WotC Ray Winninger Is Head of D&D RPG Team; Mike Mearls No Longer Works on RPG

People have been wondering where Mike Mearls has gone for quite some time. It seems that he has not been working on the D&D tabletop RPG since some time last year, and the new head of the team and Executive Producer is Ray Winninger. Winninger is an RPG industry veteran. Amongst other things, he was co-designer of DC Heroes and Torg, and wrote the Dungeoncraft column for Dragon Magazine. He...

People have been wondering where Mike Mearls has gone for quite some time. It seems that he has not been working on the D&D tabletop RPG since some time last year, and the new head of the team and Executive Producer is Ray Winninger.

Winninger is an RPG industry veteran. Amongst other things, he was co-designer of DC Heroes and Torg, and wrote the Dungeoncraft column for Dragon Magazine. He has worked at a number of RPG companies including TSR, Mayfair Games, West End Games, and more.

Ray_Winninger_at_MIX08_2_crop.jpg



Winninger is Chris Perkins' and Jeremy Crawford's boss. And in further comments, Chris Perkins says that Mike Mearls has not been part of the tabletop RPG team since some time last year.


That explains why Mearls' Twitch shows, like Happy Fun Hour, have disappeared. Although he's made a couple of retweets since, his last tweet on Twitter was February 13th, 2019. He still works at WotC on the D&D brand in some capacity, but not the tabletop RPG itself (he did an interview about Baldur's Gate 3 on Polygon last year).

Ray Winninger introduces himself in the latest issue of Dragon+, WotC's online magazine. "My name is Ray Winninger and I’m the new Executive Producer in charge of the Dungeons & Dragons studio at Wizards of the Coast. In just a few months on the job, I’ve already been impressed by the skills and the passion of the designers, artists, editors, and production staff who bring you our terrific D&D products. They are a uniquely talented group, and it is an honor to work alongside them."
 

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and when he got Bill's job, as far as I am concerned, he did turn things around since he moved to get the process of 5e out the door

This just seems like a seriously odd reading of the facts, and really misleading to me (even if it's unintentional). He was part of 4E for a long time (arguably from 3E), got put in charge of it in 2009, kept it going, for what, three or more years before getting started on the road to 5E.

Plus frankly Iron Heroes reads like the inspiration for Tome of Battle and thus 4E in a lot of ways.
 

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BenTheFerg

Explorer
This just seems like a seriously odd reading of the facts, and really misleading to me (even if it's unintentional). He was part of 4E for a long time (arguably from 3E), got put in charge of it in 2009, kept it going, for what, three or more years before getting started on the road to 5E.

Plus frankly Iron Heroes reads like the inspiration for Tome of Battle and thus 4E in a lot of ways.

My gang tried - and hated 4e - when it came out in 2008. Gave it a year then switched to Pathfinder for fantasy fare - along with WFRP - as well as other games (CoC, Deadlands etc). I was only a distant observer as to what was happening at the time. Reading between the lines, I thought then/ now that he/ WotC tried rebooting 4e with Essentials (2010?) but at the same time, he was laying the foundations for what was called D&DNext around the same time, which eventually was playtested from.... checking online - 2012, a year after Bill Slavicsek left.

I am not privy to what was going on at WotC - but I am really glad 5e was created - and it was Mearls' baby as far as I can tell - after managing a very extensive public feedback exercise with D&D fans, which was highly commended.
 

teitan

Legend
I stand corrected! 👍🏻🤪 memory failure.

He was not the lead designer though. 4e was Bill Slavicsek's baby. Under him were Rob Heinsoo, Andy Collins and James Wyatt. Then Mearls was in the team working with/ making happen their ideas from what I understood. Then Mearls got Bill's job about 2010? And got to turning things around since he was now in charge.

It was Bill’s baby but reread my screen shot. He was an integral part of the team. Credited as such. It also shows he was promoted in 09 when Heinsoo was laid off, not when Bill left. Bill left in 2011 to work in Video Games, Elder Scrolls Online actually. He was in charge for the majority of 4e’s run and I recall when 5e was announced there was a vocal minority moaning and groaning how it would fail with Mearls in charge and especially after the quick departure of Monte Cook from the team.
 

He was in charge for the majority of 4e’s run and I recall when 5e was announced there was a vocal minority moaning and groaning how it would fail with Mearls in charge and especially after the quick departure of Monte Cook from the team.

Yeah I remember this. People who were NOT fans of 4E were quite sure 5E would be total fail with Mearls in charge, because he'd been in charge most of 4E's run.
 

Whizbang Dustyboots

Gnometown Hero
Yes, there was a very recent example of this where someone was basically having a minor tantrum (replete with swearing and crying) in their Twitter because their TV show DIDN'T (I repeat didn't) get cancelled, and they'd been kind of hoping it would be so they could do a different show.

And they put that on Twitter. Like unasked. It wasn't really a response to anything it apart from the general news that the show was renewed for another season.
Yeah, Constance Wu lost her freaking mind when someone congratulated her on the renewal of "Fresh Off the Boat," not realizing she was more interested in doing more movies like "Crazy Rich Asians" and "Hustlers." I don't know that it's hurt her career, but it's hard to imagine that it didn't.

But why in god's name would you GET ON TWITTER, open that account up, and start freaking out because your show DIDN'T get cancelled. This is what they mean by "overly online" and stuff. How to do people still not realize Twitter is like putting something up on a billboard?
My guess is that they mostly hear from fans, who tend to treat everything they say as brilliant, and that diminishes their ability to self-censor.

Luckily for me, I don't have those kinds of fans. :p
 
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Whizbang Dustyboots

Gnometown Hero
I think James Gunn is doing just fine
I guarantee you he had a few sleepless nights in there after "edgy" humor from a few years back ended up being a problem later on. The fact that it was dredged up by people with a political axe to grind doesn't negate the fact that it was still there to find.

The weekend before my job interview for my current job, I spent several hours combing my Twitter timeline with various tools just to see if anything had been posted that I wouldn't post today. I went a little overboard, zapping tweets with profanity, even if they weren't really problematic. Better safe than sorry.

And I don't have a manager or the financial wherewithal to hire a social media team to do that for me, unlike Hart and Gunn.
 

Von Ether

Legend
That was all .... super quiet. They definitely wanted to make sure the team was jelling before announcing it. D&D may be small potatoes to Hasbro, but with all this fuss, it's making start to make me believe that maybe someone in this industry is earning six-figures.

At this point, I'm guessing the ratio of self-sustaining designers is equal to the ratio of writers with day jobs vs fiction authors who can live on their output alone -- except a lot more of those successful designers probably also have their own publishing house to ensure their success.
 

Charlaquin

Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Personally, I think it was a combination of the Zac S controversy happening and Mearls' response to it, and then the way that Dice, Camera, Action imploded like two months later. Something had to give there; there was no way corporate wasn't going to make some management changes after all that.
DCA was Chris Perkins, not Mike Mearls. I don’t think Mearls had anything to do with DCA. They’ve also started a new show with the same cast minus Holly and Jared and a couple new folks.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the Zack S stuff had something to do with Mearls changing positions, but I very much doubt it was WotC forcing a move. More likely, in my opinion, Mearls got tired of all the public scrutiny and decided to start looking for opportunities to make a lateral move within the company away from the public eye.
 

BenTheFerg

Explorer
Yeah I remember this. People who were NOT fans of 4E were quite sure 5E would be total fail with Mearls in charge, because he'd been in charge most of 4E's run.
Yet 5e has been incredibly successful. Mearls was not having to rework/ make work Bill's baby - but could start afresh.
 

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