D&D 5E Kate Welch on Leaving WotC

Kate Welch left Wizards of the Coast a few days ago, on August 16th. Soon after, she talked a little about it in a live-stream.

She started work at WotC as a game designer back in February 2018, and has contributed to various products since then, such as Ghosts of Saltmarsh and Descent into Avernus, as well as being a participant in WotC's livestreams. In December 2019, her job changed to that of 'senior user experience designer'.

"I mentioned yesterday that I have some big news that I wouldn't be able to share until today.

The big news that I have to share with you today is that I ... this is difficult, but ... I quit my job at Wizards of the Coast. I no longer work at Wizards. Today was my last day. I haven't said it out loud yet so it's pretty major. I know... it's a big change. It's been scary, I have been there for almost three years, not that long, you know, as far as jobs go, and for a while there I really was having a good time. It's just not... it wasn't the right fit for me any more.

So, yeah, I don't really know what's next. I got no big plans. It's a big deal, big deal .... and I wanted to talk to you all about it because you're, as I've mentioned before, a source of great joy for me. One of the things that has been tough reckoning with this is that I've defined myself by Dungeons & Dragons for so long and I really wanted to be a part of continuing to make D&D successful and to grow it, to have some focus especially on new user experience, I think that the new user experience for Dungeons & Dragons is piss poor, and I've said that while employed and also after quitting.

But I've always wanted to be a part of getting D&D into the hands of more people and helping them understand what a life-changing game it is, and I hope I still get the chance to do that. But as of today I'm unemployed, and I also wanted to be upfront about it because I have this great fear that because Dungeons & Dragons has been part of my identity, professionally for the last three years almost, I was worried that a lot of you'll would not want to follow me any more because I'm not at Wizards, and there's definitely some glamourous aspects to being at Wizards."

She went on to talk about the future, and her hopes that she'll still be be able to work with WotC.

"I'm excited about continuing to play D&D, and hopefully Wizards will still want me to appear on their shows and stuff, we'll see, I have no idea. But one thing that I'm really excited about is that now I can play other TTRPGs. There's a policy that when you're a Wizards employee you can't stream other tabletop games. So there was a Call of Cthulhu game that we did with the C-team but we had to get very special permission for it, they were like OK but this is only a one time thing. I get it, you know, it's endorsing the competition or whatever, but I'm super excited to be able to have more freedom about the kinds of stuff that I'm getting involved with."

 

[reelo]

Every race, class, feat, spell, background, and skill in the PHB is a non-standard option until the DM says it isn't.

Word.

 

[Marandahir]

Every race, class, feat, spell, background, and skill in the PHB is a non-standard option until the DM says it isn't.

Why? Because it's the DM's responsibility to make the game great. If the DM stops liking a campaign because of the inclusion of a race, class, feat, spell, background, or skill he or she dislikes, the game grinds to a halt. Players can come and go at will*, but without the GM, the game doesn't exist.

*Perhaps to find another DM whose desires better match an individual player's.

That goes without saying.

HOWEVER. Player's Handbook carries with it a different weight than any other book. In a D&D Edition where DM-May-I takes priority over Player-Free-For-All, this is the one book that is reliably targetted toward players. This is the one book that Players are assumed to buy, while the DM buys all the other books for the group (assuming you're playing with physical copies - everyone wants a PHB).

There's a reason the AL book restriction rule (and most popular home table restriction rule) is PHB+1. Abandoning Dragonborn & Tiefling to the DMG would mean no Tiefling Masterminds, no Dragonborn Purple Dragon Knights, no Tiefling College of Whispers no Dragonborn Oath of Conquest, etc etc.

Calling for the jettisoning Dragonborn and Tiefling to a DM-locked book, which you're not even supposed to be looking at unless the DM opens the page to show you, is practically the definition of "badwrongfun." Please don't defend it.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

Calling for the jettisoning Dragonborn and Tiefling to a DM-locked book, which you're not even supposed to be looking at unless the DM opens the page to show you, is practically the definition of "badwrongfun." Please don't defend it.

As long as nobody forces me to use them, I'm fine if WotC publishes the teletubbies as a race in the 6e PHB.

 

[R_Chance]

I'd say drop all the races (insert different name here) in the PHB. Information about the races role in the game, relations to other races, cultural / environmental niche and details like that might be a good fit for the DMG. I tend to view the setting as the dominant factor in what races are available for PCs.

I see the PHB like it's the menu for every restaurant in town combined. Then you check with the DM / chef at your game / restaurant and he'll tell you what's on the menu. And maybe add some others to it. If you don't like the selection you might inquire about your pick and see. Or find a game / restaurant that takes in your pick.

I like having all the races catalogued personally. Even if, as a DM, you don't have that one in your game you can cherry pick it for ideas.

Now having beaten that restaurant comparison into the ground I'm hungry

 

[MockingBird]

I use to have a distaste for DragonBorn and Tieflings. I too thought it ridiculous to have dragon people and devil people walking around. Ive opened up to them more over the years though. They are still a rare sight to see in the small towns and villages. Bigger cities the ratio goes up but its still not very common.

Getting younger people into the game I have learned to relax the list of no gos. I find younger males in particular gravitate to the DragonBorn more. As long as they have fun i don't really care and they take the fact they're rare and run with it in very interesting ways.

 

[Marandahir]

As long as nobody forces me to use them, I'm fine if WotC publishes the teletubbies as a race in the 6e PHB.

Good.

Just as you said - everything is up to DM fiat. Nobody's forcing you to use them, and if the DM says it has to be an all Dragonborn party, then you're probably at the wrong table and you can find a different table to play with (or start a mutiny ARRRG!)

 

[MNblockhead]

It's possible to play a roachperson in my game (coprophagi). Lost Lands is not just a kitchen sink campaign world, its an under-the-kitchen-sink setting.

Besides, it fills the necessary niche of having a player-character race that you can tell to "wipe that s**t-eating grin off your face" non-metaphorically.

 

[Haffrung]

The epic adventure paths are an absolute nightmare to run if you are new. The stories are way too complex to prepare ahead and too long to play in your spare time.
What really helped were the flowcharts in the newer books and still it is not enough.
I wished, that every chapter would begin with an extra chart that tells the DM which informations are crucial to hand over to the players so that you don't have to read 200 pages in advance.

The frustrating thing is other RPG publishers have demonstrated innovative and user-friendly ways to present adventures. Smart formatting, straightforward structure, call-outs, flowcharts, graphics, all essential information laid out clearly for use at the table. But WotC adventures are presented with walls and walls of text and larded with pages and pages of background and baroque politics. It's like it's 1998 forever. When third-party aids for running the campaign come out within weeks of every published adventure path, it's clear that WotC is consistently missing the mark.

Heck, you don't even need modern published adventures for examples of presentation WotC would do well to imitate. Nothing they've published for 5E comes close to Red Hand of Doom for concision, clarity, and ease of use for DMs.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

Heck, you don't even need modern published adventures for examples of presentation WotC would do well to imitate. Nothing they've published for 5E comes close to Red Hand of Doom for concision, clarity, and ease of use for DMs.

If anything, it's odd that they did not experiment a little bit more with the way adventures are written, presented and formatted.

 

[Griffon Lore Games]

Did someone say RED HAND OF DOOM?

Man, that was a great module by Baker and Jacobs, and the included design comments are gold. It was a large adventure, and it was modular. You can stuff it anywhere. 10/10 will DOOM again.