Sigil, Wizards of the Coast's VTT, Officially Launches

beholder sigil.png

Sigil, the 3D VTT developed by Wizards of the Coast and formerly known as Project Sigil, has officially launched on Window devices. Today, Wizards of the Coast announced that anyone with a D&D Beyond account (free or paid) can now access Sigil, provided they have a computer with Windows OS. Interestingly, the system's full functionality is based off of D&D Beyond's subscription tiers, with access to create multiplayer rooms and the ability to share and load maps tied to the Master Tier account. Master Tier subscribers also have access to builder kits, custom mini outfits, and unpainted minis. The Sigil client can be downloaded from D&D Beyond.

Sigil has been in development since at least 2023 alongside the launch of the One D&D initiative. One major concern about the new system, which uses Unreal Engine 5 to create 3D battle maps for D&D, was its pricing. At least for now, pricing seems to be tied directly to D&D Beyond subscriptions instead of pushing an additional monetization scheme onto players.

EN World saw a preview build of Sigil earlier this year, with a robust and relatively quick-to-implement map building system. One question that I kept asking while previewing Sigil involved exactly what Wizards wanted Sigil to be, as it functionally appeared to be a level or map builder with some basic D&D automation built into the game. The system doesn't include a full D&D revised 5E engine, but it does contain a significant amount of integration for the app to mimic some of D&D Beyond's dice rolling and resource management system has. 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.
 

log in or register to remove this ad

Christian Hoffer

Christian Hoffer

Wow, what a stupid list for free tier. Something like this could bring in so many people if they allowed sharing maps and hosting. Greed is going to slow the adoption for this like crazy.

I would've gladly checked it out for free and even run one shots on it but I love Foundry. If I can't run games without being subbed, then what's even the point?
Because it’s only a couple of quid and only the DM pays. Free tier is to practice system and for players.
I have to pay for Forge monthly to use Foundry. I don’t see the problem.

I can tell this thread is going to be painful reading on EnWorld.
“I shouldn’t have to pay”
“I don’t have a PC”
“I don’t want to create an account even if it’s free”
“Why can’t [insert VTT] get the support”

Exhausting. Seriously can we have a + thread for Sigil that actually talks about… you know… Sigil.
 
Last edited:

log in or register to remove this ad

Because Google login is authentication - it asserts, with some level of confidence, that the person who logged in with it this time is the same person as logged in with it last time. And that's all it does.

Google does not provide any space to save information about you and your use. So, for example, if you logged into Sigil, did some setup, and had your connection drop, you would probably lose that information. Yes, there are other ways to manage that sort of thing, but accounts make it much easier.

Also, of course, they eventually want to sell you stuff.,
DnD Beyond manages all my other stuff via google login though. My saved combat encounters, my campagin settings, my characters, my maps, all other configurations. I don't think thats the reason, they just want people to move away from other accounts.

I had not much interest in 3D-VTTs anyway and that mini-interest to look into it is now gone, I won't create an extra account for this.
 


Welp, three pages in now and has anyone actually, I dunno, tried it yet? I'm working this weekend and my potato of a computer likely won't do this justice, so, it would be nice if some kind, open minded individual gave it a whirl and posted a couple of screen shots.
I had a go last night. Took about 40 mins to download the client. Quite easy to set up. Account to 5 mins to create and accesses all my Beyond material.

I was given choice of jump to a trial map of an inn or creat my own so I tried the inn to start with. The tile elements are good. It’s basically dwarven forge but I think with some options for bigger pieces.

86 or so minis at the moment which obviously isn’t enough for a campaign. But they look really good, particularly the monsters.

While OP says that typical caravan ambush isn’t that appropriate for this system I actually see wilderness encounters being particularly well served by this format if they release a wilderness 3d set which I think is likely.

If they translate a module into this system and do that work for you if you buy the module on Beyond then I think it will be a game changer.
 



Because it’s only a couple of quid and only the DM pays. Free tier is to practice system and for players.
I have to pay for Forge monthly to use Foundry. I don’t see the problem.

I can tell this thread is going to be painful reading on EnWorld.
“I shouldn’t have to pay”
“I don’t have a PC”
“I don’t want to create an account even if it’s free”
“Why can’t [insert VTT] get the support”

Exhausting. Seriously can we have a + thread for Sigil that actually talks about… you know… Sigil.

Yeah I already pay $5 a month for DDB so me and all my players have access to the books I own (just core 5.5).

As long as we play 5.5 I’ll kick in for it (im reimbursedwith snacks) Saves everyone a bit of $ instead of having everyone buy a PHB etc. Especially when we may change systems in 3-4 months.

Probably won’t use Sigil though since we play in person.
 

Because it’s only a couple of quid and only the DM pays. Free tier is to practice system and for players.
I have to pay for Forge monthly to use Foundry. I don’t see the problem.

I can tell this thread is going to be painful reading on EnWorld.
“I shouldn’t have to pay”
“I don’t have a PC”
“I don’t want to create an account even if it’s free”
“Why can’t [insert VTT] get the support”

Exhausting. Seriously can we have a + thread for Sigil that actually talks about… you know… Sigil.
You pay for Forge because you want to do so, I self host for free, and still have all the privacy I want of a paid service. This is not at all the same, and you’re clearly lying by trying to say it is.

I am talking about Sigil. You wanting to complain and tone police isn’t.

Sigil is going to need mass adoption to be a product worth building. Paywalling basic features like sharing maps is ridiculous as is not allowing for hosting a room. There’s already nothing but bad PR all over this thing. You’d think they’d want people signing up and making free content to get others excited about it but nope.
 

I had alpha access, but because my Windows laptop doesn't have a dedicated graphics card, I only messed around with it for a couple of days. Will give this version another try. Curious to see how the map builder is coming along. The initial one still had quite a bit of work to be done, but reminded me of a Fallout 4/Minecraft hybrid, and was much easier than I thought it would be.

Don't have any plans on getting a serious Windows machine, so am hoping we get a Mac version at some point during the Beta trial, as I'd love to really dig in and provide feedback.
 

You pay for Forge because you want to do so, I self host for free, and still have all the privacy I want of a paid service. This is not at all the same, and you’re clearly lying by trying to say it is.

I am talking about Sigil. You wanting to complain and tone police isn’t.

Sigil is going to need mass adoption to be a product worth building. Paywalling basic features like sharing maps is ridiculous as is not allowing for hosting a room. There’s already nothing but bad PR all over this thing. You’d think they’d want people signing up and making free content to get others excited about it but nope.
I pay for Forge because I can’t self host on my laptop. It’s not a case of wanting or not. I’ve tried many times. No need to claim someone is lying.

Maybe it will need a lot of work. I hope so. I hope they put real time and investment into it. If they want to charge me $5 a month for that - good luck to them. There shouldn’t be bad PR for wanting to charge money for something - particularly when 75% of the people using it can do it for free. If you get something for free then great shout about it. But demanding something should be free seems like the worst kind of entitlement to me.
 

Remove ads

Remove ads

Top