D&D (2024) I am highly skeptical of the Unreal VTT

[Hussar]

In my experience the more graphically intensive the VTT, the less friendly it is to whiteboard and tokens. FG is okay for tokens, for example, but is just terrible at whiteboard.

Well, that's fair. FG has always been a terrible program for doing things on the fly. It's one of it's biggest weaknesses. The drawing tools have improved considerably, but, they're still, frankly, crap. OTOH, Roll20 works perfectly well with whiteboard and token and it's every bit as graphically intensive as FG. I'm less familiar with other VTT's anymore. I haven't really shopped around all that much. But, I think this is more a Fantasy Grounds problem than a VTT one.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Just to pile on a bit more on the VTT.

I watched the video bit on the VTT.

Let's be clear, WotC, none of that is going to happen at launch. None of that. It's all bollocks, all of it. Much of it will never happen.

• The graphics won't look that good on default settings, or any normal settings.
• It won't run that well - or anywhere near it - what they were showing? That's the sort of thing that makes a 3080 stutter. And the average graphics card in a couple of years will still be a lot weaker than that, even on gaming rigs.
• The models won't be as individualized - they'll look waaaaay more generic and bland.
• The models won't have that neat "hand-painted" looking finish.
• The monster models won't be as diverse in pose as shown - at least not without extreme effort.
• The interface will not be smooth, and will in fact, be extremely annoying to use, particularly for the DM. Y'all have never designed a VTT before, and AFAICT, don't have a single experienced VTT designer or turn-based videogame designer on the staff. You will make every possible mistake when designing this.
• No-one outside of some ultra-tech-y dude with a $5000 setup is going to be able to sync a real tabletop and a VTT, and even for him it won't be reliable. That's just silly.
• You are not going to give us all the pieces you put into every adventure and then let us use them to build things, because it's going to be enormously more work to make a tile-based system like that function than you think.

I could go on, but this absolutely reeks of the pre-release marketing that 4E had. I am aware that they have more time. But they have at most two years. Building the engine (yeah, within UE5, which I hard-guarantee none of the developers have significant experience with, because that'd be impossible) and developing the insane number of ultra-high-res assets you'd need just to do a BASIC D&D setup, like a really basic full-length (but not campaign-length) adventure is on par with developing a fully-functional AAA videogame, just skipping most of the animation and rigging (which is not going to save you anywhere near enough time). And because it's D&D, it needs the DM to able to arbitrarily stop things, reverse things, add things, change things, and so on, which is going to be pretty challenging and something videogames can avoid. Oh and it also requires an incredibly full-featured character-designer, one that's got to account for a loads of different races/subraces even if just PHB (and they added a giant challenge with Aardlings lol!), far more than any videogame which has a similar-quality editor has ever had. People won't be okay without stuff like different sizes/weights, choosing clothes, detailed colour options, etc. Aaaand a fully-featured dungeon-designer and wilderness designer, which has been eternally challenging for all sorts of people.

I again, I could go on and on.

There is absolutely no possibility of this being ready for launch, in two years, in any form that actually resembles what they showed there, let alone, that matches the hype they were talking. No possible way.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Better for you maybe. I play in a game that does mostly theater of the mind and I run one that very much doesn't. I know that I certainly much prefer a game where, if I'm going to be staring at a computer screen for three hours, I would much, much prefer something a little nicer to look at than some lines on a whiteboard and letter tokens.

Well, to now turn this around, sometimes the purpose of the map is simply to be able to keep track of things. I've mentioned that for a game to be functional for me without some kind of visual display, it has to not care about range, not care about movement, and not care about positioning. Because if it cares about any of those, without some sort of display I can be sure that as a GM (and probably a player) I'll lose the thread of who is where.

So for some people that's pretty much the basic function and anything else is, at best, a nice add on, and at worst, an extra distraction. I personally have come to prefer a certain aesthetic quality to the whole process so I do decent looking tokens and try to find decent maps or put them together with tiles, but I could do without and just the aforementioned lines and letter would still serve a purpose.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Well, that's fair. FG has always been a terrible program for doing things on the fly. It's one of it's biggest weaknesses. The drawing tools have improved considerably, but, they're still, frankly, crap. OTOH, Roll20 works perfectly well with whiteboard and token and it's every bit as graphically intensive as FG. I'm less familiar with other VTT's anymore. I haven't really shopped around all that much. But, I think this is more a Fantasy Grounds problem than a VTT one.

