internet with people spread across the globe.
b. Character Visualizer - Can be used to create 3D models of characters including their gear.
...etc etc...(for choices)

Which would you like to see after that one?
a. Game Table - Allows D&D play over the internet with people spread across the globe.
b. Character Visualizer - Can be used to create 3D models of characters including their gear.
...etc etc...(for choices)"

This would allow the poll to actually fit the problem. Also don't cut people out of the poll because they say they currently aren't playing, it is already very selective being that people have to visit the D&D site to get to it.

WolfStar76 wrote:

- so the bias is toward, shockingly, people with an opinion on DDI.

Yeah, no.

It was a poll of people that chose to respond to a poll about DDI and even then it wasn't all of those people.

Self selected polls are good for entertainment purposes only. Period.

lokiare wrote:

This would allow the poll to actually fit the problem. Also don't cut people out of the poll because they say they currently aren't playing, it is already very selective being that people have to visit the D&D site to get to it.

Actually I think they should do a poll that has people rank items. I've heard that those tend to give a more accurate representation of what people think of stuff. Mainly because someone may really want one thing but they have something else that is a close second which isn't reflected in the pick one type polls. And example question would be.

Place in order from most desired to least desired which software product would you like to see WotC produce next.
a. Game Table - Allows D&D play over the internet with people spread across the globe.
b. Character Visualizer - Can be used to create 3D models of characters including their gear.
...etc etc...(for choices)

Or polls that have you rank each item individually. With the Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, and Strongly Disagree. With questions like say, "Would you subscribe to DDI if it supported a Game Table software?"

It's been a while since I did anything with marketing, surveys, and etc. But as I recall both of those methods tend you yield more informative results then standard pick your favorite.

I am really suprised by this. I love dnd and I do like the changes with 4th ed. What I had hoped was that the character visualizer would be up and running as well as the digital table top. Now that I read that it is put on hold that dissapoints me. I live in an area where there isn't a lot of dnd playing. The only group that is here is only for teenagers, and I am teacher. I am too old to play in that group. I was looking to play on the digital table top so that I can play dnd. I was also looking forward to the character visualizer but that is on hold to. This bugs me because I know that this was part of their main advertaisment for the game, and now it is on hold. I really like dnd, but I wish that they would finish what they started, and keep their promise. I really do hope it is only on hold and they do fullfill their promise.

magosstratus wrote:

I am really suprised by this. I love dnd and I do like the changes with 4th ed. What I had hoped was that the character visualizer would be up and running as well as the digital table top. Now that I read that it is put on hold that dissapoints me. I live in an area where there isn't a lot of dnd playing. The only group that is here is only for teenagers, and I am teacher. I am too old to play in that group. I was looking to play on the digital table top so that I can play dnd. I was also looking forward to the character visualizer but that is on hold to. This bugs me because I know that this was part of their main advertaisment for the game, and now it is on hold. I really like dnd, but I wish that they would finish what they started, and keep their promise. I really do hope it is only on hold and they do fullfill their promise.

Why are you too old to play with teenagers? I would bet you were a teenager playing this game once. We have a group that ranges from 11 to 44 in age. We dont have any problems.

Mithreinmaethor wrote:

Why are you too old to play with teenagers? I would bet you were a teenager playing this game once. We have a group that ranges from 11 to 44 in age. We dont have any problems.

Well he said he was a teacher so I think he means some of the people in the group might be his students. And because of all the "paranoid" people out there it is considered "inappropriate" for a teacher and their students to hang out in activities outside of school.

Even in college it's not considered "appropriate" as my professor in college said he couldn't come over to a big LAN party the students were having even though he was really into gaming because it wasn't allowed by school policy.

Even if you exclude any policy conflicts cause by his job as a teacher there is still the "paranoia" issue. As people get suspicious when a much older person starts hanging out with a bunch of teenagers.

PyroMancer2k wrote:

Well he said he was a teacher so I think he means some of the people in the group might be his students. And because of all the "paranoid" people out there it is considered "inappropriate" for a teacher and their students to hang out in activities outside of school.

Even in college it's not considered "appropriate" as my professor in college said he couldn't come over to a big LAN party the students were having even though he was really into gaming because it wasn't allowed by school policy.

Even if you exclude any policy conflicts cause by his job as a teacher there is still the "paranoia" issue. As people get suspicious when a much older person starts hanging out with a bunch of teenagers.

Crap, you know what this means?





I have to stop hanging out with teenagers. Oh well I guess I will have to relinquish the title "Frag King"...

Any news on the VTT anyway?

Current status:
Not in active development

Until that changes there will not be any news.

The Adventure Tools are under active development, and it isn't until that suite of software is done that we'll see any potential for change.

Thanks Wolfstar76 for clarifying things.

Have to say as a GM the Character Builder is the best bit of digital wizardry to come my way for quite some time, The original Character Generator that shipped with D&D 3.0 had a great interface but it never was completed, and E-Tools was just awful.

I GM for my two sons and their friends, as well as my own friends. Having the Charater Builder is a fantastic time saver and printing completed character sheets always puts a smile on the players face. (and saves me straining to read other ppls handwriting lol)

Just installed the Adventure Tools too and the Monster Builder is also just as good. If WotC keep the quaility of the other tools as high then the wait for the virtual table top will be worth it.

Kudos to the team!

There's so much potential in a VTT aplication directly from WotC that it just pains me to learn that it is not in active development at least.

Considering that you could release the modules straight from dragon & dungeon into that plataform (ready to play) every GM would have to be nuts not to be a DDi user.

WolfStar76 wrote:

Current status:
Not in active development

Until that changes there will not be any news.

The Adventure Tools are under active development, and it isn't until that suite of software is done that we'll see any potential for change.

What other features are planned for the Adventure tools ?

StanC wrote:

What other features are planned for the Adventure tools ?

Monster Builder (BETA is out already)

4 more...

I guess (and hope) it's trap/hazard, encounters (with tile mapping), adventures (with Mastrerplan-like flowcharts and maybe timelines and loc-based adventure support) & campaign (kinda wiki with links to all previuos tools).

WolfStar76 wrote:

Current status:
Not in active development

Until that changes there will not be any news.

The Adventure Tools are under active development, and it isn't until that suite of software is done that we'll see any potential for change.

In other words don't hold your breath for the next 5 years.

lokiare wrote:

In other words don't hold your breath for the next 5 years.

Hmm, so we'll have a VTT for 5E?

Otakkun wrote:

Hmm, so we'll have a VTT for 5E?

If you look at their track record. Its one program every year or so. It'll take about 4 more years for them to get the adventure tools out. Assuming they immediately pick up the GT as the next project (which is not at all likely) it'll take them 1-2 years to get it out in some kind of workable form.

Unless they deviate from their past and hire several more programmers and some other software support staff, I don't see them going any faster.

By then they'll be well on their way to making 5th edition because of the power imbalance of expansion products.

So in summary we MIGHT see the GT around the time they are talking about releasing 5th edition.

lokiare wrote:

If you look at their track record. Its one program every year or so. It'll take about 4 more years for them to get the adventure tools out. Assuming they immediately pick up the GT as the next project (which is not at all likely) it'll take them 1-2 years to get it out in some kind of workable form.

Unless they deviate from their past and hire several more programmers and some other software support staff, I don't see them going any faster.

By then they'll be well on their way to making 5th edition because of the power imbalance of expansion products.

So in summary we MIGHT see the GT around the time they are talking about releasing 5th edition.

Hmmm. 4E isn't yet to years old, and we have two softwares now (or will in a couple months, depending on how you want to classify the Monster Builder Beta that's out now).

How is that one every year? At worst it's one every *tries to do quick math on a Monday* 8 months.

You also don't know (nor do any of us) what the workable status of the existing Game Table code is. Having played with it at GenCon last year - unless they have to scrap ALL of it, it was actually coming along really nicely, I'd be surprised if it would take more than 6 months to put the final polish on it and get it out the door (again, assuming they don't have to scrap the code due to changes in the way the tools (will) integrate).

At GenCon 2007 when they announced 4E they stated (during the Q&A in front of a few thousand people) their intention was to design a game system that could last 10 years. That's no promise, no guarantee, but it is a goal I'd be quite surprised they don't make every effort to keep.

So far, while there's been some power creep, I don't see anything hugely unbalanced - in fact the game still scales quite nicely across all 30 levels.

WolfStar76 wrote:

Hmmm. 4E isn't yet to years old, and we have two softwares now (or will in a couple months, depending on how you want to classify the Monster Builder Beta that's out now).

How is that one every year? At worst it's one every *tries to do quick math on a Monday* 8 months.

You also don't know (nor do any of us) what the workable status of the existing Game Table code is. Having played with it at GenCon last year - unless they have to scrap ALL of it, it was actually coming along really nicely, I'd be surprised if it would take more than 6 months to put the final polish on it and get it out the door (again, assuming they don't have to scrap the code due to changes in the way the tools (will) integrate).

At GenCon 2007 when they announced 4E they stated (during the Q&A in front of a few thousand people) their intention was to design a game system that could last 10 years. That's no promise, no guarantee, but it is a goal I'd be quite surprised they don't make every effort to keep.

So far, while there's been some power creep, I don't see anything hugely unbalanced - in fact the game still scales quite nicely across all 30 levels.

Actually I think it was mentioned somewhere that they would have to take the GT and start over from scratch. Ok, say your right and its 8 months per tool that's still 32 months (2.6 years) before the adventure tools are done. Then tack on another 8-16 months (because the GT is massively more complex than the ATs) and you get 4 years.

So at minimum its going to take 4 years to get the GT out. Imagine how many people are choosing not to buy WotC books because they haven't got the GT out. Now imagine how many books that is. Now do some math. If there are even 100 people that are choosing not to purchase WotC books until the GT comes out. There is what one book per 2 months or so which is 6 books a year (I'm sure they come out more often). Each book is sold around $30.00. So WotC is losing out on $18,000.00 of profit because they are passing up the GT and working on some adventure tools. Whatever they've made their decision. Let them reap the losses.

lokiare wrote:

So at minimum its going to take 4 years to get the GT out. Imagine how many people are choosing not to buy WotC books because they haven't got the GT out. Now imagine how many books that is. Now do some math. If there are even 100 people that are choosing not to purchase WotC books until the GT comes out. There is what one book per 2 months or so which is 6 books a year (I'm sure they come out more often). Each book is sold around $30.00. So WotC is losing out on $18,000.00 of profit because they are passing up the GT and working on some adventure tools. Whatever they've made their decision. Let them reap the losses.

But WotC also has to take into account the lost revenue that they would incur if they put out sub-standard pieces of software. IMO, the potential losses by rushing out buggy software are more than outweighed by the gains they are getting by putting out software that is the quality of the Monster Builder and Character Builder.

mudbunny wrote:

But WotC also has to take into account the lost revenue that they would incur if they put out sub-standard pieces of software. IMO, the potential losses by rushing out buggy software are more than outweighed by the gains they are getting by putting out software that is the quality of the Monster Builder and Character Builder.

Not to mention the fact that it would probably cost them well over $18,000 to develop it. Coming from a background of working with 3D computer games I can tell you that the development cost will be well over that.

A lot of people have pointed to demonstrations of the VTT and wondered how it could have required large amounts of work to finish. My best guess would revolve around the art assets. It is very easy to setup a demonstration using a dozen different models. Unfortunately when you go back and have to try to code up a system that allows new character models to be generated 'on the fly' as it were (something the VTT was suppose to do) the complexity of the programming suddenly increases a great deal.

Likewise the demo was probably using a handful of specific maps. Adding in the ability for DMs to create their own maps and suddenly you have to make sure the code is much more bullet-proof (if there is a rendering problem with a specific map you can sort it out for the demo but you can't rely on that for a final product), add in an editor, and add in a way to send those newly created maps from the DM to the players. That's an enormous amount of additional complexity that you didn't have in the demo but that you can't do without in a final product.

So now you are looking at a serious amount of work for your programmers to go from demo to final product. Maybe you could find a coder to work for a few months who turns out code that does the job without crashing and that is maintainable by future coders. Just throwing out a quick (and wildly optimistic, imo) Fermi calculation you would pay such a person the equivalent of $60,000 a year for 3 months of work or $15,000.

Ok. $15,000 is less than $18,000 so it's a win. Except for the fact that you don't have any art assets yet. You need to hire 3D artists to create base character models. Just using PH, PH2, Eberron, and Forgotten Realms you have 19 races. Since there are male and female versions of each race that's 38 models. Each model has at least 6 types of armor to choose from. If you're clever you don't have to design 218 different suits of armor because you make the various character models related so that the armor for one can be distorted to fit another but that is still a lot of work.

When you're finally done with the characters you move onto all the models for the monsters. All in all it is a lot of work.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

Not to mention the fact that it would probably cost them well over $18,000 to develop it. Coming from a background of working with 3D computer games I can tell you that the development cost will be well over that.

