Custom Compendium

The tool that was developed for publishers has been used over the last month with success, and you should start to see additional compendiums being added to the platform from many of those publishers. As that process gets tested and further updated, we will be able to start additional planning on the user interface and how to deal with the data created from custom compendiums, pending further technical and legal research.

Will we get compendiums for the system Das Schwarze Auge? In german language? Will other compendiums, like Dungeon World, be translated to other languages, specifically german? I doubt it. But I'd like to use it to have a monster library, from which I can drag&drop monsters to the vtt. At the moment I do this by using tons of character sheets in my games, which is reported to be the reason for slow loading times. If it would not affect loading times, I'd be happy as is.

Danii said: Will we get compendiums for the system Das Schwarze Auge? In german language? Will other compendiums, like Dungeon World, be translated to other languages, specifically german? I doubt it. Let me see if I can get you an answer here. But I'd like to use it to have a monster library, from which I can drag&drop monsters to the vtt. At the moment I do this by using tons of character sheets in my games, which is reported to be the reason for slow loading times. If it would not affect loading times, I'd be happy as is. I can say that significant updates to the way we handle character sheet data to make this more efficient is on the development schedule (status would be "Queued")

Thanks for the answer. :) 

Danii said: Will we get compendiums for the system Das Schwarze Auge? In german language? Will other compendiums, like Dungeon World, be translated to other languages, specifically german? I doubt it. But I'd like to use it to have a monster library, from which I can drag&drop monsters to the vtt. At the moment I do this by using tons of character sheets in my games, which is reported to be the reason for slow loading times. If it would not affect loading times, I'd be happy as is. While, we would love to support more languages in our existing compendiums, but there are no plans for the near future. 

Yes it would be useful to be able to add your own monsters and share them with others in a custom compendium with and an area/library to upload others if shared freely, +1 vote

being able to use hombrew content thats already preset into the charactermancer would be infinitely useful.  

I created my own game (at first to play with my friends only) and I would welcome a way to bulk load Characters, Handouts, Macros and Tables. Custom Compendium (even not covering macros and tables) would be a great improvement.

The first module made using the tools created for Publishers is now live on the Marketplace , and we are taking the lessons learned from that process and improving the experience. With those improvements, we will be at the stage where we can look at custom compendiums per user more closely.

We continue to work with third parties to improve the compendium creation process, most notably with work on Pathfinder 2, but we still have significant work ahead making data usable by character sheets while keeping data preparation and data entry intuitive enough to be useful. 

I really want to be able to add homebrew only to the compendium. I think if you were to have some sort of system like DNDbeyond's homebrew creation ability where it can't be put in if it is too similar to another item in the overall collection for the compendium. and maybe creating a marketplace to add homebrew for plus and pro subscribers or compendium add ons in the marketplace for homebrew stuff.

kenton h. said: We continue to work with third parties to improve the compendium creation process, most notably with work on Pathfinder 2, but we still have significant work ahead making data usable by character sheets while keeping data preparation and data entry intuitive enough to be useful.  I know you most probably have a lot of suggestions you must report to, however, this update tells us nothing. What significant work ahead is there? What kind of data are we talking about? What method of entry? If that is your style of posting updates I don't really mind (I was not expecting much either), but don't make a fool out of us. If this is what was intended from the major suggestion forums overhaul, I must say it has failed to deliver its originally proposed intent.

I wouldnt have said is so harshly, but I agree with the point being made. It really tells those of us interested in homebrew compendiums nothing.

My guess?  The fact that the existing compendiums has some issues of their own, I'm betting that their internal system for creating compendiums has evolved as a series of hacks to their initial framework and probably needs a complete overhaul before it can be presented to the public for their own use.  Tight deadlines makes situational hacks appealing solutions and that kind of snowballs. As such, this is probably far down in their priority list.  This is all just total speculation.

