they seriously need to stop nickel and diming us, the actual fans and customers, and make something for FREE for all the stuff we put up with them over the years.
This ignores all of the free adventures given away.
But more to the point:
People REALLY need to cool it with the "it's dead, let's celebrate all of the death" talk.
Y'all are ignoring the dev who said it isn't dead to run victory laps & post more doomerism to try & "win" this discussion.
Are you ignoring that counter-evidence?
(Firing people is still wrong, especially in this day and age, but still, evidence that SIgil is not dead exists.)
Letting contractors go when the project wraps up one way or another is how these projects work. D&D simply doesn’t have the portfolio to keep a full software development team like this on full time.
10% are still there, & a member of that 10% said it's not dead.
Ignoring that is intellectually dishonest.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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.
I'm really sad about it honestly. I wanted to try it so bad I even got a beta invite before they opened it up and as luck would have it, my computer bit the dust a few weeks before that and so I've never even gotten to do it. Now they are shuttering it apparently and even when I finally do get a new computer I won't be able to do it.
I'm really sad about it honestly. I wanted to try it so bad I even got a beta invite before they opened it up and as luck would have it, my computer bit the dust a few weeks before that and so I've never even gotten to do it. Now they are shuttering it apparently and even when I finally do get a new computer I won't be able to do it.
It's unlikely to be shut down immediately and depending on which rumors you believe, it may not even be on the table. It's a lot of speculation right now. That said, I have tried both Talespire and Sigil and Talespire is a much better tool, both for building and running the game, not to mention a lot cheaper. So if you are interested in doing 3d VTT, Sigil or not there are tools out there that offer that sort of service.
they seriously need to stop nickel and diming us, the actual fans and customers, and make something for FREE for all the stuff we put up with them over the years.
This ignores all of the free adventures given away.
But more to the point:
People REALLY need to cool it with the "it's dead, let's celebrate all of the death" talk.
Y'all are ignoring the dev who said it isn't dead to run victory laps & post more doomerism to try & "win" this discussion.
Are you ignoring that counter-evidence?
(Firing people is still wrong, especially in this day and age, but still, evidence that SIgil is not dead exists.)
But, it is dead. There was an internal email by Dan Rawson saying as much posted onrascal.
”Dear Team, 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 larger, 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.
I want to take a moment to praise the entire Sigil team for their incredible work to deliver this product to our community. One of the things I’m most proud of here at D&D is our strong sense of purpose. We aim to honor our current players while ensuring D&D continues to build connections and bring joy to future generations. And that’s what the Sigil team was doing. Although we haven’t fully realized our vision for Sigil to scale, the team should be proud of their achievements.”
And for people wanting free stuff, there it is. What’s there is free.
Whatever the plan for Sigil was, no matter how you look at it, with 90% of the staff laid off at this early stage in its development it means that these plans were complete and indisputable failures. Given how large of a part digital D&D was for the 2024 edition of the game, with so much energy and focus on Sigil being a major player in the future of the game, it begs the question what IS the plan for D&D in 2025?
Probably a return to core competencies (i.e. publishing).
they seriously need to stop nickel and diming us, the actual fans and customers, and make something for FREE for all the stuff we put up with them over the years.
This ignores all of the free adventures given away.
But more to the point:
People REALLY need to cool it with the "it's dead, let's celebrate all of the death" talk.
Y'all are ignoring the dev who said it isn't dead to run victory laps & post more doomerism to try & "win" this discussion.
Are you ignoring that counter-evidence?
(Firing people is still wrong, especially in this day and age, but still, evidence that SIgil is not dead exists.)
Letting contractors go when the project wraps up one way or another is how these projects work. D&D simply doesn’t have the portfolio to keep a full software development team like this on full time.
10% are still there, & a member of that 10% said it's not dead.
Ignoring that is intellectually dishonest.
There’s a reason I said “wraps up” and “full software development team”. Clearly they’re not just closing up shop, but if they’ve got the body of the software where they want it- or at least as far as they’re taking it for now- there’s no reason for them to keep most of the team. The project of “build the Sigil program” is over.
Sigil was pushed too heavily as its going to be the best VTT in the universe.
Its virtual miniatures look atrocious compared to those over at Hero Forge.
They overpromised.
I suspect they also overestimated how many gamers were genuinely interested in playing D&D in front of their computers when they can kind of do that with BG3.
