YOU are never going to write the "(Next) D&D Next"

[Heisenberg]

Re: OP, if this is true, why do half 90% of the threads on the den even exist? Is it just a big, pointless circle jerk?

[JonSetanta]

I have never seen anyone use a Grey Render in any game. It's a completely uninteresting brute monster.

I used some as part of an extradimensional invasion. They were just dumb brute summons, just because they were in the book.
Anything would have been better.

Girallons left such a big impression on one Barbarian player (fond of fighting games) that he frequently desired to "fight more four armed gorillas in the mountains".

[Kaelik]

Re: OP, if this is true, why do half 90% of the threads on the den even exist? Is it just a big, pointless circle jerk?

Alternatively, because people enjoy talking about game design principles and game design even when they are not actually intending to design the next great X. Just like a forum about writing could in fact be filled with hobbyists who talk about how to write well with no intention of specifically being bestselling novels.

[Mask_De_H]

The only major home grown talent we have is Koumei and she is very much sui generis.

I actually wouldn't say I'm unique or anything else implied by sui generis. Look at all the shit stuff I've written. I just have vast amounts of free time and enjoy creating "stuff", so churn out masses of content, and some of it happens to be good.

You make shit, aren't K and haven't been in the biz. That makes you unique to the Den.

And outside of the circlejerking, this is still the best place to talk shop about how RPGs work. We have (former) professionals willing to be open and candid and no (major) cults of personality like on RPG.net or with those OSR assholes.

[PhoneLobster]

Re: OP, if this is true, why do half 90% of the threads on the den even exist? Is it just a big, pointless circle jerk?

I'm not going to make an estimate of exactly how much is a waste of time from a progressive design basis. Lets just say it's almost certainly a lot.

But a lot of the waste of time stuff is entirely OK because it's, well, entirely off topic time wasting. No big deal to wander off and talk about computer games or politics or whatever if you want to.

In this thread I'm complaining about a specific type of waste of time. Something that masquerades as productive game design discussion but is actively destructive and based on frankly insane premises of everyone's imaginary games rules being held hostage by imaginary large audiences of imaginary grognards.

Someone has I believe already made some bullshit reference to "fighter threads" already. But actually those are an excellent example of this problem. We have a fighter thread wasting space here right now, and it's full of people wringing their hands over how grognards are PREVENTING them personally from trying to do anything to fix the fighter, it's not their own personal grognardism it's those vast audiences of "grognards" they... aren't actually making a product for...

That sort of thing is not productive. It is insane. It is counter productive. It gives people REALLY stupid ideas about how to set their personal design goals for their personal products for personal use and that is a fundamentally bad thing.

But if this sounds like I haven't said anything much new it's because I haven't. The answer to your question is basically all in the opening post already.

Short version. This place would be more interesting for someone actually designing game rules if it talked about ACTUAL interesting rules propositions instead of endless shitty threads constantly wringing hands over fake excuses why "people" are stopping them personally from making interesting rules. Case in point. Fighter threads.

[hogarth]

ICE isn't WotC.

Right, so clearly Monte Cook didn't give him his start in the RPG industry, so I don't know what your point is.

Regardless, right now WotC explicitly says they aren't even interested in interviewing you for a position if you don't live in the Seattle area. It doesn't matter whether you are willing to relocate, they aren't willing to interview you in the first place if you'd have to.

To me "only local candidates" means "we're not going to pay to fly you down here and telecommuting is not an option". YMMV.

[Previn]

ICE isn't WotC.

Right, so clearly Monte Cook didn't give him his start in the RPG industry, so I don't know what your point is.

Regardless, right now WotC explicitly says they aren't even interested in interviewing you for a position if you don't live in the Seattle area. It doesn't matter whether you are willing to relocate, they aren't willing to interview you in the first place if you'd have to.

To me "only local candidates" means "we're not going to pay to fly you down here and telecommuting is not an option". YMMV.

There are people who wouldn't have an issue moving there if offered a job. They can do the interview remotely with the clause 'must relocate, no help with relocation.' The only legitimate reason I can think of for limiting it to one small area only, is that they already have someone in mind and want to cut out as many other applicants as possible.

[Koumei]

They probably don't want to waste their time assuming someone might relocate once they get the job, so will just filter out any application that happens to be from "further away than we'd like". Because Bob from Kansas might indeed relocate. Or he might not and that's just time wasted. Whereas Timmy the Chalk-Eater, well, his IQ test may have come back negative, but at least he's local so they know he can actually get to work as long as he remembers the way there.

[Voss]

Regardless, right now WotC explicitly says they aren't even interested in interviewing you for a position if you don't live in the Seattle area. It doesn't matter whether you are willing to relocate, they aren't willing to interview you in the first place if you'd have to.

