D&D 5E Auroboros Kickstarter From Warcraft Devs Has Launched

The D&D 5E setting from developers who originally hail from video game studios like Blizzard, and video games like Warcraft and Diablo, has launched on Kickstarter with a bang, as expected. Auroborus: Coils of the Serpent details a realm called Lawbrand, which contains a number of trade cities and factions. Will this one be the 4th in the last month to join the $1M club?

The high-powered team, under the banner of Warchief Gaming, includes Chris Metzen (Blizzard Entertainment, Warcraft, Diablo, Starcraft, Overwatch), Mike Gilmartin (Blizzard, Eidos, Maxis, Atari), and Ryan Collins (Hearthstone, Marvel Heroes, HeroClix).

The setting contains 5 new races and 4 new subclasses, plus details of 8 trade cities. It also features a new game rule called the Mark of the Serpent which lets you do incredibly powerful magical effects at a cost.

Auroboros: Coils of the Serpent

An epic 5E fantasy campaign setting by Chris Metzen.

www.kickstarter.com

For $25 you can pick up the PDF bundle, or $50 for the hardcover. There are higher tiers with GM screens, world maps, slipcases, and more, with expected delivery in one year (March 2022).

 

[Waller]

Um, read my post?

I did. It describes your thoughts on the implications of an industry working within an "old boys network".

My question was: what do you think I think the implications of an industry working within an "old boys network" are, and what do you disagree with, exactly?

Because I've not offered any thoughts on the topic, other than brief one-sentence mention of its existence. So I'm still curious what you think I think the implications of an industry working within an "old boys network" are, since you've now written two long posts strongly disagreeing with something, but not anything I recall having written?

 

[Dire Bare]

I did. It describes your thoughts on the implications of an industry working within an "old boys network".

My question was: what do you think I think the implications of an industry working within an "old boys network" are, and what do you disagree with, exactly?

Because I've not offered any thoughts on the topic, other than brief one-sentence mention of its existence. So I'm still curious what you think I think the implications of an industry working within an "old boys network" are, since you've now written two long posts strongly disagreeing with something, but not anything I recall having written?

I'm still confused. I described my thoughts on what the term "old-boys-network" means, and how it applies (or doesn't, really) to the RPG industry. I'm honestly not sure what you're asking here, or what else to add.

In my initial response to your post, I added the word "good", "good-old-boys-network" instead of just "old-boys-network". @Ruin Explorer felt that I was confusing two terms and perhaps didn't understand fully what an old-boys-network is. I do understand the term, and wasn't confused. However, I did make myself unclear by adding the word "good". Sorry about that. Should we continue to argue over semantics and punctuation?

It's all about who you know. Seattle is big on the old-boys-network.

I may have initially misunderstood your point here, but I read this as the Seattle RPG industry is exclusive. To get ahead, you gotta know somebody . . . because that's what an old-boys-network is. If that isn't what you were saying . . . okay.

 

[Waller]

I'm still confused. I described my thoughts on what the term "old-boys-network" means, and how it applies (or doesn't, really) to the RPG industry. I'm honestly not sure what you're asking here, or what else to add.

You keep telling me how you strongly disagree with my opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network.

I have not offered any opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network.

So for the third time I ask -- when you say you strongly disagree with my opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network, what is it you think my my opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network are?

Because while I do have opinions on the topic, I have not posted them. But apparently you disagree with them? Without knowing what they are?

 

[Dire Bare]

You keep telling me how you strongly disagree with my opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network.

I have not offered any opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network.

So for the third time I ask -- when you say you strongly disagree with my opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network, what is it you think my my opinions about the implications of an industry working within an old boys network are?

Because while I do have opinions on the topic, I have not posted them. But apparently you disagree with them? Without knowing what they are?

I think I'm done with this circus.

 

[Scribe]

Anyway, it broke 1M Canadian.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Anyway, it broke 1M Canadian.

Break the Canadians, hear the lamentations of their moose!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

@Ruin Explorer felt that I was confusing two terms and perhaps didn't understand fully what an old-boys-network is. I do understand the term, and wasn't confused. However, I did make myself unclear by adding the word "good". Sorry about that. Should we continue to argue over semantics and punctuation?

I still feel like you're confused here. You keep talking about "exclusivity", which is a really basic misunderstanding of what Old Boys Networks are about and one which may prevent you seeing them where they exist.

You seem to think an Old Boys Network is like some sort of private club, which people can only join by being invited in, and which is always seeking to help its members and advance them. Or even how the Masons were in the UK in the 20th century (not so in the 21st), where they did that - always seeking to help their members at the cost of others (US Masons were verrrrry different I understand).

That's not right. Old Boys Networks typically make zero efforts to "exclude" people or "preserve exclusivity". They often are full of open-minded and decent people. But the issue is with bias. The term originates in the UK, referring to public schoolboys - now "public" in this sense is kind of the opposite of the US - in the UK, the normal schools most people go to are "state schools", the paid-for schools are "private schools" (same term in the US I think) and the most posh and fancy private schools are "public schools" (it's a long story). People who went to public schools are "Old Boys" - they have a sort of trans-school culture and will all have been educated in relatively similar subjects, suffered similar horrors or upsets, and likely all be either from rich families, or able to get along well with people from rich families. I'm an Old Boy in this sense so I have firsthand knowledge and experience of all this.

