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

Sorcerers Apprentice said:

A heist doesn't even have to be shady in itself if you're stealing from shady people!

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They did that with Golden Vault. But honestly, "good guys stealing from bad guys" feels like it shouldn't be the first place heist adventures go.

D&D has had player character thieves and rogues in it almost since the beginning. Let players be thieves and rogues!

Back in the AD&D days, one of my group's favorite one-class ways to play was as a pack of roving thieves, strip-mining the value from every place we encountered, especially the starting towns in modules. The Secret of Bone Hill, where the friendly baron's dungeon vaults were detailed, was clearly set up for this kind of play. Imagine magazine published an all-thief adventure. Chaosium published a whole line of Thieves World material. And there was also a third-party line for AD&D just called Thieves Guild, to flesh out this style of play.

Stop being scared of this stuff, WotC. It's an awesome, fun way to play and it opens much more of the gaming world to adventure and turns friendly and neutral NPCs and groups into possible enemies.

AstroCat said:

it seems to me they are narrowing their appeal and focus, not broadening it.

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The math shows that's simply not true.

Inviting other people in, rather than just appealing to its older demographic, might feel exclusionary if you choose to only look at the new flavors, like Witchlight or Radiant Citadel, rather than seeing that Ravenloft, the Forgotten Realms and Eberron remain the dominant settings for 5E and that WotC has recently published both Spelljammer and Planescape specifically because older fans wanted them to come back.

More people getting WotC's attention doesn't mean they don't love you any more; there's just more kids in the family now.

AstroCat said:

If you don't like how wotc "d&d" is now, then multiple that times a zillion and that is what is coming up. We'll just have to see if it's a good RoI or not. For me, wotc "d&d" doesn't even barely exist for me anymore. Which is a radical change compared to how I supported 5e financially when it first came out in 2014. We've completely moved on to other systems that capture what we enjoy in D&D, it seems to me they are narrowing their appeal and focus, not broadening it. But I believe in reality that was the goal all along, we'll just have to see if that "support" remains into the upcoming years... will be interesting to watch from afar.

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I don't mean to call you out here, as your perspective is certainly as valid as mine, but your post makes me think - I struggle to understand folks who feel like they are being left out of "modern" D&D when it moves to be more inclusive (this extends to other aspects of life that we can't discuss here).

For example: When folks complain when the art uses purples and pinks and smiles instead of say, browns and grays and gritted teeth.

I like a somewhat gritty game myself, but the art in the book isn't going to affect that. For the most part, my games, even using new material, run essentially similar to how they did in 1989.

Though, I admit, there is probably less xenophobia on the part of the common people toward strange-looking PCs - I'll grant. But that really just makes sense to me. In a world with innumerable non-human (and strange-looking) sentients moving about, I think it seems right that people would observe behaviours before judging people for how they look.

I'm speaking generally, of course - there are certainly still xenophobes around.

FitzTheRuke said:

For example: When folks complain when the art uses purples and pinks and smiles instead of say, browns and grays and gritted teeth.

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If we got a setting or books that reinforced browns, grays, and gritted teeth, then I could understand that all views/approaches/perspectives on the game are welcome within the Big Tent.

Post Tashas, there has been far too much purples, pinks, and smiles, to make any claim at equal support of various tones.

This conversation has been had a billion times on this forum however, there are other games that actually do support and reinforce those other styles and tones, and so it really is easy to shrug and move on from D&D when there has been a narrowing of styles and tones.

Add more kids to the family, welcome everyone, great.

Where's my book with Conan-esque art and tone, and grit?

FitzTheRuke said:

When folks complain when the art uses purples and pinks and smiles instead of say, browns and grays and gritted teeth.

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Also, the modern art direction includes BOTH. It's not a replacement of one aesthetic, but an inclusion of multiple ways to play.

Scribe said:

Where's my book with Conan-esque art and tone, and grit?

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Don't worry, that appropriately gritty Dark Sun book should be coming any day now. Aaaaany day now...

BrokenTwin said:

Don't worry, that appropriately gritty Dark Sun book should be coming any day now. Aaaaany day now...

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We will see.

Scribe said:

If we got a setting or books that reinforced browns, grays, and gritted teeth, then I could understand that all views/approaches/perspectives on the game are welcome within the Big Tent.

Post Tashas, there has been far too much purples, pinks, and smiles, to make any claim at equal support of various tones.

This conversation has been had a billion times on this forum however, there are other games that actually do support and reinforce those other styles and tones, and so it really is easy to shrug and move on from D&D when there has been a narrowing of styles and tones.

Add more kids to the family, welcome everyone, great.

Where's my book with Conan-esque art and tone, and grit?

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That's part of the point, though. Some of the art in new books is still straightforward gritty - just not ALL of it. You seem to be asking for a book where NONE of it (or very nearly so) is anything but dark.

I get the desire. What I don't get is the idea that a darker tone is excluded because it isn't everything that is included.

Scribe said:

This conversation has been had a billion times on this forum however, there are other games that actually do support and reinforce those other styles and tones, and so it really is easy to shrug and move on from D&D when there has been a narrowing of styles and tones.

Add more kids to the family, welcome everyone, great.

Where's my book with Conan-esque art and tone, and grit?

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In the OSR.

I don't know that WotC has any responsibility to go super grim and gritty. I don't think 5E (or any of WotC's editions) do a good job of emulating grim and gritty play, unless you do so much work on the system that you have essentially reverse engineered an OSR game.

It's a lot easier to just go pick up that OSR game than to tell your players "we're playing D&D, but you also need to remember these 12 pages of house rules." You're obviously allowed to do that, if you want, but it feels like a lot of added friction for no real benefit.

FitzTheRuke said:

That's part of the point, though. Some of the art in new books is still straightforward gritty - just not ALL of it. You seem to be asking for a book where NONE of it (or very nearly so) is anything but dark.

I get the desire. What I don't get is the idea that a darker tone is excluded because it isn't everything that is included.

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I'm not going to accept that it's rain at this point. With respect, you won't change my mind, I have eyes and the shift is obvious.

Whizbang Dustyboots said:

I don't know that WotC has any responsibility to go super grim and gritty. I don't think 5E (or any of WotC's editions) do a good job of emulating grim and gritty play, unless you do so much work on the system that you essentially have reverse engineered an OSR game.

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They absolutely don't. At this point I just don't want to have to read that I'm still being included, when I'm obviously not.