To me "only local candidates" means "we're not going to pay to fly you down here and telecommuting is not an option". YMMV.

It doesn't matter what it means to you, that specifically isn't what 'local candidates only' means. It is a specific term fairly common in advertisements for relatively low paying positions where it isn't worth your time to come in for an interview if you live more than one zip code away and can't get to the office in an hour or less. More specifically, HR and Temp offices coined the use of the term so that if they hire someone and then cut the position or person, they don't have to deal with a potential legal wrangle about the costs involved in the move to take the job that hire no longer has. So if you're outside their predetermined radius, you just don't get a call.

It is perfect fit for a laughably tiny industry that is largely centered around one town in a specific country. where personal recommendations from a handful of people count for far more than any amount of writing credits or creative writing classes (the closest the industry comes to a 'professional degree.')

[kzt]

Go to their job postings, they are seriously only interested in Seattle-based talent. It's very weird.

Wow. That's nuts. Nobody gets the best senior level people only looking locally. Even an insane and ultra-cheap-ass HR dept that I'm all too familiar with will talk to people needing relocation for jobs like senior developer and senior financial analyst etc.

Are they really that cheap? This perhaps explains the layers of fail at Wizards.

[K]

Go to their job postings, they are seriously only interested in Seattle-based talent. It's very weird.

Wow. That's nuts. Nobody gets the best senior level people only looking locally. Even an insane and ultra-cheap-ass HR dept that I'm all too familiar with will talk to people needing relocation for jobs like senior developer and senior financial analyst etc.

Are they really that cheap? This perhaps explains the layers of fail at Wizards.

Imagine if the rest of the publishing industry worked that way. We'd only get novels and textbooks out of New York's local talent.

[infected slut princess]

Wizards should be offering people a lot more money and relocation support, because the working conditions are truly horrible: they have to be in the same building as Mike Mearls, who is ugly and smells like B.O and thinks rapping dwarves are so fucking hilarious.

[Koumei]

Imagine if the rest of the publishing industry worked that way. We'd only get novels and textbooks out of New York's local talent.

Compared to the current system where you get textbooks from Texas? That sounds like a pretty good deal.

[OgreBattle]

In comparison, how does M:tG recruit?

[Voss]

Historically, I believe they snapped up people who entrenched themselves in the tournament scene, though some still came from the incestuous pit that is Seattle. Remember the only reason WotC is out there, is that is where Garfield was when he switched from doing 3rd party planar god supplements to Magic, and ultimately leveraged Magic money into owning D&D.
But I don't really know if they still do that. Given the way they shovel Magic mechanics out, I doubt 'talent' is the first quality they look for.


Of course, none of this applies to artists attached to either system, which tend to be a more free-lance and live where ever the fuck they want.

[K]

Imagine if the rest of the publishing industry worked that way. We'd only get novels and textbooks out of New York's local talent.

Compared to the current system where you get textbooks from Texas? That sounds like a pretty good deal.

We get textbooks from writers all over the world. The issue is that the Texas School Board gets to decide the standards for approving them.

[shadzar]

Are they really that cheap? This perhaps explains the layers of fail at Wizards.

second the textbooks, a bunch of cow-punchers deciding what every school in every state should know... D&D is only being made for Seatle gamers. thus why they can't figure out why int he fuck the rest of the world isnt jumping on 4th+ editions.

[Cyberzombie]

Wizards should be offering people a lot more money and relocation support, because the working conditions are truly horrible: they have to be in the same building as Mike Mearls, who is ugly and smells like B.O and thinks rapping dwarves are so fucking hilarious.

This is likely why they don't offer relocation support. They'd end up hiring a guy over the phone, pay to fly him down there and move him into an apartment, then he'd work one day, spend a day with Mearls and decide to quit.

[tussock]

To be fair, Monte Cook did almost manage to imply that it wasn't Mike Mearls who made him rage-quit, and there wasn't that many people followed him. That Numenera thing's doing well too, so I guess he has sort of written the Next D&D. Unless you count 13th Age, which is ... not a bad game, and under the OGL.

[RadiantPhoenix]

In comparison, how does M:tG recruit?

They run online gameshows.

[shadzar]

To be fair, Monte Cook did almost manage to imply that it wasn't Mike Mearls who made him rage-quit

if you mean what i think you are talking about i remember something along the lines of Mike wasn't THE reason, but he never said Mike wasnt A reason.

more of that bureaucratic BS and contractual do not discuss stuff, so nobody knows what was going on.

at this point, we don't know IF anyone at WotC really cares about D&D, or just their jobs.

if it was made using the OGL, it is 3.x/d20. not to be classified or confused with anything before or after.