If this somehow survives, or more realistically if they try again on a later date, I can see a few things.
1. A detailed tutorial with words, vocal directions, and words so people of different skill levels can handle it. This way people of various levels of computer savviness can handle this without difficulty.
2. Graphics slider. Alot of games these days have them, especially RTS style game. The slider can range from Final Fantasy XII to Elden Ring. This way someone that isn't a big Computer gamer, they can still play this. One issue I heard from this was Sigil was just as taxing on a computer as a lot of best looking games out there be it Indi Darling Baudler's Gate 3, or AAA juggernauts like the current chapter of Final Fantasy XII remake. Using World of War Craft as an example, much less a bunch of mobile games that have RAID: Shadow Legends' graphics, alot of them are not maxed out to what they could be outside of the occasional cinematic. This way they can play on most rigs without melting it.
3. All the main classes and Species in the 2024 rulebook/ease in uploading DDB Character Sheet. We can add older stuff and third party stuff later, focus on the new hotness for right now. As is, it wasn't intuitive when I first tested it, and there is only 6 player species.
4. More customization. I see mostly options for lightly armored builds. So if I want my armored behemoth, I need to go somewhere else.
Graphics honestly should have been like... bottom rung of priorities; by doing so they'd have allowed for a much broader swathe of users.
I’d guess the idea was to have something worth spending money on.
As for the 3D DTT, i think they should have asked more fans or seen what they were complaining the most on different websites like Reddit or this site.
On the corporate side there are a million ways to monetize their thing, and its with the list of Hasbro properties. Start with say the D&D cartoon characters/various Baudler's Gate ones as a base line, allow for adjustments from there.
Later on, they could either do DLC that can be paid for and or earned with in game currency (most likely paid for) for the various franchises as potential skins or outfits for different characters, mounts, enemies, familiars, animal companions, summons, NPCs, and so o: My Little Pony, GIJOE, Transformers, Pound Puppies, Jem and the Holograms, Power Ranger, and so on.
Graphics honestly should have been like... bottom rung of priorities; by doing so they'd have allowed for a much broader swathe of users.
I’d guess the idea was to have something worth spending money on.
As for the 3D DTT, i think they should have asked more fans or seen what they were complaining the most on different websites like Reddit or this site.
You know, there is a feedback channel in SigilVTT's Discord server, and they even have a web page where you can submit feedback and vote for much-requested features.
Feedback channel on discord is but one place, but this forum could have been a second more direct line of communication, and compiling the various feedback across multiple social media channels would have given a broader view of the biggest issues.
They built it, hated it, canned it. Now best we might get is the ability to not require an extensive GPU crypto-mining, next gen required hardware version that can used by a greater number of users, otherwise the thing will only be used by those who have the capacity to do so, and from the company itself that number isn’t enough to keep it going.
Hasbro bet on a horse, and when the gate opened, the horse jumped and had a heart attack. DOA, and hasbro now has a tax write-off.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
" Darkvision doesn’t work in Magical darkness, and if something is magical, Never Trust it acts the same way as a non-magical version of that same thing!”- Discotech Mage over a cup of joe.
You buy them. You have to enter your payment details etc, but then you'll be charged 0 for them. It's dumb, but there you go.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Feedback channel on discord is but one place, but this forum could have been a second more direct line of communication, and compiling the various feedback across multiple social media channels would have given a broader view of the biggest issues.
Feedback channel on discord is but one place, but this forum could have been a second more direct line of communication, and compiling the various feedback across multiple social media channels would have given a broader view of the biggest issues.
Still doesn’t matter, they could have done a better job of realizing it wasn’t going to be a big thing if only a handful of users were able to even get the thing working. First major issue it had was object size when running the launcher for the first time. How many forgot or missed the thing was a PC only windows build? Mac users can workaround, but given the user experience of the program being a system hog, it doesn’t really seem like those “features” where a priority.
I bet the first feedback from closed beta was “it don’t work.”
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
" Darkvision doesn’t work in Magical darkness, and if something is magical, Never Trust it acts the same way as a non-magical version of that same thing!”- Discotech Mage over a cup of joe.
Got the freebies just incase DnDbeyond is using them to gauge interest.
Looking forward to picking up more in future
In relation to this I've just had an email through about a pack of wild animal minis to claim. The most interesting thing was it was described as "this week's minis" and went on to say "return every week to claim a new pack of minis for your Sigil adventures" so it sounds like it's going to be a regular thing for at least the short term
Small and simple is less of an option for a major company than an indie, as I believe had already been mentioned.