Maptool has basic drawing tools, and they're okay for straight lines and angles, but they don't have any ability to do an arc worth a damn, so unless you can do a decent one with just the freedraw option, you're SOL there. Back when I did more of my own maps, I'd do them in Fractal Mapper and import them because I couldn't get even a decent version of a basic map with just Maptool. Its good in a lot of ways, but drawing on the fly is distinctly its weak spot.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

Just to pile on a bit more on the VTT.

OK, I bite.

My reservations against the VTT are threefold, they are fears of something that could happen, not something we're hinted will happen.

1. They are trying to integrate digital tool more than before with their "One" strategy (fact). Fear: I fear that the rules will evolve toward things that are easier to track in the VTT or remove things that were fun but would be a pain to integrate, while promoting a gameplay that allows for interesting tactical battle (forced movement, compounded attacks of opportunity...) or would be more complicated without digital tools (a revamped initiative system that is great if the computer is doing all the calculations, but a pain in the neck if you're doing that at a table).

2. If they are doing "just well", then it would be great for me, as they'd support both venues of moneymaking, but if they do "barely enough", that will be resources diverted from creating interesting things to me, toward creating digital assets and that would be a net loss for me. If they fail quickly, it has no impact (unless they fail so much that they go bankrupt, but I think they have more business acumen than that...) On the "resource" front, I also fear that it might delay interesting adventure as they are delayed because the tech side isn't ready.

3. If they move everything toward dndbeyond, and even one of my players won't follow suit in a purely-subscription based model, all my group won't follow suit. (This is the least likely, as I guess they are still making money from people without dndbeyond accounts, but I often feel I am in a dying minority here. [That wouldn't be bad: we have many game systems available, so I can live with the fears explained above].

On the other hand, I have fewer fears than you toward the technological side of the thing.

I watched the video bit on the VTT.

Let's be clear, WotC, none of that is going to happen at launch. None of that. It's all bollocks, all of it. Much of it will never happen.

• The graphics won't look that good on default settings, or any normal settings.

The unreal engine is scheduled to power games released in 2022 (albeit sometimes very demanding games). If they are targetting late-2024, it will probably be able to run on "average" PCs by then.

• It won't run that well - or anywhere near it - what they were showing? That's the sort of thing that makes a 3080 stutter. And the average graphics card in a couple of years will still be a lot weaker than that, even on gaming rigs.

I don't know what exactly is ressource-consuming, but the engine is suppose to run animated monsters. If they are going for a "mini" feel, it is just 3D models moving, unanimated, from token position #1 to token position #2 (with the ruler). I thought it would lessen the burden on the graphic card.

• The models won't be as individualized - they'll look waaaaay more generic and bland.
• The models won't have that neat "hand-painted" looking finish.
• The monster models won't be as diverse in pose as shown - at least not without extreme effort.

Unless you pay for it. I guess that's how they'll make money out of it. Sure, anyone will be able to use the generic goblin token to represent the three Celestial Dragons, but there will be a substantial part of the market that will shell out the money for the official Celestial Dragons models, and maybe the exclusive Platinum set of Celestial Dragons. They'll be selling virtual minis, so we can expect them to provide a lot of diversity.

I am unsure about the players token, but twice in the video they mention "playing you in the game". They might make a big effort on providing a player-facing customizing tool.

• The interface will not be smooth, and will in fact, be extremely annoying to use, particularly for the DM. Y'all have never designed a VTT before, and AFAICT, don't have a single experienced VTT designer or turn-based videogame designer on the staff. You will make every possible mistake when designing this.

Can't they buy a major VTT player outright?

• No-one outside of some ultra-tech-y dude with a $5000 setup is going to be able to sync a real tabletop and a VTT, and even for him it won't be reliable. That's just silly.

I share your concern about the price tag.

• You are not going to give us all the pieces you put into every adventure and then let us use them to build things, because it's going to be enormously more work to make a tile-based system like that function than you think.

I even fear that they won't allow custom monsters anymore. You want your zombie to be oozing a poisonous aura? Sure, let's create a custom monster for the low price of 0.99 USD+VAT. [maybe that would make people flee, so that would be too extreme.]