A lot of people have pointed to demonstrations of the VTT and wondered how it could have required large amounts of work to finish. My best guess would revolve around the art assets. It is very easy to setup a demonstration using a dozen different models. Unfortunately when you go back and have to try to code up a system that allows new character models to be generated 'on the fly' as it were (something the VTT was suppose to do) the complexity of the programming suddenly increases a great deal.

Likewise the demo was probably using a handful of specific maps. Adding in the ability for DMs to create their own maps and suddenly you have to make sure the code is much more bullet-proof (if there is a rendering problem with a specific map you can sort it out for the demo but you can't rely on that for a final product), add in an editor, and add in a way to send those newly created maps from the DM to the players. That's an enormous amount of additional complexity that you didn't have in the demo but that you can't do without in a final product.

So now you are looking at a serious amount of work for your programmers to go from demo to final product. Maybe you could find a coder to work for a few months who turns out code that does the job without crashing and that is maintainable by future coders. Just throwing out a quick (and wildly optimistic, imo) Fermi calculation you would pay such a person the equivalent of $60,000 a year for 3 months of work or $15,000.

Ok. $15,000 is less than $18,000 so it's a win. Except for the fact that you don't have any art assets yet. You need to hire 3D artists to create base character models. Just using PH, PH2, Eberron, and Forgotten Realms you have 19 races. Since there are male and female versions of each race that's 38 models. Each model has at least 6 types of armor to choose from. If you're clever you don't have to design 218 different suits of armor because you make the various character models related so that the armor for one can be distorted to fit another but that is still a lot of work.

When you're finally done with the characters you move onto all the models for the monsters. All in all it is a lot of work.

Actually since the Game Table wasn't going to use physics and didn't really need a lot of collision or real-time effects it would be much cheaper than a full 3D game. I am myself a programmer and I could put out a basic 3D GT in about a months time just working in my free time, but not something as complex as the one WotC has been designing. Now as to the art I tend to agree with your initial assessment. Art costs money, but they would be shaving at least some of the cost off by using the CAD drawings from the more recent releases of the miniatures. To start out they wouldn't need a million monsters. They already said they would give out 2d tokens that could be used with it. So it could still be released with the 2d tokens which would take less than a week to gather every monster and create a token texture from the pictures (once you got the process down, it would be a matter of macroing it into an art program).

I just pulled the number 100 out of the air. Lets look at the survey 68% said they wanted the GT. So out of a 4000 person survey 2720 people want the GT. Lets say 25% of those people are voting with their wallets (a conservative estimate) 680 people. So if 680 people are not purchasing WotC books, you lose out on $489,600.00 in sales for books over the course of the 4+ year period. Now those numbers are just educated guesses based on the poll and the average times it takes WotC to do something. I could be completely off, but it makes you think.

Now since we agree that the GT is much more complex than the ATs or CB, then it might conceivably take much longer than the 16 months I allotted for it. This means even more sales loss.

What is the loss in sales if they don't put out the ATs in order. I can't speak for everyone but I don't see a huge loss in delaying the ATs because they only make things you can already do easier. They don't provide a completely different functionality.

lokiare wrote:

Now since we agree that the GT is much more complex than the ATs or CB, then it might conceivably take much longer than the 16 months I allotted for it. This means even more sales loss.

What is the loss in sales if they don't put out the ATs in order. I can't speak for everyone but I don't see a huge loss in delaying the ATs because they only make things you can already do easier. They don't provide a completely different functionality.

The only problem as I see it with doing things the other way (GT then the ATs) is that the GT will be (I am guessing) pulling in a lot of info from the various tools that it will interface with. By putting the tools out first, the designers of the GT have a very clear idea of what variables they are going to be pulling in, and can code to those specifications. To put the GT out first, and then release the ATs, you run the risk of either limiting the ATs based on a limitation in the GT, or having to go back and re-do parts of the GT in order to accommodate the data being pulled from the various tools.

Now this is just my opinion. I don't know what WotC is taking into account when they made their decision. Is money a apart of it, yes. However, a big part of it is also certainly providing tools for DMs to use as part of the DDI suite of goodies.

I actually wasn't including physics into the programming. I was simply focusing on the aspects of creating a 3D rendering engine, user interface, network stack, and necessary editing tools as well as necessary testing time and proper documentation to support future coders.

I would be surprised if you were able to create all of those from scratch within a month. Obviously if you were to use a solution such as Ogre3D or Torque you could probably get a good renderer and editor solution up within a month but now you've added licensing issues WotC might not wish to deal with.

As for using the CAD files for the figures, those might help a little but I am sure they are miles away from being a 'magic bullet' solution. You would still need textures and material definitions as well as face optimization.

You yourself give an estimate of 12-16 months for such a project (which I suspect is actually a lot lower than it really would be). If you had a team of 6 people (most likely more) earning $50,000 a year you are going to spend between $300,000 and $400,000 just in salaries. That doesn't include equipment costs or facilities, so in the end you will spend at least as much, if not more than your estimates.

Yes, you could cut a lot of corners and have lots of 2D tokens, more generic models for players, and less terrain to build adventures, but now you run the risk of backlash for pushing a poor product out the door.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

I actually wasn't including physics into the programming. I was simply focusing on the aspects of creating a 3D rendering engine, user interface, network stack, and necessary editing tools as well as necessary testing time and proper documentation to support future coders.

Most of that can be done nowadays by 3rd party engines that are pre-built. its just a matter of getting them to work together. The editing tools, testing time, and proper documentation might take much more time.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

I would be surprised if you were able to create all of those from scratch within a month. Obviously if you were to use a solution such as Ogre3D or Torque you could probably get a good renderer and editor solution up within a month but now you've added licensing issues WotC might not wish to deal with.

There are no licensing issues with products like Ogre3D and Irrlicht. You can use them however you want as long as you don't try to claim copyright on the actual engine/code from the engine itself. You don't in some cases even have to mention that you used the engine. Seriously no licensing issues with most of these products. I can throw together a good renderer in Irrlicht in just a couple of hours. I can put together a decent program in about a month or two.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

As for using the CAD files for the figures, those might help a little but I am sure they are miles away from being a 'magic bullet' solution. You would still need textures and material definitions as well as face optimization.

Yes, this has been discussed before. You can still use some conversion and optimization programs and easily make a model without texture in less than an hour. Afterward you will have to manually optimize it and make a texture, but it drastically reduces the effort that has to be put into the model.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

You yourself give an estimate of 12-16 months for such a project (which I suspect is actually a lot lower than it really would be). If you had a team of 6 people (most likely more) earning $50,000 a year you are going to spend between $300,000 and $400,000 just in salaries. That doesn't include equipment costs or facilities, so in the end you will spend at least as much, if not more than your estimates.

Yes, you could cut a lot of corners and have lots of 2D tokens, more generic models for players, and less terrain to build adventures, but now you run the risk of backlash for pushing a poor product out the door.

It depends on the amount of detail and whether they use licensed engines (which game companies use all the time with no problems) to do the difficult work. After that its just a matter of telling it to load the models and what to do with the camera and models and what information the network engine should pass around. There wouldn't be that many corners to cut. it just mainly depends on the features that they would want to include. The tiles and models are simply artwork more of the artists problem. Which is a whole other issue. I do think if they started over they would need to take longer to get it done. Probably a year to two minimum.

If they are earning $50,000 a year they better have 10+ years experience and be versed in a dozen or more languages. I'm talking about some programmers with 3-5 years experience and in depth knowledge of 1-2 languages. More like $30,000+ each which significantly reduces the budget.

The character visualizer would be used to create the player models. I'm assuming it would output the model in the format that the GT would use.

The salary range of $30,000 for someone with several years of experience seems a bit low to me. I have to admit to just making an educated guess for the $50,000 but after a quick Google for 'average salaries programmers' I'm pretty comfortable standing by it.

Yes, game companies do license engines all the time. They also pay for those licenses which adds to the expense. My background doesn't equip me with enough knowledge to know why they typically avoid using free engines such as Ogre3D but the fact that larger projects do would make me believe that WotC would likewise do the same.

I can, however, talk with experience about reusing art assets and I think you overestimate how much the CAD models would reduce the workload on the artists. One of the big subjects batted around my office is one of motion capture and I think it proves an excellent example. Some people wish to use motion capture as a sort of 'push button' solution. We do a mocap session and all the animators have to do is a little work to clean it up. Other people feel that mocap produces terrible results. Well, the truth is that if you try to use it as a push button solution it does. To get really good results out of mocap the animators have to spend almost as much time cleaning it up as they would if they animated by hand.

So why do something like using mocap in the first place? Because it allows your artists to spend more time concentrating on the fine details and lets them skip over the rough blocking. In the end you get a better product but if you don't put in the time (i.e. try to use it as a push button solution) you get a bad result.

A good example of this would be a skeleton. Because the image on the screen is probably going to be more than 1" high what seems acceptable as a miniature would probably be absolutely awful as a 3d model. Legs and arms would be far too thick, the ribcage would be a solid mass, etc.

As for the Character Visualizer creating the player models, actually I was assuming that to be the case. The Character Visualizer will still need all the base parts to assemble the model, however, which is where you get the 38 character models each able to wear 6 different suits of armor. Of course you'll also need all the different weapons, a variety of poses, and some ability to customize the characters (hair styles, beards, etc.).

Lastly, to say that there wouldn't be too many corners to cut and to say that the models and tiles are simply artwork misses the point, I think. The majority of the work that needs to be done is the artwork. My theoretical team of 6 for 12 to 16 months wasn't 6 programmers all working on the problem. As you said the coding side isn't too terribly difficult. It was one or two programmers and four or five artists. Most of the corner cutting would probably be in the range of art assets to cut.

In the end, however, we are both kind of whistling in the dark. Since we can only guess at what the people at WotC deem to be the minimum acceptable requirements for a product they can release it is very hard to determine how much they think it will cost. My original point was that I think you are underestimating the time and effort required to hit what I assume is their minimum standard but perhaps your goal is different than mine.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

The salary range of $30,000 for someone with several years of experience seems a bit low to me. I have to admit to just making an educated guess for the $50,000 but after a quick Google for 'average salaries programmers' I'm pretty comfortable standing by it.

Yes, but we are talking about GAME programmers. Do a search and you'll see they are one of the most underpaid segments of programmers.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

Yes, game companies do license engines all the time. They also pay for those licenses which adds to the expense. My background doesn't equip me with enough knowledge to know why they typically avoid using free engines such as Ogre3D but the fact that larger projects do would make me believe that WotC would likewise do the same.

I think if you Wikipedia Ogre3D and Irrlicht you can find several examples of where they were used by big name companies to make games. I could be wrong because I haven't checked, but I do know they were used.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

I can, however, talk with experience about reusing art assets and I think you overestimate how much the CAD models would reduce the workload on the artists. One of the big subjects batted around my office is one of motion capture and I think it proves an excellent example. Some people wish to use motion capture as a sort of 'push button' solution. We do a mocap session and all the animators have to do is a little work to clean it up. Other people feel that mocap produces terrible results. Well, the truth is that if you try to use it as a push button solution it does. To get really good results out of mocap the animators have to spend almost as much time cleaning it up as they would if they animated by hand.

Its quite possible you are right about this as I'm not an artist, but any speedup would be helpful. Also they don't have to start out with 1,000 3D minis. Just a handful and add to it each month.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

So why do something like using mocap in the first place? Because it allows your artists to spend more time concentrating on the fine details and lets them skip over the rough blocking. In the end you get a better product but if you don't put in the time (i.e. try to use it as a push button solution) you get a bad result.

A good example of this would be a skeleton. Because the image on the screen is probably going to be more than 1" high what seems acceptable as a miniature would probably be absolutely awful as a 3d model. Legs and arms would be far too thick, the ribcage would be a solid mass, etc.

Probably true, I have no way of knowing.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

As for the Character Visualizer creating the player models, actually I was assuming that to be the case. The Character Visualizer will still need all the base parts to assemble the model, however, which is where you get the 38 character models each able to wear 6 different suits of armor. Of course you'll also need all the different weapons, a variety of poses, and some ability to customize the characters (hair styles, beards, etc.).

I'm not sure what you are saying here. I do know that Irrlicht can composite 3D models and save them into a new file as part of the engine itself. So the character visualizer if made with something with similar capabilities would simply need to save the 3D model and then the game table would just load it up without having millions of little pieces.

madscientistlabrat wrote:

Lastly, to say that there wouldn't be too many corners to cut and to say that the models and tiles are simply artwork misses the point, I think. The majority of the work that needs to be done is the artwork. My theoretical team of 6 for 12 to 16 months wasn't 6 programmers all working on the problem. As you said the coding side isn't too terribly difficult. It was one or two programmers and four or five artists. Most of the corner cutting would probably be in the range of art assets to cut.

