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Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mearls" data-source="post: 9704193" data-attributes="member: 697">That's true. We started work in early 2011 on what 5e could be.At the same time, I had to make the case that:<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Having an active, healthy TTRPG was good for the D&D brand.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">We could produce a game that would make customers happy within a very limited budget. I think we had maybe 20% of the headcount and cash budget to make it versus 4e.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">We could stop the business from hemorrhaging money while building a new edition. That was the big problem. 4e had effectively stopped selling around 2010 or so. Essentials hadn't changed anything. Everything had to tie back to this, since no one likes a business that runs deep into the red.</li> </ol>The alternative was to fire us all and put the TTRPG on ice, or fire us all and license it. Part of the argument was that no one wanted to license 4e, and that no one would license 3e because Paizo had already captured that audience. Hasbro would be selling very low on D&D.We had the final greenlight to make the game in late 2011. My final hurdle was a presentation to our finance VP. I don't remember when I received word that we had the greenlight, but I do remember that meeting. When it wrapped I knew that we were off to the races.We still almost licensed out D&D, but that ended up not happening because WotC could see how much momentum we were gathering. It was around Gen Con 2013 when it was confirmed that we'd be publishing and supporting the game in-house.Another big factor was turning the D&D team into a machine that made hit board games. People forget now, but we won the Origins Award for best board game three years running. Of five games we released in the run up to 5e, three of them had multiple print runs and one, Lords of Waterdeep, was a game of the year contender. Even the misses did well enough. I think that showed we had turned the corner in making products to the point that we were trusted with 5e. It also helped turn our massive losses into profitability.</blockquote>

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