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.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

That last bit is interesting. Weapons have been really generic-ized in this edition, with really only damage and damage type being the real differences between them. Having a longsword be able to do something different from a battleaxe despite both being 1d8/slashing weapons will be nice! And maybe they'll drop rapier back to 1d6, but just make it do something different from a shortsword, just so it won't be the end-all of rogue weapons simply because it does more damage...

In the next playtest, weapon features were rejected, because it amped up the complexity of every existing monster.
While having more tactical options for monsters is good, coming from 3e, having monster abilities hidden behind keywords (feats back then) is unwieldy.

Having weapon properties that can be unlocked with class features is a nice idea to remove that problem.

If some monster should use advanced weapon options, you can just write it in the stat block, but you don't have to. I like it.

And I want the new playtest now...

 

[Zaukrie]

I'm very curious what will happen with weapons. Thank you to the moderators for stepping in. I really want to talk about content for a change on this site.

 

[darjr]

Hey, I didn't know what you were talking about either, and I sell those books all the time! It's just that sometimes acronyms don't compute.

Well it’s the actual logo for the product class. It’s even on the T-shirt.

But no worries.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I like the idea of features on weapons, but I don't like what happens all too often. That being, players using only a couple of the most effective weapons and ignoring all the rest. It's why we see a million greatsword users and hardly any greataxe PCs, and that's with a basic system like core 5e. If you start giving a weapon a feature that can be unlocked, I worry the exploits will hit the streets and that's all you'll see from that point on, regardless of intent.

 

[Zaukrie]

I like the idea of features on weapons, but I don't like what happens all too often. That being, players using only a couple of the most effective weapons and ignoring all the rest. It's why we see a million greatsword users and hardly any greataxe PCs, and that's with a basic system like core 5e. If you start giving a weapon a feature that can be unlocked, I worry the exploits will hit the streets and that's all you'll see from that point on, regardless of intent.

That's not the experience at my table, but I get that many are maxers....

 

[Incenjucar]

I like the idea of features on weapons, but I don't like what happens all too often. That being, players using only a couple of the most effective weapons and ignoring all the rest. It's why we see a million greatsword users and hardly any greataxe PCs, and that's with a basic system like core 5e. If you start giving a weapon a feature that can be unlocked, I worry the exploits will hit the streets and that's all you'll see from that point on, regardless of intent.

A risk that applies to the whole game, really.

I share this concern if they don't make the effects something you can build on. If there are significant tactical paths a player can take, there can be enough of an impact to make it worthwhile to pursue different options because they have different results, even if one seems to be a bit better. For example, proning vs. slowing both impede movement but have markedly different effects.

 

[dave2008]

I am hearing that the Summit was a dumpster fire. It was not a conversation between parties, but WOTC promoting themselves- a mismatch of expectations- and the saving grace for WOTC was someone named Dixon (Edit: in addtion to Crawford and Perkins).

Well I am sure it depends on who you talk to. I liked a lot of what a heard in the transcripts provided here on EnWorld. It seemed conversational to an extent from the transcript. However,...

I have not seen anyone who had been asking for SWAG. I have seen people that came prepared with inciteful questions and disappointed that too often WOTC side-stepped questioned or had no answers. (Edit: And I just learned that many of the creators pre-submitted their questions to WOTC).

...a lot of the questions didn't seem that inciteful to me. I don't really have a polite word for it at the moment, so I will just say many seemed odd. At least to me.

I also realize that the nature of reading an unprofessional transcript versus being there is quite different, but some of what I am reading from the transcripts and reports from the live event don't paint the attendees in the best light.

For example this comment from Beth's transcript:

"A segment then that was supposed to focus on PHB questions instead ended up having people who asked questions earlier about abuse content creators have taken from the community and about rebuilding trust were asked yet again even though they had been thoroughly answered several times."

 

[zedturtle]

For the four subclasses for each class goal and the eight schools of magic, well it is a playtest and could easily change. And 8 goes into 4 pretty easily – I can see matching up Enchantment and Illusion into one subclass, with Abjuration and Divination being another subclass, or Conjuration and Evocation. That leaves Necromancy and Transmutation, but a 'cycle of life' means 'change, change, everything changes' justification could work.

 

[zedturtle]

Oh! On the influencer mental health stuff, I don't think most people were asking that their therapist bills be paid, but if Kenrick and Perkins had put out an 8-minute video about how beating up on Ginny Di because they invited her to the summit was unfair, it would have helped. Or at least showed that they were on the side of the angels.

 

[The Glen]

Orc playable class?

Mystara confirmed