Who Makes WotC's Adventures?

There are now three large hardcover adventures for D&D 5th Edition. There's the two-part Tyranny of Dragons campaign produced by Kobold Press; there's Princes of the Apocalypse, from Sasquatch Game Studios; and there's the imminent Out of the Abyss, from Green Ronin publishing. All of these are official, hardcover adventures produced for WotC by third party companies. But how does that actually work? What is the relationship between the company producing the products and the company publishing them? WotC's Jeremy Crawford told me yesterday that the term "outsourcing" is innacurate when it comes to describing this arrangement.

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If we go back a bit to when I asked Kobold Press' Wolfgang Baur about the process, he told me that "the 5E adventures are produced as a combination of studio work and WotC oversight." He went on to describe it in a little more detail, highlighting a to-and-fro between the companies -- "we'd do some portion of the work, then we would get feedback from WotC on Realmslore, or story beats, or mechanics. Then we did more of the design, and got feedback from swarms of playtesters. Then we turned over another version for feedback on the art and layout. And so forth. It was iterative..." So collaboration clearly takes place all the way through the process.

He describes Kobold Press role as "the heavy lifting in design, development, and editing" with WotC having "crucial input and set the direction for what they wanted".

Moving ahead to now, WotC Jeremy Crawford observes that "It's bizarre to see a few posters on ENWorld mistake our [D&D 5E] collaborations as outsourcing. Each book has been a team effort." The input from WotC isn't just greenlighting the book at various stages; as Jeremy tells us "Our reviews are deep. We create the story & the concept art. We write portions of the books. We design mechanics. Etc.!" As he also points out, the credits page of each book tells us who contributed to each.

So there we have it. These books aren't outsourced to third parties in any traditional sense of that word; the books are written as a collaborative effort with writing and more done by both companies.

 

[justinj3x3]

So how is the printer not an outside supplier? How is the janitor not an outside supplier? What products don't involve an outside supplier? Back office most often means administrative personnel by the way, which we know were not outsourced in this case as all the finance, accounting, legal, human resources, facilities, marketing, public relations, customer service, etc. are done in-house.

I gave you the definitions continue to debate semantics if you want. The books are outsourced no matter how you try to convolute things with other analogies.

 

[Mistwell]

The first part you are being silly. Using supplies is not outsourcing. You are reaching here.

What's funny is that's my point - of course it's not outsourcing. But why? It meets your definition. That means your definition must be flawed. Because using an outside company to produce your paper is in fact hiring an outside company to buy from them a component that goes into your end product.

Yes if they sent to a printer to print the printing itself was outsourced.

Right. But was "the product" outsourced then? When Crawford says WOTC wrote content for the product as well, was "the product" outsourced? At some point there has to be room for a joint venture. If the meaning of a joint venture cannot exist at the same time as the definition of outsourcing, then a different definition of outsourcing is best for this context - one which allows for a joint venture as a separate thing from an outsourced product.

in your definition of outsourcing, then the The production of the product was not unless you want to debate semantics. Which it seems you do.

Pretty sure that yes, this is a semantics debate. You say it's outsourcing, he says it's a joint venture (cooperative effort), and discussion is going to revolve around the meaning of those two terms (semantics). Not sure how to escape semantics in this kind of debate. Can you think of a way of avoiding it?

 

[Zaukrie]

Yes, in that case they have outsourced the printing. Exactly correct. I don't care who does what part, as long as good content is published. I am not sure why WOTC feels the need to defend their role. Explaining the process without being defensive would be a better communication method, imo.

 

[justinj3x3]

What's funny is that's my point - of course it's not outsourcing. But why? It meets your definition. That means your definition must be flawed. Because using an outside company to produce your paper is in fact hiring an outside company to buy from them a component that goes into your end product.



Right. But was "the product" outsourced then? When Crawford says WOTC wrote content for the product as well, was "the product" outsourced? At some point there has to be room for a joint venture. If the meaning of a joint venture cannot exist at the same time as the definition of outsourcing, then a different definition of outsourcing is best for this context - one which allows for a joint venture as a separate thing from an outsourced product.



