WotC Releases Sigil

[LordEntrails]

Sigil, Wizards of the Coast's VTT, Officially Launches | EN World D&D & Tabletop RPG News & Reviews (https://www.enworld.org/threads/sigil-wizards-of-the-coasts-vtt-officially-launches.712058/)

Take Aways from the article

Windows Only
Requires DDB account, free or paid, capabilities tied to DDB subscription tiers
Uses Unreal Engine 5
"It doesn't look like a bad VTT, although it's more appropriate for big set piece battles rather than standard "goblins attack the caravan" type encounters."

[Morenu]

Gonna assume 5E only?

[Muagen]

I think that's a safe bet. :P

[Nyarly Dude]

Poked at it briefly when it was in a closed beta. Wasn't too impressed in terms of actual mechanical support and there was a lack of documentation suggesting how to automate anything complex. For those that aren't already using DDB (it had the ability to link to DDB records, which ofc. are only D&D 5E) it seemed to be just a map builder + rolling tool with very very basic automation (like, it's aware how attack rolls work and it'll automatically roll and apply damage).

[Pharoid]

I tried to test it out but their server is down for maintenance. Will report back later.

Loaded it later in the day. First 3d VTT I've tried and only played around for a few mins. Could not find fog-of-war. maybe thats only 2d? Seems Nyarly Dude is right. in 3d mode its pretty simple attack and damage and conditions. Maybe the 2D maps mode (still in beta but is there) has more automation.

Looks great though. Because I dabble in 3D, all I see is lots of work. :-) Will it get to the point that when they release a new module, it'll have custom 3d assets and encounters? I kinda doubt that. And if they did, it would cost more to make up for the additional work (or they'd add a tier to the subscription)

I see the subscription cost going up sooner rather than later.

Now... If they made it in VR... I'd be way more interested. Demeo: Battlemarked is DnD in VR already (no GM) and I'm buying that day one. :-)

I do hope Wizards gives this VTT a chance (a few years at least) to mature. Somehow, I see them phoning it in eventually when they don't see the $$$.

Just my first impressions with very short time playing with it. :-)

[*Neuro*]

it will be a microtransaction fest. why then an “unpainted” Black Dragon? to have it painted you have to pay?

seems pretty limited, no fog of war, and very heavy for hardware.

we will see in one year.

not trusting corporate Hasbro though.

P.S. forgot mandatory master tier subscription

[SilentRuin]

I tried it in NDA phase - but you had to have a high tier D&D account to DM for testing - and automation was almost non existent for all the stuff I use in FGU currently. Essentially its a 3D map/minis that you manage pretty much all of the 5E Complexities yourself. I prefer automation of those complexities so will stick with FGU.

For sure people who play in person dice only - will see it as an improvement over that. Pretty much adding computers to the map but the sheet/die rolls/etc. are left to you to figure out perform just as in an in person game as far as I could tell.

[Cyrian]

I loaded it up last night just to see the interface, then again today to try a design and it took me about eight minutes from start (meaning I didn't even know where the menus were) to finishing a room from an FG campaign in the attached pic. The builder is super easy to work with and modify after pieces are placed if you need to move them. It took another seven or eight minutes of futzing around trying to understand why the ogre minis are the size of humanoids before realizing there is a bug with some of the larger minis. As to the fourth bullet in Lord Entrail's post, I could have just as easily made this an outdoor goblin caravan scene, so definitely more than just for major set pieces.

The bright points of combat are things like AOE spells showing the area and auto-selecting all targets within it (such as burning hands) and auto-rolling all saves and damage. There are definitely downsides currently like a lot of spells not having the automations finished yet but apparently it's still in development (much back and forth on forums about whether it's still in beta or not, though the DNDB site just shows it as "New" as opposed to Maps which has a "Beta" tag).

Unpainted minis almost surely mean future sellable packs of pre-made decorated minis, but hey, have you seen the FG Store's art packs, dice packs, etc.? Players already being able to custom-make their own player minis is very cool.

[Booker Grimm]

I've downloaded it and tried it out. Was able to create a map of our final BBEG fight in a few minutes that looked great. Great lighting and good graphics make scenes come alive. There is a fog of war feature too, for someone who was asking above. And it's easily added by clicking and dragging. Nice to see the spell effects and some automated features. It does need the ability to be able to connect to your own game for using another monitor in face to face games, but this has been requested.

Overall was very impressed.

[Valacar]

I mentioned it in the Enworld thread about Carl’s old tabletopconnect from 2015 looked like it…just saying hi Carl!

[MrDDT]

I've checked it out for a few months now.
Lots of pretty stuff, here are some of the things I liked:
*3d graphics looks great.
*Animated effects/spells awesome looking
*Tracking of spells and spell slots works great.
*Tracking what spells/features do with automation works great. Like knowing that upcasting hold person allows for more targets.
*Automation on DC saves/checks is great.
*Moving tokens looks great.
*Movement markers look great.
*Special features/feats are programed in well.
*3d lightning effects are great.
*3d assets are awesome looking.



