D&D 5E D&D Creator Summit--'D&D Beyond And Beyond'

This presentation is by Dan Rawson and Marjory Laymon, moderated by Sara Chaffee.

I see a live view of what I assume is WotC's offices (the caption says 'Game Room'). Muffled voices talking as people wander around.

• Dan Rawson talks about his start in D&D. Introduces the team present: Dan Rawson (SVP of D&D), Marjorie Laymon (VP D&D Beyond), Pat Backmann (Sr. Product Manager), Jared Wasdin (Product Manager), Elliot Spilk (Associate Product Manager), Sarah Chaffee (Community Manager).
• What is D&D Beyond? The official gateway to D&D for content, news, offerings. The WotC D&D site is being deprecated and DDB is taking over.
• As the official home for D&D, DDB wants to be expansive. Content, tools, VTT. It's an amusement park. A whole ecosystem for the community.
• What have they been up to? Integrating with WotC since being acquired last year. Digital content drops, plus stability and performance work. 4.5 million users creates system challenges.
• What's next? Improving play/prep, mobile play, new player onboarding, open to partners, backend tech stuff.
• Partners and publishers--early stages of what that could look like, welcome feedback.
• (Q&A section begins--It's really hard to make out anything anybody is saying).
• Discussion about global communities, content for different people across the world.
• Homebrew and marketplace features. Make homebrew creation and sharing easy.
• Mobile site and app versions of DDB are different--can functionality be added to the app?
• Digital content in other languages and ASL? Is something they are actively trying to figure out.
• Future of D&D in print is very bright. Millions cherish the books and the tabletop and they want to support that. Digital is as well as not instead of.
• WIll DDB marketplace be monetized? That is absolutely the intention. Creators can offer their products for sale. Accessible, open, and available to creators.
• Will existing settings remain open to DMs Guild/DDB marketplace creators with the launch of OneDnD? "The goal is more not less." I think that was the entire answer to the question.
• Equitability of product pricing globally. Not something they've tackled yet, they appreciate the concern, and something they need to approach.
• Older editions in DDB? That's been discussed, but there are no plans right now. Possibility, not a 'no'.
• Does that include problematic elements of old products? They'd use the mechanical rules, not the 'content'.
• Preserving WotC's DnD website resources as it migrates to DDB? Not sure what the actual question or answer were! Can't make it out!
• How VTTs and content will interact? They want content and access to be as broad as possible. They will continue to partner with great VTTs.
• Will there be any mentorship on content creation for the third party marketplace? (There's a situation where somebody in person asks a really long question, the digital attendees can't hear it, then one of the presenters summarises the question [I think], but it's not always clear what the answer is.)
• Will the VTT be on consoles? Other technical requirements? Intent -- early in development -- is to play on PC, console, and mobile. Sequencing won't be everything on Day 1. Goal is to make it available on as many platforms as possible.
• Back to legacy content being on DDB--any content will go thorugh robust review to ensure it is appropriate and inviting to everybody. Means bringing legacy content over is a lot of work, and they won't bring them over without dong that work.
• Gaming store accounts and events--that's a strategy that is underway.
• Continue to lean into D&D in schools. Working on content for children.
• And that's the session over, and my coverage done! The next one will be the afternoon Virtual Tabletop session, covered by Beth Rimmels, in an hour or two.

 

[Morrus]

That may be true, but then their statement doesn't makes sense.

What statement are you referring to?

(He says knowing he’s feeding the complete derail)

 

[darjr]

What’s OAR?

These from Goodman Games. Original Adventures Reincarnated, the ones licensed from WotC
I suspect they dint have the license from WoTC anymore

 

[Sacrosanct]

What statement are you referring to?

(He says knowing he’s feeding the complete derail)

When they sent out the invites. IIRC, some of those who got invites were saying the invite specified about connecting creators to the WoTC design team as a round table to ask questions, and was done in response to the OGL debacle. I guess that's why half your call was about how and why some people got to interview Kyle and others didn't. I.e., this summit happened because of the OGL debacle, and was WotC's attempt to reconnect with creators who were upset. Maybe I put 2 and 2 together, and assumed "OGL debacle (which impacts game creators the most)" and "invite creators for this summit" were a cause/effect relationship. And thus strange they would focus on content creators instead of the people most directly impacted by the OGL.

 

[Sacrosanct]

These from Goodman Games. Original Adventures Reincarnated, the ones licensed from WotC
I suspect they dint have the license from WoTC anymore
View attachment 280910

The Goodman Games booth at Gamestorm last week didn't have any. I spoke with Joe (manning the booth), and that was our best guess as well. Expired license.

 

[darjr]

The Goodman Games booth at Gamestorm last week didn't have any. I spoke with Joe (manning the booth), and that was our best guess as well. Expired license.

I think they still sell them, at least they have them in the store. Dunno if it’s old stock though.

But…. I dint recall any at the GaryCon booth. Huh?

 

[Morrus]

When they sent out the invites. IIRC, some of those who got invites were saying the invite specified about connecting creators to the WoTC design team as a round table to ask questions, and was done in response to the OGL debacle. I guess that's why half your call was about how and why some people got to interview Kyle and others didn't. I.e., this summit happened because of the OGL debacle, and was WotC's attempt to reconnect with creators who were upset. Maybe I put 2 and 2 together, and assumed "OGL debacle (which impacts game creators the most)" and "invite creators for this summit" were a cause/effect relationship.

The text of the invitation is publicly available (I got one too). It doesn’t mention game creators or the OGL. It does say “creator community” by which they mean the definition already discussed here.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The Goodman Games booth at Gamestorm last week didn't have any. I spoke with Joe (manning the booth), and that was our best guess as well. Expired license.

That's extremely disappointing, if so.

Goodman has already published the best TSR OAR candidates and, with the upcoming Dark Tower, the best Judges Guild adventure, but if there are to be any more volumes, and they can't get the rights from WotC, the pickings are slim, unless the Bledsaws sell the remaining Judges Guild catalog to them.

EDIT: I guess they could publish a Grimtooth's Traps volume, but they've already done a bunch of those reprint editions and it'd be a weird fit for an OAR.

 

[mamba]

Amazon gives a steep discount for lots of things.

that kinda was my point. I can buy them separately for essentially the same money, and if DL is any indication I get the printed version faster that way

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I didn't call them liars, so you can relax. Creating a video of a review of D&D material is not a D&D creator. It's a youtube content creator, but not a game creator (really, Youtube or whoever really should have come up with a different title). I'm talking about game content. If you're not actually creating any content for the game, you can't call yourself a game creator. Just like if I never actually writing anything, I shouldn't be calling myself an author. How many of us kept saying LaNasa wasn't an actual publisher because he never created or published anything until just recently? Same thing.

If someone says they are an artist because they made some things in mid journey, they are a liar. That was your direct comparison.

These folks are largely more than reviewers. They are making content helping others understand the game, content expanding on how to use game products, and some of that is also reviews, but when Bob makes a video about how to be a good player and contribute to the game in a memorable way, that’s not a review, it’s D&D content.

 

[Bolares]

why would you focus on content creators instead of game creators?

You know that all this happened because of content creators signal boosting and mobilizing the community right. Wotc finally understood the content creators importance to the comunity.