this post was submitted on 14 Mar 2025
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I don't really like discord, but my gaming group have been using it for rpg stuff. Chat channels, video calls and easy to setup bots have all been really useful.

But I get the feeling the enshitification is going to get worse, so I was looking for somewhere else to migrate to. The video stuff isn't as important, we could switch easily to other services. But before I start a new campaign, and spend time setting up bots with routines for rolling dice and calculating tables, I'd like to do it somewhere that isn't in talks for an IPO.

I'm not really up on stuff like this, so I don't know if there's some obvious similar choices or an alternative medium that I haven't considered.

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[–] LegoBrickOnFire@jlai.lu 4 points 5 hours ago

During the pandemic, discord has been a lifeline for me and I did not find alternatives that had a specific feature that may appear irrelevant but that I found deeply comforting: When people are hanging out in a vocal channel, you can see them. It was not much, but it was the closest we had to going to university and seeing groups of friends just chilling together.

There are many other platforms for text and vocal chats, but this is a feature I am still looking for.

Prove me wrong !

[–] zeropublix@lemmy.ml 3 points 16 hours ago (1 children)
[–] Acamon@lemmy.world 2 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

What's good about zulip? It's not one I'm familiar with.

[–] zeropublix@lemmy.ml 4 points 6 hours ago
  • Open Source.
  • IRC Integration
  • self-hosted
[–] other_cat@lemmy.zip 5 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

You know, I'm gonna be the oddball suggestion here.

Forums. What forums? I don't know, the last time I used them was proboards back in 2010 so I'm sure I'm out of the loop on the options, but I do miss forums sometimes. That was where I ran RPGs, back in the day.

[–] Acamon@lemmy.world 2 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

We are considering a seperate play by post game using some of the forums and sites set up for that. But having a voice and video chat with friends, with easy options for adding dice and game management bots is appealing.

[–] other_cat@lemmy.zip 2 points 7 hours ago

Yeah, I hear you. And even if you post at lightning speed, there's something about forums that just feels slower compared to the speed posting in a chatroom can get you.

[–] asudox@lemmy.asudox.dev 31 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Matrix. But if you want something that looks and feels exactly like Discord, there is Revolt. It's FOSS.

https://revolt.chat/

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

If only revolt added federation. Then I'd be behind it 100%

[–] asudox@lemmy.asudox.dev 16 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

In the FAQ, they state that federation is not in their roadmap, but if someone can do it, then they are willing to merge it. Since Revolt is written in Rust, we can use Lemmy devs' activitypub federation crate. I might take a look at it someday.

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I've even thought about it, but I don't know rust and right now just don't have the time, but it seems like it'd be fairly simple. Matrix and revolt have a lot in common, it's just translating between the two

[–] asudox@lemmy.asudox.dev 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Oh no like I meant using ActivityPub to federate between different Revolt instances or even other future software that might be an alternative to Discord and is federated using ActivityPub.

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 3 points 1 day ago (5 children)

Oh, yeah no activitypub isn't meant for private messaging. It's great for things like mastodon and lemmy, but there is zero privacy, it's meant to blast out to anyone who wants to listen. Messaging the best standards right now are Matrix and XMPP.

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[–] unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 24 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I wrote a somewhat lengthy "Introduction to Matrix/Element" comment for someone here recently. If you arent paranoid, then you can ignore the sections about not using and removing the web client session after account creation. Let me know if you have any trouble.

The comment in question: https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/16768943

To use element like discord (with servers and voice channels) you will create a Space(=discord-server) and then add Rooms(=discord-channels) to it.

Normal rooms are usually text only but you can still start a video call (doesnt have video on by default) inside one which all room members will get notified for.

To get something like voice channels you create a "video room" which people can then join and it acts like a voice channel that also has screen sharing and video functionality.

There is full permission management so you can give everyone in the space access to all rooms or use levels like guest/member/moderator/admin/owner etc or you make it invite only. Lots of options.

[–] november@lemmy.vg 57 points 1 day ago (4 children)

There's Revolt, if you're happy being on an empty platform that none of your friends will ever move to.

