DungeonScape Delivers Digital D&D

The new 5th edition of Dungeons & Dragons has just released, and already many are excited about the long-in-production role-playing game, which nudges the design in a few new directions while embracing many of the tenets of past editions. Even as the traditional structure of play remains central, Wizards of the Coast has partnered with Trapdoor Technologies to create a full digital toolset for the new edition, one that includes everything from a character creator tool to the option to buy searchable, digital versions of the game books and adventures. Ultimately, the Dungeonscape app should allow a gaming group to optionally run a whole game from the app without any outside paper, dice, or paper books.

We interviewed the team at Trapdoor Technologies about their new project, and got some additional detail about what players can expect. We talked with Chris Matney, managing director and founder of Trapdoor, producer Evan Newton, and Rachael Bowen, community and customer support manager. 

What is the DungeonScape app, and what top level tools will it eventually include for players and DMs?

Rachael Bowen: DungeonScape is the Official Companion to the Dungeons & Dragons Tabletop RPG. It is the only licensed digital toolset for fifth edition D&D and is developed by us, Trapdoor Technologies, in partnership with Wizards of the Coast. DungeonScape’s aim is to provide a full-featured set of tools for playing fifth edition D&D. We have features for both pre-game role playing (character generation, creating DM notes, maps and monsters, etc.), and actual gameplay (character and adventure tracking, in-game document sharing, party chat, secret DM messaging). 

Being new to D&D myself, I’ve been astounded at the amount of information contained in the physical D&D books. One of the coolest things DungeonScape will provide at the top level is a fully searchable Player’s Handbook, Monster Manual and Dungeon Master’s Guide. This includes all images, maps, rules, spells, races, armor classes, etc. This tool is incredibly powerful and on its own stands to change the way that role-players play D&D. 

The character creator aspect of the app seems like it is the farthest along – what are some of the features of the character creator that you’re especially proud of and excited about?

Chris Matney: There are two things here that I think are really cool. The initial design idea behind character creation was to make it faster in order to facilitate more play time. We’ve taken the process of rolling up a character and provided all the info you need to do so at your fingertips - this takes the pain of creating characters out of the equation and turns it into something that is fast, easy and fun. 

The second thing that I’m really excited about is something we’ve begun implementing recently. We’ve included a lot of features to move the app toward bringing creativity back to the forefront in character building. In an effort to try and get the creative juices really flowing, we’ve made it easy to make a character that’s going to be memorable; one that you’ll play for a long time and provide you with many challenges and opportunities for role play. Basic characters are a pile of numbers which is great for combat, but if you really want to role play, it’s about being able to understand your characters motivations, flaws, background: It’s about the things that make them tick and really make them interesting and exciting. When you talk to people about what characters in the past they’ve been excited about, it’s not the all 18 ability score character – it’s the one that had a tragic flaw that made them fun or challenging to play from a roleplaying perspective. I’m really excited about the way we’ve implemented this in DungeonScape. If you don’t want to dive into the creative process, you don’t have to - you can hit ‘random’ and go. 

For many D&D players, the analog experience of rolling dice and using paper is a key part of the experience. In what ways can DungeonScape be an additive and more enjoyable experience for players who are hesitant to integrate digital components into their approach to play?

Evan Newton:  Well, the answer is that for some people, we simply can’t replace the pencil and paper experience.  With that in mind, however, we are designing DungeonScape with face-to-face gameplay as a priority.  To us, the game is about living in the world you’ve created with your friends.  It’s not about spending a half hour pouring over rulebooks to find the correct calculations for breaking down a door (for example).  We’re trying our best to make information easily accessible.  

Matney: One of the key things to note here is that the creative player doesn’t like to roll electronic dice! I like to use paper and roll dice; I like the old time experience of D&D. With DungeonScape, you could use the app simply as a giant reference book, never for your character or for rolling dice. People that are hesitant to make that change can gently transition. When they realize the not so fun parts like bookkeeping and rule finding are made much more accessible using the app, it becomes easy. Some will get into the dice rollers, some won’t. The point is we can all play together using the technology or not. It’s not something where everyone has to be playing at the same level of integration with the tool. There is a path for those who want to make the transition slowly; once you realize you’ll never lose a character and that looking up spells isn’t integral to the fun of the game, the app becomes pretty indispensable pretty quickly. 

[Next Page: How much of a full D&D game can be played exclusively using the app?]

Other players are likely eager to integrate digital elements as fully as they can into their D&D games. Once DungeonScape is complete, how much of the gameplay experience can be handled entirely through the app?

Newton: DungeonScape is designed to work well according to the player’s level of comfort. If you just want to use it for rules reference and do everything else by paper, that’s fine. If you want to have it do everything including your dice rolls, that’s fine too.  

