D&D 5E Are you happy with how WOTC's D&D department interacts with the fans (Frequency/ Transparency/Methods)?

[Jester David]

Do you have any evidence that they have doubled their number of employees?

He's referring to the names in the credits of recent books who are not on the lost if known members of the D&D department, and assuming they now are.
Of course, they might just as easily be freelancers or members of other teams at WotC who worked on D&D for a period but aren't part of the team.

 

[Mistwell]

1) They never did, no. But they also claimed to want to improve relations and communication with the fanbase. So that's a good reason to do so now.
2) Whenever Paizo has a new hire, that person gets a blog post on the front page of Paizo.

D&D is a department of WOTC, which is a division of Hasbro. A lot of their "new hires" are simply people who usually work on Magic The Gathering or something else, doing work on D&D. And then they have freelancers, who are sometimes also employees. It's a far more fluid situation than a discreet, small company like Paizo who does mostly one thing rather than 1000 things like Hasbro. It's probably unclear to Mike Mearls who is officially part of the D&D department at all times.

 

[Mistwell]

He's referring to the names in the credits of recent books who are not on the lost if known members of the D&D department, and assuming they now are.
Of course, they might just as easily be freelancers or members of other teams at WotC who worked on D&D for a period but aren't part of the team.

I verified every one of them with LinkedIn to make sure they list themselves as employees of WotC. If they work in another part of WotC, that feeds my point that you can't have it both ways - blaming WOTC for not behaving like Paizo in introducing new D&D employees, and then assuming they're not new employees if it doesn't satisfy the new narrative of claiming they're not D&D employees but just on loan.

 

[Mistwell]

Do you have any evidence that they have doubled their number of employees?

Yes. I listed them all. I am not sure if Morrus deleted them (because they had LinkedIn links in them) or not. But if you pick up the newest adventure, compare the WOTC credits to Morrus' last list of verified D&D employees, and then check LinkedIn for the new names, you will find they are all listed as WOTC employees, with new D&D credits. I also posted it at the WOTC boards. It now looks to be either 29 or 30 employees (depending on whether the one guy got laid off or not).

 

[Jester David]

D&D is a department of WOTC, which is a division of Hasbro. A lot of their "new hires" are simply people who usually work on Magic The Gathering or something else, doing work on D&D. And then they have freelancers, who are sometimes also employees. It's a far more fluid situation than a discreet, small company like Paizo who does mostly one thing rather than 1000 things like Hasbro. It's probably unclear to Mike Mearls who is officially part of the D&D department at all times.

D&D is a subsidiary of Hasbro, not a division.

Given many are listed in the Core Rulebooks, you imply either Mike Mearls cannot keep track of whom he works with or lied when he said the D&D department was under 20 people.

 

[Shasarak]

Yes. I listed them all. I am not sure if Morrus deleted them (because they had LinkedIn links in them) or not. But if you pick up the newest adventure, compare the WOTC credits to Morrus' last list of verified D&D employees, and then check LinkedIn for the new names, you will find they are all listed as WOTC employees, with new D&D credits. I also posted it at the WOTC boards. It now looks to be either 29 or 30 employees (depending on whether the one guy got laid off or not).

That is less then those listed in the DMG (for example).

 

[Mistwell]

D&D is a subsidiary of Hasbro, not a division.

I think you meant WOTC is a subsidiary of Hasbro. The salient point of what I said is that D&D is a department of WOTC, which itself is part of a larger entity (it does't matter if it's a subsidiary or division, the point remains the same in this context).

Given many are listed in the Core Rulebooks

And the most recent credits are quite different from the core rulebook credits. Which tells you it's not the same as it was then.

, you imply either Mike Mearls cannot keep track of whom he works with

No I say, directly, that he may not be sure which employees are assigned officially to the D&D department of WOTC, or whether they are assigned officially to another department but doing some work for D&D, at a particular month. He knows who he works with, but he may not know where they fall in that moment on the org chart in terms of what department they're currently assigned to. And, you just said essentially the same thing when you said, "Of course, they might just as easily be...members of other teams at WotC who worked on D&D for a period but aren't part of the team." I am not sure why it's a meaningful difference for this issue if WOTC has rapidly and drastically increased the number of people they at least temporarily assign to the D&D department to work on new content for D&D, or if they are longer term assignments, since the question is about what resources they're willing and able to assign to the department to work on D&D right now. Either way, the myth of a skeleton crew is blown. Either way, the claim that they don't commit resources to the department is blown. The question then only becomes "for how long" or "how often will they do this" and not "can they and will they".

or lied when he said the D&D department was under 20 people.

When did he say that? Look at the date, and what he specifically said.

 

[Maggan]

2) Whenever Paizo has a new hire, that person gets a blog post on the front page of

I like that with Paizo. That and the superstar thing, which is a great way of vetting people while still keeping the fans in the loop. Paizo is the best at customer relations. I've seen them even being rather blunt with the fan base (regards missing material from Kingmaker) and no major uproar. So they have enormous goodwill with the fans, and WotC could do well to be inspired by that.

But I still have to see Paizo publicise people being fired. Once or twice when a high profile person left maybe. And I think that's good, out of respect to those who lose their jobs.

 

[Umbran]

It doesn't cost them anything to pop on and confirm/deny.

Oh, really? In order to "pop on and confirm/deny" they first have to know the discussion is happening. So, now they have to *monitor* EN World? That certainly has a cost in time and effort. And what about the other sites out there - does WotC now have to declare some sites as officially supported? How many? Start multiplying that monitoring cost - you're now talking about having "online communications coordinator" being a job description....

Any time you find yourself in the position of thinking, "Well, they could just take a quick look at it..." (where "they" are anyone working in a professional capacity - doctor, car mechanic, public relations coordinator, or what have you) you are probably underestimating the amount of effort supporting that kind of service actually takes.

 

[Umbran]

I verified every one of them with LinkedIn to make sure they list themselves as employees of WotC.

That doesn't mean they are actually "employees" in a technical sense. On LinkedIn, folks will generally self-report where they work as their employer, even if they are contractors or working through agencies such that they aren't actually full-time employees. LinkedIn is not a human resources system of record.