We should not need to speculate. Speculation causes hostility between the community and the devs. We could go all over crazy conspiracy theories but it won't change the likeliness of when and how this suggestion is implemented. In order for us to give constructive feedback and relay what we want as a community we need a transparent and truthful approach from the devs. Sadly this has not been the case from the latest responses in this thread at least. If there is something to share with us please do so, if there is not or you have ulterior motives to not implementing this please do tell us so. There is nothing more painful than waiting for a suggestion only to have the devs sidestep through corporate speech and smokescreens. We were told we would have legitimate communication on suggestions above a threshold, I have yet to see it in this thread. As I said above, if this is how you plan to continue with handling the suggestions I would recommend you reconsider. If you somehow feel burned out by dealing with us cheeky users who do nothing but complain everyday (though in this case it would not have happened if you did give us a transparent approach), go ahead and shut down the suggestion forum until you are in a better shape to accept input from users.

As far as the concerns of piracy go, that hasn't stopped competitors like DNDB and FG from allowing for custom content (heck DNDB revolves around this and they have that partnership with WotC). You could maybe have a ToS update but I don't think it's a significant issue all things considered, especially if there's no way to transfer Homebrew content between GMs. Even if not everything could be implemented, at least not right away, being able to just create homebrew spells, feats, and items for a private compendium just for your players would be a great way to start. (Races and subclasses would be the big things I want, just cause I've written a lot of homebrew content of that nature.)

Note that DND Beyond has strict rules about homebrew content not violating copyright, (see  here ) and have vetting process in place for homebrew content (not familiar with FG but I presume they have something similar in place to protect themselves from legal issues).  Roll20 would probably need to put in place something similar.  As I said above, my guess is that the main hurdle in implementing this is most likely that they need a complete overhaul of their current compendium framework before it is ready for public consumption.

Consider this another vote for a custom compendium. I don't really see how adding the ability for me to create custom compendium entries that work only for my games would be a copyright issue. In my case I want to be able to create custom backgrounds that can be selected by my players in the charactermancer.

Yes please, let's allow more homebrew... rule of cool, if i want to give my players something... let me do it!

This is crazy, we should at least  be able to add custom items and spells. I just moved to DM'ing on Roll20, so I didn't even know that I couldn't do this until yesterday. It's such a common part of any tabletop game that I thought "of course you'd be able to do that!" So yeah, yet another +1 for this long overdue feature.

Man, I see lots of folks supporting the platform (monetarily (with paid subscriptions)) that would like to see this happen. I will add my comment, with the Pro tag showing that I support the platform with my money, to the tally.   

I'm with Eric S. and Robert S. on this one. This is something that should have shipped when the compendium first started. These are some basic features.

not saying anything new, but i just wanted to comment my support. it shouldve been a feature from the start.

Adding my support. Sure, I can handjam in custom stuff. But doing it for each character is really laborious. A custom compendium which allowed for customer versions of each class of item would be amazing. I know it's not trivial, and I understand it isn't a priority. Just saying - it would make a big different for a lot of GMs, which we all know are the scarce resource when it comes to gaming.

It sure would be amazing ^^

As someone doing a near entirely homebrewed campaign soon? This would be luxurious. I can make do with just manually adding things to player's sheets but if they ever start playing pass-around with any homebrew items I'd probably start crying as it is.

Adding my support

This was needed before the charactermancer, now it's pretty essential. I'd also like to be able to add my extensive list of custom spells and items to my compendium so my players can drag and drop.

SO... if we're not getting personal custom compendiums soon, what does it take as a content creator to get the toolkit to create a marketplace compendium?

This needs to happen.  I'm stuck trying to use roll20 exclusively, but the DnD Beyond has pretty great ability for me to add subraces, backgrounds, and other homebrew content that is really important to me. So, having subscriptions at both places and building the same core rule books in both places is not sustainable.  My hope is that roll20 keeps pace so it's my all-the-time home for DnD.  Thanks folks!

+1.  This is kind of a no-brainer and should receive some priority. It would make a great subscription incentive feature.  It adds no new legal issues that aren't already present by allowing users to upload custom art, maps, etc.

Don't really buy the " too complex" and legal issues. As others have said, theres more chance to distribute custom "illegal" content on Roll20's competitors products yet its allowed. As for too complex, providing easy to use tools is nice, but I'm sure there are some smart enough people here that can figure it out....just look at some of the characters sheets and api scripts.

+1 to the request. Don't thing legal issues is the main problem here, I personally don't see the difference between creating the handout note with the same information and creating the compendium entry. Also there are various ways to import this content already.  The transparent and clear answer (at least about the status of the topic) would be appreciated.

