Recent content by mearls

I mentioned upthread that I would look at the Gen Con numbers and give some thoughts on them. I track based on number of available seats for TTRPGs, then track how many of those seats fill before the show. Roughly speaking: D&D has the most seats of all games, but it is not a majority of all...

Thank you. I really appreciate the words.

I think their actions speak for themselves, but here is what I am seeing that I think is a critical change: They're listening to learn, not to correct. What struck me about Justice's response to Bob Worldbuilder was how practical it was. Bob thought the encounters in the new Starter Set robbed...

I think the foundation might be there. The quick build fighter I created had the Magic Initiate feat, and it picked shield and a defensive cantrip that were good choices IMO.

I'm leery of the complexity the feat paths are bringing to the table. 5.5 can already run slow, wish these were more agile. OTOH, I freaking LOVE the druid. This is a super awesome way to get people to embrace a wild shape approach that plays faster. I love giving players an incentive to go...

100% this. I did a deep dive into Gen Con events, looking at them over a six or seven year period. I'll try to remember to dig it up tomorrow and post some interesting tidbits. When I worked on D&D, the core challenge was getting people to play the new thing. If we did an adventure or a...

So if we had 2,017 options each for class, ancestry, and background, each human on the planet could make a unique character. OK everyone, get to work!

I wonder if accounting for all the decisions you need to make while levelling is a blocker. DDB used to offer random characters, but they were hilariously unplayable. We used to do them for whacky one shots ("I'm a gnome barbarian with an 8 strength who put all his ASIs into Charisma!")

Like if I could play D&D right now with that character, I 100% would.

It works great! Just built a dragonborn paladin. The background I took gave me wizard spells (shield, blade ward), so I had a nifty, very tanky character. with a few clicks. This is really cool! Here's a link: https://www.dndbeyond.com/characters/163323412 I think backgrounds do pose a bit of...

For anyone wondering how D&D and TTRPGs are doing, I track crowdfunding as part of my job. We're up 20% year over year, and have a good shot at setting a funding record. 5e-based campaigns did dip a bit the past two years, but they now look they are rebounding as some of the big publishers bring...

I think this is the general media trend. If you wait for actual news to happen, you end up with a lot of dead air. You can always speculate, and negative speculation drives views. Most “news” sources these days are like this, lots of commentary and pondering theoreticals. The more lurid, the...

Lots of great stuff! Very happy to see Vault of Mini Things there. It deserves more attention.

I’m eager to try this one out. If I read the rules right, generating bonus dice while also autofailing on three 1s could make for really tense rolls. On paper, I like how the mechanic leads you dramatically success or disastrous failure.

FWIW, I've found in play that this rule makes hitting 0 hit points really tense. In my last in-person game, an evil illusionist hit the party with a prismatic blast that dropped everyone to 0 HP. It made the last round of combat incredibly tense, as the PCs started piling up failed death saves...