In the end, however, we are both kind of whistling in the dark. Since we can only guess at what the people at WotC deem to be the minimum acceptable requirements for a product they can release it is very hard to determine how much they think it will cost. My original point was that I think you are underestimating the time and effort required to hit what I assume is their minimum standard but perhaps your goal is different than mine.

Well I was giving it a minimum time frame. Maximum we are looking at another 2-3 years just for the CV and GT. This means about on the outside 7 years wait for the GT (since the CV would need to be made first). Which means its even closer to 5th edition than I postulated earlier.

My own experiences with game programmers haven't really shown them to be underpaid, but I will admit my experience has been primarily with a single company (and not EA which does have a rep) so it's possible that most other game companies tend to underpay. Competition tends to be pretty fierce in the industry.

I wouldn't really call the companies working on the projects listed by Wikipedia A list companies, though Runic seems to have some good talent (not sure what their financing is like).

What I was saying about the Character Visualizer is that while it is not too terribly difficult to make an engine build a composite model you still need the initial parts for the composite model to be assembled from and that is a lot of pieces. Added to that is the fact that composite pieces are trickier to build than ordinary models. On a normal model you need to design a suit of chainmail that fits the model and looks good. For something like the Character Visualizer you need to make the suit of chainmail so that it can be distorted to fit 19 or 38 different models (depending on whether the item is gender specific) and still look good. It will need to be able to be worn with a wide variety of other equipment (backpacks, cloaks, scabbards, bows, quivers, gloves, arm slot items, head slot items, boots, etc.) and be constructed so that the artists can generate modified textures (hopefully something more than just tinting) for all the magical variations without requiring a totally separate texture for each one (trim areas that can receive separate texture maps, for example). Now add in the fact that that armor needs to hold up in a variety of different poses (if the models carrying two handed swords stand like the models carrying bows it's going to look pretty bad) and I think you can begin to appreciate how much work is required on the part of the artists.

All in all a pretty serious undertaking and not something you want a bunch of brand new programmers/artists to be attempting.

Again, you can always cut corners (one pose, arm slot items aren't visible, a single texture for each armor tye so all chainmail suits look alike, etc.) but at what point will releasing such a cutdown product cause more problems than it solves?

madscientistlabrat wrote:

My own experiences with game programmers haven't really shown them to be underpaid, but I will admit my experience has been primarily with a single company (and not EA which does have a rep) so it's possible that most other game companies tend to underpay. Competition tends to be pretty fierce in the industry.

I wouldn't really call the companies working on the projects listed by Wikipedia A list companies, though Runic seems to have some good talent (not sure what their financing is like).

What I was saying about the Character Visualizer is that while it is not too terribly difficult to make an engine build a composite model you still need the initial parts for the composite model to be assembled from and that is a lot of pieces. Added to that is the fact that composite pieces are trickier to build than ordinary models. On a normal model you need to design a suit of chainmail that fits the model and looks good. For something like the Character Visualizer you need to make the suit of chainmail so that it can be distorted to fit 19 or 38 different models (depending on whether the item is gender specific) and still look good. It will need to be able to be worn with a wide variety of other equipment (backpacks, cloaks, scabbards, bows, quivers, gloves, arm slot items, head slot items, boots, etc.) and be constructed so that the artists can generate modified textures (hopefully something more than just tinting) for all the magical variations without requiring a totally separate texture for each one (trim areas that can receive separate texture maps, for example). Now add in the fact that that armor needs to hold up in a variety of different poses (if the models carrying two handed swords stand like the models carrying bows it's going to look pretty bad) and I think you can begin to appreciate how much work is required on the part of the artists.

All in all a pretty serious undertaking and not something you want a bunch of brand new programmers/artists to be attempting.

Again, you can always cut corners (one pose, arm slot items aren't visible, a single texture for each armor tye so all chainmail suits look alike, etc.) but at what point will releasing such a cutdown product cause more problems than it solves?

I agree that it would take a lot of artwork assets to get it done in perfect form. Of course not quite as much as what your indicating. If you don't think it is possible or even quick, check out the time that it took to add a type of armor to the Neverwinter Nights editor. Not very long and not many artists (check on the update not the entire game). Really its just a matter of matching custom nodes within the 3D object (armor) to other custom nodes within the 3D object (character), and resizing to match. Heck they could even do some kind of math for the distance between two points to get the scale difference. Its more important to note the amount of detail they want to put into it. If it is highly detailed then it might be more difficult and require more artists and more time. If it is low detail, then it might not take much time at all.

The programmers I'm talking about aren't programming gurus, but at the same time they are far from being beginners. Most will have had college and at least a couple of years working in the field. So they will know what they are doing in their respective fields.

Armor holding up in a variety of poses is relatively easy. If it mirrors real armor then it can be easily made to look good in any pose. If it doesn't, the only thing that needs to be done is making sure each segment of armors edge matches the next parts edge (which is easily done by binding two point on the 3D model together).

Wow, now this is a bit of a deep creek, isn't it?

Well, let's think about this for a moment. What in essence, does WotC gain by screwing its entire fanbase over for something that doesn't amount to more than a quick buck?

The answer is they don't.

I think some people have been a bit tough on Wizards for 4e. But I think people are being a wee bit selfish in their rants and a bit short sighted. First off, the delay in part might be blamed upon the recession, that hit hard last fall. It has for sure, hurt my ability to purchase the Draconion and Manual of the Planes. I can only imagine how much this must have cut down Wizard's budget for the project, as well as the sales that they might have been hoping to of made with the new edition.

Wizards took a massive gamble when they decided to put an end to 3e and start 4e, especially with a fanbase that had already invested so greately in their previous edition. Simply slapping one new rules to the old genre would be percieved as nothing more than money grubbing and more so with the fact that 3.5 had been released not so long ago. Further risk is further induced due to two other factors; WoW and the recent fantasy explosion and the fact that Wizards is a big time company.

It's rather obvious that Wizards has been inspired to some degree to use some of the methods that WoW has put forth to streamline their system...but that doesn't mean they want to make a cheap copy. Doing so would easily be spotted and revealed to be what it is. And not only would Wizards lose its fanbase, but their product may look so identical to a more established and somewhat "cooler" product that they've gained nothing. But then again, it's also silly not to use a good concept for your game. It's basically calling car designers cheap con artists because they use wheels in their designs rather than coming up with their own shapes.

Add this together with the big company look for Wizards and you've got a hostile fanbase and no gain.

And I think the response from some of the fanbase is rather unfair in this manner. Wizards has gone out of their way to offer us an olive branch. They supplied us with Dragon and Dungeon Magazines for a few months to let us have a feel for what sort of quality they have to offer us. They came out with silly cartoons to appeal to our humor and let us know they don't per say consider this the comign of Christ. It's good, but they want to have fun with it. They let us in on the designs of what's going on and not only give us teasers, but teasers full of lore that makes us want to scream for more. And they promised us not only a brand new system for better game play (or at least a new spin on it), but a way to do so over the internet with a great program that will make it as close to the real thing as possible.

And you know what?

They ****ed up.

They ****ed up big time.

For some reason, something in the planning or developing stages just didn't go well and now we're over a year behind for what they promised us. But you know what? People, even big companies (especially big companies) make mistakes. Major ones.

But at no point have any of you been cheated. To an extent, they have failed you, but they didn't cheat you. Your all sitting around blowing your hornes of how you can apparently do this in six months (or some equal) and go about beating Wizards over the head for it. There is a massive difference between the doctor who gave your old grandma sugar pills while telling her it will cure cancer and the doctor who promised that he'd save your dad from death, but despite everything he tried, it just fell apart.

I think Wizards falls into the later. They have nothing to gain from putting out a new system with the promise of a great new product to go with it only to recall on the later. It ruins their reputation and without it, their chances of making a profit off of D&D hits Nessus and the company itself is shamed.

As it is, they look pretty bad. Their new product still isn't out...one that they made a fairly big deal about. But they are clearly trying to keep what part of the deal they can. We still have new Dungeon & Dragon Magazines coming out with amazing quality, continuity, and dedication. The people who write these articles clearly care about their job and are putting all they reasonably can into making it good. And look at the Character Generator; sure we don't have full models yet, but the generator itself is working well and is of good quality. It even allows me to upload pictures for characters. As it is, it is a stand alone product that someone might buy for a cheap price. And then there's the Monster Builder, which thus far looks amazing. Granted, it would be nice if I had some pictures and perhaps even a bit of Knowledge check fluffs, because at times I don't even know what I'm looking at for new monsters or how they work within the new edition. However, the monster generator works pretty well and the monsters are the real McCoy (save for a few mistakes that people point out and the issue with getting Tiamat to work in the system).

In short, they're trying and while we haven't been given what we're promised, we are getting what we pay for and we get it with quality. Now, if they wanted to cheat us, they'd give us a cheap program. Basic character sheets with little style and incredibly dull design that gets the job done with all the joy of filling out tax forms. Or the monster builder could just have basic monsters from MM1. Hell, they could get away with just adding in MM2.

But that isn't what they're doing. We have stats for creatures from the Dragon's magazine, Open Grave, Dungeon, and just about every sourcebook out there. They're giving us a massive database. A good one.

I think that some of us should stop acting like hostile customers and give Wizards a break. Yes, they messed up and they did so at one of the worst times a company can, but despite this they haven't given up. Recent articles are still good, well written, and inspiring. Content quality control is well kept and they work hard to give us our money's worth, even if it isn't the product we (or they, that's important to remember) were hoping for.

What I'm trying to say is that instead of grabbing mounds of dirt and trash to build our moral high ground, we should be supporting Wizards. Oh don't get me wrong, you don't have to like 4e or be a part of them at all. But if you want their products and you like what they sell, screaming about how much they suck doesn't help. It just makes them not want to do business with you anymore. We can be wary in our customer relationship with Wizards, but we shouldn't be treating them like they're the enemy. These people deserve better than what they've been dealt by portions of this community (be it intentional flamming or an knee-jerk response to the issue at hand).

We are the consumers and if we provide a reasonable support for Wizards when they need it, they will learn that we are of value to them and they'll work with us. But no one is going to return affection if they are being told of how much they suck because things didn't go as planned.

Anywho, I didn't mean for this rant to go on and I don't intent to insult anyone here, but I just want people to stop taking a rather self-absorbed perception of the situation and just cool down a bit.

And to Wizard's team; thank you for working as hard as you are to keep this goal from dying and thank you for the quality product (if incomplete) that you are supplying us with. Good luck getting this to work.

Mith_The_Godling wrote:

Wow, now this is a bit of a deep creek, isn't it?

Well, let's think about this for a moment. What in essence, does WotC gain by screwing its entire fanbase over for something that doesn't amount to more than a quick buck?

The answer is they don't.

I think some people have been a bit tough on Wizards for 4e. But I think people are being a wee bit selfish in their rants and a bit short sighted. First off, the delay in part might be blamed upon the recession, that hit hard last fall. It has for sure, hurt my ability to purchase the Draconion and Manual of the Planes. I can only imagine how much this must have cut down Wizard's budget for the project, as well as the sales that they might have been hoping to of made with the new edition.

Wizards took a massive gamble when they decided to put an end to 3e and start 4e, especially with a fanbase that had already invested so greately in their previous edition. Simply slapping one new rules to the old genre would be percieved as nothing more than money grubbing and more so with the fact that 3.5 had been released not so long ago. Further risk is further induced due to two other factors; WoW and the recent fantasy explosion and the fact that Wizards is a big time company.

It's rather obvious that Wizards has been inspired to some degree to use some of the methods that WoW has put forth to streamline their system...but that doesn't mean they want to make a cheap copy. Doing so would easily be spotted and revealed to be what it is. And not only would Wizards lose its fanbase, but their product may look so identical to a more established and somewhat "cooler" product that they've gained nothing. But then again, it's also silly not to use a good concept for your game. It's basically calling car designers cheap con artists because they use wheels in their designs rather than coming up with their own shapes.

Add this together with the big company look for Wizards and you've got a hostile fanbase and no gain.

And I think the response from some of the fanbase is rather unfair in this manner. Wizards has gone out of their way to offer us an olive branch. They supplied us with Dragon and Dungeon Magazines for a few months to let us have a feel for what sort of quality they have to offer us. They came out with silly cartoons to appeal to our humor and let us know they don't per say consider this the comign of Christ. It's good, but they want to have fun with it. They let us in on the designs of what's going on and not only give us teasers, but teasers full of lore that makes us want to scream for more. And they promised us not only a brand new system for better game play (or at least a new spin on it), but a way to do so over the internet with a great program that will make it as close to the real thing as possible.

And you know what?

They ****ed up.

They ****ed up big time.

