Community

Nyarlathotep, you should average out the ratings after posts die down. It would be cool to see the end result.

Magazines: B+. The value of the content is very high for me (A+). I have use for something every issue. The lateness (C-) has hurt the magazine, though it seems to be improving.  My continued pet peeves are searching (F) and lack of a way to store the content easily - bundling or compiled issues are a must for the collector (F).
 
Character Builder: B. The current offering still has detriments compared to the offline CB, but it is a sound tool. It compares very favorably to anything else on the market.
 
Adventure Tools: F-. This is the biggest travesty in DDI. Complete and utter failure, from communication to vision to functionality. Really needs to be a priority. Saddens me at least five times a week.
 
Compendium A-. This is a continually useful part of DDI for me. It surprises me how often I use this and it has transformed how quickly I can find things for adventure writing, character building, rules lookup, etc. I still don't understand why the content stream for Compendium/CB/MB are different. It is very confusing to users to see different tools with inconsistent text. There should also be no stealth updates via the compendium!
   
Virtual Table: B. C. Given what it needs to do, it is doing a fine job. Playing online isn't a priority for me, but the games I played were great. You don't need much here for it to be a decent offering. However, the grade could drop if they focus too much on micro-transactions vs enabling DMs and players to play the game. Content (adventures) can carry a price, but the value of that content should be assigned via a fair market system and not by limiting what DMs can write and share. Edit: I'm downgrading to a C after agreeing with Logopolis... the token export is a must for me. It was very painful to customize my PC for a game and then lose all that work. One of the great strengths of other tools is being able to set up your token so the powers are organized, edited, and displayed the way you want them. If I played online a lot this one issue would be a huge one.
    
Customer Service A-. Maybe it is because I've worked customer service and understand how hard a job this is to get right organizationally, but I think CS does a fine job given realistic goals. They won't have every answer, and often they have to just pass things on to developers. That's to be expected. They should have a better database so they can improve consistency. Otherwise, works really well for me and seems to be used internally to address errata and clarifications.

Jul 8, 2011 -- 2:04PM, Alphastream1 wrote:

Nyarlathotep, you should average out the ratings after posts die down. It would be cool to see the end result.

I was thinking the same thing

Magazines: C-.  Content is ok but website is terrible.  Lacking any easy way to store/organize/search the articles.  Lacking any form of personalization (what is important to me, how do I like organize the info, how about a digital locker or way for me to create collections, how about RSS feeds for me to subscribe to?)  Needs better website to make it work, less product placement.  Compiled issues were nice, I'm ok with seeing them go--if there are enough digital tools to help me organize the individual articles--otherwise I want them back.


Character Builder: C. I still hear grumblings from my players about it and about people trying to data mine the data to use in the offline CB.  My players still tell me the online CB is a downgrade from the offline one.  They don't like they layout/interface.  I don't either.  It is not streamlined, simple, and minimalistic.


Adventure Tools: F.  Monster builder lacking the one thing it should have had from the start: an easy way to build classed NPCs (NPCs using class powers...such as an evil Cleric..instead I have to fall back to the rules in the DMG to do this, by hand, rather than a handy digital tool to help).  I can reflavor any other published monster in seconds, I don't need a tool for that.  What I need is something to help me put together NPCs quickly--they are the thing that is time consuming.

Also missing:

• Something as good as masterplan for adventure writing (if not better).
• Tools to help with encounter design, encounter libraries/search tools (DnD Compendium for encounters would be nice).
• Tools to help share encounters/creatures that others create (and search them).
• Something as good as obsidian portal to show my campaigns to others.

There could be a whole after-market for canned encounter packs, custom/themed monsters, best of's, contests with Dungeon/Dragon, etc, but the tools to do something like this are completely missing from the website.  Huge oversight WotC.  Huge.  Target horribly missed on this one.