I think the most interesting take on the subject of Sigils status came from DM Shorts in his recent Youtube video. I think its a pretty fair assessment and shows the low level of readiness the application is in at the moment. It's hard to predict how much work a small 3-4 man group can get done and how quickly they can address some of these core issues with the tool if WotC chooses not to shutdown the project entirely. With such a small group working on it however they would have relatively low overhead moving forward so one might estimate that while progress might be slow, it might mean they will proceed with the product despite the bad press its getting.
I agree though it's very difficult to see where it's all going from a franchise perspective and how successful it can even become even if the product works exactly as intended. From my personal experience with Sigil, all I can say about it is that it's not a good VTT at all, even if all the features actually worked as planned. It requires far too much work to prep for a session, it's just very impractical. But I suppose if you have lots of time on your hands and are willing to put in the work, assuming they fix it up to working order there might be some fraction of the general D&D population willing to participate.
For me the concern remains that there is nothing in the 2025 calendar being released for the game in terms of content that I have an interest in and I wonder how many people share that disappointment. There are 4 books on the calendar right now and a starter box. From my seat it looks like it will be a year of not buying anything from official D&D content baring any potential 3rd party releases which, I don't wouldn't buy here anyway as I want physical products. So its a bit of a quandary, there is at least for me personally, nothing to be excited about. I suppose the Starter Box being based on Keep on the Borderland might be something, but even that begs the question, do I really want another starter set for 5e? I have three already, two of which I never even took out of the shrinkwrap. I'm just not feeling it.
This has been the biggest point for me. I understood that Sigil was in alpha/ early beta, so I was very much waiting to see where it went. That having been said, there were a number of decisions they made with it that even at this early point had me less certain that it would convince me to leave Talespire. I most certainly do NOT want to see Sigil killed off, and was very curious to see what would come next, but man, I can believe a lot of the stuff circulating about confused leadership and uncertainty about the differences between video games and VTT's.
Fingers crossed that Sigil does not get the axe, because there IS potential, and it would absolutely suck if so much effort just vaporized for no discernable reason.
This has been the biggest point for me. I understood that Sigil was in alpha/ early beta, so I was very much waiting to see where it went. That having been said, there were a number of decisions they made with it that even at this early point had me less certain that it would convince me to leave Talespire. I most certainly do NOT want to see Sigil killed off, and was very curious to see what would come next, but man, I can believe a lot of the stuff circulating about confused leadership and uncertainty about the differences between video games and VTT's.
Fingers crossed that Sigil does not get the axe, because there IS potential, and it would absolutely suck if so much effort just vaporized for no discernable reason.
I mean, the reason would presumably be that they determine it’s operating at too much of a loss to be worth tossing good money after bad to salvage.
Fingers crossed that Sigil does not get the axe, because there IS potential, and it would absolutely suck if so much effort just vaporized for no discernable reason.
It sounds like the current plan is "salvage what is salvageable for inclusion in another project". It was always a bad sign when Maps started in development, because, well, a company producing competition with its own planned projects usually indicates some sort of internal dysfunction. In this case, I think the D&D Beyond/Maps team had a better understanding of the actual market.
Sigh. Once again, we get a half-baked solution. No disrespect to the Sigil team who was trying their best, but we would have been better off if WOTC had never bothered, and just licensed content to other capable platforms (I'm looking at you Foundry, with 5e rules but no adventure support from WOTC...)
Fingers crossed that Sigil does not get the axe, because there IS potential, and it would absolutely suck if so much effort just vaporized for no discernable reason.
It sounds like the current plan is "salvage what is salvageable for inclusion in another project". It was always a bad sign when Maps started in development, because, well, a company producing competition with its own planned projects usually indicates some sort of internal dysfunction. In this case, I think the D&D Beyond/Maps team had a better understanding of the actual market.
God, this.....
I have been utterly baffled at the way they kept talking about Sigil as if other 3d VTT's just....did not exist. The messaging kept sounding like they were flat out unaware of what the market state is, rather than being confident in what they were making. And yeah, I very firmly join you in the club of being confused as to why they were working on two VTT's at the same time, while also pretending to be unaware of the awkwardness.
I’m seriously wondering if DDB were already working on Maps when they were acquired and just continued on development because no one told them not to. By the sounds of things Chris Cao and his digital team had terrible communication with DDB, plus the rumours he hates the site and was against buying it, so I can easily believe that the two teams had no idea that the other VTT was in development before the general public did
I’m seriously wondering if DDB were already working on Maps when they were acquired and just continued on development because no one told them not to. By the sounds of things Chris Cao and his digital team had terrible communication with DDB, plus the rumours he hates the site and was against buying it, so I can easily believe that the two teams had no idea that the other VTT was in development before the general public did
They had quite a lot of time to realize that this was happening and correct it. My suspicion is internal corporate politics rather than just bad communications (remember, they're actually in separate divisions of Hasbro).
