WotC Hasbro CEO optimistic about AI in D&D and MTG’s future

[Cadence]

There's a difference between writing/visual artistry and bookkeeping/accounting, though. They're completely different skill sets. I don't want to be seen as looking down on bookkeeping and accounting, because those are important things, but you need to be able to develop styles and techniques in creative fields that you don't need to develop in a mathematical field (and IIRC, creative accounting is generally not a good thing). While you can learn to write or draw through study the same way you can learn to do the math needed for accounting, you can't learn to develop a style through study. Unless you're just copying someone else.

This is true even in writing and creating art for gaming products. If generative AI becomes "good enough" to fully replace artists and writers, then what it's going to produce is either going to be incredibly bland or a copy of someone else's work. I don't know about you, but I don't want to pay for something bland or that's just a copy.

I don't mind if people use AI to create something they can use as a model or prompt--that's no different than grabbing a picture off google and using that as a guide, or being inspired by a piece of writing. But the final piece needs a personal touch in a way that mathematical fields don't.

Having watched people who supposedly have quantitative/statistical/mathematical training demonstrate the huge gaping holes in their intuition and big picture understanding... Or looking at the way people try and explain the outcome of an analysis or do data visualization... I don't think I'd be as dismissive about the mathematical side of things or be so firm that they are totally different from the arts in some ways.

It also feels like a lot of what is published, seen at art shows, in the cinema, on the radio, etc... doesn't rise.that far above bland or a copy. Even by folks who have turned out a masterpiece or two. (Is the one hit wonder a thing?).

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I have zero interest in stepping into the global warming debate, but this is just false even as an exaggeration.

I've heard it directly from folks at CalFire, who tend to be politically conservative but also the first line when dealing with wildfires.

Our wet winter is likely going to lead to a summer full of very dry scrub, ripe for wildfires.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yeah I was lamenting our pathetic winter this year. I am pretty sure once my current problem is resolved the wife and I are moving to a place where the Canadian Winter is still a force.

We're looking at a possible move for a job in the next two years, and in every case, we have to look at what the weather is like now and what all the projections say 10-15 years out. It's pretty sobering.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah, but the way diversity is presented is what's important. Actions, not words after all. I want to be able to open an RPG and see people who don't look like me get presented in a positive light.

Which is a great goal, one I imagine everyone wants. I certainly want that too. I just don't think everyone needs to be actively pushing for it, and (more importantly) that people who don't are bad folks. Our polarizing society really seems to force a "them or us" narrative on just about everything.

I care far more about how the content I receive and pay for will work in my game than how its presentation affects the world at large. That is, after all, what the product was made for. Same with any creative media. The most important thing to me for a story is that it's a good story, and it is my opinion that creative works that focus first on creative quality and then look to message are more successful, more entertaining (they are intended as entertainment), and ultimately will be more likely to spread whatever message they're trying to convey more successfully.

 

[Thomas Shey]

But also, the power use and carbon footprint associated with even hobbyist uses of gen AI are very bad news, and ultimately maybe not worth the boring visuals and language these models can produce.

This I think is a valid argument, but I'll note it makes some assumptions that I'm not sure is a given in at least one of the two cases you're discussing--which doesn't mean your point isn't valid, but inserting "boring" in that statement doesn't really help your case.

 

[Cadence]

Which is a great goal, one I imagine everyone wants. I certainly want that too. I just don't think everyone needs to be actively pushing for it, and (more importantly) that people who don't are bad folks. Our polarizing society really seems to force a "them or us" narrative on just about everything.

I care far more about how the content I receive and pay for will work in my game than how its presentation affects the world at large. That is, after all, what the product was made for. Same with any creative media. The most important thing to me for a story is that it's a good story, and it is my opinion that creative works that focus first on creative quality and then look to message are more successful, more entertaining (they are intended as entertainment), and ultimately will be more likely to spread whatever message they're trying to convey more successfully.

If someone was confronted with a single piece of art and wanted to focus on it as a piece of art devoid of greater societal impact or placement sure... When it results in someone being fine that there is little or know representation across an entire type of media then it seems different to me.

It feels like wanting either only the former or none of the former is the slippery slope path to crappiness (in at least one of art and/or society).

[In magical Christmas land I would reserve the right to edit these remarks if they didn't come out sounding like they intended.]

 

[cbwjm]

We're looking at a possible move for a job in the next two years, and in every case, we have to look at what the weather is like now and what all the projections say 10-15 years out. It's pretty sobering.

Had to shift house recently here in Auckland, NZ, every time I looked at a place I had to check if it was in a flood zone so that I know I won't get messed up by another "once in a lifetime" storm.

 

[Yaarel]

With regard to rising sea levels, the latest sober science (2023) establishes that the global sea level is rising about 1 inch every 8 years.

This is from NOAA (US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration). NOAA is responsible for the lives of millions of people, in the context of hurricanes and so on. It must neither underestimate the risk to life, nor indulge exaggerations that disrupt the livelihood of millions.

This amount of rising sea level is concerning because of regional complications, such as lack of drainage whence storm floods.

However, 1 inch per 8 years is a far cry from the very many alarmist predictions about rising sea levels made in previous years that have now been demonstrated to be false.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If someone was confronted with a single piece of art and wanted to focus on it as a piece of art devoid of greater societal impact or placement sure... When it results in someone being fine that there is little or know representation across an entire type of media then it seems different to me.

It feels like wanting either only the former or none of the former is the slippery slope path to crappiness (in at least one of art and/or society).

[In magical Christmas land I would reserve the right to edit these remarks if they didn't come out sounding like they intended.]

My question is: is it currently socially acceptable not to actively press for it? Can you appreciate creative work that is not explicitly diverse without having to lament said lack of diversity in your public opinions or risk being labeled negatively for not doing so? To look at it from the other direction, does every creative work have to be multicultural and/cosmopolitan?

 

[Cadence]

My question is: is it currently socially acceptable not to actively press for it? Can you appreciate creative work that is not explicitly diverse without having to lament said lack of diversity in your public opinions or risk being labeled negatively for not doing so? To look at it from the other direction, does every creative work have to be multicultural and/cosmopolitan?

Feels to me like - No, not every one does. No, it is not ok if few or none do.

I can certainly see folks reading things into the motivations of someone who always uses the former to disclaim concern about the later.