WotC Shannon Appelcline the layoffs and the OGL fiasco.

[darjr]

Shannon Appelcline relates the OGL fiasco to the yearly lay offs, as I. The loss of institutional knowledge from years past meant not enough authoritative voices could tell WotC it was a bad idea.

Is the OGL Era Over? (Part Four) – Designers & Dragons

The D&D historian points out WotC was afraid if competitors even though D&D lost the lead only in 1997 and 2013. He also suggests that the bad news may not be over.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I don't buy the thesis.

Look, the most important thing in the article is this- WoTC's finances have been really good this year. The layoffs are surprising, in that they affected WoTC more than most people thought they would (it's the toys that are killing Hasbro, not WoTC), but tying this in to the OGL issue doesn't make a lot of sense.

I think that Shannon does touch on the issue, albeit in passing. WoTC is still the 800 pound gorilla. It will always be able to attract young new people willing to do the work. And it still pays really well in relation to the industry. If you look through the roster of luminaries that have been cut loose previously, you'll see the same pattern repeat over and over again- great people (designers, artists, etc.) break it big at WoTC, then get cut loose, and then do other things.

What they have done isn't good, or nice. They are laying off people before Christmas. These are real people. People that have children. People that have mortgages to pay. People that have put their hearts and souls into their work. But it is what Hasbro (and other corporations) will often do. They are shedding some of the higher costs, knowing that there are always lower costs in the pipeline. A lifetime ago, I worked at a very successful company that was known for this- they were a great company because they took people straight out of college, worked them hard, gave them skills, and then ... well, at that point you had the resume to move on to something else. But if you didn't, you shouldn't expect to stay, because the company wasn't going to keep you at a higher salary.

Also, the OGL debacle wasn't a loss of institutional memory. We had the exact same thing happen in 4e as well. It's just the usual internal bickering over IP. Corporations gonna monetize. It's like asking a shark to stop swimming. Thankfully, they reversed course. But we know from further reporting that this was an internal battle at the company, and that people there did raise their objections.

 

[Velderan]

It sounds like from what Chris Cocks said in his memo that there would be more layoffs in the next 6 months as they assess what the company needs done to fix things. I wouldn't be overly surprised if there are unfortunately more cuts from the D&D team as the 2024 books are closer to completion.

Worth mentioning Mark Seifter mentioned Washington state has a law that prevents companies from laying off employees and then immediately bringing them back as freelancers. I guess companies like Microsoft are pretty bad about that sorta thing, so they couldn't let a designer they need to finish the books go and then give them a freelance gig to finish what they were working on.

 

[Maxperson]

This layoff sucks, but it isn't anywhere near the caliber of screw-up as the OGL debacle. It's a grape to the OGL grapefruit.

 

[payn]

I don't buy the thesis.

Look, the most important thing in the article is this- WoTC's finances have been really good this year. The layoffs are surprising, in that they affected WoTC more than most people thought they would (it's the toys that are killing Hasbro, not WoTC), but tying this in to the OGL issue doesn't make a lot of sense.

I think that Shannon does touch on the issue, albeit in passing. WoTC is still the 800 pound gorilla. It will always be able to attract young new people willing to do the work. And it still pays really well in relation to the industry. If you look through the roster of luminaries that have been cut loose previously, you'll see the same pattern repeat over and over again- great people (designers, artists, etc.) break it big at WoTC, then get cut loose, and then do other things.

What they have done isn't good, or nice. They are laying off people before Christmas. These are real people. People that have children. People that have mortgages to pay. People that have put their hearts and souls into their work. But it is what Hasbro (and other corporations) will often do. They are shedding some of the higher costs, knowing that there are always lower costs in the pipeline. A lifetime ago, I worked at a very successful company that was known for this- they were a great company because they took people straight out of college, worked them hard, gave them skills, and then ... well, at that point you had the resume to move on to something else. But if you didn't, you shouldn't expect to stay, because the company wasn't going to keep you at a higher salary.

Also, the OGL debacle wasn't a loss of institutional memory. We had the exact same thing happen in 4e as well. It's just the usual internal bickering over IP. Corporations gonna monetize. It's like asking a shark to stop swimming. Thankfully, they reversed course. But we know from further reporting that this was an internal battle at the company, and that people there did raise their objections.

Right, I think a lot of folks are missing the forrest for the trees here. Nothing the WOTC folks did is likely the result of the layoffs. Corps. love to build a culture around the entire team. That means centralizing the operational mission and idea of every team. By spreading out the layoffs this is a Hasbro team problem and not a toys problem. Everybody is feeling the pinch as they reorganize around a new strategy.

 

[darjr]

No snarf, he says the prior layoffs were the loss of institutional knowledge and the prior bleeding other than layoffs.

That loss was an erosion to the brakes that could have stopped the OGL fiasco as an idea.

 

[billd91]

I'm a bit skeptical about the issue of layoffs leading to the lack of institutional knowledge that allowed WotC to pull such a big boner as threatening the OGL. From the rumblings at the time, it seems that people with that institutional knowledge were arguing against the tactic... but weren't listened to. And while that may mean the lever-pullers lacked that institutional knowledge, the main issue is that they didn't listen to the institutional knowledge holders they had. And if you don't value that input or see yourself as a disrupter as a manager, it doesn't matter how much institutional knowledge you have as an organization.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

No snarf, he says the prior layoffs were the loss of institutional knowledge and the prior bleeding other than layoffs.

That loss was an erosion to the brakes that could have stopped the OGL fiasco as an idea.

Yeah, I read it. I don't buy it. At all.

The OGL was created before Hasbro. The train was already out of the station. After the OGL, Hasbro's first two moves were to introduce 3.5e very quickly, and then to move to 4e without an OGL. In other words, when Hasbro started paying attention, they tried to ditch the OGL within the first seven years.

5e came around, but it was considered a "last gasp" with a skeleton crew. It's not like Hasbro was paying that much attention.

When Hasbro started paying attention again, they stated cooking up a way to get rid of the OGL, again. This wasn't from a lack of institutional knowledge, at all. Like I said, I don't buy the thesis. There were people in WoTC that knew that people would react badly- but Hasbro wanted to monetize it further. They decided that the blowback would be worth it. They decided wrong.

TLDR; every time Hasbro has turned Sauron's eye to D&D, they have tried to monetize it and get rid of the OGL. The thesis is not a good one. Because it doesn't pay any attention to what actually happened.

 

[DarkCrisis]

It's NOT just the layoffs. It's just another turd in the Hasbro turd sandwich that they can't seem to stop pinching out. Bad PR is just par for the course for them at this point.

 

[Sacrosanct]

. If you look through the roster of luminaries that have been cut loose previously, you'll see the same pattern repeat over and over again- great people (designers, artists, etc.) break it big at WoTC, then get cut loose, and then do other things.

I'm friends with a lot of people who worked for WotC and were let go. For the overwhelming number of them, "other things" means getting a job outside the industry like the rest of us, while working on rpg stuff as a hobby or secondary income (like me and many others who never worked for WotC or "made it big"). Only a rare few have been able to make a decent living doing solely rpg stuff after leaving WotC.