The Gaming Den

Mike Mearls wrote:If D&D had been healthy and strong from 2000 to today, I'm probably still just a designer or maybe a team lead.

https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/6 ... _designer/


Hahaha

Mike Mearls wrote:Based on what we've seen, I'd say that our release schedule has been a key component to D&D's explosive growth.

The level of either cognitive dissonance or bold-faced lying necessary to make this statement is mind-boggling.

Mechalich wrote:

Mike Mearls wrote:Based on what we've seen, I'd say that our release schedule has been a key component to D&D's explosive growth.

The level of either cognitive dissonance or bold-faced lying necessary to make this statement is mind-boggling.

Probably both at the same time. We're almost halway through 2017, and have they even released anything that wasn't an adventure path? He must have convinced Wotc and Hasbro that the D&D section can just continuously glide on revenue from the big three books.

This year? No. Since launch there has been a DM screen, a fluff filled not-quite-a-Monster Manual and a children's book featuring mind flayers. So, yeah.

He must have convinced Wotc and Hasbro that the D&D section can just continuously glide on revenue from the big three books.

Eh. They've got enough back of the napkin shit that they publish as unearthed arcana web pages that i don't think this is the case. I honestly think its the opposite problem- Hasbro sees no value in throwing resources into D&D books, because they've seen the 'healthy and strong' brand in 2000 torn to shit by this specific chucklefuck.

A lot of the answers in those reddit posts are sad [fronting about Greyhawk] and/or disturbing [laying the blame for his career and the destruction of the D&D brand on 9/11].

Voss wrote: a children's book featuring mind flayers.

I used the laughing joker image too soon then. Did they include an image of a Mind Flayer eating?

A lot of the answers in those reddit posts are sad [fronting about Greyhawk] and/or disturbing [laying the blame for his career and the destruction of the D&D brand on 9/11].

What? 9/11? Pat Pulling would be a slightly better response than that.

As for Greyhawk, yeah, that's sad, I actually would like it if they actually went back to Greyhawk with at least some of the sourcebooks instead of more Forgotten Realms. It wouldn't be any better likely, but it would still at least be different. Or at least lest stale than Forgotten Realms.

Well, he claims it focused him on his career, and his career is what lead to the destruction of the D&D brand. That was a fairly unclear extrapolation on my part.


No, Greyhawk wouldn't be less stale. Greyhawk is boring as fuck, just less familiar to most players these days. But since he claims to be 26 during 9/11, he's roughly the same age I am. The Greyhawk boxed set came out when I was.. 10 or 11, and the setting was largely set aside [in favor of FR] shortly after that, then mostly set on fire during the 1e->2e transition. [Actually, after Gygax got kicked, he continued writing about it in his Gord the Rogue novel series. Tharzidun ate it.]

It's unlikely Mearls ever really played much with Greyhawk, except as a retro thing after he sucked Monte's cock for a career in D&D. He's just posing for a reddit audience for... some reason. Vapid praise, presumably.


No idea on mind flayers eating. They just used it as the cover image, I presume they were covered in some fashion.

I will say, Greyhawk is probably just nostalgia from some adventures I did in it when my Uncle ran games for me and my siblings when we weren't even teenagers yet.

I have no idea one the 9/11 thing, I wasn't even in elementary school when that happened.

How has no one here made fun of his new, "less clunky" initiative system?

Do I really need to break it down?

Couldn't spot at first, didn't realize it was on his twitter and oh jeez this is just terrible. Is it really broken up by the type of attack? What if someone using multiple attack types Mearls? What if there is a fighter built around quick attacks with light weapons and one around a massive two handed sword Mearls? Why does Ranged go first Mearls?

And why can't you, the chief designer of Dungeons and Dragons, handle simple addition Mearls?!

Why not everyone just roll straight D20 and reroll based on how many times you gave the GM Christmas gifts?

I don't even know how this makes it simpler, there's more shit to track for a gain of what?

Not to mention the "my spell has a ranged attack roll" arguments you briefly touched on.

Mike Mearls wrote:I'm far more loose with the rules than people might expect. My attitude as DM is that I'd rather let something ride than look up a rule. Even a broken character is only an issue if it stomps on another player's fun.

No Mike, that's about as expected as learning that the Sun is hot.

Mike Mearls wrote:If D&D had been healthy and strong from 2000 to today, I'm probably still just a designer or maybe a team lead.

This is 100% true. There were a lot of people between him and the big chair. If there hadn't been mass firings that went all the way to the top of the D&D division every year of 4th edition's train wreck, he never would have gotten enough Klingon promotions to reach the top spot.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote:

Mike Mearls wrote:If D&D had been healthy and strong from 2000 to today, I'm probably still just a designer or maybe a team lead.

This is 100% true. There were a lot of people between him and the big chair. If there hadn't been mass firings that went all the way to the top of the D&D division every year of 4th edition's train wreck, he never would have gotten enough Klingon promotions to reach the top spot.

-Username17

Of course. The funny part is that he realizes this, and admits it in public...

If Mearls was fired or otherwise left for greener pastures, what would even happen to WoTC, to D&D at this point?

If Mearls and all his associates were fired, I assume that would be the end of the "D&D Team", and they'd just can the IP for years to come?

Aryxbez wrote:If Mearls was fired or otherwise left for greener pastures, what would even happen to WoTC, to D&D at this point?

Nothing at all and almost nothing, respectively. WotC doesn't need to care much about the D&D line.
Mearls getting the kick would almost inherently be a net positive. Almost anyone replacing him would try to do something, rather than just sit around and farm out scans of old crap to third parties.

If Mearls and all his associates were fired, I assume that would be the end of the "D&D Team", and they'd just can the IP for years to come?

I don't see any of those people as anything but replaceable.

But realistically, most of the D&D IPs are already canned. The novel line is dead, and outside of tiny slivers of FR, they haven't produced any product. Even D&D as a brand itself barely gets badtouched each year.