MAPS debuted Sept 19th 2023, and closed beta started around march I think? So, Maps was probably a quick feature to stem the flood, and ended up torpedoing SigiL.
BG3 gave some delusions of grandeur, and both time and money went the wrong way.
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.
In under a week we have gone from 'nothing to see here' because it's perfectly normal for software developers to be let go as soon as a project has been brought to completion to having to acknowledge that a leaked internal memo says Wizards of the Coast just weren't fulfilling what they had overpromised and so the project won't be as a large as initially intended and because of this they had to let people go ...
My first post on the topic: "Honestly, it feels like Wizards has given up on Project Sigil -- they stealth released it in a way that, from what I've heard, probably wasn't ready for release, and then laid off the team."
That's not "nothing to see here". This is absolutely doom for Project Sigil. It just doesn't mean much outside of Project Sigil.
My first post on the topic: "Honestly, it feels like Wizards has given up on Project Sigil -- they stealth released it in a way that, from what I've heard, probably wasn't ready for release, and then laid off the team."
That's not "nothing to see here". This is absolutely doom for Project Sigil. It just doesn't mean much outside of Project Sigil.
I wasn't speaking specifically about you or what you had said. I was speaking specifically about those who were making excuses. Including the one I mentioned.
On the first page you have one person saying this is normal and another 'confirming' what that person is saying and even going out of his or her way to mention how he or she knows someone in the industry and another also saying it's standard behavior.
To lay off those hired to work on a software's development once the project has neared completion and they are no longer needed.
But that is not what happened here.
One could probably safely bet a pot of gold those invoking that excuse won't admit to their being wrong either.
And it means plenty outside of the project. For the thirty people now out of work and any of their dependents. And for anyone with even the most basic human empathy.
10% are still there, & a member of that 10% said it's not dead.
Ignoring that is intellectually dishonest.
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.
I'm really sad about it honestly. I wanted to try it so bad I even got a beta invite before they opened it up and as luck would have it, my computer bit the dust a few weeks before that and so I've never even gotten to do it. Now they are shuttering it apparently and even when I finally do get a new computer I won't be able to do it.
It's unlikely to be shut down immediately and depending on which rumors you believe, it may not even be on the table. It's a lot of speculation right now. That said, I have tried both Talespire and Sigil and Talespire is a much better tool, both for building and running the game, not to mention a lot cheaper. So if you are interested in doing 3d VTT, Sigil or not there are tools out there that offer that sort of service.
But, it is dead. There was an internal email by Dan Rawson saying as much posted onrascal.
”Dear Team, 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 larger, 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.
I want to take a moment to praise the entire Sigil team for their incredible work to deliver this product to our community. One of the things I’m most proud of here at D&D is our strong sense of purpose. We aim to honor our current players while ensuring D&D continues to build connections and bring joy to future generations. And that’s what the Sigil team was doing. Although we haven’t fully realized our vision for Sigil to scale, the team should be proud of their achievements.”
And for people wanting free stuff, there it is. What’s there is free.
Probably a return to core competencies (i.e. publishing).
There’s a reason I said “wraps up” and “full software development team”. Clearly they’re not just closing up shop, but if they’ve got the body of the software where they want it- or at least as far as they’re taking it for now- there’s no reason for them to keep most of the team. The project of “build the Sigil program” is over.
Sigil was pushed too heavily as its going to be the best VTT in the universe.
Its virtual miniatures look atrocious compared to those over at Hero Forge.
They overpromised.
I suspect they also overestimated how many gamers were genuinely interested in playing D&D in front of their computers when they can kind of do that with BG3.
I think the most interesting take on the subject of Sigils status came from DM Shorts in his recent Youtube video. I think its a pretty fair assessment and shows the low level of readiness the application is in at the moment. It's hard to predict how much work a small 3-4 man group can get done and how quickly they can address some of these core issues with the tool if WotC chooses not to shutdown the project entirely. With such a small group working on it however they would have relatively low overhead moving forward so one might estimate that while progress might be slow, it might mean they will proceed with the product despite the bad press its getting.