The issue occurs when you have an organisation where a high percentage of employees (esp. at the top) are Old Boys (which can include women nowadays), because of their shared culture and experience, it means they're disproportionately likely to know each other outside of work, know each other's work, appreciate each other's culture, and so on. There's no active exclusion, usually - you don't get people turned away because they aren't like that - but rather you get people brought in because they are. They do better in interviews because they're on the same wavelength as the interviewer and know exactly what is wanted from them, and will have their CV perfectly aligned, and they may well hear about the job opening sooner though backchannels, and when they work their, their cultural similarity and the "small world" nature of things means they're disproportionately likely to be involved socially with co-workers, particularly people who might be able to help them with advancement. But they're not trying to "keep out" others in an exclusionary way. Does this make sense? It's very different from a club or conspiracy or whatever.

And the term is usually used metaphorically, where the network isn't literally public schoolboys, but rather industries, often small industries, where everyone in leadership and decision-making roles kind of knows each other, likely knows each other's work, reads the same books, maybe went to the same unis, certainly has similar levels of education, and anyone entirely outside that is likely to have difficulty getting an "in" to the industry, not because of intentional exclusion, but because they don't have the contacts, and can't easily make them and so on. Smaller industries with low turnover are particularly vulnerable to this. And from an outside perspective it does seem like the larger companies in the RPG industry are like this. Few new/young people are able to enter it, and those that do are only those similar to those already there. There's often a "revolving door" between a few companies. I don't think the RPG industry was always like this, and I think KS and so on offer ways to bypass it, but it's a major contributor to what in the UK is referred to as "stale, male and pale" cultures w/in companies, no matter how well-meaning people in them may be.

 

[Dire Bare]

I still feel like you're confused here. You keep talking about "exclusivity", which is a really basic misunderstanding of what Old Boys Networks are about and one which may prevent you seeing them where they exist.

You seem to think an Old Boys Network is like some sort of private club, which people can only join by being invited in, and which is always seeking to help its members and advance them. Or even how the Masons were in the UK in the 20th century (not so in the 21st), where they did that - always seeking to help their members at the cost of others (US Masons were verrrrry different I understand).

That's not right. Old Boys Networks typically make zero efforts to "exclude" people or "preserve exclusivity". They often are full of open-minded and decent people. But the issue is with bias. The term originates in the UK, referring to public schoolboys - now "public" in this sense is kind of the opposite of the US - in the UK, the normal schools most people go to are "state schools", the paid-for schools are "private schools" (same term in the US I think) and the most posh and fancy private schools are "public schools" (it's a long story). People who went to public schools are "Old Boys" - they have a sort of trans-school culture and will all have been educated in relatively similar subjects, suffered similar horrors or upsets, and likely all be either from rich families, or able to get along well with people from rich families. I'm an Old Boy in this sense so I have firsthand knowledge and experience of all this.

The issue occurs when you have an organisation where a high percentage of employees (esp. at the top) are Old Boys (which can include women nowadays), because of their shared culture and experience, it means they're disproportionately likely to know each other outside of work, know each other's work, appreciate each other's culture, and so on. There's no active exclusion, usually - you don't get people turned away because they aren't like that - but rather you get people brought in because they are. They do better in interviews because they're on the same wavelength as the interviewer and know exactly what is wanted from them, and will have their CV perfectly aligned, and they may well hear about the job opening sooner though backchannels, and when they work their, their cultural similarity and the "small world" nature of things means they're disproportionately likely to be involved socially with co-workers, particularly people who might be able to help them with advancement. But they're not trying to "keep out" others in an exclusionary way. Does this make sense? It's very different from a club or conspiracy or whatever.

And the term is usually used metaphorically, where the network isn't literally public schoolboys, but rather industries, often small industries, where everyone in leadership and decision-making roles kind of knows each other, likely knows each other's work, reads the same books, maybe went to the same unis, certainly has similar levels of education, and anyone entirely outside that is likely to have difficulty getting an "in" to the industry, not because of intentional exclusion, but because they don't have the contacts, and can't easily make them and so on. Smaller industries with low turnover are particularly vulnerable to this. And from an outside perspective it does seem like the larger companies in the RPG industry are like this. Few new/young people are able to enter it, and those that do are only those similar to those already there. There's often a "revolving door" between a few companies. I don't think the RPG industry was always like this, and I think KS and so on offer ways to bypass it, but it's a major contributor to what in the UK is referred to as "stale, male and pale" cultures w/in companies, no matter how well-meaning people in them may be.

I'm not confused. We disagree about what an old-boys-club or network is. That's okay.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I'm not confused. We disagree about what an old-boys-club or network is. That's okay.

Fair enough but I can tell you for sure that in the UK it's used the way I'm describing, and in the context of every time I've seen the term used in the US media, it's correlated with the approach I'm describing, not with a more aggressive exclusionary approach, which has also separately been discussed in some US media and uses different terms. I accept that there may be a regional usage in the US (particularly in the South, including Texas, so it could be pretty widespread), where it's got the more exclusionary meaning you're describing, because I'm less familiar with usage originating from there.

 

[Raftar]

Neither "dungeon" nor "dragon" is product identity for a reason. It only works as a trademark when they're conjoined.
https://19216801.onl/ https://routerlogin.uno/
In the Warcraft franchise "fel" refers to supernatural energies related to hell. Basically, hellfire, but something Blizzard can own and control, which they'd have a hard time doing with "hellfire."