I could go on, but this absolutely reeks of the pre-release marketing that 4E had. I am aware that they have more time. But they have at most two years. Building the engine (yeah, within UE5, which I hard-guarantee none of the developers have significant experience with, because that'd be impossible) and developing the insane number of ultra-high-res assets you'd need just to do a BASIC D&D setup, like a really basic full-length (but not campaign-length) adventure is on par with developing a fully-functional AAA videogame

Really? (I am not in this field...) I'd think it would be less intensive...

 

[wedgeski]

Meanwhile, in the real world of DnDBeyond, the spell Silvery Barb is on sale for 1.99 USD.

You can get the discount of your lifetime by getting all 5 Strixhaven spells bundled for a mere 4.99, a 49.9% discount. Buy now and get the best value!

DNDB's model is more interesting because the money you spend on this, that, or the other from a sourcebook is then subtracted from the price of buying the whole book. Plus, when the only part of a sourcebook I'm interested in is the monsters, I don't have to fork out for the whole thing. I have a hard time finding anything wrong with this system.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Fear: I fear that the rules will evolve toward things that are easier to track in the VTT or remove things that were fun but would be a pain to integrate, while promoting a gameplay that allows for interesting tactical battle (forced movement, compounded attacks of opportunity...) or would be more complicated without digital tools (a revamped initiative system that is great if the computer is doing all the calculations, but a pain in the neck if you're doing that at a table).

It's a reasonable fear but given 4E didn't go that way even as the digital tools gradually improved, I don't think it's very likely.

However I do expect an update at some point in a few years, and if the VTT somehow succeeds, I suspect we'll see some rules tweaks to make rules work more easily on the VTT rather than making the VTT work with the rules. We'll see.

Oh another thing to worry about - if they're really intending to give use the pieces of every map (or even some maps) from official adventures we buy (a specific claim in the video), they're going to end up designing maps to fit existing terrain pieces, not vice-versa, and limiting how maps are designed in general to make them easier to model in the VTT. They might even do stuff like delay publication of adventures or other books to let the VTT team keep up.

The unreal engine is scheduled to power games released in 2022 (albeit sometimes very demanding games). If they are targetting late-2024, it will probably be able to run on "average" PCs by then.

UE5 can already technically run on an "average" PC. Running isn't the issue. Running well is. Here's the graphics cards people on Steam have right now:

Steam Hardware & Software Survey

In two years, now the crisis is clearing, will that change? Yes. But Nvidia have shown a very clear pattern, as have consumers, and the average card in normal gaming machine as of 2024 is going to probably be about as powerful as a 3060 (indeed in a lot of cases, it will be a 3060), if we're lucky, frankly. And a lot of people will be wanting to play this on laptops and iPads and the like.

So there will be no major gain there performance-wise, beyond what I said.

I don't know what exactly is ressource-consuming, but the engine is suppose to run animated monsters. If they are going for a "mini" feel, it is just 3D models moving, unanimated, from token position #1 to token position #2 (with the ruler). I thought it would lessen the burden on the graphic card.

Not that much, from what they're proposing, which is this fancy FX and post-processing-heavy, way of doing things, with what appears to be a free camera, people moving stuff around, likely physics-driven dice bouncing around and so on. That's also likely to be extremely inefficiently streamlined, because they're working with a new engine, and again AFAICT, none of them have done anything like this before.

And it's got to be networked - this is a multiplayer game with several players, all of whom can likely be doing stuff, including a DM who can interrupt at any time. That's another whole problem I didn't even account for. Do they even have people experienced with multiplayer networking for that kind of thing? What's very common in AA and indie projects is that they totally screw up the networking, and people are constantly getting disconnected or having other huge problems (on the flipside some do nail as a priority)

And none of the "wannabe AAA" teams WotC now owns is staffed up, so we're kind of looking at an AA team trying to do a project which basically is on the borderline of AAA in terms of graphics, UI needs, and so on, and in terms of multiplayer requirements is particularly heinous (you'd potentially be looking at tens of thousand to millions of people using this simultaneously).

I am unsure about the players token, but twice in the video they mention "playing you in the game". They might make a big effort on providing a player-facing customizing tool.