Bringing this back up because I just want to point that this is literally the opposite of reality.
A major company can, if they want, make something that's small and simple and supports play and they can even offer it for free and it will still make them money by making the 'on-boarding' process easier and lead to more people buying the stuff they do sell.
The issue is that WotC under Hasbro doesn't want more money. It wants ALL the money and if something doesn't make maximum buckaroos they simply don't consider it worth doing. But that's crappy corporate culture, not reality.
That's why Sigil will literally never make them money. Most people don't play with minis in physical table-top because of the cost, they're not going pay money for a mini that evaporates the moment the VTT it's a part of stops operating because WotC decides to shutter it because it's failed or because it was successful for a while but now sales are slowing down so they've decided to launch a 'new, improved' version where everyone has to re-buy all the content to stay up-to-date. And the people that are willing to pay for minis mainly do so because a mini is a physical thing that you can paint and/or customise and when you're done using it you can put it in a display case as a conversation piece and reminder of the good times you had playing that character or, as a DM, running the encounter your players had with that monster. Those people are going to be even less inclined to pay for a digital ghost of a thing over the actual thing itself.
And that's the problem, really. If the goal of Sigil was not to be a new revenue stream, but to support play and instead of having to buy digital minis, you would just get digital minis for every monster and NPC in every book you own on D&DBeyond and a bunch of digital minis with customisation appropriate for every species/class combination and a whole load of terrain all for free... Then WotC could make a mint on selling physical versions of the minis and terrain they play with in Sigil. Just so they could have them, not even necessarily to play with.
It takes very little effort to discover how ridiculously lucrative the market for physical figurines of characters and monsters from video games, and anime is. Figurines that get sold for the sole reason that people saw the cool characters and monsters in motion on their screen and now they want to own a physical representation for themselves to display and look at. It would take even less effort to discover this for Hasbro, which already fupping makes some of those.
Small and simple is less of an option for a major company than an indie, as I believe had already been mentioned.
Bringing this back up because I just want to point that this is literally the opposite of reality.
A major company can, if they want, make something that's small and simple and supports play and they can even offer it for free and it will still make them money by making the 'on-boarding' process easier and lead to more people buying the stuff they do sell.
The issue is that WotC under Hasbro doesn't want more money. It wants ALL the money and if something doesn't make maximum buckaroos they simply don't consider it worth doing. But that's crappy corporate culture, not reality.
Welcome to Maps, the virtual tabletop (VTT) fully integrated with DUNGEONS & DRAGONS on D&D BEYOND! Our VTT is designed to easily bring you and your friends closer together for tactical adventures, whether you're in the same room or on opposite sides of the world.
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Roll dice directly from Maps or from a character sheet with the shared Game Log.
Use tools like fog of war, overlays, ping, and more to streamline your playing experience.
Only Master Tier subscribers can host game sessions in Maps, but anyone with a free account can join a hosted game. And because it's browser-based, you can play on any device with an internet connection.
A major company can, if they want, make something that's small and simple and supports play and they can even offer it for free and it will still make them money by making the 'on-boarding' process easier and lead to more people buying the stuff they do sell.
The issue is that WotC under Hasbro doesn't want more money. It wants ALL the money and if something doesn't make maximum buckaroos they simply don't consider it worth doing. But that's crappy corporate culture, not reality.
Corporations, and Hasbro is no exception, look at projects in terms of what they cost, how likely they are to work, and what the rewards of success are. There tend to be bureaucratic costs and reputational risks that make larger corporations unwilling to do very small projects, but Hasbro has no shortage of products that are only modest performers. Project Sigil was a gamble that didn't pay off.
Small and simple has the problem that, well, there's already well established competition in that market segment so the odds of success are not great, not that Hasbro is inherently opposed to trying to do something like that.
A major company can, if they want, make something that's small and simple and supports play and they can even offer it for free and it will still make them money by making the 'on-boarding' process easier and lead to more people buying the stuff they do sell.
The issue is that WotC under Hasbro doesn't want more money. It wants ALL the money and if something doesn't make maximum buckaroos they simply don't consider it worth doing. But that's crappy corporate culture, not reality.
Corporations, and Hasbro is no exception, look at projects in terms of what they cost, how likely they are to work, and what the rewards of success are. There tend to be bureaucratic costs and reputational risks that make larger corporations unwilling to do very small projects, but Hasbro has no shortage of products that are only modest performers. Project Sigil was a gamble that didn't pay off.