For some reason, something in the planning or developing stages just didn't go well and now we're over a year behind for what they promised us. But you know what? People, even big companies (especially big companies) make mistakes. Major ones.

But at no point have any of you been cheated. To an extent, they have failed you, but they didn't cheat you. Your all sitting around blowing your hornes of how you can apparently do this in six months (or some equal) and go about beating Wizards over the head for it. There is a massive difference between the doctor who gave your old grandma sugar pills while telling her it will cure cancer and the doctor who promised that he'd save your dad from death, but despite everything he tried, it just fell apart.

I think Wizards falls into the later. They have nothing to gain from putting out a new system with the promise of a great new product to go with it only to recall on the later. It ruins their reputation and without it, their chances of making a profit off of D&D hits Nessus and the company itself is shamed.

As it is, they look pretty bad. Their new product still isn't out...one that they made a fairly big deal about. But they are clearly trying to keep what part of the deal they can. We still have new Dungeon & Dragon Magazines coming out with amazing quality, continuity, and dedication. The people who write these articles clearly care about their job and are putting all they reasonably can into making it good. And look at the Character Generator; sure we don't have full models yet, but the generator itself is working well and is of good quality. It even allows me to upload pictures for characters. As it is, it is a stand alone product that someone might buy for a cheap price. And then there's the Monster Builder, which thus far looks amazing. Granted, it would be nice if I had some pictures and perhaps even a bit of Knowledge check fluffs, because at times I don't even know what I'm looking at for new monsters or how they work within the new edition. However, the monster generator works pretty well and the monsters are the real McCoy (save for a few mistakes that people point out and the issue with getting Tiamat to work in the system).

In short, they're trying and while we haven't been given what we're promised, we are getting what we pay for and we get it with quality. Now, if they wanted to cheat us, they'd give us a cheap program. Basic character sheets with little style and incredibly dull design that gets the job done with all the joy of filling out tax forms. Or the monster builder could just have basic monsters from MM1. Hell, they could get away with just adding in MM2.

But that isn't what they're doing. We have stats for creatures from the Dragon's magazine, Open Grave, Dungeon, and just about every sourcebook out there. They're giving us a massive database. A good one.

I think that some of us should stop acting like hostile customers and give Wizards a break. Yes, they messed up and they did so at one of the worst times a company can, but despite this they haven't given up. Recent articles are still good, well written, and inspiring. Content quality control is well kept and they work hard to give us our money's worth, even if it isn't the product we (or they, that's important to remember) were hoping for.

What I'm trying to say is that instead of grabbing mounds of dirt and trash to build our moral high ground, we should be supporting Wizards. Oh don't get me wrong, you don't have to like 4e or be a part of them at all. But if you want their products and you like what they sell, screaming about how much they suck doesn't help. It just makes them not want to do business with you anymore. We can be wary in our customer relationship with Wizards, but we shouldn't be treating them like they're the enemy. These people deserve better than what they've been dealt by portions of this community (be it intentional flamming or an knee-jerk response to the issue at hand).

We are the consumers and if we provide a reasonable support for Wizards when they need it, they will learn that we are of value to them and they'll work with us. But no one is going to return affection if they are being told of how much they suck because things didn't go as planned.

Anywho, I didn't mean for this rant to go on and I don't intent to insult anyone here, but I just want people to stop taking a rather self-absorbed perception of the situation and just cool down a bit.

And to Wizard's team; thank you for working as hard as you are to keep this goal from dying and thank you for the quality product (if incomplete) that you are supplying us with. Good luck getting this to work.

Actually there is a whole segment of people that were "cheated". Let's see what cheated actually means. Wikipedia says this about cheating

Cheating is an act of lying, deception, fraud, trickery, imposture, or imposition. Cheating characteristically is employed to create an unfair advantage, usually in one's own interest, and often at the expense of others.[1] Cheating implies the breaking of rules. The term "cheating" is less applicable to the breaking of laws, as illegal activities are referred to by specific legal terminology such as fraud or corruption.

When WotC definitely lied when they said the VTT would be out by release (regardless of whether they went back and changed their story), they lied when they said they would have the character visualizer out by release, they lied when they said they would have a code in the back of the books that would allow the owner to access a digital version of the book online. Even though they came back later and said the stuff would be delayed, or that they were putting it "on the side to work on something else" (i.e. its dead), they still initially lied. Therefore those of us that believed them and bought into D&D4E were tricked by lies. Yes they said it would be delayed by a few months, but once again that turned out to be a lie (even though they later corrected themselves at the time it was a lie). So a lot of the people that bought the books at the 4E release or pre-ordered them thinking "oh its been delayed a few months" and then got shafted were tricked by lies, and therefore me and those like me were cheated by WotC. It may not be pretty, but its true.

Now are they cheating us right now? I'm not so inclined to agree, because they've cleaned up the way they communicate. They no longer tell us release dates or what features a product will have until the product is in beta. This is good for them. Of course a lot of us would like to see a reverse release date instead, so we can gauge the minimum amount of time it would take to see the product. Something along the lines of "you won't see this product for at least 1 year."

So in short they did cheat a lot of people, but they are currently not cheating anyone that I know of.

xavier222 wrote:

And this would be why I'm glad that I didn't subscribe to DDI yet. I'll just wait until the game table is operational.

Thats why I didn't spend any money on it. I wanted the Table. So glad I didn't wast any Cash.

lokiare wrote:

When WotC definitely lied when they said the VTT would be out by release (regardless of whether they went back and changed their story), they lied when they said they would have the character visualizer out by release.

They may not have met that goal, but it wasn't lying if they expected it to be true when they said it.

they lied when they said they would have a code in the back of the books that would allow the owner to access a digital version of the book online.

They announced SIX MONTHS before the release of the books that this concept had been dropped.

Even though they came back later and said the stuff would be delayed, or that they were putting it "on the side to work on something else" (i.e. its dead), they still initially lied. Therefore those of us that believed them and bought into D&D4E were tricked by lies. Yes they said it would be delayed by a few months, but once again that turned out to be a lie (even though they later corrected themselves at the time it was a lie). So a lot of the people that bought the books at the 4E release or pre-ordered them thinking "oh its been delayed a few months" and then got shafted were tricked by lies, and therefore me and those like me were cheated by WotC. It may not be pretty, but its true.

My turn to pull out a dictionary reference:

[indent]lie
1  /laɪ/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [lahy] Show IPA noun, verb, lied, ly⋅ing.
Use lie in a Sentence
–noun
1. a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood.[/indent]

See that part about a DELIBERATE INTENT TO DECEIVE?

If WotC has been unable to meet goals - yes, they've failed. And that's a disappointment for everyone (us the customers *AND* them the sellers).

However, if they've been honest with us about their goals and expectations - that's a far cry from lying.

It may be indicative of other problems (poor project management, over promising, lack of foresight re: economy, etc) - but it isn't lying.

I really don't understand why people insist that Wizards was being dishonest. That doesn't work for them in any way possible, save to make a quick buck...which doesn't work if you want to sell a line of books and products to the same people you smacked in the face.

Seriously, does anyone here actually believe that the big wigs actually approved of something so stupid? Yeah, they're out to make a profit and they might to less then admirable things sometimes, but I don't think Dispater runs the entire department.

WolfStar76 wrote:

They may not have met that goal, but it wasn't lying if they expected it to be true when they said it.

According to your own quoted definition of a lie it was a 'falsehood', one of the three definitions of a lie. Sure it may not have been intentional but they still lied.

WolfStar76 wrote:

They announced SIX MONTHS before the release of the books that this concept had been dropped.

I'll agree to that, however that doesn't change the fact that it didn't come to pass as they said it would, and therefore it was a 'falsehood' and a lie. Even if they come out later and changed what they said.

WolfStar76 wrote:

My turn to pull out a dictionary reference:

[indent]lie
1  /laɪ/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [lahy] Show IPA noun, verb, lied, ly⋅ing.
Use lie in a Sentence
–noun
1.     a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood.[/indent]

See that part about a DELIBERATE INTENT TO DECEIVE?

If WotC has been unable to meet goals - yes, they've failed.  And that's a disappointment for everyone (us the customers *AND* them the sellers).

However, if they've been honest with us about their goals and expectations - that's a far cry from lying.

It may be indicative of other problems (poor project management, over promising, lack of foresight re: economy, etc) - but it isn't lying.

Each of those sentences is a separate definition of 'lie', therefore 'a falshood' is still a lie. So by your own evidence they lied. Now I didn't say they did it on purpose or that it was malicious, but it DID happen.

As to what is happening now, they don't appear to be lying about anything (well with the exception of what the current status of the GT is). Which is making me begin to believe that someone there actually cares about something other than money.

I'm still pretty new, and this arguing about the meaning of words etc, what is really the point?

the fact is that we are all very disappointed that the VTT is not available yet.. but truth is that we have managed for 30 years without one and we just have to manage for a few more..

I would love to see the VTT but for now I will make due with the myriad of tools that are available (masterplanner and maptools come to mind)

but I think even currently for $10 USD D&Di subscription it is well worth it! I'm a DM and having all creatures of the compendium at my finger tips and not to mention the awesome character builder.. and now the latest Monster builder.. Not to mention Dungeons magazines and the adventures that comes with it.. (as I'm running the scales of war campaign)

For me, D&Di subscription even in its current state is a no brainer worth every penny..

and over the next couple of years if they roll out more things the value will just explode.. and if in a few years they do roll out the VTT, well that would be awesome and be the crown achievement..

but till then,
let the dice roll and let your imagination be your guide.

double post because of the WotC maintenance downtime..

lokiare wrote:

If they are earning $50,000 a year they better have 10+ years experience and be versed in a dozen or more languages. I'm talking about some programmers with 3-5 years experience and in depth knowledge of 1-2 languages. More like $30,000+ each which significantly reduces the budget.

Nonsense. The average salary for a game programmer is in the mid 50s. *I* have 10+ years experience and I have a 6 figure salary and for the record I've never been paid less than $50k a year, even when I first started. I would have laughed at someone offering me $30k.

The information is easily available. It astounds me why you would just make something like that up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_programmer

Guivre wrote:

Nonsense. The average salary for a game programmer is in the mid 50s. *I* have 10+ years experience and I have a 6 figure salary and for the record I've never been paid less than $50k a year, even when I first started. I would have laughed at someone offering me $30k.

The information is easily available. It astounds me why you would just make something like that up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_programmer

Well since Wikipedia is the end all be all of knowledge, I'll have to bow out and admit that I may have estimated on the low side. The places that I got my estimates www.gamasutra.com and other places that are similar say otherwise though.

Martin_cy wrote:

I'm still pretty new, and this arguing about the meaning of words etc, what is really the point?

the fact is that we are all very disappointed that the VTT is not available yet.. but truth is that we have managed for 30 years without one and we just have to manage for a few more..

I would love to see the VTT but for now I will make due with the myriad of tools that are available (masterplanner and maptools come to mind)

but I think even currently for $10 USD D&Di subscription it is well worth it! I'm a DM and having all creatures of the compendium at my finger tips and not to mention the awesome character builder.. and now the latest Monster builder.. Not to mention Dungeons magazines and the adventures that comes with it.. (as I'm running the scales of war campaign)

For me, D&Di subscription even in its current state is a no brainer worth every penny..

and over the next couple of years if they roll out more things the value will just explode.. and if in a few years they do roll out the VTT, well that would be awesome and be the crown achievement..

but till then,
let the dice roll and let your imagination be your guide.

What a really pleasant way to say "shut up about the GT" in a thread about the GT.

Guivre wrote:

Nonsense. The average salary for a game programmer is in the mid 50s. *I* have 10+ years experience and I have a 6 figure salary and for the record I've never been paid less than $50k a year, even when I first started. I would have laughed at someone offering me $30k.

The information is easily available. It astounds me why you would just make something like that up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_programmer

I'd just like to add, that I one day wish to achieve a 6 figure salary in the game programming field.

lokiare wrote:

Well since Wikipedia is the end all be all of knowledge, I'll have to bow out and admit that I may have estimated on the low side. The places that I got my estimates www.gamasutra.com and other places that are similar say otherwise though.

No you didn't. You're backpedalling and making stuff up.

2007 Salary Survey from Gamasutra: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_i … tory=18212

Show me the $30k for a programmer. If you're going to make claims on numbers back them up. Show evidence.

I'd just like to add, that I one day wish to achieve a 6 figure salary in the game programming field.

Actually I didn't mean to imply that I was a game programmer. I have no desire to be. I am however a (senior) software engineer.

Software engineer salaries are comparable across the market. The point I was making was that at no point in my career, even a fresh out of college newbie, would I have accepted a $30k a year job, not today, and not 12 years ago when I started. Especially not in an industry with a reputation for death marching it's coders.

Guivre wrote:

No you didn't. You're backpedalling and making stuff up.

