D&DI now charges. What do you get right off the bat?
If you haven’t heard all ready, Dungeons & Dragons Insider has finally gone to subscription model. If you wish to sign up for it, you can go here. I have purchased an annual subscription because a) I think the price is reasonable and b) since they don’t have a “final” price model yet, I wanted to lock in a low cost for at least the next 12 months.
As time goes by, I will review what it has to offer and make recommendations accordingly. For now, since this is the first day of the new model, I thought I would simply post a comparison of what you get with a paid subscription as opposed to without.
Release Calendar
If you have a subscription, you will now see a calendar with a release schedule for items from both Dragon and Dungeon magazine on the right side. You can also view the calendar as a non-subscriber by going to the D&DI home page and then clicking “Check out this month’s exclusive content.”
Some Dungeon/Dragon articles now available only to subscribers
I clicked on a few articles without being logged in and found that a lot of them tell me that I must subscribe to read the full article. Items such as RPGA Reports and Design and Development articles are still free. The 4E Barbarian playtest article is still free as well.
“Battle to the Death. Fight for Fame.”
There’s a banner in the D&DI section only available to subscribers. It has the words “Battle to the Death. Fight for Fame.” printed on it. It will be available on October 17. Not sure what it is, but it’s obviously a subscriber’s only feature.
Items over 3rd level in the Compendium only available to subscribers
I did a search for “Surefoot Boots,” a level 5 magic item in the PHB. I found it just fine as both subscriber and non-subscriber but, when I clicked on its name to get a description and I wasn’t logged in, it told me I had to subscribe to view it.
New Bonus Tool: Monster Builder
A tool to build new monsters is now available but only to subscribers. Definitely a useful tool.
Anything else?
At this point, no. In the coming days and months there will be more available, such as beta-testing the Gaming Table and Character Builder. For now, if you want to read Dungeon adventures, like the Scales of War campaign, you’ll need to subscribe. Otherwise, you may want to hold off unless there’s something on the release schedule that you think you must have right now.
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jonathan October 14th, 2008 at 7:24 PM
I’m not going to subscribe – at least not at the moment. I have books, my own Core Lists, and then there’s the tools at asmor.com. (Monster designer is available for free from Asmor.com, btw). Plus… the announcement seems to indicate the price point may “change” (go up) as new tools are released.
and.. are they kidding? have you seen the screen shots for the monster builder? its just a friggen javascript that reformats what you type in and does some basic calculations for you. Total waste of cash IMHO. Save your money.. buy something from RPGNow.com instead and support the independent developers out there.
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