D&D General Ray Winninger on 5e’s success, product cadence, the OGL, and more.

[THEMNGMNT]

I'm getting a strong sense that Mike and Ray had very different jobs, despite the superficial similarities.

Mike's job was to save a dying game. Simple. But not easy.

Ray's job was to not kill the golden goose while parrying a bunch of half-baked ideas from corporate execs desperately trying to "maximize shareholder value".

For those of us who care about this sort of thing, this thread has been an amazing glimpse behind the scenes.

I'm grateful to both Mike and Ray for being thoughtful, passionate stewards of this great game.

 

[dbolack]

My point was that it was physically impossible for WotC to print as many copies as they needed in the time to meet their schedule. That was certainly not the case with the 4E PHB. The print run for the 2024 PHB was much, much larger than that of the 4E PHB.

That was before the last round of massive printer consolidation and closures, as I recall. Certainly a factor.

 

[mearls]

I'm getting a strong sense that Mike and Ray had very different jobs, despite the superficial similarities.

Oh boy, yeah. Reading about Ray's experiences just confirms that moving over to Magic back in 2020 was one of the best career decisions I've ever made.

 

[michaeljpastor]

It was released in January 1974, you don't celebrate your 50th anniversary on the 51st anniversary.

The exact date is unknown. The earliest it could have been finished based on evidence was the last week of January. That doesn't account for when it was released to the public, which is likely later by weeks. And you're seriously going to quibble over missing a hypothetical date for the last book by less than a month?

 

[Scribe]

Oh boy, yeah. Reading about Ray's experiences just confirms that moving over to Magic back in 2020 was one of the best career decisions I've ever made.

You uh...werent responsible for F.I.R.E were you?

 

[dbolack]

You're talking every year, Ray was suggesting 1 new core book each year out of 4 books considered to be core so you at worst would be buying a revised version of a single book every 4 years. I don't think that's a bad idea for a version of a game that has lasted a decade. In fact I think it could be a good thing if it allows designers a chance to fix things that after 3 years of play have been found to maybe not be the best idea ever.

It also allows for textual clarification, presentation and style refreshes based on marketing data (these kids are all about the X now), or format changes, such as a Trade paperback format. Sometimes you just can't errata in a fix in a "reprint."

 

[eyeheartawk]

Ray's job was to not kill the golden goose while parrying a bunch of half-baked ideas from corporate execs desperately trying to "maximize shareholder value".

If you had asked me in 1998 who would be the bigger detriment to D&D between Lorraine Williams and the concept of shareholders.

I, uhm, would not have picked the concept of shareholders.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

If you had asked me in 1998 who would be the bigger detriment to D&D between Lorraine Williams and the concept of shareholders.

I, uhm, would not have picked the concept of shareholders.

If you haven't heard the When We Were Wizards podcast yet, I would make some time for it. It's going to make you rethink a lot of things you think you know about D&D's history.

 

[michaeljpastor]

If you haven't heard the When We Were Wizards podcast yet, I would make some time for it. It's going to make you rethink a lot of things you think you know about D&D's history.

Yeah, but they stop just before the time referenced.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yeah, but they stop just before the time referenced.

The podcast does make one reconsider the myth of Lorraine Williams, Enemy of Dungeons & Dragons, as @Snarf Zagyg has explained in an epic thread here.