D&D 4E 4E WotC Tools dead?

[AbdulAlhazred]

then why did the rules measure movement and spell ranges in inches? It's quite clear there was an underlying assumption, players would be using miniatures.

I agree. Although even 1e is a bit vague on exactly how space and movement work once you get 'engaged' in melee, the game very definitely assumes a sort of 'battle space' where everything has a location and you can make measurements (and nominally it has a scale). This is all directly descended from the original D&D rules, which resolved combat using Chainmail, with the exception that indoor areas were mapped 1" = 10' instead of 10 yards. They even have a scaling of AoEs and ranges so that everything takes up the same inches underground that it does above (in other words, the game is really played in inches, not yards or feet).

Early D&D play ALWAYS had minis. In fact there was a standing rule in our game club (which had a few 100 members) that you couldn't run a character unless you had an accurate figure for it. If the only dwarf you had was wielding a mace, guess what weapon your PC got to use! Maybe that was a bit extreme, but everyone seemed to think that was how it was played, and it was very 'wargame mode'.

Admittedly, that had pretty well worn off by the mid-80's. OA maintained the conventions for example, but the play didn't really emphasize large complex fights, it was more 'stab in the dark' and 'get executed by the emperor for being offensive at the poetry contest' or something.

 

[Jhaelen]

Measuring in inches implies mini use just as much as squares, IMO.

I agree.
It was only in the very beginning that we tried to play without any physical representation of the (combat) locations, but quickly gave up because it caused too many arguments.

So, when we played AD&D we most often used graph paper and whatever was handy to represent the characters and monsters (typically dice).
In 2e we upgraded to use a few miniatures, in particular for the player characters.

When we started playing 3e we also started using dungeon tiles and battle-maps and many of us started investing heavily in D&D Miniatures. Some of us also started playing the D&D Minatures game. So, for us 4e didn't change much in that regard, except that tactical movement became a lot more interesting.

In fact, when we started playing Pathfinder, our DM almost immediately imported several rules from 4e to improve combat. In retrospect it was quite appaling how bad combat worked in 3e!

 

[thanson02]

So even though the conversation involving minis and combat has been really fun to read, I do have a question that is more on topic of the thread.

I have the old character builder on my computer, Windows 10 operating system, and it's working perfectly fine. One program I have not been able to get work is the adventure tools. I'll go through the process to install it and then I keep hitting the same point and the program won't let me hit the button I need to continue the installation process. I don't know if it's because I don't have a driver on my computer or what. I was wondering if other people who have Windows 10 has run into the same problem and if they have, how did you bypass the stall out in the installation?

 

[Garthanos]

I managed to get it to install fairly recently

 

[thanson02]

I managed to get it to install fairly recently

Mind if I PM you for some help regarding troubleshooting?

 

[Garthanos]

[MENTION=6801619]thanson02[/MENTION] I do not recollect having any problems but I basically installed it to a non-programs directory and as admin

 

[Garthanos]

Mind if I PM you for some help regarding troubleshooting?

sure if you like

 

[darkbard]

Well, today marks the official death of the 4E tools ... on December 31. Received an email from WotC earlier today:

​ Dear DDI Subscriber, We appreciate you being a subscriber for so many years! The sheer number of D&D encounters, characters, & creations this service has enabled is truly staggering and we are eternally grateful. Due to the Silverlight platform no longer being supported by Microsoft, the Dungeons & Dragons Insider service will be ending effective December 31, 2019. All your characters and material will be unavailable starting on January 1, 2020. There will be no charge for using the service in December of 2019 and our partners at Digital River will be contacting you with details on any potential refunds for charges made this month. If you have any questions, please reach out to Wizards Customer Service here. Don’t fret! All your creations made on this platform can be exported. Here are simple instructions for how to download your creations for future use: Characters: Go to https://ddi.wizards.com/DDiTools.aspx Click Launch on the Character Builder Click Load next to “Load a D&D Character” Select the character you would like to save Click the export button Name the file the name of your character Click Save You can now open your character in a notepad program and look at the raw data. Monsters: Go to https://ddi.wizards.com/DDiTools.aspx Launch Adventure Tools Click Monster List Click on the monster you want to save Click Preview on the top right corner Click Export on the bottom right corner Name your monster Click Save You can now open your character in a notepad program and look at the raw data. All of this content will become unavailable starting on January 1, 2020 so please make any exports before then. Once again, we on the D&D Team appreciate fans who have used the D&D Insider platform for so many years. You are all heroes and we hope to see you rolling dice in the future! Happy holidays, The D&D Team​ ​ ​ If you would like to sign up to receive D&D news, visit https://myaccounts.wizards.com/login/dnd. This is a service-related email. Wizards will occasionally send you service-related emails to confirm changes to your account as well as to inform you about updates and revisions to Wizards' services and polices. Services and policies are subject to Wizards' terms of use and may be revised from time to time.​ ©1995-2019 Wizards of the Coast LLC, a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 1600 Lind Ave SW #400, Renton, WA 98057 Terms of Use | Privacy Statement​

 

[MwaO]

Yup. Just started figuring out alternate options and managed to get a fake windows computer on my mac to run everything. Which is weird and a flashback to 10 years ago.

Everyone should bug customer support and ask them if they're willing to let someone else take over the service. It can't have been costing them that much other than causing customer support to get bugged by them. The other option is perfectly functional and just requires some sort of stamp of legitimacy. And if there is no other option, well, not sure why WotC would mind it.

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

No word on whether this includes the Compendium? Or is it just the silverlight stuff?