Compendium A-. I use this every game.  Every single game.  Update issues or inaccuracies aside, this is the reason I still pay for DDI.  I can find monsters I want to use quickly and print them off for use at the game.  No more having to cart multiple monster manuals around.  What would make it better?  Little more flexibility in search text.  Sometimes I do not get the result I'm looking for if I refer to something by a synonym (probably not enough meta-tagging in the data).


Virtual Table: N/A.  Haven't used, haven't even seen it.  This should have been a 'content licensing' thing--instead of something built in house or with a single 3rd party.  Let as many gaming table companies license the content as want to, and may the best solution win.  We've seen that WotC is lacking a little in the vision department for digital tools....so why not let people who do digital games/tools for a living help sort it out.  Save the time and money developing this and put it into the website/community.


Customer Service N/A.  Never called customer service.  Hope to never have to.


I'd like to add one more:

Website/General:  D-.  Things could be much better: more personalization tools and sharing tools could really help bind the community together.  The website gives me a migraine every time I come here.  It shouldn't feel like a scavenger hunt to find what I want but it does.  I'm spammed with far too much product placement for things I do not use:  Novels, Gaming nights at hobby stores, product categories that do not interest me, etc.

Personally, I am not interested in certain things...so I should not have to see them.  I'd rather find adventures and encounters more quickly--instead of fishing around for them, or spending over an hour trying to figure out why there are no longer compiled issues of dungeon and dragon.  A lack of personalization, sharing, and a lack of good web organization is hurting WotC's digital effort...pretty much castrating it.

Based on my last interactions with the tools and following discussions, tables of contents, etc. Some uses were longer ago than others (e.g., I haven't used the VT since the first round of testing). 

Magazines: D. Light, uninteresting content. Nothing worth resubscribing for.

CB:  C. Adequate but no more than that. However, since it doesn't offer anything that I can't do myself in the old CB, it's not compelling. 

MB/Adventure Tools: F. No need to really explain this one. 

Compendium: C-. Clunky and irritating, although it does do what it claims to - acts as a database of rules stuff. I actually like the new interface less than the old hideous one, which is frightening.

Virtual Table: C-. Basically adequate to the task, but offers little that can't be done elsewhere. 

Customer Service: C. They're there, and they answer questions. Average marks. 

Magazines: B-.  I haven't seen 100% of the content, but I've seen enough in the last two months to know that there have been a number of very solid articles with interesting content, and it's generally been on time.  More quantity would improve things, as would compilations of some sort, searchability of PDFs, etc.  But it's up to a B- from a D as recently as April, so not bad.

Character Builder: B-.  Haven't used it in a couple of months, but it's still missing key features: custom elements, houseruled extra feat/whatever slots, etc.  More than 20 characters.  Offline functionality (don't need building features; reviewing would be enough).  It's possible I'd revise this up or down a fraction of a letter grade if I used it some more, but it wouldn't be much.

Adventure Tools: F.  Duh.  See that "s" on the end of "Tools"?  Yeah.  Also, if you look really close at "Monster Builder" you'll see "BUILD" as an operating word.

Compendium: B+.  If it was updated more frequently, it'd easily move into the A range.  Some bugs and typos are inevitable and don't really bother me.  I used it a lot when I subscribed, and I'd still use it a lot of I were still subscribed.

Virtual Table: N/A (no higher than C).  As long as it doesn't allow custom map artwork and the import/export of maps and tokens, it can never rise above a C.  I don't know what it is right now, but that's an absolute cap when they limit functionality so severely.

Customer Service: B.  It looks like people are lumping PR into this, so the rating is based on that combination.  Pure customer service, handling problems, I'd give an A.  I got a full refund of my year subscription when I was unhappy with the dramatic reduction of services... at the very end of that subscription.  Can't complain about that.  The public relations side of things, specifically communication, is somewhere around a C+ these days.  There have been substantial improvements.  It's still not great, but that's probably due to lack of planning ahead on the design side of things.  We get a lof of "we're still figuring that out" responses, and I don't really blame the PR people.  The C+ is up from a flat F six months ago.

It really is at the point now where a few added features to the CB and the VT would have me resubscribing.