At the Gen Con in Indianapolis, there was new information about Project Sigil, the virtual tool that will breathe even more life into your D&D battles
Popularly, tabletop role-playing games are often referred to as pen & paper, but this is a far cry from reality. Even though in many cases paper, pens and possibly dice are sufficient to play, hardly any group of heroes nowadays relies on such archaic methods.
Instead,playing via online services is becoming increasingly popular. Spurred on by the coronavirus pandemic, many groups have acquired a taste for it and are using digital services even if not all their friends live in the same city.
Third-party offerings are usually used here, butWizards of the Coast is currently working on its own VTT(Virtual Tabletop) for Dungeons & Dragons. At Gen Con 2024, the project was given the name Project Sigil and some new information was revealed.
Major collaborations
The latest version of Project Sigil was presented to the audience in Indianapolis during a panel. Here it was shown how game directors can use it to build their 3D maps both quickly and meticulously
And those who prefer to tinker with characters rather than maps will also be able to do so to their heart’s content. We’re talking about a character editor with tons of customization options. In addition, there will also be cooperations with well-known D&D brandswhich can then also appear in your digital worlds.
First and foremostBaldur’s Gate 3, whose characters are available as virtual miniatures. So you can simply add Karlach, Astarion, Lae’zel and co. to your game. Play them, fight them or seduce them. You can see what Astarion and Karlach look like in action in Project Sigil in a live round with actors Neil Newbow (Astarion) and Samantha Béart (Karlach):
And those who prefer to tinker with characters rather than maps will also be able to do so to their heart’s content. We’re talking about a character editor with tons of customization options. In addition, there will also be cooperations with well-known D&D brandswhich can then also appear in your digital worlds.
First and foremostBaldur’s Gate 3, whose characters are available as virtual miniatures. So you can simply add Karlach, Astarion, Lae’zel and co. to your game. Play them, fight them or seduce them. You can see what Astarion and Karlach look like in action in Project Sigil in a live round with actors Neil Newbow (Astarion) and Samantha Béart (Karlach):
There is currently no public version of Project Sigil, but this is set to change soon. A closed beta will start this fall,for which you can register now
What exactly is this?
VTTs are in a way theintersection of tabletop role-playing and video games On the one hand, these programs are designed to make online gaming easier by digitally displaying dice rolls, but many go one step further. For example, some VTTs aim to make 2D maps and tokens more interactive by implementing dynamic fog of war
The biggest disadvantage of such graphically impressive map tools is, of course, the building effort. Let’s see how well this works in Project Sigil.
The whole thing becomes even more complex when battle or dungeon maps are displayed in 3D. Not many programs have dared to try this yet. The most well-known is Talespire, which is currently still in Early Access on Steam and allows you to build maps like in a real level editor
However, where Talespire wants to map everything and therefore provides quite generic assets, you can use Project Sigil to build maps perfectly tailored to D&D All map assets and characters match the D&D look you know from the books exactly
In addition, there is of course a lot of financial power behind it. That’s why it looks amazingly good and even enables magical effects. Project Sigil brings your very own campaigns to life in a new way.
