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.

 

[Mournblade94]

Are you asking a corporation that is responsible for serving millions of D&D players to do "art" that no one needs?

In any case, art must fulfill the needs of others. If "art" is made and no one utilizes it and no one sees it, then nothing is "expressed", and no "art" exists in the first place.

Sometimes vision just isn't functional. I'd rather have the functional.

 

[Mournblade94]

It becomes a matter of which 5e is your preference for a base to your 3pp and homebrew (or at least it should be IMO). I believe Level Up, itself using 5.0 as a base, is better as a spring board than 5.5 or any other 5e-based game. I'm quite glad designers got their 5.0-based versions out there and supported before WotC iterated themselves and created their usual gravity well encouraging other creators to tow their line.

5th edition is a really good system. The 5.5 forgotten realms may be good because Ed Greenwood is writing it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I am curious about your take on the trends. What do you expect Wyatt and Schneider to do differently from Crawford and Perkins?

My main take right now would be that I don't really know what to expect!

I think the designers who seem to be in place now are, on paper, a little more "mechanically inclined" and also more interested in themes of classes - not that 5E was badly designed/themed, but I think there was a level of confusion to the design (particularly of certain classes). So I'd be unsurprised to see changes there.

The only thing I really do expect within 3 years at the outside, is a book that's akin to Xanathars/Tasha's, but probably more experimental in some ways. There may be a less-experimental "more mechanics" book already on the way of course.

I don't think we'll see a lot of actual influence from the new team for at least 12 months, because as I understand it, the pipeline of conception-writing-editing-layout-printing (I'm probably missing steps, I'm not a book writing guy!) for WotC is like 12 months, and it might go beyond that. Still, I expect we'll have some idea by later 2026 - and hell, they might have told us by then, but WotC are totally all over the place with communications.

 

[Belen]

My main take right now would be that I don't really know what to expect!

I think the designers who seem to be in place now are, on paper, a little more "mechanically inclined" and also more interested in themes of classes - not that 5E was badly designed/themed, but I think there was a level of confusion to the design (particularly of certain classes). So I'd be unsurprised to see changes there.

The only thing I really do expect within 3 years at the outside, is a book that's akin to Xanathars/Tasha's, but probably more experimental in some ways. There may be a less-experimental "more mechanics" book already on the way of course.

I don't think we'll see a lot of actual influence from the new team for at least 12 months, because as I understand it, the pipeline of conception-writing-editing-layout-printing (I'm probably missing steps, I'm not a book writing guy!) for WotC is like 12 months, and it might go beyond that. Still, I expect we'll have some idea by later 2026 - and hell, they might have told us by then, but WotC are totally all over the place with communications.

I do not disagree with more mechanics, but I think more crunchy bits like weapon masteries would have been better as optional add-ons like the way feats were handled in 5.0.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I do not disagree with more mechanics, but I think more crunchy bits like weapon masteries would have been better as optional add-ons like the way feats were handled in 5.0.

There don't appear to be any optional add-ons in 5.5, at least not how it is presented.

 

[Belen]

There don't appear to be any optional add-ons in 5.5, at least not how it is presented.

This is the way I see it too. I think it was a mistake. They could have served crunchy and non-crunchy by layering rather than forcing.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

This is the way I see it too. I think it was a mistake. They could have served crunchy and non-crunchy by layering rather than forcing.

2014 leaned fairly hard on optionality in its corebooks for a mainstream RPG that isn't like multi-genre (i.e. GURPS/SWADE/FATE are multi-genre) - it's somewhat unusual.

Then 2024 banishes that entirely. A response to the market? I suspect so, I suspect relatively few people were using any of the optional rules as far as WotC could tell (but who knows!).

Anyway, doing that must have been a very conscious decision.

I tend to think we're more likely to see some optionality return whenever 6E appears (I think you please more people when there are options, even if they don't use them), and I expect that any "extra mechanics" books for 2024 are going to be full of optionality too.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

They did pretty much exactly that with the Spelljammer abd Planescape campaigns.

I don't think that I agree. I mean, yes, they made the adventures shorter, but they weren't more "meaty". They were shorter to make room for Setting stuff. And the format seemed to me to mostly be a way to make more money off of a smaller page count. They weren't as terrible as their reputation might suggest (at least Spelljammer, I think Planescape gets better reviews, and is, in fact, better) but I don't think I'd advocate for any future product learning anything from those products, other than things NOT to do.

 

[mamba]

Then 2024 banishes that entirely. A response to the market? I suspect so, I suspect relatively few people were using any of the optional rules as far as WotC could tell (but who knows!).

not saying they were used as lot, but I am not sure how they can tell

 

[Alzrius]

Penny Arcade has posted their take on the situation: