trancejeremy
Adventurer
Personally, I think it's a bad sign not so much for his design skills, but what he represents - a link to both 3e and 2e.
AFAIK, this basically leaves the team that designed 4e, which frankly, is not going to win back any people who were alienated by 4e.
There are a whole bunch of 2e guys still around (Zeb Cook, Jeff Grubb), and many 1e/BD&D guys that could have been brought in to consult. Roger E. Moore would have been my pick, or Frank Mentzer (whose version of D&D is perhaps the best selling ever, at least I think the Aceceum says that).
I mean, they want to make a version of D&D that appeals to everyone that loved D&D in the past, but all the designers seem to be from the WOTC as a division of Hasbro era. Big corporation people, not little small company aimed at a hobby.
AFAIK, this basically leaves the team that designed 4e, which frankly, is not going to win back any people who were alienated by 4e.
There are a whole bunch of 2e guys still around (Zeb Cook, Jeff Grubb), and many 1e/BD&D guys that could have been brought in to consult. Roger E. Moore would have been my pick, or Frank Mentzer (whose version of D&D is perhaps the best selling ever, at least I think the Aceceum says that).
I mean, they want to make a version of D&D that appeals to everyone that loved D&D in the past, but all the designers seem to be from the WOTC as a division of Hasbro era. Big corporation people, not little small company aimed at a hobby.