Small and simple has the problem that, well, there's already well established competition in that market segment so the odds of success are not great, not that Hasbro is inherently opposed to trying to do something like that.
To expand on this, for larger corporations with more resources it can be a matter of opportunity costs- particularly relative to a dev team's man hours. They can try for a small and simple thing with modest returns relative to man hours, or aim for a significantly more ambitious project that if successful gives much larger returns relative to man hours. Hypothetically taking the simple option effectively costs them the larger returns of the more ambitious one. Obviously this is predicated on the big project being a big success which was not the case here, but it's not just the mindless chasing of big numbers- it's an efficiency analysis of time invested against returns. Large corporations have the capacity to take on larger projects which creates the impetus- particularly for publicly traded ones- that they make those attempts.
Got the freebies just incase DnDbeyond is using them to gauge interest.
Looking forward to picking up more in future
In relation to this I've just had an email through about a pack of wild animal minis to claim. The most interesting thing was it was described as "this week's minis" and went on to say "return every week to claim a new pack of minis for your Sigil adventures" so it sounds like it's going to be a regular thing for at least the short term
That would be nice, thanks for the heads up, will be keeping my eye out for them
If this somehow survives, or more realistically if they try again on a later date, I can see a few things.
1. A detailed tutorial with words, vocal directions, and words so people of different skill levels can handle it. This way people of various levels of computer savviness can handle this without difficulty.
2. Graphics slider. Alot of games these days have them, especially RTS style game. The slider can range from Final Fantasy XII to Elden Ring. This way someone that isn't a big Computer gamer, they can still play this. One issue I heard from this was Sigil was just as taxing on a computer as a lot of best looking games out there be it Indi Darling Baudler's Gate 3, or AAA juggernauts like the current chapter of Final Fantasy XII remake. Using World of War Craft as an example, much less a bunch of mobile games that have RAID: Shadow Legends' graphics, alot of them are not maxed out to what they could be outside of the occasional cinematic. This way they can play on most rigs without melting it.
3. All the main classes and Species in the 2024 rulebook/ease in uploading DDB Character Sheet. We can add older stuff and third party stuff later, focus on the new hotness for right now. As is, it wasn't intuitive when I first tested it, and there is only 6 player species.
4. More customization. I see mostly options for lightly armored builds. So if I want my armored behemoth, I need to go somewhere else.
Graphics honestly should have been like... bottom rung of priorities; by doing so they'd have allowed for a much broader swathe of users.
I’d guess the idea was to have something worth spending money on.
As for the 3D DTT, i think they should have asked more fans or seen what they were complaining the most on different websites like Reddit or this site.
On the corporate side there are a million ways to monetize their thing, and its with the list of Hasbro properties. Start with say the D&D cartoon characters/various Baudler's Gate ones as a base line, allow for adjustments from there.
Later on, they could either do DLC that can be paid for and or earned with in game currency (most likely paid for) for the various franchises as potential skins or outfits for different characters, mounts, enemies, familiars, animal companions, summons, NPCs, and so o: My Little Pony, GIJOE, Transformers, Pound Puppies, Jem and the Holograms, Power Ranger, and so on.
You know, there is a feedback channel in SigilVTT's Discord server, and they even have a web page where you can submit feedback and vote for much-requested features.
Feedback channel on discord is but one place, but this forum could have been a second more direct line of communication, and compiling the various feedback across multiple social media channels would have given a broader view of the biggest issues.
They built it, hated it, canned it. Now best we might get is the ability to not require an extensive GPU crypto-mining, next gen required hardware version that can used by a greater number of users, otherwise the thing will only be used by those who have the capacity to do so, and from the company itself that number isn’t enough to keep it going.
Hasbro bet on a horse, and when the gate opened, the horse jumped and had a heart attack. DOA, and hasbro now has a tax write-off.
" Darkvision doesn’t work in Magical darkness, and if something is magical, Never Trust it acts the same way as a non-magical version of that same thing!”- Discotech Mage over a cup of joe.
There are free items in the DNDBeyond store for Sigil, but no indication on how you're supposed to redeem them. Does anybody know how?
You buy them. You have to enter your payment details etc, but then you'll be charged 0 for them. It's dumb, but there you go.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
They're automatically in the VTT.
I checked.
You DO know I also mentioned a feedback page too.
