Taylor Navarro Joins Wizards of the Coast as D&D Designer

Wizards of the Coast has hired yet another D&D game designer - this time UK-based designer Taylor Navarro. Navarro announced that she was joining the D&D team this week on BlueSky. Navarro notably was a winner of the Diana Jones Emerging Designer Award back in 2024 and has worked for Ghostfire Gaming and Evil Hat in addition to working on several DMs Guild projects. Some of her most notable works was contributing to the DMs Guild publication Journeys Beyond the Radiant Citadel and publishing Not Yet: A Romantic Duet TTRPG.

Navarro is the fourth D&D game designer to join Wizards of the Coast in recent weeks, with James Haeck, Leon Barillaro, and Erin Roberts also announcing that they've joined D&D in a similar game designer capacity. Additionally, Justice Ramin Arman was promoted to Game Design Director of the group.

 

[TwoSix]

Then you would probably buy the things I wouldn't. Noted. Thanks for letting me know your buying pattern.

Thanks for explicitly asking!

 

[Artamo]

I suspect you guys are talking about different adventures.

There is a carnival-based adventure in Zinda and, separately, an American South analog horror adventure.

That makes a bit more sense!

 

[Mournblade94]

The term is magitech, but hey at least you didnt call it steampunk i guess. And it isnt at all a hackjob, it is quite in line with the history and themes and inspiration of Calimshan, just written by someone who knows more than a cursory intro class worth of knowledge about the inspiration, ie Golden Age Baghdad.

And yeah, if magic like dnd has was real IRL in that time, Baghdad would have had "robots", and Europeans at least would have called said "robots" humonculus.

Calimshan is still very much the same place it was in older editions. It has just evolved a bit, like it should in a living world like FR.

Dude I used an e instead of an i. We're on that level now? I'll be sure to reprimand my editor.

If magic was IRL thats how it would work in baghdad? Very convincing argument there. I'd love to read a paper on THAT.

Calimshan does not vaguely represent the greenwood calimshan. Did you read the older stuff I mean valid question because nobody thinks I read the nu calimshan. It didn't evolve. It was changed as bad as they changed the Realms for 4th edition. No evolution just a jump and leap of faith. I respect evolution.

 

[Mournblade94]

Thanks for explicitly asking!

You'll note you quoted a statement not a question.

 

[bedir than]

No evolution just a jump and leap of faith. I respect evolution.

They described the how and process for the shifts though. It wasn't sudden.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Dude I used an e instead of an i. We're on that level now? I'll be sure to reprimand my editor.

I should have used an emoji. It was said in humor.

If magic was IRL thats how it would work in baghdad? Very convincing argument there. I'd love to read a paper on THAT.

I mean, I said magic like dnd has, which is an extremely more specific statement. And yes, if the most scientifically and technologically advanced place in the world at the time, where people literally had ideas of things like homunculus, it is silly to object to the idea of such a place, if possessed of dnd magic for it's entire history, not having homunculus and other constructs.

It is literally a world that has constructs in other places already. It is ridiculous to claim that they are out of place in "DnD version of Golden Age Baghdad."

Calimshan does not vaguely represent the greenwood calimshan. Did you read the older stuff I mean valid question because nobody thinks I read the nu calimshan. It didn't evolve. It was changed as bad as they changed the Realms for 4th edition. No evolution just a jump and leap of faith. I respect evolution.

LOL

I have read every edition of FR's Calimshan. It is, and has always been, my favorite place in the Realms.

And, aside, even 4e was an evolution. Not as smooth as some others, sure, but hardly a retcon. And for the record, Calimshan was one of my least favorite developments of the 4e Realms.

This new state of things, though, is a pretty mild change.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yes corporate will always chase the money. But D&D specifically is quite loud about rejecting the gamers it catered to.

No. it is not.

They tell us having races of alignment is the wrong way to play.

No, they have not. Not putting it in the book is not telling you that you play the game wrong. It just isn't specifically catering to you.

They tell us half races were the wrong way to play.

Absurd claim. no.

They tell us dungeon crawling needs to change because it was... colonialism?

What. How? When? What the hell?

People online have said something kinda like that but vastly less absurd, but wotc has never come close to this, in any form.

Sorry its quite obvious that big tent no longer wants traditional D&D play. And frankly alot of those ideas especially the colonialism is a serious stretch

It's quite obvious that none of that is remotely true.

Fortunately I run a library game, an RPG club after school club in an urban district and I have so far been successful in steering those to see what the rejected idea of D&D is really about and how good it is.

Sure, until they go play with their friends outside that context and adapt to the cultural and generational norms of their peers. But regardless, running games for kids at the library is awesome, right?

If one of the DMs I guide in the RPG club wanted to run the cooking modules or the more modern things in Radiant Citadel I'd tell them to go for it. We have access to D&D Beyond anything on there is accessible with club budget. But im not a salesperson for WOTC, im not going to suggest it because its not the direction I want to go in.

lol no one wants you to be a salesperson for wotc?

 

[bedir than]

I have yet to see a module in either Journeys To or Journeys Beyond that's about cooking.
There is one that has a possible singular cooking challenge, but that's not the theme of the adventure.

 

[Mournblade94]

Sure, until they go play with their friends outside that context and adapt to the cultural and generational norms of their peers. But regardless, running games for kids at the library is awesome, right?

Yes its tons of fun and even better watching them, guiding them, and helping them DM and build encounters.

Of course their going to get away from the traditions I've shown them but at least they'll be educated about it and not fall for the nonsense they say about how the game used to be played online, or misconceptions about alignments, or the aesthetics of AD&D.

They'll probably even learn about narrative games like pbta and things like that which im not equipped to teach them. I would hope they continue to discover what they like and not leave it when they graduate

 

[Paul Farquhar]

And surely colorful costumes and feathers have been used in Carnival celebrations for ages.

And a great many other celebrations too. Humans love dressing up and having fun, and are quite good at finding reasons to do it.