D&D General Critical Role Investigation Into Complaint

A couple of weeks ago, Critical Role was accused of commissioning work from one of their community members, but of not paying for that work. The company immediately undertook to investigate the claim, and made this statement, indicating that no work was commissioned or received from the person in question, and no such agreement was in place.

The person who made the complaint referred to online bullying within the Critical Role fandom.

The full announcement reads:

 PRESS RELEASE

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A couple weeks ago, an individual made statements online claiming that he provided work for Critical Role without payment. Critical Role took these allegations seriously and immediately sought to investigate the situation. After an extensive investigation directed by outside counsel, it has been concluded that Critical Role never established, or intended to establish, any employment, independent contractor relationship, consulting arrangement or any other type of work-related contract with that member of the community.

This individual voluntarily reached out to Critical Role with concerns around his own experience with online bullying. Critical Role does not condone online bullying or harassment of any kind, and an employee within the company listened with the sole purpose of being an understanding ear. The correspondences on Discord reflect an empathetic dialogue with a concerned member of the community and not the providing of any professional services to Critical Role by this individual. Nothing in the communications established any professional, employment, or contractual relationship with Critical Role. After months of casual interaction, the individual made an inquiry to the Critical Role employee about possibly being engaged by Critical Role as a consultant to the company. Upon receiving this request, the Critical Role employee immediately and clearly declined the request.

The importance of helping cultivate and encourage positive and inclusive spaces for Critters has always been a huge priority for us well before this interaction. Although we understand that there is only so much we can control within unofficial online communities and platforms, Critical Role has been working on new policies to ensure that we’re clear with you about what we stand for, and more importantly, what we do not stand for. You’ll hear more about this in the coming months.

Thank you for your ongoing support. Harassment of any kind is unacceptable, so please be kind, and don’t forget to love each other.

Critical Role

 

[jgsugden]

The legal involvement story in situations like this can be quite varied. The first legal involvement could have been an established firm that aggressively pursues employment disputes, it could have been a shared counsel that advises artists and professionals, or it could have been a buddy from college that just passed the bar and was willing to write a demand letter. All tell drastically differently stories of how this started, and the response by CR would likely be similar to each.

 

[Espadadelaaurora]

A shame that lately we've reading more about controversy than the game itself.

 

[jgsugden]

A shame that lately we've reading more about controversy than the game itself.

Lately?

 

[Guest 6948803]

Critical Role built its brand upon cristal clarity and sterling honesty.
It helped them to repulse all scripting accusations. It's their boon and burden, so they can't treat lightly any indictments.
And controversies heat up people more than game itself, partly because WotC trickle game news at excruciatingly slow rate, having pretty low direct web presence. I can't remember when I checked D&D page directly for news, last D&D live was not that interesting and technically troubled, we still have no word about new iteration of Dice, Camera, Action (I don't remember its new name) all in all, we can only speculate. So, out of boredom, we gossip and argue instead of picking apart new rules or discuss new storylines or settings.

 

[jgsugden]

Critical Role built its brand upon cristal clarity and sterling honesty.
It helped them to repulse all scripting accusations...

Which was also assisted by the notion that 'scripting' the D&D game would be ridiculous. Utterly. I believe they have out of game discussions that guide the direction of the game, but only to the extent necessary to avoid legal/regulatory issues, or to keep Matt from going insane (we've all had the "Hey, Folks, I'm not prepared to wing a delve into that side of the dungeon tonight... if we go that way, we have to stop now" discussion with our players).

 

[Morrus]

A shame that lately we've reading more about controversy than the game itself.

There just isn’t that much news about the game itself, unless you want to dive into all the zillion rules questions they answer on Twitter. Controversies seem to turn up more often than news items!

 

[DnD Warlord]

Ugh...I am so glad after they self examined they realized they did nothing wrong...

Then again, if my boss was breaking the law, got called on it, then said "I made sure to thourgouly investigate this and I did nothing wrong...here I paid a lawyer to also tell you I did nothing wrong" no one would believe her.

 

[Teraptus]

A simple mere Twitter search will reveal a group of people who are specifically targeting WOTC and anything/anyone related and even now targeting people who play D&D and support WOTC. A real awesome group of humans. Hive Mind mentality brought to you by Twitter.

 

[DnD Warlord]

A simple mere Twitter search will reveal a group of people who are specifically targeting WOTC and anything/anyone related and even now targeting people who play D&D and support WOTC. A real awesome group of humans. Hive Mind mentality brought to you by Twitter.

Wait...targeting them irl???

 

[Morrus]

A simple mere Twitter search will reveal a group of people who are specifically targeting WOTC and anything/anyone related and even now targeting people who play D&D and support WOTC. A real awesome group of humans. Hive Mind mentality brought to you by Twitter.

I don’t think it’s that simple. WotC in particular seems to be getting it from all sides right now. The folks talking about Mearls or Orion Black are definitely not the same folks yelling at them about alignment and orcs.