Some of the major issues:
*LOS issues works like real tabletop and not a VTT.
*Adding in 3rd party info and content is really hard.
*UI is a bit hard to deal with so far, they are working on it.
*Any type of deviation from normal 5E rules is going to be hard or impossible to do.
*Runs like crap on computers. Lots of lag, uses a lot of GPU resources and needs to be installed.
*Access to information on NPCs, Charsheets, etc. is not easy to get and or update.
*Creating content is not fast, or very many options.
*Lack of movement tracking.


There are a lot more things, but these are some of the highlights.

Personally, I don't see me moving to this VTT if ever due to how they handle things. But it is very pretty and if they get the UI worked out better, I can see it being very popular. Adding in optional 3rd party sales of items that are turnkey, this would be epic.
I expect they will need to do 2 major things before real release.

1) They need to do something about the massive GPU usage.
2) They will need to add in more options for house rules and 3rd party content.

[Lazybones1969]

Yeah, I could see buying a published adventure for Sigil and running it as a one-off, but as someone who primarily runs lengthy homebrew campaigns with a ton of custom content, I think it has a way to go to duplicate the advantages of FGU.

[Lo Zeno]

I've been beta-testing it for a while. I think a fairer comparison would be towards Talespire, rather than Fantasy Grounds or Foundry.

It's quite clearly NOT in a complete state at the moment, sure it can be used the same way one would play with minis rather than a VTT (the lack of LOS being the first thing that's missing), that said it's moving fast. The improvements and features are coming rather quickly, especially compared to Talespire.
Seeing how it's focused on one rules system only, the DnDBeyond developers will likely have a much easier time delivering automation features and their resources will not be spread across multiple systems that need to be kept working at each new release, at the same time preparing 3D sceneries and dungeons for a game takes a LOT of time even in advanced tools like Talespire, and I don't think Sigil will make it significantly faster without sacrificing the ability of the DM to create original and unique sceneries.

That said, I fully expect that in a year time or two, for every new WoTC published adventure they will provide the 3D version of the maps to Master tier subscribers to allow anyone to quickly run encounters in Sigil.

[Nylanfs]

And it's dead... Doug, maybe there's some people you want to snag?

https://www.enworld.org/threads/90-of-d-d%E2%80%99s-project-sigil-team-laid-off.712430/

[Muagen]

I had a gut feeling this was the way it would go. I think the only digital successes that company has scored have been in other people's hands during all the important parts.

[Lo Zeno]

And it's dead... Doug, maybe there's some people you want to snag?

https://www.enworld.org/threads/90-of-d-d%E2%80%99s-project-sigil-team-laid-off.712430/

I saw the news this morning. I'm not even going to try and understand the reasons behind this move, companies that operate in the tech/software space have been doing a lot of weird/pointless **** recently.
It's a big shame though, it had good potential for 5E especially if they integrated it better with the existing DnDBeyond features.

[LordEntrails]

Wow, I did expect this, but not just weeks after release. I thought it would be another 6 months. I guess now we know why they released a Beta and didn't call it that. It appears to have been a last Hail Mary approach to get what thye had out the door in case it just was good enough to be an instant success.

[Morenu]

Umm...wow? guess its harder that some people think. ::chuckle:: shame, I don't think it would have been a huge bite out of FGU unless they really supported homebrew, but for those wanting to run stock 5e campaigns it would have been nice.

[MrDDT]

Hey they still have 3 people working on it at least.

[Muagen]

Hey they still have 3 people working on it at least.

Oof. I hadn't even computed what a 90% cut would look like.

Three people. That's just about as token an effort as you could manage for an official team on a big brand name like D&D.

The first day after that bloodbath must have been absolutely morale-shattering for the leftovers.

[Nyarly Dude]

https://www.polygon.com/dnd-dungeons-dragons/542716/wizards-sigil-vtt-layoffs

Frozen (maintenance mode, no future features beyond what was already implemented) apparently.




Howard also shared the following email, which he said was sent yesterday to all employees. It’s attributed to Dan Rawson, senior vice president Dungeons & Dragons and Hasbro Direct.
...
"I want to share an important update regarding Sigil. After several months of alpha testing, we’ve concluded that our aspirations for Sigil as a large, standalone game with a distinct monetization path will not be realized. As such, we cannot maintain a large development effort and most of the Sigil team will be separated from the company this week. We are, however, proud of what the Sigil team has developed and want to make sure that fans and players on DDB can use it. To that end, we will transition Sigil to a DDB feature. We will maintain a small team to sustain Sigil and release products already developed at no additional cost to users. To those moving on as a result of this decision, we will provide robust support, including severance packages, 2024 bonus, career placement services, and internal opportunities where possible."

[Valacar]

Just shows that Carl’s 3D vtt 8 to 9 years ago by one guy was amazing what he put out.

[anstett]

Tabletop Connect was amazing.

[Lonewolf]

Tabletop Connect was amazing. You mean FGU is amazing see https://www.tabletopconnect.com/smiteworks-acquires-tabletop-connect/