I even have it right here. https://dddigital-feedback-zbkem2ak.featureupvote.com/
Still doesn’t matter, they could have done a better job of realizing it wasn’t going to be a big thing if only a handful of users were able to even get the thing working.
First major issue it had was object size when running the launcher for the first time. How many forgot or missed the thing was a PC only windows build? Mac users can workaround, but given the user experience of the program being a system hog, it doesn’t really seem like those “features” where a priority.
I bet the first feedback from closed beta was “it don’t work.”
" Darkvision doesn’t work in Magical darkness, and if something is magical, Never Trust it acts the same way as a non-magical version of that same thing!”- Discotech Mage over a cup of joe.
In relation to this I've just had an email through about a pack of wild animal minis to claim. The most interesting thing was it was described as "this week's minis" and went on to say "return every week to claim a new pack of minis for your Sigil adventures" so it sounds like it's going to be a regular thing for at least the short term
Bringing this back up because I just want to point that this is literally the opposite of reality.
A major company can, if they want, make something that's small and simple and supports play and they can even offer it for free and it will still make them money by making the 'on-boarding' process easier and lead to more people buying the stuff they do sell.
The issue is that WotC under Hasbro doesn't want more money. It wants ALL the money and if something doesn't make maximum buckaroos they simply don't consider it worth doing. But that's crappy corporate culture, not reality.
That's why Sigil will literally never make them money. Most people don't play with minis in physical table-top because of the cost, they're not going pay money for a mini that evaporates the moment the VTT it's a part of stops operating because WotC decides to shutter it because it's failed or because it was successful for a while but now sales are slowing down so they've decided to launch a 'new, improved' version where everyone has to re-buy all the content to stay up-to-date.
And the people that are willing to pay for minis mainly do so because a mini is a physical thing that you can paint and/or customise and when you're done using it you can put it in a display case as a conversation piece and reminder of the good times you had playing that character or, as a DM, running the encounter your players had with that monster. Those people are going to be even less inclined to pay for a digital ghost of a thing over the actual thing itself.
And that's the problem, really. If the goal of Sigil was not to be a new revenue stream, but to support play and instead of having to buy digital minis, you would just get digital minis for every monster and NPC in every book you own on D&DBeyond and a bunch of digital minis with customisation appropriate for every species/class combination and a whole load of terrain all for free... Then WotC could make a mint on selling physical versions of the minis and terrain they play with in Sigil. Just so they could have them, not even necessarily to play with.
It takes very little effort to discover how ridiculously lucrative the market for physical figurines of characters and monsters from video games, and anime is. Figurines that get sold for the sole reason that people saw the cool characters and monsters in motion on their screen and now they want to own a physical representation for themselves to display and look at. It would take even less effort to discover this for Hasbro, which already fupping makes some of those.
Welcome to Maps, the virtual tabletop (VTT) fully integrated with DUNGEONS & DRAGONS on D&D BEYOND! Our VTT is designed to easily bring you and your friends closer together for tactical adventures, whether you're in the same room or on opposite sides of the world.
With Maps, you can:
Only Master Tier subscribers can host game sessions in Maps, but anyone with a free account can join a hosted game. And because it's browser-based, you can play on any device with an internet connection.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Corporations, and Hasbro is no exception, look at projects in terms of what they cost, how likely they are to work, and what the rewards of success are. There tend to be bureaucratic costs and reputational risks that make larger corporations unwilling to do very small projects, but Hasbro has no shortage of products that are only modest performers. Project Sigil was a gamble that didn't pay off.
Small and simple has the problem that, well, there's already well established competition in that market segment so the odds of success are not great, not that Hasbro is inherently opposed to trying to do something like that.
To expand on this, for larger corporations with more resources it can be a matter of opportunity costs- particularly relative to a dev team's man hours. They can try for a small and simple thing with modest returns relative to man hours, or aim for a significantly more ambitious project that if successful gives much larger returns relative to man hours. Hypothetically taking the simple option effectively costs them the larger returns of the more ambitious one. Obviously this is predicated on the big project being a big success which was not the case here, but it's not just the mindless chasing of big numbers- it's an efficiency analysis of time invested against returns. Large corporations have the capacity to take on larger projects which creates the impetus- particularly for publicly traded ones- that they make those attempts.
That would be nice, thanks for the heads up, will be keeping my eye out for them
Why are you so mean?
? Who...who are you calling mean?
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.