Matney: All of it! Specifically, your rule books can be replaced by the digital version which is fully readable, searchable and integrated with the experience. Character sheets are on your iPad and you can have multiple versions by saving off chars at every level - whatever you normally do with your paper, you can do in the app. The creation of material can be done entirely through the app and will be stored on the cloud and any supplements that you’d normally buy would be implemented as well. The proof in the pudding will be when you see a game that has dice, minis and a bunch of iPads around the table and folks are looking at each other in the face the same amount of time as if it were paper. You’ve gained an hour in play because you don’t have to look up the rules. The only thing you need other than the app is your imagination. 

The application is able to go online. What features can you provide to players and DMs through that online connection?

Newton: The answer to this is a two part answer. Right now, we are offering party-based sharing and chat abilities, so you can send messages to your party members and your DM. We are also working on the ability for the DM to share specific content with players i.e., maps or illustrations. The second part is that our limitations are really only governed by the technology we’re developing on so in essence, the sky's the limit. If our community rallies around a networking feature that they really want then we’ll seriously evaluate it. 

Matney: You can use the app offline but the full experience is the online experience. The practicalities of building mobile apps means that you can’t download everything all the time, especially when you have a content rich world like The Forgotten Realms with thousands of images, videos and large files – some of that has to be done through the cloud. All the interactions where you are using the share feature (sending secret messages, sending dice rolls), requires that you sync through a connection. I think that people who play offline will still have a very superior level of play and that they’ll be able to enjoy the game with a much higher level of satisfaction than they will with the traditional paper and books. Having offline capabilities is especially important when considering small LGS and conventions with unreliable or non-existent wifi.

The 4th edition of Dungeons & Dragons had a set of digital tools. In what ways does DungeonScape differ from those tools? Are there elements of the 4th edition digital toolset that you liked and were interested to implement in this new version?

Matney: To me, the biggest difference between us and fourth edition (and really every other solution out there) is that we‘re also approaching this from a publishing standpoint. 4e was solely about creating characters, not running adventures, creating content or managing games. This is not meant as a knock on 4e - the technology just didn’t exist back then. As publishers who are approaching this project in terms of the canon of D&D – adventures and campaigns like Forgotten Realms and other worlds – there is an immense background of material, which of course results in an immense pile of books.

By integrating everything together, we’re taking an approach that simply hasn’t existed in previous tools. The 4e tools were fine for the tech they existed on. The real difference is that by looking at it from the DM’s perspective, we have a whole new dimension that didn’t exist before. 

How will be it made available to the public? Is it free? Is there a one-time cost? A subscription fee?

Matney: The app will be free to download and it will contain some free content in the form of rules and adventures – enough to get a flavor for what DungeonScape does. You can buy material in the same way that you're currently buying it; PHB, MM, DMG. We also allow for a gentler introduction through buying content in smaller pieces – sort of an ‘a la carte’ method rather than having to buy everything up front. There’s also a super bundle option, so in total, there are three pay level options and some free content. All WotC content will be fully integrated into DungeonScape – text will be searchable, all images and maps will be included and all rules will be integrated into the character sheet. 

The app will be available via the Apple App Store, the Android Google Play Store and through web browsers. Since it works across all platforms, you can mix and match devices and operating systems and updates will be pushed out automatically - no need to wait for published errata, we’ll just push it right to your account!

On what platforms do you hope to eventually release DungeonScape? Do you have a release time frame in mind?

Newton: For our initial launch, we are targeting Android and iOS Tablets and web browsers. We’ve had a lot of interest in the Kindle and Microsoft Surface so we’re considering those platforms as well. Currently our plan is to do a staggered release of features. The Players Release, designed for primarily player-based features like Character Creation and the Character Sheet, will be available sometime in September. The DM’s Release will include adventure and campaign management tools along with networked party features, and the Forge Release will have fully featured customization options for adding player generated content. Both the DM’s Release and the Forge release are due out by the end of the year. 

What are your favorite features of the new edition of D&D?

Matney: I have several! The thing I like about it big picture wise is this:  D&D through AD&D 2nd edition and 3rd edition had a very consistent and wonderful set of mechanics that made the game work. In 4e, they took that away and changed it completely. I’m not saying it’s terrible, I’m saying it was different enough that those of us who loved previous versions stopped playing. Everyone went to Pathfinder. Which is great, but hardcore:  Books and rules make it almost impossible to play once your character gets past 20th level. If you’re a hardcore min/maxer, Pathfinder is great. 

What I love about fifth edition is that it hits that sweet spot between Pathfinder and a one page game like Savage Wolves. Wizards has hit the perfect mix of complexity and playability that people who are casual can get into it and hardcore players can play a 20th level character and have a lot of fun doing it. 

The thing I’m really excited about on the mechanics level is the concept of advantage/disadvantage as a way of getting out of having modifiers for everything. From a mathematical standpoint, it’s a really interesting idea. The other thing i really like about the rules is that they’ve kept the ability to sort of do whatever you want to do while having a framework that allows the DM to come up with the appropriate roles. They’ve made things like feats (that are very powerful), more interesting and harder to get. The level of complexity versus flexibility is a great balance.  People who’ve played for 35 years will be nostalgic, people who are new will be able to pick it up quickly and people who like to role play will find the rules fairly transparent.