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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Eltab

Lord of the Hidden Layer
(I don't believe anyone wasn't surprised to see a freaking nothic in that adventure.)
I was not surprised to see the nothic. Because our group never got a good look at it. It zapped us from the shadows under the bridge. I moved Dancing Lights behind it to get a silhouette, everybody else took a shot at it until it fell down dead. I was on top of the bridge (planning to dramatically jump down) and did not have line-of-sight. The DM only told us what it was after the session was over.
 

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J-H

Hero
I was not surprised to see the nothic. Because our group never got a good look at it. It zapped us from the shadows under the bridge. I moved Dancing Lights behind it to get a silhouette, everybody else took a shot at it until it fell down dead. I was on top of the bridge (planning to dramatically jump down) and did not have line-of-sight. The DM only told us what it was after the session was over.
Does anyone else change the nothic's damage from necrotic to psychic? Necrotic just doesn't seem to fit to me.
 

I saw that Twitter feed and I don't think anyone in that feed made an accusation about Mearls sharing their emails to Zak. I saw a lot of random people making that assumption about what happened, not that it happened to them. If I missed something I'd like to see it. Though, I'd like to see their evidence that happened as opposed to just their accusation.

The best I could see in the Twitter thread is from Jacob "Gnome" Randolph accusing Mearls of doing that with the emails of one of his co-authors. I've spent enough time going back down the rabbit hole again, so I'm not going to spend any more time looking. Ultimately who you choose to believe is up to you. Based on what I remember reading last time and this time I know who I believe in this. If you need more concrete evidence you can find it yourself, although I'm not sure you're going to find hard evidence on something like this posted online.
 

Except, while all of that has been repeatedly bandied about, nobody has ever, to the best of my knowledge, provided even one scrap of actual evidence that it happened like that. There's lots of speculation, but every time this comes up and someone asks for evidence, the same not-evidence keeps being produced.



I didn't dig too far into that mess, but I couldn't find those replies. Can/would you link them directly? I am a fan of Mearls and am happy to defend him in this matter, but if I'm wrong, I'd like to see the evidence.
 


As someone who also enjoyed his work, this is spot on. He went way out of his depth, and did not interact with the public responsibly. Hence, no more interaction with the public...
Yeah, in regards to Mearls design work, I'm a fan too. I also felt like this wasn't a situation he was trying to cover up. I think he was trying to find out the truth of what had occurred, but the way he handled this situation from start to finish was terrible. The non-apology at the end of it sounded like something the WotC legal department put together for him on his behalf.
 


Kitsune

Explorer
One of the people who was privy to the correspondence between Mearls and Smith (and has no love for either, so no real incentive to lie for them) has said the claims of leaked names are false. Not that I'm sad to see the pair gone anyways, Mearls ensured that I'd not buy any D&D products with his "not wanting bad rules means you hate women" message, and even if Smith is pure as the driven snow in the accusations against him, he's still an epic douche.
 

Lanefan

Victoria Rules
'>>> click <<<

I was watching a "classic" NHL hockey game on TV last night and one of the players was named Zack Smith - and I just couldn't remember why that name sounded familiar or where I'd heard it before.

Now I know...for better or worse...
 

Parmandur

Book-Friend
One of the people who was privy to the correspondence between Mearls and Smith (and has no love for either, so no real incentive to lie for them) has said the claims of leaked names are false. Not that I'm sad to see the pair gone anyways, Mearls ensured that I'd not buy any D&D products with his "not wanting bad rules means you hate women" message, and even if Smith is pure as the driven snow in the accusations against him, he's still an epic douche.

Yeeeeaaaah, I'm not inclined to trust that source...or much of anybody involved in the situation.

The point isn't exactly how bad the situation is, bit that Mearls waded into inappropriate territory in a free-wheeling public manner. He ought not to have engaged, and really for him the consequences are pretty light.
 

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