I promise not to pirate anything. Swear down.

I am not asking to download a custom homebrew'd compendium or to public my homebrew'd compendium. ALL i'm asking for is a private compendium that I can use for my games. Legal issues shouldn't be an issue in this case, I am not publishing any copyrighted material, I am not downloading any copyrighted material, I am simply adding my own privately used spells/races/feats/etc. If any on the content I have added into my compendium is similar to the official compendiums (i.e: a zombie variant that very similar to the base DnD 5e zombie monster but has increased stats and an increased cr) this shouldn't be a problem as I am not publishing my compendium.

I also want this feature

This needs to happen

+1

I'd absolute love this. I use overhead tokens in my games instead of portrait tokens, and also tend to customize monsters and enemies quite a bit. At the moment, I just have an enormous "Monster Manual" folder in my game journals which contain all my monster character sheets (both customized monsters, and ones taken directly from the standard compendiums but with new tokens), and a game specifically made for the purposes of holding all these sheets so I can transmogrify them to other games, but that's a pretty convoluted and time-consuming process, particularly with no way of organizing or alphabetizing the transmogrifier.

+1

+1 vote for this please - especial for games that have a not for profit open license for material for the game system, such as where as long as you are not making money the SRD is already available on the web.....FATE, Forged in the Dark, 1st addition D&D for example 

+1 Never Forget

we will not relent. this should have been part of the site all along, we will not stop pestering y'all over this. WE WANT HOMEBREW COMPENDIUMS.

Need this so much, I would love Gunslingers in my campaign but can't add the custom content for it ): 

So what they are saying (by saying nothing and dragging their feet on this) is that all of us users with subscriptions should cancel them until they get this up and working (or at the very least are more transparent in communicating with us about it). If they will not listen to reason, then they will listen when we affect their pocketbooks...

The Dungeon Master said: So what they are saying (by saying nothing and dragging their feet on this) is that all of us users with subscriptions should cancel them until they get this up and working (or at the very least are more transparent in communicating with us about it). If they will not listen to reason, then they will listen when we affect their pocketbooks... This is Roll20 in a nutshell. Roll20 is now at the turning point of listening to the suggestion forums or allow it to be a beacon as to how others can take users away from Roll20.

+1

Hello everyone, I am truly sorry for the length of time between posts. To keep things direct, over time working with third parties in implementation of compendiums has shed a lot of light on where the current user interface falls short. A Custom Compendium in its current state would be a difficult and unintuitive experience for users. In addition, in areas that are not as evident as a feature, the Compendium software is in need of optimization. We're asking a lot of the current software, most of which wasn't planned with the initial work or since. In my eyes, these optimizations are necessary before we open doors to custom compendiums and trust us with maintaining that data. The data stored in Compendiums take a lot of effort and care from the GMs and players who create them-- as such this should be a fully realized feature that is intuitive and easy to use both in editing and navigating.  Taking feedback and lessons learned from previously , this does not seem to be the reality at this time. We absolutely love the idea of custom compendiums and want to provide you all with a pleasant experience in using them. We do not want to rush anything out the door while we are still working through other high priority issues at this time. In the mean time, Pro users have access to the Transmogrifier, which can move Characters, Handouts, and much more between games. The Character Vault might also be able to meet some intermediate needs. One other point, Custom Compendium is not a single "feature" but rather an entire suite of features. When we start to implement the ability to store and search data, it will be released in smaller increments. 

Hello all,      I have recently started to DM a game of TOA and I have realized that I would like to offer my characters some homebrew items and maybe customer creature stats. I know that currently there is no customer item/monster sheet for us to modify 100%. I have ran into some issues with not being able to customize it as much as I would like to. Essentially what I am proposing is an option to have "Homebrew" sheets added to the compendium. I think it will add a bit of new flare to the whole experience and it will add some more fun to the entire DM and player experience. If anyone would have any questions or would like to possibly expand upon this please do so. Thank you. 

Thumbs said: Essentially what I am proposing is an option to have "Homebrew" sheets added to the compendium.  Are you suggesting the ability for custom sheets to use the Compendium? They can do that already, they just need to be written to support it (which won't be easy, but it can be done).