Charles Ryan (and others) out at WotC?

[Kanegrundar]

I'm not going to comment on the sky falling or any other doom and gloom gaming-wise since a good man (likely several, but Charles is the only one I knew of off that list) lost his job today.

Good luck, Charles. I'm sure you'll land on your feet. Thanks for keeping in touch with us fans.

Kane

 

[I'm A Banana]

Y'know, something tells me this relates to the recent descision to separate M:tG's advertising department from D&D's as mentioned a while back. Wasn't there something about them being handled by another company?

Don't really need a brand manager when they hire a specialist to manage their brand for them...

Still, can't imagine having a specialist who doesn't know D&D doing any better than the job that Mr. Ryan did over there 'till recently....

C'est le vive, I suppose. I'm not going to say anything gloom-n-doom about D&D in general. I don't think it's warranted. But they *have* been in a slumpish way post 3.5, in general. I think the re-release of some material affected the buying market, driving some to other purchases, driving others away from buying altogether. I see that getting better, but regardless, the company sees not as much dinero and they're going to take some step or another to rectify the problem, even if it's ultimately not a corporate concern.

Anyway, now I'm conspiracy theorizing. I wish 'em well. I'm confident they all did good work and will be doing good work wherever they go next.

 

[kenobi65]

Y'know, something tells me this relates to the recent descision to separate M:tG's advertising department from D&D's as mentioned a while back. Wasn't there something about them being handled by another company?

Actually, that announcement was that MtG and D&D were going to use two different public relations agencies, IIRC. And, most companies of that size do hire outside agencies to handle PR (even if they also have internal PR departments).

 

[Pramas]

So she said, but I thought that she was freelance, and not on staff. What position did she hold?

Michelle was on staff as an editor. She moved out here last year with family in tow to take the job.

 

[Nikchick]

So she said, but I thought that she was freelance, and not on staff. What position did she hold?

Curse you, Pramas!


Um, so Pramas and I just said the same thing. Allow me to say: "What he said."

 

[BrooklynKnight]

Michelle was on staff as an editor. She moved out here last year with family in tow to take the job.

That just stucks.

Looks like WOTC pulled a G4 move.....thats dispicable. I hope her and her family is ok.

 

[Steel_Wind]

Looking at the seniority of the people axed from WotC, I think this looks like a pure salary dump.

In a shrinking market perceived to be in a cyclical downturn, a public company dumps its higher salaried folks perceiving that they have got their best out of them. Time to dig in and await an uptick without having to pay the salaries in the meanwhile.

Cynical and mean spirited move - but not original. This appears to be short term management and budget cutting. In a public company, it is, sadly, par for the course.

I guess the twitch reaction is to wish that WotC would just let the D&D brand and IP go. Sell it off to someone who will make it their core business and not an afterthought. (I would sooooo love Elevation/Bioware/Pandemic to buy the D&D brand and WotC/TSR IP! Though they would not make it their core business either....)

That said, there are excellent products being turned out by WotC right now. We have a smorgasbord of rules supplements, tons o' miniatures and even a perceived move towards more adventures.

Paizo seems to be making a real go of it. Dungeon's sale continues to pay dividends to the hardcore hobbyists and even Dragon is starting to turn around.

So...while it may suck to be a game retailer right now , or a publisher, or a former employee of WotC - I'm not sure that those of us on the consuming end of things have ever had it better.

 

[BSF]

Michelle was on staff as an editor. She moved out here last year with family in tow to take the job.

Any chance they are eliminating the position and planning to outsource it back as a freelance gig? It's not quite the same thing, but better than being completely tossed out the door...

 

[Turjan]

Any chance they are eliminating the position and planning to outsource it back as a freelance gig? It's not quite the same thing, but better than being completely tossed out the door...

I think she would have mentioned something like that when she said she'd been sacked.

 

[Nikchick]

Any chance they are eliminating the position and planning to outsource it back as a freelance gig? It's not quite the same thing, but better than being completely tossed out the door...

Because of the Microsoft Permatemp lawsuits, I think they're prevented from laying someone off and then turning around and hiring them back as a "contractor" to do the same job.