Valatar
July 7th, 2017, 00:35
We can always use more players. With more players comes more creators. With more creators comes more maps, tokens, rulesets, and stuff for making games better and easier. With more content comes more GMs. And so forth and so on, in a cycle that hopefully will build on itself to the benefit of all of us. Grabbing Pathfinder is a really big deal, but that alone doesn't have a lot of 'wow' factor when it comes to showing someone a screenshot or video that makes them excited to throw money at Smiteworks. Seeing a picture of a bestiary page in a FG window isn't gonna make anyone fall out of their chairs. FGU, on the other hand, does have the nifty eye candy that can snag people. With that in mind, here are my unsolicited opinions:
1. Fantasy Grounds is intimidating to a new user at a point where they're likely to bail out.
Most of the people I know would, when confronted with an empty FG screen, try to click on a few things, get their eyes glazed over, then uninstall it. Setting up a campaign in a VTT is a fair amount of work, and staring at a blank tabletop is likely to make someone feel that it's too much work and they shouldn't bother. I propose that a new install of FGU should come with a pre-made module where all the bells and whistles are done already. Pretty maps, lighting and masking and weather effects already enabled, encounters already set up with some nice tokens for the monsters, something that shows off everything it can do in the best possible light. Then, on the first run of the program, offer to load that module. That way a new prospective buyer who's downloaded the demo will see the potential things they can do instead of the manifestation of a GM's version of writer's block. Having a video or webpage with a step-by-step for a new GM with the demo module to load an encounter and go through the combat tracker would also not be a bad idea, just something with arrows for 'Click this button, then this button to roll initiative. Drag this attack onto a token to roll an attack against a player'. Something hand-holdy and simple to get the basics across. People fear the deep end, so start them on the shallow side.
2. There are unexplored avenues into the nerd market that can get lots of eyes on FG for not too much money.
A lot of video game nerds are also tabletop nerds on the side, and there are a ton of video game nerd channels on YouTube and Twitch. Once you have a shiny demo mini-campaign, grab some video game reviewing YouTubers. Some of them would be willing to show your stuff for free if you give them a license, others would need to be paid to do a sponsored video, but if they have a fun game session there'll be thousands of prospective customers watching it who've never heard of FG. This is a bit of a corollary to number one, 'cause before you plop FGU into the hands of streamers, you need to have a polished experience for them to show. If they hit a bunch of snags or can't work out how to use the program, it'll just make FGU look bad, and odds are that most of the YouTube folks aren't gonna spend twenty hours learning the basics of doing their own campaign, so they'll need some training wheels in place. Doug being available to these people for a quick tutorial would be good too; showing that you can make a map with just some tiles and a few clicks and drags can only go over well.
Meanwhile, current GMs running FG could be pretty easily bribed into putting their games up on Twitch if you threw them some free stuff from the store in exchange for agreeing to stream their games. Make some tokens and map tiles to give away or something. That way you'll have GMs who already know how to use the system showing custom content and not just the same demo adventure that people would be seeing on YouTube. They won't have nearly the viewing audience, but if someone sees a video of a popular YouTube person playing the demo, wants to see more, and searches on Twitch, they'll be able to find more content to watch. In addition to spreading the perception of a big healthy community, GMs who know what they're doing with FGU should hopefully be showing off some tricks that less-experienced folks new to the program wouldn't have touched on.
I think that if FGU's release is treated as the unveiling of an entirely new product, with the marketing to match, rather than just an update of a years-old system, there's a strong opportunity to grab a sizable chunk of market share. Everyone out there who doesn't know about VTTs in general, knows something about VTTs but not FG, or knows about FG but wrote it off because they don't know what it can do, all of those people are potential new community members if they can get grabbed and shown the product with the bells and whistles added in FGU.
1. Fantasy Grounds is intimidating to a new user at a point where they're likely to bail out.
Most of the people I know would, when confronted with an empty FG screen, try to click on a few things, get their eyes glazed over, then uninstall it. Setting up a campaign in a VTT is a fair amount of work, and staring at a blank tabletop is likely to make someone feel that it's too much work and they shouldn't bother. I propose that a new install of FGU should come with a pre-made module where all the bells and whistles are done already. Pretty maps, lighting and masking and weather effects already enabled, encounters already set up with some nice tokens for the monsters, something that shows off everything it can do in the best possible light. Then, on the first run of the program, offer to load that module. That way a new prospective buyer who's downloaded the demo will see the potential things they can do instead of the manifestation of a GM's version of writer's block. Having a video or webpage with a step-by-step for a new GM with the demo module to load an encounter and go through the combat tracker would also not be a bad idea, just something with arrows for 'Click this button, then this button to roll initiative. Drag this attack onto a token to roll an attack against a player'. Something hand-holdy and simple to get the basics across. People fear the deep end, so start them on the shallow side.
2. There are unexplored avenues into the nerd market that can get lots of eyes on FG for not too much money.
A lot of video game nerds are also tabletop nerds on the side, and there are a ton of video game nerd channels on YouTube and Twitch. Once you have a shiny demo mini-campaign, grab some video game reviewing YouTubers. Some of them would be willing to show your stuff for free if you give them a license, others would need to be paid to do a sponsored video, but if they have a fun game session there'll be thousands of prospective customers watching it who've never heard of FG. This is a bit of a corollary to number one, 'cause before you plop FGU into the hands of streamers, you need to have a polished experience for them to show. If they hit a bunch of snags or can't work out how to use the program, it'll just make FGU look bad, and odds are that most of the YouTube folks aren't gonna spend twenty hours learning the basics of doing their own campaign, so they'll need some training wheels in place. Doug being available to these people for a quick tutorial would be good too; showing that you can make a map with just some tiles and a few clicks and drags can only go over well.
Meanwhile, current GMs running FG could be pretty easily bribed into putting their games up on Twitch if you threw them some free stuff from the store in exchange for agreeing to stream their games. Make some tokens and map tiles to give away or something. That way you'll have GMs who already know how to use the system showing custom content and not just the same demo adventure that people would be seeing on YouTube. They won't have nearly the viewing audience, but if someone sees a video of a popular YouTube person playing the demo, wants to see more, and searches on Twitch, they'll be able to find more content to watch. In addition to spreading the perception of a big healthy community, GMs who know what they're doing with FGU should hopefully be showing off some tricks that less-experienced folks new to the program wouldn't have touched on.
I think that if FGU's release is treated as the unveiling of an entirely new product, with the marketing to match, rather than just an update of a years-old system, there's a strong opportunity to grab a sizable chunk of market share. Everyone out there who doesn't know about VTTs in general, knows something about VTTs but not FG, or knows about FG but wrote it off because they don't know what it can do, all of those people are potential new community members if they can get grabbed and shown the product with the bells and whistles added in FGU.