2007 Salary Survey from Gamasutra: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_i … tory=18212

Show me the $30k for a programmer. If you're going to make claims on numbers back them up. Show evidence.




Actually I didn't mean to imply that I was a game programmer. I have no desire to be. I am however a (senior) software engineer.

Software engineer salaries are comparable across the market. The point I was making was that at no point in my career, even a fresh out of college newbie, would I have accepted a $30k a year job, not today, and not 12 years ago when I started. Especially not in an industry with a reputation for death marching it's coders.

I was about ready to concede the point, but then you had to link to an average. lets say 1 senior programmer makes $100k per year and two programmers just starting out make $30k whats the average of that? 53k averaged. Is that accurate? probably not. I have been told throughout college that game programmers have a harder job and make less money than programmers in other fields. If you can supply some actual facts that are not skewed I will gladly concede the point, until then I'll wait for facts.

Yes, it is the same reason I paid for 4th edition materials. What a disappointment and ripoff.

Darth Smaul wrote:

that is a real bummer, that was one of the reasons I paid for one year of D&DI.



oh well.

steve

well i sold all my 3.5 stuff just because i thought they were going to be doing this soon...now they cancel it and im disappointed with 4th along with many other ppl here in town...but i would had been happy for the dig table to be done soon...now you say its been placed on hold...well i think im going back to 3.5...really sucks ppl are out for money they have to keep bleed ing you with more and more books..all the other editions all you really needed was the PH, the DMG and the MM now if you want basic classes from the other editions you need all 3 PHs probablly all DMG and we will have mass quanity of MMs but the MMs arefine by me....

AH_hellstorm wrote:

well i sold all my 3.5 stuff just because i thought they were going to be doing this soon...now they cancel it and im disappointed with 4th along with many other ppl here in town...but i would had been happy for the dig table to be done soon...now you say its been placed on hold...well i think im going back to 3.5...really sucks ppl are out for money they have to keep bleed ing you with more and more books..all the other editions all you really needed was the PH, the DMG and the MM now if you want basic classes from the other editions you need all 3 PHs probablly all DMG and we will have mass quanity of MMs but the MMs arefine by me....

I agree and had nearly the same thing happen to me. The problem is I really like 4E (flaws included), but without the GT I'm just wasting time that could be better spent on an MMO where I can actually socialize with other people through the internet while I play.

I think both sides are making valid points and refuse to acknowledge some of the valid points made by the other side.

For instance, Wizards of the Coast did advertise the digital tabletop before 4e was even released. They were using it as a major selling tool for their content and for the DDI subscription. Now, no, they didn't screw anyone over, they probably got screwed over themselves, but yes, we did get a promise made to us that wasn't delivered to us on the tentative schedule that was given. Many people invested money into DDI and D&D 4e in general because they wanted to play online. Yes, there are other online options, good ones, but they are not as easy to learn and accessable as we have been taught the digital tabletop will be.

DDI does have a lot of additional content that does give it value, but why defend WotC and/or try to convince people in general that they are wrong for being upset at WotC because they promised something and didn't deliver? I understand the logic that some have given, but I find some of the positions people are taking as rather selfish and insensitive to others. Just because you find value in DDI doesn't mean everyone else will, as we are all in different situations, and in my mind, if someone says buy x and I'll give you y soon, then y becomes part of the the informal contract / agreement for me buying x. Does that really make such little sense? I'm not interested in the legal ramifications of that statement, I'm just talking about one honest person dealing with another.

WotC made a mistake. There's no sense glossing it over or defending them for it. It wasn't just about a 3rd party dropping the ball, WotC did as well with their marketing plan for DDI. They promised something and didn't deliver. As some have stated they have all the resources they need to deliver, but they don't want to diminish profits by hiring on additional developers, even as contractors. In essence they've chosen that their bottom line is more important than keeping their word and satisfying customers, or arguing perhaps in a rather dishonest spirit that they never gave their word and used wording like 'coming soon' which is relative and subjective and suits their needs whatever the situation.

No doubt there are good people working at WotC and Hasbro that deserve to be given credit, but at the end of the day executive/management decisions are being made that are in the best interest of Hasbro's shareholders, not in the best interest of the customers. Is that standard today? Unfortunately yes, but just because it's standard does not make it right, nor does it undermine in any way the justification of customers feeling angry, frusterated, ripped off, or deceived.

I also want to say I agree wholeheartedly with some of the family-aged people who are posting. My books mainly serve as paper weights because I don't have the time to spend hours away from my family, nor do I know enough people in my local area who would play D&D face to face. I don't know that having the digital tabletop would allow me to play any more often than having maptools, but it definitely would be nice to have something I was promised when I paid for DDI, which was also the main reason I paid for it as well.

Now I'm not of the mind that Hasbro needs to be boycotted, or that D&D has ripped me off, and that I've lost faith in the brand. I enjoy D&D, it's still the best rules set out there in my opinion, and I have faith that the average joe who works at Hasbro/WotC is more interested in getting me and you the digital table top as fast as possible moreso than they are about Hasbro's bottom line despite how tired they might feel about hearing the criticism. This is how this world is today. Modern business ethics are not very altruistic in any regard, despite the fact that many people who work for companies may be fine people. Hasbro is going to charge us as much as they can get away with, and exhaust as little resources as they can get away with. That's just how it rolls these days. It's all about maximizing revenue and minimizing expenses right? So I see little purpose in taking this out on Hasbro or WotC. It would only serve to hurt the product I love, and as a religious man, I trust the man upstairs to separate the wheat from the chaff when all is said in done, that's not my job here on earth.

So I guess what I'm saying is this: WotC screwed up. Don't defend that. It was not intentional, but they haven't made any effort whatsoever (that I can see) to make up for their screw up. So don't defend that either. People paid for something and only received a part of what they were promised, so don't try to convince them they are wrong for feeling cheated, they aren't. Just because you have a great use for the parts of what was promised that you do have, doesn't mean everyone does. Don't contend that Hasbro is not a greedy corporation. Greed is rampant in this world, and just because they are no different than the majority does not make them any less greedy. If they weren't greedy they'd have taken a cut in profits in order to keep their word and satisfy the people who make them rich.

That's about all I have to say.

Gicker wrote:

I think both sides are making valid points and refuse to acknowledge some of the valid points made by the other side.

For instance, Wizards of the Coast did advertise the digital tabletop before 4e was even released. They were using it as a major selling tool for their content and for the DDI subscription. Now, no, they didn't screw anyone over, they probably got screwed over themselves, but yes, we did get a promise made to us that wasn't delivered to us on the tentative schedule that was given. Many people invested money into DDI and D&D 4e in general because they wanted to play online. Yes, there are other online options, good ones, but they are not as easy to learn and accessable as we have been taught the digital tabletop will be.

DDI does have a lot of additional content that does give it value, but why defend WotC and/or try to convince people in general that they are wrong for being upset at WotC because they promised something and didn't deliver? I understand the logic that some have given, but I find some of the positions people are taking as rather selfish and insensitive to others. Just because you find value in DDI doesn't mean everyone else will, as we are all in different situations, and in my mind, if someone says buy x and I'll give you y soon, then y becomes part of the the informal contract / agreement for me buying x. Does that really make such little sense? I'm not interested in the legal ramifications of that statement, I'm just talking about one honest person dealing with another.

WotC made a mistake. There's no sense glossing it over or defending them for it. It wasn't just about a 3rd party dropping the ball, WotC did as well with their marketing plan for DDI. They promised something and didn't deliver. As some have stated they have all the resources they need to deliver, but they don't want to diminish profits by hiring on additional developers, even as contractors. In essence they've chosen that their bottom line is more important than keeping their word and satisfying customers, or arguing perhaps in a rather dishonest spirit that they never gave their word and used wording like 'coming soon' which is relative and subjective and suits their needs whatever the situation.

No doubt there are good people working at WotC and Hasbro that deserve to be given credit, but at the end of the day executive/management decisions are being made that are in the best interest of Hasbro's shareholders, not in the best interest of the customers. Is that standard today? Unfortunately yes, but just because it's standard does not make it right, nor does it undermine in any way the justification of customers feeling angry, frusterated, ripped off, or deceived.

I also want to say I agree wholeheartedly with some of the family-aged people who are posting. My books mainly serve as paper weights because I don't have the time to spend hours away from my family, nor do I know enough people in my local area who would play D&D face to face. I don't know that having the digital tabletop would allow me to play any more often than having maptools, but it definitely would be nice to have something I was promised when I paid for DDI, which was also the main reason I paid for it as well.

Now I'm not of the mind that Hasbro needs to be boycotted, or that D&D has ripped me off, and that I've lost faith in the brand. I enjoy D&D, it's still the best rules set out there in my opinion, and I have faith that the average joe who works at Hasbro/WotC is more interested in getting me and you the digital table top as fast as possible moreso than they are about Hasbro's bottom line despite how tired they might feel about hearing the criticism. This is how this world is today. Modern business ethics are not very altruistic in any regard, despite the fact that many people who work for companies may be fine people. Hasbro is going to charge us as much as they can get away with, and exhaust as little resources as they can get away with. That's just how it rolls these days. It's all about maximizing revenue and minimizing expenses right? So I see little purpose in taking this out on Hasbro or WotC. It would only serve to hurt the product I love, and as a religious man, I trust the man upstairs to separate the wheat from the chaff when all is said in done, that's not my job here on earth.

So I guess what I'm saying is this: WotC screwed up. Don't defend that. It was not intentional, but they haven't made any effort whatsoever (that I can see) to make up for their screw up. So don't defend that either. People paid for something and only received a part of what they were promised, so don't try to convince them they are wrong for feeling cheated, they aren't. Just because you have a great use for the parts of what was promised that you do have, doesn't mean everyone does. Don't contend that Hasbro is not a greedy corporation. Greed is rampant in this world, and just because they are no different than the majority does not make them any less greedy. If they weren't greedy they'd have taken a cut in profits in order to keep their word and satisfy the people who make them rich.

That's about all I have to say.

I applaud your post.

lokiare wrote:

I was about ready to concede the point, but then you had to link to an average. lets say 1 senior programmer makes $100k per year and two programmers just starting out make $30k whats the average of that? 53k averaged. Is that accurate? probably not. I have been told throughout college that game programmers have a harder job and make less money than programmers in other fields. If you can supply some actual facts that are not skewed I will gladly concede the point, until then I'll wait for facts.

Umm the conversation WAS ABOUT THE AVERAGE SALARY. I love the lengths people go to on the internet to backpedal when they're shown to be wrong.

I've provided actual facts, or as close as we're going to get. You've provided anecdotal evidence that's worth nothing, especially in the face of actual data. ESPECIALLY from the SOURCE where YOU claimed to have gotten your information. A source which you are backpedalling away from once you were proven wrong.

You've been vastly under-representing what a project like this would involve. Clearly you don't have the experience or knowledge to have an opinion on the subject. Here's a tip for you: If you REALLY want to make 6 figures as an engineer learn to admit when you're wrong and try listening to people with actual experience. You'll get much further in the field...and life in general.

Give it up.

Guivre wrote:

Umm the conversation WAS ABOUT THE AVERAGE SALARY. I love the lengths people go to on the internet to backpedal when they're shown to be wrong.

I've provided actual facts, or as close as we're going to get. You've provided anecdotal evidence that's worth nothing, especially in the face of actual data. ESPECIALLY from the SOURCE where YOU claimed to have gotten your information. A source which you are backpedalling away from once you were proven wrong.

You've been vastly under-representing what a project like this would involve. Clearly you don't have the experience or knowledge to have an opinion on the subject. Here's a tip for you: If you REALLY want to make 6 figures as an engineer learn to admit when you're wrong and try listening to people with actual experience. You'll get much further in the field...and life in general.

Give it up.

No, the conversation was on the cost of a development team, we got off on a tangent about how much those people make, usually you will have a highly paid lead programmer or project lead (sometimes they do both at the same time). These are the ones that will be paid a lot of money, but it is not uncommon to have 1 programming lead per 6-10 programmers. After that they usually like to group them with more programming leads, but not always. So my example is still very valid. If 1 programming lead is making 100k and the rest are making 30k-40k your average is going to look like 50k or higher. Which is why the report you linked to MAY be wrong. I could be completely wrong about it (really I hope I am as I am going to try to enter that field soon). However I won't just roll over and change my view when a stranger says 'you should think this' without at least some facts. If you could find one of those summary studies that supposedly show you how much your supposed to make it would be more accurate (if it includes senior programmer and programmer instead of lumping them into a single category as the link you provided did) I would gladly admit that I was wrong and tell you that you were right. I have done this numerous times. It is not 'backpedaling' because I'm honestly admitting that I am wrong. 'backpedaling' implies dishonesty or trying to save your reputation. I don't do that. I simply ask for relevant proof.

you mean they were complaining about money thats why they dropped....& all that money WoTC makes esspecially from card games(magic-the death of RPG games) and so many other things..they r sitting there like bill gates and they know it

AH_hellstorm wrote:

you mean they were complaining about money thats why they dropped....& all that money WoTC makes esspecially from card games(magic-the death of RPG games) and so many other things..they r sitting there like bill gates and they know it

That goes back to the 'what motivates corporations' argument. I'm sure if you scroll back up you can find it pretty easy.

