I consider this a public service, since there’s tons of confusion about the issue (and for that I can place the blame solely on Wizards of the Coast.) With the advertisement in the back of every core book, it seems like the service launched, but that’s not the case. I’ve been asked lots of questions about what you can and cannot do with D&D Insider right now, and the answer is not much, though the first real bit has come out today.
For those who totally are unaware, D&D Insider was planned to be the new digital component of 4e D&D, a suite of tools designed to complement playing. The big elements that were being pushed were:
- Online play via the Game Table
- Character Generator
- Rules Compendium (one application that is supposed to contain all the rules, like a more robust version of 3e’s online SRDs)
- Social networking to find and connect with other gamers
- Dungeon & Dragon online magazines
The first, online play, is probably the most highly anticipated. As of the D&D Experience in February, they were still in “pre-alpha”, making it increasingly unlikely that the product would launch anywhere close to 4e’s release. As it stands, Wizards has taken a “it’ll be ready when it’s ready” approach, and given no time line.
Likewise, the character generator (and the accompanying “character visualizer”) has no ETA. Though it has been shown off to several news organizations, there is no word when it will be ready, even for a beta release.
The Rules Compendium launched in limited form today. Surprisingly, there appears to be no limit to who can use it – you don’t even need to be signed in to the website, unlike many other features. The Rules Compendium contains only information from the PHB at the moment, although some users have noticed that there appears to be ADDITIONAL content not present in the book. It also does not contain the core rules, just information on how to make a character.
Social networking is not there yet, though Gleemax is up in some form, and has been for a while. Even the Wizards staff who used it to blog agree that it’s not there yet. Confusion between it, the other parts of D&D Insider, and the message boards have engendered quite a lot of vocal opposition to the whole idea. The bottom line is the piece launched too soon for everything they wanted it to do, and many are not happy about it.
Dungeon & Dragon magazines have had regular content added, which can be downloaded for free from the site by signing in. This month has seen some quality content: expanded Warforged race (for those wanting to play Eberron in 4e ASAP), some Mearls kobold goodness, and even a new adventure. Though it caused a large outcry when the licenses were pulled from Paizo, the two magazines are probably the only piece of D&D Insider that not only launched on time but delivered what was promised. (Mostly.)
So, the bottom line is that D&D Insider is not here yet, though you wouldn’t know it from Wizards site or by looking at all the ads they placed in the core books. Had the digital piece been a later addition, and not something promised to be tightly integrated with fourth edition, Wizards could have avoided a lot of the negativity they are experiencing right now.
EDIT: A statement has been put up about the Rules Compendium, in a horrendous tiny window without a visible scrollbar.
And, DDI does not support those of us using Macs — not for the supposedly cool stuff to come. Yeah, sure, we’re a relatively small percentage of os’s on the world scale, but I wonder how many gamers are Mac users, and therefore cut right out of the features that, if they work, would make DDI worth subscribing to.
I understand the idea of a business decision — appeal to those who will pay the bills. Sure. But c’mon..with so much cross-platform and browser-based apps out there now, isn’t it a bit silly (stupid?) to ignore Mac users?
It’s even funnier when you realize that most of the designers and developers of 4e use MacBooks as their personal computers. I know the brand team is very aware of how upset Mac users are over it, so I have to wonder if the decision was made at some higher level.
The decision was apparently made because they already had an in-house 3d engine that used DirectX, and programmers that were familiar with it.
What accounting department would approve additional spending in that case?
Graham’s last post: Pathfinder 16 & 17 – Good sections, but…
They haven’t shown they can program working software for Windows, yet. Until they do, I consider expending the service for other OSes to be a far-off and unlikely dream.
– Brian
Brian’s last post: Stupid Random Encounter Table Tricks
What is this additional content you speak of?
I too am outraged. I expected much more and sooner. Dungeon and Dragon were released but in a very limited form, “mostly” is generous… yet the content was excellent.
I love 4E, but I hate the way it had been launched and the Mac issue boils me up. Stupidity on Wizards part and may spur me on to rebel against a DDI account….
BUT ARE THEY LISTENING TO THE OUTRAGE?
The content of Dungeon and Dragon are of roughly equal quality to what WotC was producing before they passed them to Paizo… however, they’re releasing only about a third of the quantity.
TSR’s Dungeon and Dragon were better, Paizo’s Dungeon and Dragon were better, and WotC’s print Dungeon and Dragon was the same but containned more.
Sorry to say, I personally think WotC dropped the ball on all aspects of DDI. The launch of 3E was handled much better than the launch of 4E, and the main reason for that was the magazines. Tons of preview content, and an excellent 3E minicampign in both magazines (Legends of Sherwood) the day that the books hit the streets.
I love the 4E rules, but WotC is fast becoming one of thos game companies where I only ever buy the core book and never look back.
(And, of course, I’m one of those angry Mac users too.)
Bartoneus: For example, look up the Rogue entry in the Compendium. There is an extra build listed that’s not in the PHB (and there’s a spot for a build called Thief-Acrobat but no game rules.)
Douglas: I wouldn’t say they’re not listening, there was a long apology post on the messageboards by the lead in DDI who tried to address concerns, but what it boiled down to “it’s not ready, and we’re not sure when it will be ready, but we’re going to make sure it’s done before we release it.” What they failed on was making it sound like it was tied to the game itself, then not even delivering that. (I’m sure there would be fewer people decrying that 4e was a videogame, for example.)
So wait, what features of D&D Insider can run on Macs, and what features cannot run on Macs? Anyone know for sure?
The 3d apps (character visualiser, virtual tabletop) can not.
Most of the rest are web apps, and are thus OS-independent. There may be other programs that are not web apps, but if so I don’t remember them.
That all said, I think some people have had luck emulating DirectX under linux, possibly under WINE. The same things could theoretically be done under OSX, though I don’t know if it’s been tested.
EDIT: http://wine-review.blogspot.com/2007/11/directx-90c-on-linux-with-wine.html
Yep, you can use DirectX under Wine. And Wine does run on OSX, I believe. Check it out. If it works, you can use every part of DDI, even if it’s not Mac-native.
Graham’s last post: Pathfinder 16 & 17 – Good sections, but…
Not a mac user, not really caring because the cost of DDI is enough to put me out f the market for using it. Some of us are college students scraping to get by as it is, and 15 dollars a month is two boxes of ceral and a couple pounds of ground meat. Which would you choose? Anyhow, I’ll by 4e PRINT products the way I’ve been doing since I first found out about D&D and DDI can bite me since there’ll be plenty of people offering similar services for free. Only thing I’ll miss out on really is the visualizer.
That being said, yay 4E boooooooo DDI