Pretty sure that yes, this is a semantics debate. You say it's outsourcing, he says it's a joint venture (cooperative effort), and discussion is going to revolve around the meaning of those two terms (semantics). Not sure how to escape semantics in this kind of debate. Can you think of a way of avoiding it?

Sure by not continuing to debate it. I can agree to disagree.

 

[Barantor]

I think the big question is how much of the actual written word is done by the companies that they "outsource/contract/whatever" to?

Is 90% of the written work done by non-WOTC employees? How much criticism goes into what they write from WOTC?

If you can see a habit of less enjoyed adventures from a specific company that they have "outsourced/contracted/whatever" then it might be in folks best interest to pay attention to who makes what. If for example you like Sasquatch's work with WOTC and that work has more involvement from Sasquatch writing staff then you may be more apt to look for those products.

Is WOTC more like an editor or more like a publishing company? I think that is sort of what folks are looking for.

 

[delericho]

He might not call it outsourcing but it is. Every outsourced product always has feedback from the company that controls the IP. This is not a unique thing and is part of the process of outsourcing.

This.

And none of that's a bad thing: provided the product is good, why care whether parts of the production are outsourced? (And, as Mistwell notes, the actual printing of RPG products has been outsourced by virtually everyone since the very start of the hobby.)

 

[Mistwell]

I gave you the definitions continue to debate semantics if you want. The books are outsourced no matter how you try to convolute things with other analogies.

I don't know why you chastise me for engaging in a semantics debate - how is this not about semantics, how could any reply be made in this thread (on topic) that isn't involving semantics, given the subject matter IS semantics?

It's not an analogy. I am not comparing two a separate thing, I am talking about other components of this same product. They do in fact buy printing products and services for these books, those products and services are essential components of their books, and if those things also fit in your definition of outsourcing then I think a better definition of outsourcing is in order because it would mean all books are outsourced.

I think you are saying the writing portion is outsourced - but Crawford said WOTC writes some meaningful parts of the book as well, and there is a continual back and forth and contribution, on an ongoing basis, between the two companies concerning the writing. So it sure sounds like a joint venture rather than outsourcing.

 

[justinj3x3]

I don't know why you chastise me for engaging in a semantics debate - how is this not about semantics, how could any reply be made in this thread (on topic) that isn't involving semantics, given the subject matter IS semantics?

It's not an analogy. I am not comparing two a separate thing, I am talking about other components of this same product. They do in fact buy printing products and services for these books, those products and services are essential components of their books, and if those things also fit in your definition of outsourcing then I think a better definition of outsourcing is in order because it would mean all books are outsourced.

I think you are saying the writing portion is outsourced - but Crawford said WOTC writes some meaningful parts of the book as well, and there is a continual back and forth and contribution, on an ongoing basis, between the two companies concerning the writing. So it sure sounds like a joint venture rather than outsourcing.

I guess you missed the part where I said I'm not continuing to debate. I made my point. Some agree and others don't.

 

[Ashran]

Soon with that line of reasoning, (knowing exactly who wrote what, at what page ...)the credits will be longer then the actual books

 

[callinostros]

Yes, this is all mostly a matter of semantics. The underlying issue at hand is that currently WotC is suffering from the stigma of "not producing any new books of their own". Crawford is saying that they do...sort of. Crawford is trying to split hairs on the word outsourcing. Fundamentally that is what WotC is doing. He is trying to say that they aren't because of added material and oversight of the product. However, they are not really writing their own books, certainly not in the way WotC and TSR did in the old days where all the design work was done in house.

For some people "WotC designing their own books" means in-house writing and design, like the old days. For the new WotC D&D department it means "writing some but not the bulk of it". That divide is large for some people, and for those people what WotC is doing right now is definitely outsourcing, no matter how much WotC is trying to squash the idea that they are not designing their own books.

However, whether or not the books are outsourced or not, by and large the books have been done well (IMO).

Also, some people are irritated that WotC is trying to tell us what "outsourcing" means despite our own knowledge of its meaning.