I'm sure they will, but it won't look anything at all like what they're showing, results-wise. Those are custom-designed models that moulded in a way that shows they absolutely could not be modular. And frankly, if they let you make a fat guy who smokes at release, I'll be very impressed. I bet that pipe gets nixed ("sending the wrong message to the kids" sez PR) and I bet they find out how hard it is to make characters who can be significantly fat/thin look good and not totally distorted. Anyway, point is, the actual thing will look vastly more generic. The Emperor's New Clothes/Low Standards crowd will cheer it even if it looks godawful, but what they're showing here is bullshots wall to wall.

Can't they buy a major VTT player outright?

They could but they haven't, and there is no possibility of turning any VTT, major or minor, into this within two years. That they're adopting an engine that's only recently become available is good future-proofing but also means they've not really even started to work on this. If it's out in anything but an ultra-simplistic form (tokens and barely-textured maps) by even 2027 I'd be surprised.

I even fear that they won't allow custom monsters anymore. You want your zombie to be oozing a poisonous aura? Sure, let's create a custom monster for the low price of 0.99 USD+VAT. [maybe that would make people flee, so that would be too extreme.]

I'm not too worried about that because people would reject it. On the other hand, the temptation to try and double-dip people by getting them to pay for expensive virtual minis is going to be severe, esp. as some whales would totally go for it. But that requires the product to be out and functioning well, so is kind of a later concern.

Really? (I am not in this field...) I'd think it would be less intensive...

Less intensive than what? The sort of art/design budget they'll need to make this look like they're claiming is huge, and again, whilst they can skip animating/rigging, they have virtually every other challenge a videogame has, and some more on the side.

Getting a really basic 5E VTT up and running would be very doable in that time frame, but getting it user-friendly enough for a mass market (which I'd suggest Roll20 etc. are nowhere near), and then making actually enforce 1D&D rules (which people will want it to do - and those rules will be in flux until 2024 note), but also allowing the DM to override stuff, and giving it this ultra-high-res look, and giving it a networking model and functionality that works well with tens of thousands of players or more? That's going to be very demanding. Easily at the level of lower-end AAA stuff now. Hell maybe even middle-end. With WotC's lack of experience in the field and the fact that they seem to be trying to do this in-house, rather than hiring a studio, costs and time could be much higher too.

 

[Hussar]

I have to admit, I'm a lot less skeptical than you @Ruin Explorer. I mean, DM Alchemist, right now, will create 3d environments, pretty easily, that look pretty much like the video. Now, I do think that the actual VTT won't be quite so high end as that video, but, hey, I could be wrong. But, like I said, if some guy in his basement can bang out something like DM Alchemist, I'm not really sure how difficult it would be to wed that to a VTT. Particularly when they've already got the database stuff already with D&D Beyond.

Also, why are you saying they are doing this "in house"? They bought a development studio recently. So, I'm not sure the lack of talent is as much of an issue as you seem to think it will be.

We'll have to wait and see I guess. I

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Also, why are you saying they are doing this "in house"? They bought a development studio recently. So, I'm not sure the lack of talent is as much of an issue as you seem to think it will be.

Because they are doing it "in-house" as far as we know. Their development studio, Tuque, are making terrible video games, and Archetype entertainment is working on a sci-fi CRPG. Which studio do you think are doing it? Maybe they bought another one?

I mean, DM Alchemist, right now, will create 3d environments, pretty easily, that look pretty much like the video.

I mean, first off, they don't look like that, and they're totally static low-quality models designed to essentially produce screenshots for a map, and that's like saying "If anyone with a pentax can take some pictures, I'm sure some guys with a video camera can make a Hollywood movie!".

Particularly when they've already got the database stuff already with D&D Beyond.

ROFL oh jesus dude. They absolutely do NOT "have the database stuff already with Beyond". Beyond has had huge problems with adding new rules - they've not got to some rules from 2020, and they had to give up on UA stuff being implemented - and the only consistent claim from them has been that it's somehow the fault of the database and it's inability to adapt/be adapted (they also seem to have lost the people who originally created it). You think that a clunky-ass database like that is going to hook up smoothly to a VTT and work great? They'll probably have to re-write it, and they'll certainly have to massively debug it, as not everything on Beyond outputs the correct results (but it doesn't matter because there isn't a VTT so the DM/players can just ignore the wrong stuff).

So anyway, do you really honestly believe that in two years, we will have VTT from WotC that resembles the hype CGI they put out?

 

[Henadic Theologian]

I will wait to judge till it's released.