Virtual Table Top announced

[Bluenose]

Well, I wasn't expecting this. Although I hope they're also working to make the CB work better too.

Edit: Also noticed in the FAQ, the Monster Builder Online.

Edit 2: also from the FAQ, this:

Quote:

Q: What versions of D&D is the VT designed to be used with?

A: The character and monster information storage portion of the VT is set up to be used in 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons. The rest of the tools can be used with any edition.

[ghettowedge]

It looks like they completely scrapped the original version they previewed a couple of years ago. I guess they won't be selling packs of virtual miniatures.

[Pyrrhic Victory]

Wow, two years and now this. The preview that was touted with 4th ed was a 2/3? top down semi 3-D looking virtual desktop that looked like it was going to be high quality and a step beyond the Map Tools, etc. of the world. Now this looks to be nothing special. Pretty disappointing!

[Matthew Koelbl]

Honestly, I care a lot more about functionality than making it 3D and fancy looking. I'm pretty sure that was why the original design (made by a third party) crashed and burned, and why they needed to eventually start over from scratch.

What is disappointing is the FAQ saying that "at this point the VT does not integrate with our web-based tools". But the way it is worded makes it sound like that may be an eventual addition, and I think that will be the strong point.

RIght now, I play a game using Maptools, and it is impressive how much of a character you can code into macros and tokens and such. a WotC VT that did it all automatically, and let you easily important characters and monsters from the CB and MB - that would be well worth it!

[Shane Leahy]

I just got an email saying I am in the Beta so I will get to check it out.

I have used Fantasy Grounds in the past so I have a bit of experience with VT's.

As long as it looks good enough to get the point across and the functionality is there it could be good.

And I agree, it will have to integrate with other webtools. Let the players create thier characters with the CB and then 'flag' them as being in a game which gives the DM access to them.

[Uchawi]

Even if the VTT was released tomorrow and perfectly functional and integrated, the current limit on characters in the web based CB, and no monster builder would make it very limited in scope.

[CorvidMP]

Uchawi wrote:

Even if the VTT was released tomorrow and perfectly functional and integrated, the current limit on characters in the web based CB, and no monster builder would make it very limited in scope.

Not to mention largely pointless for those of us who use hand painted mini's and battlemats....

Now a capmaign planner with encounter building monster modification treasure rewards and what not all built in...now that i coul use. I'm never going to see it from these nimrods though, if they're focusing all their energy on a watered down web only VTT.

[Mandisa]

There's a thorough 15min walkthrough of the VTT beta from blogger Dread Gazebo. (Also on YouTube)

In its current form, it looks like the software is D&D-oriented, but version non-specific, with some kind of LfP/LfG campaign search functionality like Pen & Paper Games/Obsidian portal. Character-sheet & monster/NPC info is entered by players/DM, so as yet there's no Char/Monster Bldr integration.

Hard to tell from the video how much of the lag is the software and how much is not, but the interface looks pretty intuitive and covers most of the obvious bases. Non-4e versions were mentioned, but DG didn't go into those, so I don't know if the character/monster panel auto-adjusts for different systems.

Looks promising to me though - MapTools is the obvious comparison, and while I like the comprehensiveness of MT, I think something like this is more newb-friendly. From an UI standpoint, the only thing I really think they need to fix is that the screen is rigid - the map can be zoomed, and panels can be hidden, but none are resizable.

[YULDM]

Well. Looks like some things take a very, very, long time to go out of beta...