Aug 14, 2009 -- 10:39PM, lokiare wrote:

AH_hellstorm wrote:

you mean they were complaining about money thats why they dropped....& all that money WoTC makes esspecially from card games(magic-the death of RPG games) and so many other things..they r sitting there like bill gates and they know it

That goes back to the 'what motivates corporations' argument. I'm sure if you scroll back up you can find it pretty easy.

Yeah, so the new forums are up? anyone else got a new argument to add?

I'm sorry to get into this so late but the virtual tabletop was the main selling point for me. And i feel like a dumb ass for subscribing to DDi but oh well they say one of us is born every minute. And the character builder and adventure tools are a good start.

I too have a group that lives all over the country and using the GT to play together once a week online was a key selling point for 4E and DDI. Fortunately for me I didn't subscribe to DDI until the Character builder was fully released though.

Now I'm an old gamer coming off the back of 25 years or so play. My group uses the core books and generally feels the additional books are just money spinner regurgitating the same crap with a slight imbalance but in a shiny new guise (for those that remember... Unearthed Arcana).

Anyhow, I digress. My point is that once my subscription to DDI runs out I've already got everything I need until the arrival of a GT so I wont be renewing. Which makes me wonder how many other people will feel the same?

Aug 28, 2009 -- 12:07AM, Nixxon wrote:

I too have a group that lives all over the country and using the GT to play together once a week online was a key selling point for 4E and DDI. Fortunately for me I didn't subscribe to DDI until the Character builder was fully released though.

Now I'm an old gamer coming off the back of 25 years or so play. My group uses the core books and generally feels the additional books are just money spinner regurgitating the same crap with a slight imbalance but in a shiny new guise (for those that remember... Unearthed Arcana).

Anyhow, I digress. My point is that once my subscription to DDI runs out I've already got everything I need until the arrival of a GT so I wont be renewing. Which makes me wonder how many other people will feel the same?

Exactly what I'm doing.

Aug 28, 2009 -- 12:42AM, lokiare wrote:

Aug 28, 2009 -- 12:07AM, Nixxon wrote:

I too have a group that lives all over the country and using the GT to play together once a week online was a key selling point for 4E and DDI. Fortunately for me I didn't subscribe to DDI until the Character builder was fully released though.

Now I'm an old gamer coming off the back of 25 years or so play. My group uses the core books and generally feels the additional books are just money spinner regurgitating the same crap with a slight imbalance but in a shiny new guise (for those that remember... Unearthed Arcana).

Anyhow, I digress. My point is that once my subscription to DDI runs out I've already got everything I need until the arrival of a GT so I wont be renewing. Which makes me wonder how many other people will feel the same?

Exactly what I'm doing.

And me.

Initially the VT was a big seller for me, and the fact that it's taken a back seat torqued me for some time. Only now am I getting into 4E, and yes, I have subscribed to DDI.

I haven't found Dungeon or Dragon to be particularlly useful as of yet, and there is a lot of back issues to go through... so the fact that I have found little of interest is disturbing.

That said, WOTC has made up big ground with the Character Builder and the Monster Creator. As a DM I found these tools to be indespensible. One of the main things is it takes the onus off of me to have every source book available just so I can say yay or nay to a character idea. Players buy rule supplements all the time and want to use the ideas presented there... and rightly so... they bought the book. But trying to keep track of every feat and power is an impossible task for someone with a life (dad, husband, work, etc). Now, I can make a reasonably informed decision on a rule without having to take out a second mortgage on my house. 3.5 was bloated with feats, skills, prestige classes, etc. and it was endless the things players would want to incorporate into their characters as a campaign progressed.

The rules reference is also handy for this reason as well.

As for the VT... I much prefer to game around the table anyway... I want real flesh and blood folks around me to make me laugh and interact with. If I can get them together I don't need the VT.

It's sad that WOTC hasn't man-upped and admited their error and spoke with some clarity on the issue, but they have done is work very hard to provide us some very useful and powerful tools for the game. As long as that continues they've got my monthly subscription (that is as long as it remains reasonably priced).

Sep 1, 2009 -- 7:39PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Initially the VT was a big seller for me, and the fact that it's taken a back seat torqued me for some time. Only now am I getting into 4E, and yes, I have subscribed to DDI.

I haven't found Dungeon or Dragon to be particularlly useful as of yet, and there is a lot of back issues to go through... so the fact that I have found little of interest is disturbing.

That said, WOTC has made up big ground with the Character Builder and the Monster Creator. As a DM I found these tools to be indespensible. One of the main things is it takes the onus off of me to have every source book available just so I can say yay or nay to a character idea. Players buy rule supplements all the time and want to use the ideas presented there... and rightly so... they bought the book. But trying to keep track of every feat and power is an impossible task for someone with a life (dad, husband, work, etc). Now, I can make a reasonably informed decision on a rule without having to take out a second mortgage on my house. 3.5 was bloated with feats, skills, prestige classes, etc. and it was endless the things players would want to incorporate into their characters as a campaign progressed.

The rules reference is also handy for this reason as well.

As for the VT... I much prefer to game around the table anyway... I want real flesh and blood folks around me to make me laugh and interact with. If I can get them together I don't need the VT.

It's sad that WOTC hasn't man-upped and admited their error and spoke with some clarity on the issue, but they have done is work very hard to provide us some very useful and powerful tools for the game. As long as that continues they've got my monthly subscription (that is as long as it remains reasonably priced).

I agree, I would much rather sit around a table with a bunch of smelly nerds and laugh at star trek jokes than play over the internet through voice chat and a virtual table, unfortunately like most who have a problem with the GT not being released, we don't have this option.

Sep 1, 2009 -- 8:35PM, lokiare wrote:

I agree, I would much rather sit around a table with a bunch of smelly nerds...

 

Lol.... That's what the incense is REALLY for.

Sep 1, 2009 -- 7:39PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Initially the VT was a big seller for me, and the fact that it's taken a back seat torqued me for some time. Only now am I getting into 4E, and yes, I have subscribed to DDI.

I haven't found Dungeon or Dragon to be particularlly useful as of yet, and there is a lot of back issues to go through... so the fact that I have found little of interest is disturbing.

That said, WOTC has made up big ground with the Character Builder and the Monster Creator. As a DM I found these tools to be indespensible. One of the main things is it takes the onus off of me to have every source book available just so I can say yay or nay to a character idea. Players buy rule supplements all the time and want to use the ideas presented there... and rightly so... they bought the book. But trying to keep track of every feat and power is an impossible task for someone with a life (dad, husband, work, etc). Now, I can make a reasonably informed decision on a rule without having to take out a second mortgage on my house. 3.5 was bloated with feats, skills, prestige classes, etc. and it was endless the things players would want to incorporate into their characters as a campaign progressed.

The rules reference is also handy for this reason as well.

As for the VT... I much prefer to game around the table anyway... I want real flesh and blood folks around me to make me laugh and interact with. If I can get them together I don't need the VT.

It's sad that WOTC hasn't man-upped and admited their error and spoke with some clarity on the issue, but they have done is work very hard to provide us some very useful and powerful tools for the game. As long as that continues they've got my monthly subscription (that is as long as it remains reasonably priced).

First, they have come and admitted their error, and have apologized, several times. They bite of more then they could chew, had vendor issues, and were hit by the economy, forcing them to reduce staff. However, don't expect them to have to keep apologizing. Several times is enough. 

When they assessed the situation, they made the choice to put the table and character visualizer on hold, with no firm date on when they will get back to it, and decided that they need to work on tools that will help make the game easier to play, namely tools for the DM. 

The first was the Monster Builder, which is pretty awesome. As a DM, it's made making adventures for my group pretty quick. 

They are still committed to a digital aspect of Dungeons and Dragons, and at GenCon, they said they are still planning on bringing it out. Other then that, no other details were given. NONE. So if you ask, when, the answer is, don't know. If you ask will it come in blue, the answer is don't know.

Sep 2, 2009 -- 3:22PM, Dane_McArdy wrote:

Sep 1, 2009 -- 7:39PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Initially the VT was a big seller for me, and the fact that it's taken a back seat torqued me for some time. Only now am I getting into 4E, and yes, I have subscribed to DDI.

I haven't found Dungeon or Dragon to be particularlly useful as of yet, and there is a lot of back issues to go through... so the fact that I have found little of interest is disturbing.

That said, WOTC has made up big ground with the Character Builder and the Monster Creator. As a DM I found these tools to be indespensible. One of the main things is it takes the onus off of me to have every source book available just so I can say yay or nay to a character idea. Players buy rule supplements all the time and want to use the ideas presented there... and rightly so... they bought the book. But trying to keep track of every feat and power is an impossible task for someone with a life (dad, husband, work, etc). Now, I can make a reasonably informed decision on a rule without having to take out a second mortgage on my house. 3.5 was bloated with feats, skills, prestige classes, etc. and it was endless the things players would want to incorporate into their characters as a campaign progressed.

The rules reference is also handy for this reason as well.

As for the VT... I much prefer to game around the table anyway... I want real flesh and blood folks around me to make me laugh and interact with. If I can get them together I don't need the VT.

It's sad that WOTC hasn't man-upped and admited their error and spoke with some clarity on the issue, but they have done is work very hard to provide us some very useful and powerful tools for the game. As long as that continues they've got my monthly subscription (that is as long as it remains reasonably priced).

First, they have come and admitted their error, and have apologized, several times. They bite of more then they could chew, had vendor issues, and were hit by the economy, forcing them to reduce staff. However, don't expect them to have to keep apologizing. Several times is enough. 

When they assessed the situation, they made the choice to put the table and character visualizer on hold, with no firm date on when they will get back to it, and decided that they need to work on tools that will help make the game easier to play, namely tools for the DM. 

The first was the Monster Builder, which is pretty awesome. As a DM, it's made making adventures for my group pretty quick. 

They are still committed to a digital aspect of Dungeons and Dragons, and at GenCon, they said they are still planning on bringing it out. Other then that, no other details were given. NONE. So if you ask, when, the answer is, don't know. If you ask will it come in blue, the answer is don't know.

Yes, and thank you once again for minimizing our concerns. We know all this. We also know that WotC is just hoping the GT fanbase will just let it disapear into the ether without a passing thought. Most of us are simply not willing to let this happen.

Also WotC doesn't seem to be capable of learning from their mistakes as we see from every single peice of software they touch. These boards are a prime example. The monster building not being crossplatform is the other. They simply continue on oblivious to everything around them. About the only thing we can do is decide not to fund such a beast.

Personally, having used both of the new tools extensively at this point, think what WOTC has done is awesome. For YEARS we've been saying, "Make the DM's job easier and the game will grow."

Well, darn it, they are doing it... and you're not "going to fund such a beast" ??

Well, I fully intend to, and am looking forward to what they do next. Great job WOTC... I've supported D&D for 30 years now, and while I was out of it for a while (actually playing 1e ), I'm now in full support of 4E. There are still the 2E hold out that I gave up on a long time ago, and some 3.5E folks that just don't get what 4E has done... and I didn't either until the tools hit.

The game is very balanced, playable, smooth, and its a lot of fun to play! For the first time in 30 years I would say the game system fully realizes the true potential of fantasy adventure simulation in a very cinematic way... what we've always wanted it to do... at least myself. I've always RAN cinematic... which meant a lot of homebrew rules to compensate for system short falls.

Isn't this why you support a game??

Sep 2, 2009 -- 10:14PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Personally, having used both of the new tools extensively at this point, think what WOTC has done is awesome. For YEARS we've been saying, "Make the DM's job easier and the game will grow."

Well, darn it, they are doing it... and you're not "going to fund such a beast" ??

Well, I fully intend to, and am looking forward to what they do next. Great job WOTC... I've supported D&D for 30 years now, and while I was out of it for a while (actually playing 1e ), I'm now in full support of 4E. There are still the 2E hold out that I gave up on a long time ago, and some 3.5E folks that just don't get what 4E has done... and I didn't either until the tools hit.

The game is very balanced, playable, smooth, and its a lot of fun to play! For the first time in 30 years I would say the game system fully realizes the true potential of fantasy adventure simulation in a very cinematic way... what we've always wanted it to do... at least myself. I've always RAN cinematic... which meant a lot of homebrew rules to compensate for system short falls.

Isn't this why you support a game??

