Jeremy Crawford Also Leaving D&D Team Later This Month

Jeremy Crawford is leaving Wizards of the Coast later this month. Screen Rant (via me!) had the exclusive announcement. Crawford was the Game Director for Dungeons & Dragons and was one of the guiding forces for D&D over the past decade. In the past year, Crawford has focused on the core rulebooks and leading the team of rules designers. He has also been a face of Dungeons & Dragons for much of 5th Edition, appearing in many promotional videos and DMing Acquisitions Incorporated Actual Play series.

He joins Chris Perkins in leaving the D&D team in recent weeks. Perkins, who was the Creative Director for D&D, announced his retirement last week. Both Perkins and Crawford appear to have left Wizards on their terms, with Lanzillo very effusive with her praise of both men and their contribution in our interview.

On a personal note, I've enjoyed interviewing Jeremy over the years. He was always gracious with his time and answers and is one of the most eloquent people I've ever heard talk about D&D. I'll miss both him and Chris Perkins and look forward to their next steps, wherever that might be.

 

[Dire Bare]

I didn't say it would automatically produce a better product. I was specifically talking about labors of love versus products put out because of a desire for profit.

Eh.

Every publishing company desires a profit. At the very least, to keep the lights on and give everybody involved paychecks. WotC/Hasbro's need to make their shareholders happy is on another level, however.

Labor of love? I'm comfortable assuming that a lot of folks on the D&D team over the years LOVE D&D and are excited to work on official D&D products.

Most professionally produced RPGs . . . IMO . . . have to balance passion, vision, and making a reasonable profit. At WotC, at Paizo, even with indie creators.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

That’s an iteration of the existing game. That’s not innovation.

That is objectively fallacious logic. Whether etc innovates or not aside, it is absolutely possible to innovate within an existing product line.

 

[mamba]

But they do innovate, on most of their 5E products...?

we seem to have different thresholds for this, for example I do not consider the 2024 core innovative at all, many adventures are rehashes of old ones. I do not mind the latter but I do not consider it innovative either, so I definitely would not say ‘most’

But the very innovation often is met with controversy and push-back.

and I said they should ignore it, it does not matter, what matters is whether they sell / find an audience interested in them

 

[Faolyn]

Eh.

Every publishing company desires a profit. At the very least, to keep the lights on and give everybody involved paychecks. WotC/Hasbro's need to make their shareholders happy is on another level, however.

Desires a profit is also different from "putting out books solely to make a profit."

Labor of love? I'm comfortable assuming that a lot of folks on the D&D team over the years LOVE D&D and are excited to work on official D&D products.

I'm sure they do love D&D and I'm sure they give their work their all. But: Elsewhere in this thread (pretty sure it's this thread; maybe it's the thread on gamer conservatism), people are talking about how "the fans" voted against certain changes that were made in those UA playtests because they didn't want radical changes to the game. Which says that the writers couldn't write what they wanted (something quite different from D&D's norm) because "the fans" wouldn't buy it, thus reducing the profits the book would make.

(I'm actually pretty sure people would buy the books anyway and either find they like the changes or complain about them bitterly for the next decade, like they always do.)

So that's what I mean.

 

[TiQuinn]

That is objectively fallacious logic. Whether etc innovates or not aside, it is absolutely possible to innovate within an existing product line.

Sure. I think it’s been fairly incremental.

 

[Hussar]

Innovation isn’t just to make something entirely new

You’re right.

Apparently innovation is “stuff I like”.

 

[soviet]

You’re right.

Apparently innovation is “stuff I like”.

To be fair this is the correct definition of the word innovation - to applaud something while at a drinking establishment

Edit: at least that's what ChatGPT told me

 

[Mournblade94]

Deleted. Stupid Point.

 

[TrainedMunkee]

Creativity within D&D has taken a sharp nose dive within the last two years. It kind of feels as if D&D is just treading water at this point, that is fine I will take my tables to other systems. I doubt that this is Crawford's fault, I feel that this is more to do with corporate culture encouraging profit over creativity. I base this on nothing other than 50 years of playing the game. After the recent update I even considered going back to 4e. I never dreamed that those thoughts would cross my mind. 5e just seems stale and uncreative to me at this point.

 

[Mournblade94]

Heck, half of 2e was put out solely to make money, to the point that D&D was competing with itself. And we all know how that went.

Unfortunately, the only way you're going to get products that are entirely labors of love is if you stick strictly with small press and indie stuff. Larger companies may still care more about the game because they don't have a board of directors breathing down their necks, but they also have more bills to pay because they're larger.

2nd Edition came out ONLY because they needed to cut Gygax out. That sped it along. It is my favorite edition so I am no disparaging it. Gygax talked about a 2nd edition but TSR went full throttle when the board got rid of him.