WotC D&D Embraces Corporate Cancer: Chris Perkins & Cultural Consultants

Corolinth · November 11, 2022, 06:23:17 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on November 11, 2022, 12:33:33 PM
Quote from: hedgehobbit on November 11, 2022, 12:19:21 PM
You won't replace D&D with a lightly better version of D&D. *snip*

Yes you can. That's what Pathfinder did for years before 5e came along.

Quote from: Zelen on November 11, 2022, 12:54:18 PM
Quote from: hedgehobbit on November 11, 2022, 12:19:21 PM
You won't replace D&D with a lightly better version of D&D. The game to replace D&D will be as radically different from D&D as D&D was to the skirmish wargames that inspired it.

Pathfinder did pretty well for awhile. Even though Paizo squandered their market lead by going even harder into Leftist psychopathy. Conditions are actually shaping up for a repeat.

Pathfinder didn't replace D&D. Pathfinder was 3E winning the Edition Wars for the second time in a row.

Quote from: Jaeger on November 11, 2022, 02:05:46 PM
Pathfinders big mistake was going in the wrong design direction from the start. Baizuo openly admitted that they did not fix any of the underlying math issues with 3.x - they just layered an employees house rules on top of the OGL that doubled down on the featapalooza aspects of 3.x.

This was not a mistake. This is the exact reason why Pathfinder succeeded. It turns out that, for all its faults, 3E is what people actually wanted to play.

Zelen · November 11, 2022, 06:44:54 PM

Quote from: Corolinth on November 11, 2022, 06:23:17 PM
Pathfinder didn't replace D&D. Pathfinder was 3E winning the Edition Wars for the second time in a row.

The point you're making here is a non sequitur. We weren't discussing the mechanics of the system (everyone knows Pathfinder is functionally equivalent to 3E), it's that screwups by WOTC can damage their brand/IP to the point where functionally-equivalent products can start outselling the 800lb gorilla.

Omega · November 12, 2022, 03:34:47 AM

Someone prior joked that WOTC would cancel the Barbarian as it is "problematic".

Which reminded me that during the 5e playtest there was bitching about. Yep. The Barbarian and how wacist it was! gasparoonies!

I mean this is a company that thinks the COLOR black is wacist. Never underestimate how deep a hole of stupid WOTC can dig.

Adam Csipke · November 12, 2022, 03:41:48 AM

It is going to be fun to watch when the Critical Role-inspired fad fades away and most of the new players drift off to other hobbies and sales plummet, when Wizards go to Hasbro to explain why sales are tanked and describe how they're going to get market share back by appealing to old-school gamers...and an accountant from Hasbro looks at a spreadsheet and just cancels Wizards.

S'mon · November 12, 2022, 04:39:30 AM

Quote from: Corolinth on November 11, 2022, 06:23:17 PM
This was not a mistake. This is the exact reason why Pathfinder succeeded. It turns out that, for all its faults, 3E is what people actually wanted to play.

This is true. Then from 2014 most people wanted to play 5e.

I don't know whether a non-woke 5e clone using the OGL could do to ONE D&D what Pathfinder did to 4e. It seems plausible that a gap in the market is opening up, but my suspicion is that non-woke gamers will simply drift away from D&D and eventually D&D will lose the necessary critical mass of core gamers who actually like to run games. I think Mearls & co in 2014 understood that you need those gamers to create a solid core around which the accretion disk of fluffy wokesters can accumulate. Crawford never understood this.

thedungeondelver · November 12, 2022, 02:26:54 PM

Quote from: tenbones on November 11, 2022, 06:51:38 AM
Why do any of you play this game?

Man, I play 1e AD&D and occasionally OD&D because they're cool. I can't fathom anyone finding enjoyment from 3e forward. And yeah, I've played 3e, 3.5e, 5e, too. I playtested the latter. But the awful awful corporate culture now, just shitting up the game? No way, Wouldn't touch it with a 10' pole.

Omega · November 12, 2022, 02:42:11 PM

Quote from: Adam Csipke on November 12, 2022, 03:41:48 AM
It is going to be fun to watch when the Critical Role-inspired fad fades away and most of the new players drift off to other hobbies and sales plummet, when Wizards go to Hasbro to explain why sales are tanked and describe how they're going to get market share back by appealing to old-school gamers...and an accountant from Hasbro looks at a spreadsheet and just cancels Wizards.

One can hope it will be 4e all over again where Hasbro finally snapped and out a rather tight leash on WOTC.
Problem is. WOTC has been co-opting an already highly compromised Hasbro so they may have enough foothold to start dragging everyone down with them.

