Jeremy Crawford Also Leaving D&D Team Later This Month

FitzTheRuke · Apr 13, 2025

I still feel that they should make APs smaller in scope (less 12-15 levels of advancement more 4-6 levels of advancement) and flesh them out deeper. More "meat" (described NPCs, art, maps, monsters), and more "bones" (alternate paths to take, sidequests and subplots). Less "earth-shattering" plots and more connectivity for the PCs and their world. More Replay Value, too. (Do it again, but with different characters and choose different paths for a different play experience).

But I suppose I get why they have tried to avoid the old "this Adventure goes from Level 8-12" and stuck with "they all go from 1-12ish" (Yes, I know there are exceptions). They worry that anyone who doesn't have an extant party of 8th level characters won't buy the book without Levels 1-7. I'm not sure that is worth worrying about, though.

Uta-napishti · Apr 13, 2025

Dear Jeremy,
Thank you for your development and long stewardship of the rules of D&D. You did a good job! I'm sure you felt the weight of responsibility as everything you said for long years was parsed and sifted for clues for this that and the other. Thank you for the high standard you set for mechanics, and for keeping 5E mostly compatible with itself despite all the little experiments you and the team were constantly trying within those constraints. I have a shelf of the lovely books produced under your watch, and many happy memories of play. I wish you luck taking on any challenges before you, and look forward to seeing your work appear in some fresh corner of the nerd-o-sphere outside of D&D. You are relieved, sir!

Faolyn · Apr 13, 2025

AlViking said:
People in small companies rarely get the go ahead to do whatever they want if they want to stay in business either. Everyone has restrictions of some sort.

Which is why I also said "Indie stuff." There are no restrictions on what you write if your company consists of 1-3 people. Check out some of the games on places like Itch. There's some pretty cool things there that have a lot of potential.

Faolyn · Apr 13, 2025

AlViking said:
Small companies are limited by funding, budget and, if there is more than one person, frequently have disagreements on approach as well. All companies have issues and restrictions, size just changes the nature of those challenges a bit.

But they have far, far fewer restrictions on actually writing what they want. They can write, illustrate, lay out, and even publish a game using nothing more than whatever software is on their computer or tablet (that's what I did when I wrote my supplement for Level Up--drawn in ProCreate, written and laid out in Word). It may even be a superb game (that depends on how good they are at game design). The only thing it won't have is a big company name behind it.

grimslade · Apr 13, 2025

I miss all the juicy gossip when I pull long work hours...
I wish Jeremy Crawford all the best going forward and thank him for his contributions to D&D. I did not always agree with his rules interpretations, but you could tell his decisions were from a play perspective, not just a white room simulation. May he find success away from Hasbro as well.
As for all the doom, this is the longest we have had a group of designers at D&D for this long. Crawford, Perkins, and to a lesser duration Mearls, have shepherded our Medieval Math Rocks game to heights undreamed of by anyone other than a coke-fueled EGG in the early 80's LA. 5E is an aberration. It is also fine. It is heading into its Monopoly years. Same rules, with minor tweaks over the decades. There will be a D&D Go! at some point. Meanwhile, innovation will continue in smaller, more nimble, and creative games companies. I expect we will continue to see expansion sets for D&D, either Adventure Path or Setting material, to keep the brand in the public eye, but there will not be another major edition. It is too big of a gamble. Physical production is too volatile in a world with trade wars, tariffs, and pandemics. Digital and IP licensing will provide steady, risk-adverse, profit.
It is the end of an era, but hardly the first or last. Wyatt and Schneider are capable shepherds. May they prosper and do well by the game.

Faolyn · Apr 13, 2025

Hussar said:
Y'know what else I can't tell you? How much input does that Hasbro executive have in the day to day running of WotC. I don't know and neither do you.

No, I don't know.

But assume a designer came in with a really cool but out-there idea for a campaign setting. How likely, would you say, is it that the designer would be allowed to spend company time and money creating and then publishing the setting?

Because I'm pretty sure that the designers who have worked at WotC have had lots of campaign setting ideas, if only because people who play D&D tend to come up with setting ideas really easily. Probably, since they're professionals who know how to write and format a setting, some of these ideas are actually really fleshed out, not just at the "hey, it would be cool if..." stage.