I agree. Even the Character builder makes my job easier.

For consumable items, I can print out the items card, and I hand it to the player. The rule is, hold on to it, and when you use it, hand it back. No need to add it to your character sheet. Same for any magic item. If the players get an item in the middle of an adventure and want to use it, they don't have to look it up, and can add it later.

Sep 2, 2009 -- 10:14PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Personally, having used both of the new tools extensively at this point, think what WOTC has done is awesome. For YEARS we've been saying, "Make the DM's job easier and the game will grow."

Well, darn it, they are doing it... and you're not "going to fund such a beast" ??

Well, I fully intend to, and am looking forward to what they do next. Great job WOTC... I've supported D&D for 30 years now, and while I was out of it for a while (actually playing 1e ), I'm now in full support of 4E. There are still the 2E hold out that I gave up on a long time ago, and some 3.5E folks that just don't get what 4E has done... and I didn't either until the tools hit.

The game is very balanced, playable, smooth, and its a lot of fun to play! For the first time in 30 years I would say the game system fully realizes the true potential of fantasy adventure simulation in a very cinematic way... what we've always wanted it to do... at least myself. I've always RAN cinematic... which meant a lot of homebrew rules to compensate for system short falls.

Isn't this why you support a game??

I agree that 4E is better designed than the other version. I also agree that both the Character Builder and Monster Builder are both excellent programs and provide great functionality. They simple do it on the Window$ PC only. That leaves out all of the Mac, Linux, BSD, and all the other operating systems out there. Heck if they had learned their lesson we would have people creating monsters on their iPhones by now, but they didn't learn their lesson.

No matter how optimistic you'll have to agree that there were problems with the "forums", or this faceWiz, myWiz or whatever you want to call their community site. From actual legal questionability to things like black on white and tiny text, getting rid of BBCode, and mony more things that would take 3-4 pages to list.

Sep 3, 2009 -- 4:33AM, Dane_McArdy wrote:

Sep 2, 2009 -- 10:14PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Personally, having used both of the new tools extensively at this point, think what WOTC has done is awesome. For YEARS we've been saying, "Make the DM's job easier and the game will grow."

Well, darn it, they are doing it... and you're not "going to fund such a beast" ??

Well, I fully intend to, and am looking forward to what they do next. Great job WOTC... I've supported D&D for 30 years now, and while I was out of it for a while (actually playing 1e ), I'm now in full support of 4E. There are still the 2E hold out that I gave up on a long time ago, and some 3.5E folks that just don't get what 4E has done... and I didn't either until the tools hit.

The game is very balanced, playable, smooth, and its a lot of fun to play! For the first time in 30 years I would say the game system fully realizes the true potential of fantasy adventure simulation in a very cinematic way... what we've always wanted it to do... at least myself. I've always RAN cinematic... which meant a lot of homebrew rules to compensate for system short falls.

Isn't this why you support a game??

I agree. Even the Character builder makes my job easier.

For consumable items, I can print out the items card, and I hand it to the player. The rule is, hold on to it, and when you use it, hand it back. No need to add it to your character sheet. Same for any magic item. If the players get an item in the middle of an adventure and want to use it, they don't have to look it up, and can add it later.

That's a neat idea, I'll have to implement that when I can afford to buy more ink for my printer. How do you get them to come up without creating a character?

Aug 31, 2009 -- 8:31AM, Otakkun wrote:

Aug 28, 2009 -- 12:42AM, lokiare wrote:

Aug 28, 2009 -- 12:07AM, Nixxon wrote:

I too have a group that lives all over the country and using the GT to play together once a week online was a key selling point for 4E and DDI. Fortunately for me I didn't subscribe to DDI until the Character builder was fully released though.

Now I'm an old gamer coming off the back of 25 years or so play. My group uses the core books and generally feels the additional books are just money spinner regurgitating the same crap with a slight imbalance but in a shiny new guise (for those that remember... Unearthed Arcana).

Anyhow, I digress. My point is that once my subscription to DDI runs out I've already got everything I need until the arrival of a GT so I wont be renewing. Which makes me wonder how many other people will feel the same?

Exactly what I'm doing.

And me.

 

lol. me too. Seems the most logical course of action.

the online tabletop has been scrapped. it takes too much time in manpower for too little return in revenue. rather than giving us something revolutionary that will pull us away from our youtube feeds and casual gaming on facebook, wotc thinks a smarter strategy is to give us little scraps of goodness in a constant-flowing stream through D&DI. not sure i'm going to continue my subscription when it's time to renew because it's like drinking from the firehose -- sounds awfully fun before you put your lips to the water, and miserably difficult to handle after over a year of constantly flowing content. when i was a kid, we had 3-5 books that lasted us 10 years. nowadays, it's a new book a month and frankly, I'm not willing to tithe $50/month in my income to wotc for books and D&DI, no matter what their bean counters think. if it weren't for my OCD i'd be in a happier mood and my bookshelves wouldn't be groaning under the weight of a dozen too-thin hardbound 150 page splatbooks.

btw, i love the character builder. it's worth $45 a year. but $120? nope, i don't think so.

Sep 29, 2009 -- 1:37PM, jsepeta wrote:

the online tabletop has been scrapped. it takes too much time in manpower for too little return in revenue. rather than giving us something revolutionary that will pull us away from our youtube feeds and casual gaming on facebook, wotc thinks a smarter strategy is to give us little scraps of goodness in a constant-flowing stream through D&DI. not sure i'm going to continue my subscription when it's time to renew because it's like drinking from the firehose -- sounds awfully fun before you put your lips to the water, and miserably difficult to handle after over a year of constantly flowing content. when i was a kid, we had 3-5 books that lasted us 10 years. nowadays, it's a new book a month and frankly, I'm not willing to tithe $50/month in my income to wotc for books and D&DI, no matter what their bean counters think. if it weren't for my OCD i'd be in a happier mood and my bookshelves wouldn't be groaning under the weight of a dozen too-thin hardbound 150 page splatbooks.

btw, i love the character builder. it's worth $45 a year. but $120? nope, i don't think so.

Actually it wouldn't take that much manpower. It would take time though, and they can't hook everybody and keep them interested without monthly content long enough to get the GT (Game Table) out. They are also unwilling to license it out to a 3rd party like mapTools, or any of the other proven 3rd party GT software companies.

I also agree about the books. Not only can't I afford $50.00 per month, even if I could I would be unwilling to pay that much every month for content me and my group is unlikely to use.

I also think the character builder is a worthy accomplishment, they just need to port it to other platforms. Your right $45 a year for it isn't that bad, but $120 is just outrageous. The Dungeon and Dragon magazines are a nice bonus, but they are not worth raising the price to $120 either.

I am finally seeing more and more people that have done the same things and have the same reasons for jumping into 4e... unfortunately we miss judged the depth and did a handstand in the 3' instead of a cannon ball in the 12'!!!

 

I see that some people are arguing about salaries of programmers, hers what I think about that:

if you sit on your behind and whine about deadlines, your not doing real work and should not be paid over 30k a year... I know someone is cussing me at saying this, but maybe 50k is more realistic.

there are other fields of work that do not make anywhere near that much and definitely deserve it, i.e; your line cooks!! making $12/hr avg. + 40/hr week = >25k/yr... and that's if you can even find a job!!!  

and thats why I wanted the game table with my DDI subscription, I cant buy every book anymore... so when I could have all my DnD stuff together in one package and be able to play with my group all over the world... i said hell yeah!!! 

i was looking at the 4e books in the store earlier too see if we should switch from 2nd but didnt get the rules in that short time, saw the ad in the back of the book, so i just signed up not but 2 hours ago for the sole reason of checking out the game table and getting some of the rules explained visually when lo and behold they cancelled it? wtf? this blows

Oct 9, 2009 -- 2:19AM, Thebarronlacroix wrote:

i was looking at the 4e books in the store earlier too see if we should switch from 2nd but didnt get the rules in that short time, saw the ad in the back of the book, so i just signed up not but 2 hours ago for the sole reason of checking out the game table and getting some of the rules explained visually when lo and behold they cancelled it? wtf? this blows

My story is that they announced it would be out with 4E.

Then I preordered the books.

Then they announced it would be delayed.

Then my books came.

I read all the books and played with my nephews (while certainly D&D, not as entertaining as playing with peers my own age).

Then they announced they put the GT (Game Table) and the CV (Character Visualizer) on the "back burner".

I lost it and got a lot of reported posts and closed threads in the forum.

They announced they were working on the AT (Adventure Tools) after doing a hokey poll that was skewed.

I *******************************************************. (edited so this thread doesn't get closed).

They announced that maybe sometime in the distant future they might decide to pick up the GT and work on it.

I got put on anti-anxiety medicine. Haven't had a thread closed on me since.

doesnt that suck...you buy all the books and you are hoping that you can play with your friends back home when you got time off from work and you live so far away due to either military or some other bussiness..then they hipe you all out at gencon...then they give you sneak peeks and a sample characters to play...then once the game comes out they drop the dig table like its a hot turd....well i thought TSR was running this game into the dirt but WoTC is doing a great job themselves at that....so everyone give WoTC a big applause for screwing up a great game....THANK YOU WoTC

Maptool (or other VTT) plus Skype (or other VOIP) really work well. Don't give up on remote gaming because we don't have an official Wizards product for it.

There are campaign structures that generous gamers have built out there for 4E (you have to put in your own powers etc. so that there is no copyright infringement), so getting started is not hard. Just do it incrementally as required.

Now, if only Wizards would give us downloadable maps for all published adventures without the placement of traps and enemies revealed on them! Put that under DND Insider and it would be another reason to subscribe.

Oct 15, 2009 -- 4:16AM, MigarFrobert wrote:

Maptool (or other VTT) plus Skype (or other VOIP) really work well. Don't give up on remote gaming because we don't have an official Wizards product for it.

There are campaign structures that generous gamers have built out there for 4E (you have to put in your own powers etc. so that there is no copyright infringement), so getting started is not hard. Just do it incrementally as required.

Now, if only Wizards would give us downloadable maps for all published adventures without the placement of traps and enemies revealed on them! Put that under DND Insider and it would be another reason to subscribe.

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

Oct 15, 2009 -- 12:51PM, lokiare wrote:

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

That's only required if the DM wants to use the macros (or whatever the software uses) to do all the calculations for you. All of them come with, AFAIK, basic die-rolling tools that could be used to replicate the rolling that would be done around a table.

Oct 15, 2009 -- 12:51PM, lokiare wrote:

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

Meh, I do it for maptool, and I wouldn't really call it a disaster.

well it looked really cool..they showed the lighting on the character and the player could his piece...sounded really good...i dont see y ppl would not want to complain about that...i am devestated that they are doing away with it...

Oct 15, 2009 -- 12:51PM, lokiare wrote:

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

Not true - Masterplan downloads everything for you, if you have an Insider subscription.

Oct 18, 2009 -- 2:02PM, Devereaux wrote:

Oct 15, 2009 -- 12:51PM, lokiare wrote:

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

Not true - Masterplan downloads everything for you, if you have an Insider subscription.

Which many of us do not!

Oct 19, 2009 -- 12:36PM, lokiare wrote:

Which many of us do not!

Which is not the fault of masterplan.  Which is a third party program which does what you say it cannot... at a small price to you To WotC

Oct 15, 2009 -- 12:51PM, lokiare wrote:

Oct 15, 2009 -- 4:16AM, MigarFrobert wrote:

Maptool (or other VTT) plus Skype (or other VOIP) really work well. Don't give up on remote gaming because we don't have an official Wizards product for it.

There are campaign structures that generous gamers have built out there for 4E (you have to put in your own powers etc. so that there is no copyright infringement), so getting started is not hard. Just do it incrementally as required.

Now, if only Wizards would give us downloadable maps for all published adventures without the placement of traps and enemies revealed on them! Put that under DND Insider and it would be another reason to subscribe.

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

Not finding it disastrous myself...

Holy cow this is awesome: blogs.msdn.com/surface/archive/2009/10/1...

This is D&D played on the Mircorsoft surface. WOTC, are you guys involved with this at all? Is this what you had in mind when you launched 4th edition? This is such a cool integration of gaming and technology.

Sorry boardmasters if I posted this in the wrong place. I will try a few other forums here also.

that is cool...however WoTC will never do that!!!

Just speaking as someone in the game industry, according to the latest survey, and entry level game programmer (that is someone with less than 3 years of experience) makes an average salary of $59,375. Having 3-6 years experience will net you an average of $75,526. While 6+ years you are looking at $98,571. And that is ith out looking at the program lead or technical director positions which obviously demand further still. 

Then for the art/animation side you are looking at $45,985 for less than 3 years, $59,017 for 3-6 years, and $79,221 at 6+ years.

I'll assume that they already have competent designers, and producers in house, though they'd still likely have to hire audio engineers, and quite possibly QA testers. 