Ocule · November 12, 2022, 03:34:45 PM

Quote from: Jaeger on November 10, 2022, 06:26:06 PM
Chris Perkins explains how WotC D&D will mainline Corporate Cancer into every product:
https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1375-leveling-up-our-creative-process-learnings-from

Quote
Leveling Up Our Creative Process: Learnings From Spelljammer
By Christopher Perkins

This blog is one of the ways in which the D&D Studio discusses topics of interest to those who play and enjoy D&D.
In this blog post, I'll talk about how we in the D&D Studio are changing our review process following the problematic content that appeared in Spelljammer: Adventures in Space.
Harmful Content
If we discover that something we created is harmful or hurtful to fans, we correct it. Then we identify how it happened and how to do better in the future.
The first printing of Spelljammer: Adventures in Space included two pieces of content that fans correctly flagged as offensive. The first is an illustration of a hadozee bard that resembles offensive minstrelsy materials and other racist depictions of Black people. The second is a paragraph about hadozees that reinforces harmful real-world stereotypes. Future reprints will omit both the illustration and the offensive text, neither of which had been reviewed by cultural experts.
Inclusion Reviews
In the weeks since fans flagged the offensive content in Spelljammer, we in the D&D Studio have been building and testing a new inclusion-review process. Inclusion reviews ensure our games are inclusive and welcoming for all players.
Previously, inclusion reviews were done at the discretion of the Product Lead, who identified which pieces of a product needed an outside inclusion review. The studio's new process mandates that every word, illustration, and map must be reviewed by multiple outside cultural consultants prior to publication.
While the D&D team is racially, ethnically, gender, and cognitively diverse, we don't want our marginalized employees to be burdened with the task of reviewing content for cultural competency. That's why we leverage the expertise of outside cultural consultants.
Inclusion reviews now happen several times during a product's development and at least once during each of the following phases:
Text Creation phase
Art Creation phase
Final Product Review phase
Text and art are reviewed separately until the Final Product Review phase, when cultural consultants review the edited text and final art side by side.
Implementation
Now let's peek at how the new inclusion-review process works.
Consultant Reports. After completing their reviews, the cultural consultants submit written reports that are shared with the studio's leadership team. The Product Lead then works with the Art Director and the Managing Editor to develop a plan that addresses the consultants' feedback.
Next Steps. The feedback and the proposed changes are compiled into a single document for review by the consultants and the studio's Executive Producer. Once the changes are approved, the plan is implemented. If the plan requires the creation of new content, that content receives its own inclusion review.
Reprints
The new inclusion-review process applies to not only products in development but also reprints. In other words, every reprint is an opportunity to conduct a new inclusion review on previously published content.
As I write this blog post, Spelljammer: Adventures in Space is about to be reprinted. Applying our new inclusion-review process to the Spelljammer reprint led us to make additional changes, which are captured in our official errata document and reflected on D&D Beyond.
Moving Forward
Just as D&D is a living game that grows and changes as we learn, so too will our inclusion-review process evolve and improve.
We are expanding our pool of cultural consultants so that we have the expertise needed to review the variety of material we publish. We will also continue to listen to D&D fans who call attention to offensive content. We will do our best to make this process as diligent, methodical, and universal as possible, better ensuring that our products bring joy rather than cause pain to our fans.[/size]

In short: WotC D&D will pay for a group of outside cultural consultants, and give them creative veto power on everything that they do.

The ride never ends...

My biggest worry with this is that they try to erase legacy books or edit them with their mental sickness

Almost_Useless · November 12, 2022, 04:16:37 PM

Quote from: Ocule on November 12, 2022, 03:34:45 PM
My biggest worry with this is that they try to erase legacy books or edit them with their mental sickness

Reviewing and editing would have to cost more than any new sales could make up for. It's much more likely they'll decide "we can't keep selling these in good conscience" and they'll memory hole them.

thedungeondelver · November 12, 2022, 05:14:34 PM

Quote from: Tasty_Wind on November 11, 2022, 08:09:55 AM
When was the last time WotC put out genuinely good content for D&D?

2014 with the 1e reprints, plus S1-4 and A1-4 compilations (not counting A0)

Venka · November 13, 2022, 02:32:57 AM

Quote from: tenbones on November 11, 2022, 06:51:38 AM
Why do any of you play this game?

Doesn't everyone play the editions they play because that's what their table wants to play?

Eirikrautha · November 13, 2022, 03:19:30 PM

While the D&D team is racially, ethnically, gender, and cognitively diverse,...

It's seldom that you loudly declare that your own employees are retarded. Bonus points for doing so in such a euphemistic manner, though...

Tyndale · November 13, 2022, 04:37:13 PM

Quote from: Eirikrautha on November 13, 2022, 03:19:30 PM
While the D&D team is racially, ethnically, gender, and cognitively diverse,...
It's seldom that you loudly declare that your own employees are retarded. Bonus points for doing so in such a euphemistic manner, though...