I agree though it's very difficult to see where it's all going from a franchise perspective and how successful it can even become even if the product works exactly as intended. From my personal experience with Sigil, all I can say about it is that it's not a good VTT at all, even if all the features actually worked as planned. It requires far too much work to prep for a session, it's just very impractical. But I suppose if you have lots of time on your hands and are willing to put in the work, assuming they fix it up to working order there might be some fraction of the general D&D population willing to participate.
For me the concern remains that there is nothing in the 2025 calendar being released for the game in terms of content that I have an interest in and I wonder how many people share that disappointment. There are 4 books on the calendar right now and a starter box. From my seat it looks like it will be a year of not buying anything from official D&D content baring any potential 3rd party releases which, I don't wouldn't buy here anyway as I want physical products. So its a bit of a quandary, there is at least for me personally, nothing to be excited about. I suppose the Starter Box being based on Keep on the Borderland might be something, but even that begs the question, do I really want another starter set for 5e? I have three already, two of which I never even took out of the shrinkwrap. I'm just not feeling it.
This has been the biggest point for me. I understood that Sigil was in alpha/ early beta, so I was very much waiting to see where it went. That having been said, there were a number of decisions they made with it that even at this early point had me less certain that it would convince me to leave Talespire. I most certainly do NOT want to see Sigil killed off, and was very curious to see what would come next, but man, I can believe a lot of the stuff circulating about confused leadership and uncertainty about the differences between video games and VTT's.
Fingers crossed that Sigil does not get the axe, because there IS potential, and it would absolutely suck if so much effort just vaporized for no discernable reason.
I mean, the reason would presumably be that they determine it’s operating at too much of a loss to be worth tossing good money after bad to salvage.
It sounds like the current plan is "salvage what is salvageable for inclusion in another project". It was always a bad sign when Maps started in development, because, well, a company producing competition with its own planned projects usually indicates some sort of internal dysfunction. In this case, I think the D&D Beyond/Maps team had a better understanding of the actual market.
Sigh. Once again, we get a half-baked solution. No disrespect to the Sigil team who was trying their best, but we would have been better off if WOTC had never bothered, and just licensed content to other capable platforms (I'm looking at you Foundry, with 5e rules but no adventure support from WOTC...)
God, this.....
I have been utterly baffled at the way they kept talking about Sigil as if other 3d VTT's just....did not exist. The messaging kept sounding like they were flat out unaware of what the market state is, rather than being confident in what they were making. And yeah, I very firmly join you in the club of being confused as to why they were working on two VTT's at the same time, while also pretending to be unaware of the awkwardness.
I’m seriously wondering if DDB were already working on Maps when they were acquired and just continued on development because no one told them not to. By the sounds of things Chris Cao and his digital team had terrible communication with DDB, plus the rumours he hates the site and was against buying it, so I can easily believe that the two teams had no idea that the other VTT was in development before the general public did
sadly that sounds very much possible and likely to had happen.
They had quite a lot of time to realize that this was happening and correct it. My suspicion is internal corporate politics rather than just bad communications (remember, they're actually in separate divisions of Hasbro).
MAPS debuted Sept 19th 2023, and closed beta started around march I think? So, Maps was probably a quick feature to stem the flood, and ended up torpedoing SigiL.
BG3 gave some delusions of grandeur, and both time and money went the wrong way.
" 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 under a week we have gone from 'nothing to see here' because it's perfectly normal for software developers to be let go as soon as a project has been brought to completion to having to acknowledge that a leaked internal memo says Wizards of the Coast just weren't fulfilling what they had overpromised and so the project won't be as a large as initially intended and because of this they had to let people go ...
So basically the 'doomsayers' were right. Again.
My first post on the topic: "Honestly, it feels like Wizards has given up on Project Sigil -- they stealth released it in a way that, from what I've heard, probably wasn't ready for release, and then laid off the team."
That's not "nothing to see here". This is absolutely doom for Project Sigil. It just doesn't mean much outside of Project Sigil.
I wasn't speaking specifically about you or what you had said. I was speaking specifically about those who were making excuses. Including the one I mentioned.
On the first page you have one person saying this is normal and another 'confirming' what that person is saying and even going out of his or her way to mention how he or she knows someone in the industry and another also saying it's standard behavior.
To lay off those hired to work on a software's development once the project has neared completion and they are no longer needed.
But that is not what happened here.
One could probably safely bet a pot of gold those invoking that excuse won't admit to their being wrong either.
And it means plenty outside of the project. For the thirty people now out of work and any of their dependents. And for anyone with even the most basic human empathy.