Make of these numbers what you will, but as was mention before, people in the gaming industry tend to make less that the same skills, and quality of work would fetch in other industries.

Okay, guys, let's simplify this.

There never needed to be "every rule in the book" built into this game.  There just needed to be a referee who could place terrain tiles and place/move monster icons, and players who could be tagged with an icon and move it.  If you wanted to get fancy, you could add effect template overlays and an initiative cycle that the referee could override.

This was doable within months of the showing I saw at GenCon, and what's more, it would have been useful for all manner of games, not just D&D. 

That they stopped, indicates to me that whoever started it quit and left their code in crap shape, or that they simply mismanaged the dev effort.  

In either case, WotC bears the brunt of this, and the marketing goons who decided to pretend to the rest of us that this was a potentially viable outcome.

Which is, contrary to some opinions expressed here, fraud.

  T 

Oct 15, 2009 -- 12:51PM, lokiare wrote:

Oct 15, 2009 -- 4:16AM, MigarFrobert wrote:

Maptool (or other VTT) plus Skype (or other VOIP) really work well. Don't give up on remote gaming because we don't have an official Wizards product for it.

There are campaign structures that generous gamers have built out there for 4E (you have to put in your own powers etc. so that there is no copyright infringement), so getting started is not hard. Just do it incrementally as required.

Now, if only Wizards would give us downloadable maps for all published adventures without the placement of traps and enemies revealed on them! Put that under DND Insider and it would be another reason to subscribe.

As I've reiterated a billion times: All of the 3rd party tools require you to (if you wish to remain legal) enter manually all of the information that you use from the books. For players this might not seem to bad, but for DMs its disastrous.

Call me crazy, but http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Canon+-+CanoScan+Flatbed+Scanner+with+Z-Lid+Expansion+Top/9239594.p?id=1218077784413&skuId=9239594&st=scanner&cp=1&lp=10

  T 

Dec 15, 2009 -- 8:22AM, thomas.j.theobald wrote:

Okay, guys, let's simplify this.

There never needed to be "every rule in the book" built into this game.  There just needed to be a referee who could place terrain tiles and place/move monster icons, and players who could be tagged with an icon and move it.  If you wanted to get fancy, you could add effect template overlays and an initiative cycle that the referee could override.

This was doable within months of the showing I saw at GenCon, and what's more, it would have been useful for all manner of games, not just D&D. 

That they stopped, indicates to me that whoever started it quit and left their code in crap shape, or that they simply mismanaged the dev effort.  

In either case, WotC bears the brunt of this, and the marketing goons who decided to pretend to the rest of us that this was a potentially viable outcome.

Which is, contrary to some opinions expressed here, fraud.

  T 

It's quite exasperating, especially as a new player.  I'm very interested in some of the offerings that D&Di provides.  For some people it's a good value.  However, despite that, I know that even just the three Core books (DM's Guide, MM, and PH1) alone provide more content than I'll ever, EVER get through in my life time.  The virtual tabletop though was what would have gotten me to sign up.

I would have loved having access to a all encompassing tabletop program that would have let me keep playing with my current group all year round.  I would have loved to be able to set a virtual game up without spending hours setting up the maps, making sure all the monsters, items, terrain, and everything else worked properly.  I would have loved to not have compatability issues, or to try and explain tech support for a network connection problem over the phone.

Let me reiterate:  I would have really liked having a official program that made playing the latest edition online with my friends very easy. 

Rumor has it in pittsburgh that a couple of students at CMU have building build a virtual table top specificly for D&D in mind, with the use of the new Windows Surface.  boingboing.net/2009/10/29/dd-on-multi-to... for anyone who is interested.

So...  I made an adventure for Maptool.

First I downloaded Maptool, then I downloaded some tokens and the Tokentool

Then I made some tokens and a map out of pictures and maps I had from previous.

I wrote in all the stat lines for the monsters on the first floor

Then I watched a "how to" video and exclaimed "So that what Macro's are for!"

Then I wrote in Macro's for all the tokens on the first floor.

Then I downloaded Veg.lib

Then I redid all my Macro's.

Then I spent most of the night digging for pics on the Wizards website for more tokens.

Then I finished the adventure.

Then I figured out how to add a rider text to power macros, so things like the Stormclaw Scorpion might work the way their supposed to.

I'm ready for the WotC Game Table now.  Seriously any time.

May 6, 2009 -- 6:24AM, Kyraeus wrote:

Wow, really Wolf?  No offense, but that's extremely hopeful and/or naive of you.  Shelved software products have this alarming tendency never to be finished. I certainly can't remember the last decent offering that got shelved, then picked back up that ended up well. At the very least it would mean any work that WAS done on it would need to be redone from scratch. Who are they going to get to pick that up?  Moreover, see the other people's point of view. Hasbro/WoTC spent the better part of a year or more now marketing a product to us that, frankly, didn't exist, and if you're saying it's shelved indefinitely, that means for the forseeable future probably WON'T exist. Yes, it sucks. Yes, people are unhappy about it. They've got every right to be. I'm sorry if you don't like whining on your boards, but that's kinda going to happen.  Hasbro has changed a number of things about the franchise, not the least of which was slamming the price of the books through the roof immediately because they knew they had a hardcore fanbase who was willing to pay to get their 'fix'. Dropping these tools that had already gone out through their marketing department as an incentive to purchase a subscription to Insider just shows more of the same. Once with this problem when the original character builder was semi-released with the books was bad enough. Now this second shortfall is just ridiculous.  While I see your point, and trying to maintain hope, I honestly have to say it looks extremely bad, and I think pumping money into D&D in it's current state is a big mistake. I won't go dramatic about it, but it is a damn shame to go through picking up this new service with overdone promises of new tools, better experiences, and GENERAL COMPETENCE OF THE COMPANY TO FULFILL CUSTOMER EXPECTATIONS, only to be let down, and told that 'well. our 3rd party software developer may have dropped the ball'. or, excuse me, not told that, because I highly doubt anything I've heard on here was from a rep. Oh wait, they haven't said anything except that it's delayed. Indefinitely.  I dunno. maybe that's just me, but that sounds like EXTREMELY poor planning on the part of the officials overseeing the D&D project as a whole. Proper implementation would have had 2/3+ of this software suite done by now. Before people start saying I don't know what I'm talking about, I work in distribution sales for software and hardware implementation, speaking daily with guys who do exactly this. I've seen rollouts of software platforms intended to allow remote management of systems in the 10,000+ qty pushed faster than this.   Frankly, it's a damned shame. I think a good gaming table made by the franchise itself would have pulled people back in droves to the game, besides my own happiness. Not to mention I'd hoped being connected to a large company known for gaming products would have done some good. Ah, well. Live and learn.

Very well said. What worries me most about a lot of this, is how they seem to make the same mistakes as they made at the start of 3.0, with the character builder that ended up being e-Tools, the interactive atlas and such.

Sep 1, 2009 -- 8:35PM, lokiare wrote:

Sep 1, 2009 -- 7:39PM, dave_the_DM wrote:

Initially the VT was a big seller for me, and the fact that it's taken a back seat torqued me for some time. Only now am I getting into 4E, and yes, I have subscribed to DDI.

I haven't found Dungeon or Dragon to be particularlly useful as of yet, and there is a lot of back issues to go through... so the fact that I have found little of interest is disturbing.

That said, WOTC has made up big ground with the Character Builder and the Monster Creator. As a DM I found these tools to be indespensible. One of the main things is it takes the onus off of me to have every source book available just so I can say yay or nay to a character idea. Players buy rule supplements all the time and want to use the ideas presented there... and rightly so... they bought the book. But trying to keep track of every feat and power is an impossible task for someone with a life (dad, husband, work, etc). Now, I can make a reasonably informed decision on a rule without having to take out a second mortgage on my house. 3.5 was bloated with feats, skills, prestige classes, etc. and it was endless the things players would want to incorporate into their characters as a campaign progressed.

The rules reference is also handy for this reason as well.

As for the VT... I much prefer to game around the table anyway... I want real flesh and blood folks around me to make me laugh and interact with. If I can get them together I don't need the VT.

It's sad that WOTC hasn't man-upped and admited their error and spoke with some clarity on the issue, but they have done is work very hard to provide us some very useful and powerful tools for the game. As long as that continues they've got my monthly subscription (that is as long as it remains reasonably priced).

I agree, I would much rather sit around a table with a bunch of smelly nerds and laugh at star trek jokes than play over the internet through voice chat and a virtual table, unfortunately like most who have a problem with the GT not being released, we don't have this option.

Our group would still use it even face to face, I would DM form my laptop for the maps etc.. and just plug it into the HD big screen so we didnt need to hover around the table and move markers on a map (that get bumped etc..) cuz I cant afford all the minis etc..

Im still hoping this will happen someday in the fairly near future.  Im getting older and it would be nice to sit in a comfy high back chair with a clipboard and a big screen all the players can see.

just my 2 cents and checking back to see how things have progressed is all.

Jan 4, 2010 -- 4:47PM, Dragom wrote:

So...  I made an adventure for Maptool.

First I downloaded Maptool, then I downloaded some tokens and the Tokentool

Then I made some tokens and a map out of pictures and maps I had from previous.

I wrote in all the stat lines for the monsters on the first floor

Then I watched a "how to" video and exclaimed "So that what Macro's are for!"

Then I wrote in Macro's for all the tokens on the first floor.

Then I downloaded Veg.lib

Then I redid all my Macro's.

Then I spent most of the night digging for pics on the Wizards website for more tokens.

Then I finished the adventure.

Then I figured out how to add a rider text to power macros, so things like the Stormclaw Scorpion might work the way their supposed to.

I'm ready for the WotC Game Table now.  Seriously any time.

I lol'd at this. Not in a making fun of you way, but in a simpathetic  way. I did something similar.  Although I didn't jump in right away on  building stuff. I really did quite a bit of homework after the initial "what? I can do more with these things called frameworks?". I took some time  to figure out how it worked, what options I had etc. Again, not making  fun.

I will say though that I can't see the DDI VTT being as  robust as we want it to be. I really do see it as a visual tabletop that  has some basic stuff, such as lighting, character management, etc, but  not much in the way of automation. Maybe I'm wrong, but...

Maybe someday WotC earns enough money with us DDI Subscribers for finishing their former promises. Or maby someday no one will re-subscribe until the do so...

Apr 4, 2010 -- 8:19PM, Acrylium wrote:

Maybe someday WotC earns enough money with us DDI Subscribers for finishing their former promises. Or maby someday no one will re-subscribe until the do so...

I know the frustration of the vtt. It is the biggest reason to get DDI  for me. But I can't see people not resubscribing. There are good things about DDI, and the price is reasonable for what you get at this point. If not, people wouldn't be there now.

I won't be resubbing, so there are at least a few of us that are dissapointed enough that we won't be coming back until the products we expected when we signed up, exist.  I signed up for a year assuming (yeah, I know, my fault) that these products would be out in that year. 

No luck for me.

No more of my money for them.  Sure, there are other good resources here, but that's not what I gave them my money for.  Those that enjoy it, more power to ya, I'm happy for you.  I just didn't get anywhere near what I was expecting and have been unhappy since.

@trekkan.

Your feelings are yours. I meant no disrespect. My main reason for D&Di was/is for the game table as well. The CB, MB, Dungeon and Dragon mags were, and still are good tools, but not my main reason for getting the product. But they are enjoyable, and useful.

I think my real point is that you are getting value for the dollar. It's not for everyone, to be sure, but you are getting what you pay for.

Well, I'm done with DDi. I purchased a year subscription for the VTT and it still hasn't came out. All the other tools may be neat and worth it for some but it wasn't what I signed up for. So long, as of today I have officially cancelled my subscription.

People here talk about how they like to get VTT so as to play with others online.  I want it so I can play solo.  In August, the Castle Ravenloft Boardgame will come out.  One of the things that is said about it is that it can be play solo.  I guess that will make me happy, but I feel that a VTT will offer greater freedom of creativity.

Jun 19, 2010 -- 10:07PM, Nurydian wrote:

People here talk about how they like to get VTT so as to play with others online.  I want it so I can play solo.  In August, the Castle Ravenloft Boardgame will come out.  One of the things that is said about it is that it can be play solo.  I guess that will make me happy, but I feel that a VTT will offer greater freedom of creativity.

Darn I hop on here every 4 or 5 months to see if there is any news about the VTT.  I still see that the demoed version from either 2 or 3 years ago still isn't finished.  I subscribed for a year my self.  That is long since cancelled.  I really am waiting for this.  I don't have time to work, spend time with my kids, and drive all over the place to play.  The VTT would allow me to find time to play.  Shoot I'd even kill my WoW subscription if I could just plop down on a simple to use VTT with pregen adventures or a good DM and just play.