While it pains me to defend WOTC on this, the term "cognitive diversity" is not talking about intellectual ability, but is just another example of weird corporate-speak. They are, instead, talking about supporting groups of people to include individuals with different thinking "approaches" (my term) which avoids "group think" - essentially folks that can think outside of the box. And as one who administers IQ tests for a living, this is good thing.

Eirikrautha · November 13, 2022, 04:51:58 PM

Quote from: Tyndale on November 13, 2022, 04:37:13 PM
Quote from: Tyndale on November 13, 2022, 04:37:13 PM
While it pains me to defend WOTC on this, the term "cognitive diversity" is not talking about intellectual ability here, but is just another example of weird corporate-speak. They are, instead, talking about supporting groups of people to include individual with different thinking "approaches" (my term) which avoids "group think" - essentially folks that can think outside of the box. And as one who administers IQ tests for a living, this is good thing.

While it pains me to defend WOTC on this, the term "cognitive diversity" is not talking about intellectual ability, but is just another example of weird business- speak. They are, instead, talking about supporting groups of people to include individual with different thinking "approaches" (my term) which avoids "group think" - essentially folks that can think outside of the box. And as one who administers IQ tests for a living, this is good thing.

No, they aren't. They are talking about "neuro-atypical" and other special snowflake terms for the massively socially awkward, et al. Otherwise, it would not have been listed with race, sex, and ethnicity. Diversity has nothing to do with opinions or ideas for these people. They don't value them at all.

The Spaniard · November 13, 2022, 06:19:05 PM

Quote from: Jaeger on November 10, 2022, 06:26:06 PM
Chris Perkins explains how WotC D&D will mainline Corporate Cancer into every product:
https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1375-leveling-up-our-creative-process-learnings-from

Quote
Leveling Up Our Creative Process: Learnings From Spelljammer
By Christopher Perkins

This blog is one of the ways in which the D&D Studio discusses topics of interest to those who play and enjoy D&D.
In this blog post, I'll talk about how we in the D&D Studio are changing our review process following the problematic content that appeared in Spelljammer: Adventures in Space.
Harmful Content
If we discover that something we created is harmful or hurtful to fans, we correct it. Then we identify how it happened and how to do better in the future.
The first printing of Spelljammer: Adventures in Space included two pieces of content that fans correctly flagged as offensive. The first is an illustration of a hadozee bard that resembles offensive minstrelsy materials and other racist depictions of Black people. The second is a paragraph about hadozees that reinforces harmful real-world stereotypes. Future reprints will omit both the illustration and the offensive text, neither of which had been reviewed by cultural experts.
Inclusion Reviews
In the weeks since fans flagged the offensive content in Spelljammer, we in the D&D Studio have been building and testing a new inclusion-review process. Inclusion reviews ensure our games are inclusive and welcoming for all players.
Previously, inclusion reviews were done at the discretion of the Product Lead, who identified which pieces of a product needed an outside inclusion review. The studio's new process mandates that every word, illustration, and map must be reviewed by multiple outside cultural consultants prior to publication.
While the D&D team is racially, ethnically, gender, and cognitively diverse, we don't want our marginalized employees to be burdened with the task of reviewing content for cultural competency. That's why we leverage the expertise of outside cultural consultants.
Inclusion reviews now happen several times during a product's development and at least once during each of the following phases:
Text Creation phase
Art Creation phase
Final Product Review phase
Text and art are reviewed separately until the Final Product Review phase, when cultural consultants review the edited text and final art side by side.
Implementation
Now let's peek at how the new inclusion-review process works.
Consultant Reports. After completing their reviews, the cultural consultants submit written reports that are shared with the studio's leadership team. The Product Lead then works with the Art Director and the Managing Editor to develop a plan that addresses the consultants' feedback.
Next Steps. The feedback and the proposed changes are compiled into a single document for review by the consultants and the studio's Executive Producer. Once the changes are approved, the plan is implemented. If the plan requires the creation of new content, that content receives its own inclusion review.
Reprints
The new inclusion-review process applies to not only products in development but also reprints. In other words, every reprint is an opportunity to conduct a new inclusion review on previously published content.
As I write this blog post, Spelljammer: Adventures in Space is about to be reprinted. Applying our new inclusion-review process to the Spelljammer reprint led us to make additional changes, which are captured in our official errata document and reflected on D&D Beyond.
Moving Forward
Just as D&D is a living game that grows and changes as we learn, so too will our inclusion-review process evolve and improve.
We are expanding our pool of cultural consultants so that we have the expertise needed to review the variety of material we publish. We will also continue to listen to D&D fans who call attention to offensive content. We will do our best to make this process as diligent, methodical, and universal as possible, better ensuring that our products bring joy rather than cause pain to our fans.[/size]

In short: WotC D&D will pay for a group of outside cultural consultants, and give them creative veto power on everything that they do.

The ride never ends...

Talk about a grift... good grief. They never fail to disappoint.