How many new settings have they actually published? Eberron, which was from a contest. Nentir Vale, which if I'm understanding it correctly is pretty empty on purpose, and two more that are supposed to be coming out for 5.24. Did I miss any? Over the last few editions, we've mostly gotten expansions or revamps of settings that came out of settings put out by TSR. So either the designers have had minimal interest in creating anything new, or they weren't allowed to create anything new and publish it under WotC's banner. Not forbidden--that's not what I mean--but they were assigned to write specific things and those things are not whatever they want to.

Clint_L · Apr 13, 2025

grimslade said:
I miss all the juicy gossip when I pull long work hours...
I wish Jeremy Crawford all the best going forward and thank him for his contributions to D&D. I did not always agree with his rules interpretations, but you could tell his decisions were from a play perspective, not just a white room simulation. May he find success away from Hasbro as well.
As for all the doom, this is the longest we have had a group of designers at D&D for this long. Crawford, Perkins, and to a lesser duration Mearls, have shepherded our Medieval Math Rocks game to heights undreamed of by anyone other than a coke-fueled EGG in the early 80's LA. 5E is an aberration. It is also fine. It is heading into its Monopoly years. Same rules, with minor tweaks over the decades. There will be a D&D Go! at some point. Meanwhile, innovation will continue in smaller, more nimble, and creative games companies. I expect we will continue to see expansion sets for D&D, either Adventure Path or Setting material, to keep the brand in the public eye, but there will not be another major edition. It is too big of a gamble. Physical production is too volatile in a world with trade wars, tariffs, and pandemics. Digital and IP licensing will provide steady, risk-adverse, profit.
It is the end of an era, but hardly the first or last. Wyatt and Schneider are capable shepherds. May they prosper and do well by the game.

Great post!

Also, I really wanna see what D&D Go! looks like!

AlViking · Apr 13, 2025

Faolyn said:
Which is why I also said "Indie stuff." There are no restrictions on what you write if your company consists of 1-3 people. Check out some of the games on places like Itch. There's some pretty cool things there that have a lot of potential.

I don't believe it will produce a better product just by being "indie". The only thing I judge a book by is the contents. I don't judge it by it's cover or what the organizational structure was in place for it's production. There are always restrictions and limitations of time, budget, feedback, art and other factors. Of course there's also the simple fact that what someone creates, no matter how innovative, will simply not resonate with me.

Edit - having to do everything yourself or only with a couple other people is a massive restriction on what can be done. Very few people are good at art, writing rules, editing, organizing and so on. When I was on bigger teams I often set the direction for the project but different people were able to focus on things they were good at where I lacked the skills. Big, small, in-between size groups can produce great, awful and in-between products.

Uni-the-Unicorn! · Apr 13, 2025

Henadic Theologian said:
Didn't like how it butchered the lore, but mechanically it was good.

The lore was one of the best parts for us - fit right into our settinf

Micah Sweet · Apr 13, 2025

AlViking said:
I don't believe it will produce a better product just by being "indie". The only thing I judge a book by is the contents. I don't judge it by it's cover or what the organizational structure was in place for it's production. There are always restrictions and limitations of time, budget, feedback, art and other factors. Of course there's also the simple fact that what someone creates, no matter how innovative, will simply not resonate with me.

Edit - having to do everything yourself or only with a couple other people is a massive restriction on what can be done. Very few people are good at art, writing rules, editing, organizing and so on. When I was on bigger teams I often set the direction for the project but different people were able to focus on things they were good at where I lacked the skills. Big, small, in-between size groups can produce great, awful and in-between products.

To me the questions is, is the person or people who holds the purse strings also a driving part of the actual process, or do they just tell those people what to work on? If the owner of the company is also the driving creative force (or at least an important one of them), I have more faith that they will create a creative passionate project that is more about GAME than PRODUCT.

Jeremy Crawford Also Leaving D&D Team Later This Month

Christian Hoffer

FitzTheRuke

Legend

Uta-napishti

Adventurer

Faolyn

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Faolyn

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grimslade

Krampus ate my d20s

Faolyn

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Clint_L

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AlViking

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Uni-the-Unicorn!

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Micah Sweet

Level Up & OSR Enthusiast

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