D&D General Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford Join Darrington Press

Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford have a new home, joining Critical Role’s Darrington Press. The LA Times was the first to report on the news of the pair joining Darrington in undisclosed roles. [UPDATE: Per Darrington Press, Perkins is Creative Director and Crawford is Game Director, matching their roles at Wizards.] According to the article, Perkins and Crawford were approached by Critical Role shortly after news broke that the pair were departing Wizards of the Coast.

I was committed to staying with Wizards until after D&D’s 50th anniversary, which gave me lots of time to work on succession planning and exit strategies,” Perkins told the LA Times. “What brought me out of retirement was the chance to work with Jeremy and the brilliant folks at Critical Role on things that have a lasting, positive impact on the world.”

“Chris and I talked about his retirement plan for years, so his approaching departure was long on my mind. When we sent the new D&D rule books to the printer last year, I felt it was time to explore a new chapter for myself,” Crawford added. “I love the game and its team, but 18 years is a long time. I was ready for a new adventure. The chapter that we’ve now opened feels like coming home — resuming work with Chris and returning to Southern California.”

Darrington Press just launched Daggerheart, a fantasy TTRPG that’s more narrative focused than D&D, but also has significant rules-crunch. Many have described Daggerheart as a rival to D&D, a comparison that will likely be made even more now that Darrington has snatched away two of D&D’s primary architects for the last 10+ years.

 

[FrogReaver]

This is worth it for Darrington for the PR and advertising alone. The huge market is of course in eating the D&D 5e player base and that's two huge names.

I hope I’m not one of the ones eaten

 

[Neonchameleon]

I hope I’m not one of the ones eaten

I'd have thought you were more in the Shadow dark direction

 

[SteveC]

What are some examples of blockbuster games that people stopped playing two or three years later?

I think that's a really good question. I think there are examples of games that had huge Kickstarters but no one played. Once a big group is playing and having fun with one, not sure that I can think of one that's faded away. Now I'm sure someone will bring one up to prove me wrong.

 

[FrogReaver]

I'd have thought you were more in the Shadow dark direction

I must check this out now.

 

[zakael19]

This is worth it for Darrington for the PR and advertising alone. The huge market is of course in eating the D&D 5e player base and that's two huge names.

Does much of the player base even know who Perkins and Crawford are?

 

[DarkCrisis]

What are some examples of blockbuster games that people stopped playing two or three years later?

Maybe not 2-3 years but WoD isnt anywhere near what it used to be.

I’m actually shocked that Star Wars gets a full remake/system every 10 years. It’s Star Wars!

See also Trek.

 

[Deset Gled]

What are some examples of blockbuster games that people stopped playing two or three years later?

I immediately thought of Star Wars Saga Edition. A pretty big release in 2007, but ended abruptly in 2010 and lost a lot of players very quickly.

I am guessing licensed games probably aren't the kind of examples you intended, but are probably the biggest real cases of this. When a property gets big, it gets an RPG; when it gets stale, any interest in the RPG dies. I don't have numbers, but I'm guessing the Battlestar Galactica RPG, the Firefly RPG, and the My Little Pony RPG all had a decent following upon their release but suffered fast losses as the franchises fell out of view to the general public.

More to the meat of your earlier point, though, is that I'm suspicious most of these "fair weather fans" who pick up and drop RPGs quickly or who actively hate on other RPGs aren't as fickle as their outward appearance would suggest. The issue isn't that they're not loyal to new RPGs. The issue is that they're overly loyal to one specific RPG (often, but not always, their first), and never really wanted to move away from it in the first place. This is, of course, complete speculation. But the only people I've ever seen hate on 5e and want D&D/WotC/something to fail always have another RPG that they want to herald instead of it.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Maybe not 2-3 years but WoD isnt anywhere near what it used to be.

That's a 30-year old line. That is hardly flaring up bright and burning away. If anything, the major damage was done to that line right before the turn of the century, when they decided to "wrap up" the World of Darkness.

The suggestion was that games like Shadowdark appear suddenly and then fickle gamers stop playing them. White Wolf worked very hard to give their players an off-ramp in the late 1990s, which isn't a comparable situation.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I immediately thought of Star Wars Saga Edition. A pretty big release in 2007, but ended abruptly in 2010 and lost a lot of players very quickly.

I am guessing licensed games probably aren't the kind of examples you intended, but are probably the biggest real cases of this. When a property gets big, it gets an RPG; when it gets stale, any interest in the RPG dies. I don't have numbers, but I'm guessing the Battlestar Galactica RPG, the Firefly RPG, and the My Little Pony RPG all had a decent following upon their release but suffered fast losses as the franchises fell out of view to the general public.

Yeah, licensed games live or die by their licenses. I'm sure there are people out there still playing the Buffy RPG, but once all of the upcoming books in that line were cancelled (among them, Tea & Crossbows, a book about the Watchers, which sounded awesome), folks headed for the doors.

More to the meat of your earlier point, though, is that I'm suspicious most of these "fair weather fans" who pick up and drop RPGs quickly or who actively hate on other RPGs aren't as fickle as their outward appearance would suggest. The issue isn't that they're not loyal to new RPGs. The issue is that they're overly loyals to one specific RPG (often, but not always, their first), and never really wanted to move away from it in the first place. This is, of course, complete speculation. But the only people I've ever seen hate on 5e and want D&D/WotC/something always have another RPG that they want to herald instead of it.

I think that's probably accurate. They are the folks who lost the vote in their gaming group, so they're playing 5E instead of Pathfinder, but remain frustrated over that instead of finding an additional outlet to play Pathfinder.

 

[DarkCrisis]

That's a 30-year old line. That is hardly flaring up bright and burning away. If anything, the major damage was done to that line right before the turn of the century, when they decided to "wrap up" the World of Darkness.

The suggestion was that games like Shadowdark appear suddenly and then fickle gamers stop playing them. White Wolf worked very hard to give their players an off-ramp in the late 1990s, which isn't a comparable situation.

True. I remember that. I was at the GenCon when they announced it. Wild times.

I hope Shadowdark has a long life and picks up more fans.