[–] Acamon@lemmy.world 21 points 1 day ago

Hah, that's fine, because it would be for our group activity they'd be fine with making accounts. I never used discord to chat with people outside my small group of irl friends.

[–] jherazob@fedia.io 15 points 1 day ago

Never say never, once Discord goes IPO and the enshittification goes bad enough to annoy gamers Discord is fucked, and Revolt is a drop-in replacement, the fact that it can be self-hosted will also be a plus for some people, mass migrations are rare but they DO happen

[–] DampSquid@feddit.uk 9 points 1 day ago

Oooh! This sounds like me!

[–] auraithx@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Why this over matrix which has similar features, actual users, and is federated?

[–] MentalEdge@sopuli.xyz 10 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Revolt has better feature parity with discord.

If all you're looking to do is replace discord with a friend-group who is already on board, it's ideal.

For gaming-related use cases, matrix isn't there yet. It doesn't noise gate voice calls, or support audio chat rooms, just to mention a few things.

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[–] Fermiverse@gehirneimer.de 35 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] dfyx@lemmy.helios42.de 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Remind me... is that the same UK that currently tries to force apple and google to include governement backdoors into their encryption?

[–] Fermiverse@gehirneimer.de 6 points 1 day ago

Its open source and you could selfhost a server.

No need to use UK webspace.

[–] vaionko@sopuli.xyz 1 points 21 hours ago

is GDPR compliant

Isn't that required of everything that wants.to operate inside the EU?

[–] AynRandLibertarian@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Internet Relay Chat

a technology handed down to use from the ancients.

[–] RichardDegenne@lemm.ee 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)
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[–] troed@fedia.io 25 points 1 day ago
[–] contrapunctus@lemmy.cafe 16 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Jabber, a.k.a. XMPP. It's decentralized, featureful, standardized, and low on server resources.

Here's a user's guide I wrote.

https://contrapunctus.codeberg.page/the-quick-and-easy-guide-to-xmpp.html

[–] Count042@lemmy.ml 1 points 6 hours ago

This is the right answer.

I've adminned both, and XMPP is ridiculously performant. Matrix made a mistake making the room the atomic unit.

[–] tatann@lemm.ee 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I think Element/Matrix could do the trick

At least that's what I intend to do with some friends for our gaming sessions and daily mindless chat

[–] solrize@lemmy.world 16 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I've never felt a desire to move off old-school IRC.

[–] Darorad@lemmy.world 49 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] tauren@lemm.ee 25 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Funny enough, Skype is dead now, just like ICQ, MSN, and many others. But IRC is still alive. Decentralized protocols <3

[–] xigoi@lemmy.sdf.org 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Unfortunately, it’s only alive as long as you don’t close your client.

[–] tauren@lemm.ee 10 points 1 day ago

The community had solved this problem decades ago. Of course, bouncers, relays, and other solutions are not for everyone. But there are also modern web clients like https://thelounge.chat/ that always stay online. You can use them pretty much like discord for text chats.

[–] Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] ekZepp@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago

Too soon, add 500 years.

[–] mlflexer@lemm.ee 11 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Matrix? I think you can setup text channels and also do voice/video/screen sharing in the channels as well if you’re using element, though I havn’t been able to convince my friends to jump ship yet, so don’t know how it compares to discord

[–] candyman337@sh.itjust.works 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] jherazob@fedia.io 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

First i hear of this one, interesting, how far along is it?

[–] Kangy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 day ago

Not even close to being a replacement currently. I'm hoping it gets there though

https://docs.spacebar.chat/faq/

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[–] Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

If you want a different level of shitty platform, You could just move to a VTT like Roll20.

[–] Noggog@programming.dev 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)
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[–] Rappe@sopuli.xyz 4 points 1 day ago

I mean, our friend group still uses IRC. Go back to the roots, discord is merely a fancy IRC anyway. Quakenet is still up and running, working as smoothly as ever! (So at least one netsplit* a day... :D)

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