WotC: We Are Not Making AI Dungeon Masters

Adding to the recent spate of YouTube-based claims about WotC's plans for Dungeons & Dragons were some additional claims -- (a) that D&D Beyond would have $30 subscription fee; (b) that homebrew content would not be permitted on lower tiers; and (c) that DDB was actively working on AI Dungeon Masters.

Some of this was based on a (long ago debunked) slide from a presentation last year.

WotC has made some clarifications:

Hey, everyone. We’ve seen misinformation popping up, and want to address it directly so we can dispel your concerns.

Rumors of a $30 subscription fee are false.

No one at Wizards is working on AI DMs. We love our human DMs too much. If you’re looking for a DM, we suggest heading to our Discord where DMs and parties are looking for players.

We have designers whose core job it is to compile, analyze, and then act upon your feedback. Your feedback has made the game better over the past decade, and your feedback is central to D&D’s future.

Homebrewing is core to D&D Beyond. It's not going away, and we're not going to charge you for it. Your homebrew is, and always will be, yours. We’ve always been excited to see your creations both on and off D&D Beyond!

There is still no clear statement regarding the Open Gaming License v1.0a, however.

 

[Charlaquin]

Manipulative language and banishing criticism to the gulag isn't 5D chess. It's Standard Corporate Abuse Tactics

SCATs

 

[Dausuul]

WotC intern: "ChatGPT, please write an AI DM app to be used in our D&D VTT."
Done!

The funny thing is, GPT-3 actually is quite handy for certain programming tasks. I use it a lot to tell me the syntax for some arcane and ill-documented procedure -- it may not get things exactly right, but it's often close enough that I can take it from there.

It's very nice for cases that are too esoteric for the usual combination of Google and Stack Overflow to turn up answers. Particularly since you can ask it follow-up questions and get responses immediately.

 

[The Stray]

SCATs

...
...
...That was intentional. Yup. Mmhmm.

 

[Umbran]

Wow, Jeremy Crawford is posting about the survey thing. Yet he's been silent on the OGL for weeks.

You say that as if you expect he's been allowed to do so.

 

[The Stray]

You say that as if you expect he's been allowed to do so.

Eh. I kinda expected him to be the sacrificial lamb they turned Kyle into, TBH.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Wizards did?

Yeah on Beyond. This morning were they are going to post a survey and document on Friday.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Eh. I kinda expected him to be the sacrificial lamb they turned Kyle into, TBH.

I don't think Kyle is a sacrifice.

 

[mamba]

In all fairness, I really don't think WotC cares about 3PP and the OSR movement. It is chump change. I really think this is about their business plan for a WoW-ification of D&D (VTTs, microtransactions, online only play, etc.). They want a virtual only D&D (no printing, no owning of books, no face-to-face paper and pencil play). They just don't know exactly how to wall off 1D&D from the rest of the OGL......

and I do not see why that is even needed

 

[Umbran]

Eh. I kinda expected him to be the sacrificial lamb they turned Kyle into, TBH.

You (hopefully) don't sacrifice principle designers in the middle of a redesign project.

 

[mamba]

they also probably want to be sure they get their cut if Disney makes "The Owlbears!" animated movie...

so Disney makes them the Hawkbears instead