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Kate Welch on Leaving WotC
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<blockquote data-quote="Al'Kelhar" data-source="post: 8092985" data-attributes="member: 7884"><p>A bit late to this conversation, but my 2c.</p><p></p><p>The focus of the discussion around the new player experience seems to have been caught up in the length and complexity of the ruleset.</p><p></p><p>The new player experience has nothing to do with the length and complexity of the ruleset.</p><p></p><p>Let me use an analogy.</p><p></p><p>My wife has one of those "sleep story" apps, where some softly-spoken person tells you a nice, calming story to relax you and send you to sleep. One of those sleep stories is, quite literally, <em>John McEnroe reading the official rules of tennis</em>.</p><p></p><p>I think tennis is quite a popular sport. It is quite a popular activity for kids. Tennis schools abound.</p><p></p><p>Has any one of the tens or hundreds of millions of tennis players ever read the rules of the game? Remember, <em>those rules can literally send you to sleep</em>.</p><p></p><p>And yet, millions of people take up tennis, and for many reasons, for example, because it looks fun, they want to get fit, or their friends play it and they want to hang out with their friends.</p><p></p><p>D&D is the same.</p><p></p><p>The new player experience has to focus on the <em>experience</em>. If I see a bunch of people laughing, yelling, hanging on the edge of their seats as some other person at the table evocatively describes a scene for them, jumping up and high-fiving other players when they roll some number on some weird-shaped die, or even bursting into tears when some imaginary person dies or otherwise does something deeply emotionally moving - I want in on <em>that experience</em>. That <em>shared</em> experience.</p><p></p><p>If I get that experience, and keep getting that experience, sooner or later, I'm gonna learn the rules. Possibly wrongly. But who cares, right?</p><p></p><p>Improving the new user <em>experience</em> is fundamentally about <em>improving the experience</em>, not improving (simplifying, making more accessible, etc.) the rules. The rules are a vanishingly small part of the experience.</p><p></p><p>Cheers, Al'Kelhar</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Al'Kelhar, post: 8092985, member: 7884"] A bit late to this conversation, but my 2c. The focus of the discussion around the new player experience seems to have been caught up in the length and complexity of the ruleset. The new player experience has nothing to do with the length and complexity of the ruleset. Let me use an analogy. My wife has one of those "sleep story" apps, where some softly-spoken person tells you a nice, calming story to relax you and send you to sleep. One of those sleep stories is, quite literally, [I]John McEnroe reading the official rules of tennis[/I]. I think tennis is quite a popular sport. It is quite a popular activity for kids. Tennis schools abound. Has any one of the tens or hundreds of millions of tennis players ever read the rules of the game? Remember, [I]those rules can literally send you to sleep[/I]. And yet, millions of people take up tennis, and for many reasons, for example, because it looks fun, they want to get fit, or their friends play it and they want to hang out with their friends. D&D is the same. The new player experience has to focus on the [I]experience[/I]. If I see a bunch of people laughing, yelling, hanging on the edge of their seats as some other person at the table evocatively describes a scene for them, jumping up and high-fiving other players when they roll some number on some weird-shaped die, or even bursting into tears when some imaginary person dies or otherwise does something deeply emotionally moving - I want in on [I]that experience[/I]. That [I]shared[/I] experience. If I get that experience, and keep getting that experience, sooner or later, I'm gonna learn the rules. Possibly wrongly. But who cares, right? Improving the new user [I]experience[/I] is fundamentally about [I]improving the experience[/I], not improving (simplifying, making more accessible, etc.) the rules. The rules are a vanishingly small part of the experience. Cheers, Al'Kelhar [/QUOTE]
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