Allow filtering free sources from Compendium

The new compendium allows filtering on sources, but the source list does not distinguish between 2014 and 2024 content.  As an example, set a filter for the name "Animal" and the Source "D&D 5th Edition SRD".  The results include both the 2014 and 2024 versions of the Animal friendship SRD.

Now for a 2024 game, with backwards compatibility, that might make some sense, since existing players could have the older version and you might need to look up both, or the DM might allow adding the older version on level-up.

But for an older game using the 2014 sheet, it's pointless, as you get the "Hello from the future" error when dragging and dropping such items onto the sheet due to the compendium incompatibility.  And if the DM uses the 2024 sheet but wants to run a 2024-only campaign, including the 2014 SRD is just going to be confusing (some spells, for example, have very different behavior under the two systems).

So, this suggestion is three-fold:

1. List ALL of the compendium sources, including default ones like the SRD, in the Content Sharing section of the Game Settings, so the DM can exclude the irrelevant ones from their games.

2. Separate and identify the 2024 and 2014 content when using filters in the new compendium, so you can control them separately. (and put the marking at the start of the line so it isn't cut off, eg "2024 5E SRD")

3. In filters, allow an "exclude checked content" mode (so I could, eg, exclude the items labelled 2024 when searching).

Hi Ken S., 

The current SRD problem should be temporary? My understanding is that due to how the D&D 2024 compendium was implemented it collided with the SRD's normal "replacement" system. The old system where the PHB, EK, etc automatically replaced the SRD.

I think the Devs are working on the issue. 

Well that's good news, if true. But it could cause as much of a problem as it solves.

Right now, I'm playing in and DMing pure 2014-rules games, and want a way to do that cleanly.  But longer term, those will likely transition to a mix of both systems (it's what I did when Xanathar's and Tasha's added new spells and features) and if so they'll be hybrid games for a time and possibly for the life of the campaign (my last campaign ran six years with most of the original characters still in play).

What concerns me then is that sometimes you'd want both available. 5E (2024) is supposedly explicitly backwards compatible, and supports the existance of characters with 2014 stats, even when those differ from the 2024, but still need to select one or the other at times.  It's largely up to the DM how you handle that kind of mixing apparently, as the PHB is notably silent on the topic.

But take, for example, the Poison Spray cantrip.  In 2014, it requires a Constitution saving throw to avoid damange and has a range of 10 feet.  Under 2024 rules, it uses a ranged spell attack with a range of 30 feet. Now in this particular case, most people would probably want the new version.  But someone might want to retain the old form of the spell, or the DM might want to, as it was part of the original definition of the "character" of the PC.  The new PHB doesn't really address that kind of situation (hopefully the DMG will when it comes out), but I can see a DM allowing it regardless, so the VTT/Compendium needs to make provision for it.

And in that case, you'd need to allow use of both definitions in a game, in case a new sheet had to be created (re-creating a corrupted one, or importing an existing character from some other table system).

Also, I don't think it's just an SRD issue.  Even if I as DM allow both (and share my purchases in a game), I might want to search for compendium content from "new" sources, and right now the filters don't really make that possible (at least I couldn't figure out which sources used new or old rules where I had duplicate entries).  Or a player might have both books available in their purchases, but need to explicitly select only legacy content because the DM was running a 2014-rules campaign.

We've never run into that problem before, as far as I know, because earlier D&D editions have used dedicated sheets and compendiums.  A hybrid system and a new shared sheet that supports old, new or mixed games is the root of this.  And while I applaud Roll20's attempt to make a shared sheet work, mechanically it has problems with a mixed set of compendium sources that likely persist beyond fixing replacement.

Not at home right now but if you could provide some concrete examples of the problems with screenshots I can probably help you navigate the differences.

A screenshot of how you see both Poison Spray spells for example.

In the specific incident I mentioned, I wasn't the DM who had the problem, just a player in his game, so I didn't see the screens.  I think it was basically just a case of grabbing the first item that came up in a journal search and being surprised when it gave an error, and then doing the same thing again (because he was rushing to fix a prep error in his game in the middle of combat and not taking the time to read closely).

Which sounds like "user error", but I'd call it bad ergonomics.  Sometimes you don't have the option to be leisurely.

However, my own experience is that the list of sources is confusing, although looking at it today, I can't replicate what I saw this weekend, as I'm only seeing two sources listed under spells today, "D&D 5th Edition SRD" and  "(2024) Free Basic Rules", despite that I am sharing all of my 2014 content, including a half-dozen books with spells, and, as you'll see below, that I can actually find spells from several of them if I don't apply filters (and can't find them at all if I do).

I own Strixhaven, for example, and looking up the spell Silvery Barbs in the general Spell category by the first word finds it, attributed to the correct book.

However, applying a filter for the word Silvery against the the Spells category actually fails to locate the Strixhaven spell, so I think in trying to correct the SRD conflict, they've broken general filtering.

Just for completness, here's what I get with Poison Spray today (from simply searching the word Poison under spells, without filtering):

So it's still showing the 2024 content by default.

Here is what happens when I apply a filter for "poison" against ONLY the 5E SRD item:

and the output:

Note that despite the filter, it still found both the 2014 and 2024 versions of Poison Spray.

Note: I also tried searching for Green Flame Blade, which appears in both Tasha's and the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide (both of which I own and share with this campaign), and the filter on "green" under spells found neither but a simple search on the same word without the filter turned up both entries.

So they've simplified the list, but now filters basically don't work for anything that isn't SRD content.

I should note that the above is from a non-Jumpgate, new-compendium-enabled game that I share my 5E purchases with. I don't know if it matters, but the game was created 18 months ago and is used in ongoing play, it wasn't set up as a test. The game only has the old 2014 5E sheet enabled, nothing else.

Sorry for not getting back to you sooner, I lost this thread. :D

This is some good information. Based on this it appears this falls under a bug and I would recommend filing a bug report via the Help Center. 

The New Compendium is still a work in progress and the Devs could use this information to further refine it. 

With that said, if you have difficulty with the New Compendium you might try switching to the Old Compendium until the issue is resolved. 

I just checked (prior to filing a bug report) and both of these issues have been corrected, well, mostly.

1. All purchased (and free) sources appear in the filter list (except the 2014 SRD).

2. The 2024 Free content appears in Compendium sharing and can be excluded from a game.

What's still missing is the 2014 SRD content, if a DM wanted to exclude the old form of, eg Poison Spray, and only allow the 2024 version (which has a somewhat different definition).  There's no entry for that in Compendium Selection, so it can't be excluded.

While that meets my current needs for running a "pure" 2014 game, I can see the inability to block the 2014 SRD being a problem for someone who wants to run a "pure" 2024 game.  So I'll leave this suggestion in place and I filed a bug report specific to that case.

Roll20 replied to my bug report (that was fast!) that:

This is actually something we are working to implement in the near future. The ability to maintain both compendiums simultaneously has required some additional hoops in development to reduce potential data conflicts that were causing issues.

Ideally, this functionality should be live within the next week or so.

Thanks for the suggestion!

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