Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks Talks AI Usage in D&D [UPDATED!]

Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks is convinced that the Dungeons & Dragons franchise will support some kind of AI usage in the future. Speaking today at a Goldman Sachs event, Cocks spoke about how AI products could soon support Dungeons & Dragons and other Hasbro brands. Asked about whether AI has the potential to "bend the cost curve" in terms of entertainment development or digital gaming, and how it's being used in the toy and content industries, Cocks said the following:

"Inside of development, we've already been using AI. It's mostly machine-learning-based AI or proprietary AI as opposed to a ChatGPT approach. We will deploy it significantly and liberally internally as both a knowledge worker aid and as a development aid. I'm probably more excited though about the playful elements of AI. If you look at a typical D&D player....I play with probably 30 or 40 people regularly. There's not a single person who doesn't use AI somehow for either campaign development or character development or story ideas. That's a clear signal that we need to be embracing it. We need to do it carefully, we need to do it responsibly, we need to make sure we pay creators for their work, and we need to make sure we're clear when something is AI-generated. But the themes around using AI to enable user-generated content, using AI to streamline new player introduction, using AI for emergent storytelling, I think you're going to see that not just our hardcore brands like D&D but also multiple of our brands."

Wizards of the Coast representatives has repeatedly said that Dungeons & Dragons is a game made by people for people, as multiple AI controversies has surrounded the brand and its parent company. Wizards updated its freelance contracts to explicitly prohibit use of AI and has pulled down AI-generated artwork that was submitted for Bigby's Presents: Glory of the Giants in 2023 after they learned it was made using AI tools.

A FAQ related to AI specifically notes that "Hasbro has a vast portfolio of 1900+ brands of which Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons are two – two very important, cherished brands. Each brand is going to approach its products differently. What is in the best interest of Trivial Pursuit is likely quite different than that of Magic: The Gathering or Dungeons & Dragons." This statement acknowledges that Hasbro may use AI for other brands, while also stating that Wizards is trying to keep AI-generated artwork away from the game. However, while Wizards seems to want to keep AI away from D&D and Magic, their parent company's CEO seems to think that AI and D&D aren't naturally opposed.

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UPDATE -- Greg Tito, who was WotC's communications director until recently, commented on BlueSky: "I'm deeply mistrustful of AI and don't want people using it anywhere near my D&D campaigns."

 

[Jd Smith1]

There was a time we couldn't conceive of programming computers to hallucinate either, but it was clearly possible.

Giving up is never the answer. Again: fatalism.

Im not giving up: I strongly support, and eagerly await, the advance of AI.

Also, if betting were involved, I would bet on the side of the techies working hard to improve AI, and on the corporate bean-counters planning on how to exploit AI, rather that casual discussion on the Internet.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Realism, not fatalism. And your acceptance is purely optional.

We do. Inventing the airplane created ground attack and strategic bombing. People use technology, and in free countries, you are not going to limit its use by much. Nor are you going to get a significant consensus on 'better' and 'worse', especially in the halls of power.

All I can impact is my own little world, and in that world, I'll be pushing for treating people better. That includes pushing WotC away from using AI to replace people by calling out this little interaction for what it is - dehumanizing.

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

In Japan it was a little different and I really do not have any details as to why they stopped manufacturing gunpowder weapons. Lack of iron ore may have something to do with it.

Japan never stopped making guns. However in the 200 years of peace that followed the end of the sengoku period there was little demand for military weapons of any kind so large scale manufacturing stopped. Gun production continued as a cottage industry making hunting weapons, and there wasn't much pressure to innovate improved designs as there was in Europe.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Japan never stopped making guns. However in the 200 years of peace that followed the end of the sengoku period there was little demand for military weapons of any kind so large scale manufacturing stopped. Gun production continued as a cottage industry making hunting weapons, and there wasn't much pressure to innovate improved designs as there was in Europe.

That is interesting to know, thanks.

 

[Oofta]

All I can impact is my own little world, and in that world, I'll be pushing for treating people better. That includes pushing WotC away from using AI to replace people by calling out this little interaction for what it is - dehumanizing.

That assumes that they are going to replace people with AI. We don't know what their plans are. As far as technology replacing people being dehumanizing, there are probably people that said the same thing about the steam engine. People being displaced by technology is nothing new.

 

[I'm A Banana]

That assumes that they are going to replace people with AI. We don't know what their plans are. As far as technology replacing people being dehumanizing, there are probably people that said the same thing about the steam engine. People being displaced by technology is nothing new.

Yeah, people being displaced by technology is nothing new. And, also, it's always been a problem that we have a responsibility to solve, every time it happens. Part of how to solve it is to be clear that the suffering that being displaced by technology causes is not inevitable. It is a choice, made by people, who can choose differently. It's also not something we can wash our hands of and chalk up to the arc of progress and assume we have no agency in. No one else will solve the problem for us.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Yeah, people being displaced by technology is nothing new. And, also, it's always been a problem that we have a responsibility to solve, every time it happens. Part of how to solve it is to be clear that the suffering that being displaced by technology causes is not inevitable. It is a choice, made by people, who can choose differently. It's also not something we can wash our hands of and chalk up to the arc of progress and assume we have no agency in. No one else will solve the problem for us.

Yes, everything is this post is true and nothing posted here is going to make a damn piece of difference. If you want to effect chance you have go out among your neighbours and start there. All politics is local.

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

It's not like having your job replaced by technology should be a new and unexpected thing in 2024, it's been happening for over a 100 years and the experts have been telling us for a long time that workers need to be flexible and ready to adapt, and that we can expect to shift to a new field several times in our working life.

 

[Oofta]

Yeah, people being displaced by technology is nothing new. And, also, it's always been a problem that we have a responsibility to solve, every time it happens. Part of how to solve it is to be clear that the suffering that being displaced by technology causes is not inevitable. It is a choice, made by people, who can choose differently. It's also not something we can wash our hands of and chalk up to the arc of progress and assume we have no agency in. No one else will solve the problem for us.

So we should go back to the "good old days" when 90% of the people did back breaking manual work on farms? Or ... hey let's go back to being hunter gatherers. I mean, 99% of us would starve within months but the few that survived would be fully ... umm ... employed hunting down supper!

We do not know what WotC plans are for AI usage. We don't really know how many people will be displaced by AI. While the pace of technology displacing people may have accelerated technology has displaced people since time immemorial and, no, there's no stopping it.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Im not giving up: I strongly support, and eagerly await, the advance of AI.

I guess being on the other side is by definition not giving up.