As I arrived at StartPlaying, the website offered to help me get into Pathfinder.
So what? I was on StartPlaying.games because Wizards of the Coast announced a partnership with them. I wasn’t expecting a nudge towards a D&D rival.
The premise is that a traditional non-solo RPG like D&D needs more than one person to play. You need a brave DM, and you need regular players. That’s easier said than achieved; the challenges of looking for (a) group and enjoying a regular TTRPG are legendary.
StartPlaying is a platform to find a game used by professional GMs/DMs who will charge you for their time. It has no notion of outside the United States and/or off the internet.
We don’t know the terms of the Wizards of the Coast and StartPlaying deal but WotC may be getting a cut of the money StartPlaying earns. There’s undoubtedly a referral code and system in place, with D&D offering $10 off people’s first StartPlaying game.
Other sites offer a similar service, and some of Roll20’s success comes from their Looking For Group tool. There is more than a quarter of a million people on Reddit’s /LFG community.
When Demiplane launched the focus on Groups & Matchmaking, the digital tools and Nexus followed swiftly behind.
The prize and the challenge on offer is regular money in an industry that previously relied on needing to publish each book and hope the community bought them. Why is that a challenge? It’s almost a winner-takes-all scenario. If there are not enough potential games/players on a platform to find a game, then there’s no point in looking for it to find a game. If there’s no point in using a LFG site in the first place.
Once there’s an established place to go get a game of D&D, it’s hard to recommend less successful game finders to people, and so the cycle continues.
What does the StartPlaying partnership mean for D&D?
D&D’s partnership with StartPlaying was announced alongside D&D 50th’s anniversary news. It suggests strongly that Wizards of the Coast aren’t doing their own Looking For Group site.
The implication of WotC not having an Game Finder is that their own virtual tabletop won’t have one either. That’s definitely news for Roll20.
WotC do mention Maps, which is their VTT, in the news. The adventure Descent into the Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth will be free with D&D Beyond accounts from March 26th. The connection between VTTs and LFG isn’t speculation; therefore, WotC acknowledges it in its own post.
WotC bought D&D Beyond from Fandom, which bought the original platform after it became very successful. Wizards now use D&D Beyond as their main digital channel rather than the Hasbro-provided sub-domain.
Therefore;
- Wizards of the Coast are promoting a private company which promotes rivals to D&D. It’s likely WotC aren’t worried.
- Wizards of the Coast may be getting a slice of the pie.
- StartPlaying now has a very large partner who is well positioned to give them the ‘Looking For Group’ market, but WotC might not step up.
- Wizards of the Coast is unlikely to release its own LFG solution this year; therefore, Maps/its VTT is also unlikely to have one.
- The spotlight may bring new partners to StartPlaying but it’s not a VTT and does not need permission to mention other systems and 2d20, Year Zero Engine and other rule sets are already in their search engine.
A good result of this might be that StartPlaying grows, and getting a game for any system gets easier. In the long run, that’ll help the smaller games.
A bad result is that StartPlaying grows, becomes indispensable, and is bought by Hasbro and chucks of D&D rivals.
We’re deep into speculation here, though.
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