Kyle Brink (D&D Exec Producer) On OGL Controversy & One D&D (Summary)

The YouTube channel 3 Black Halflings spoke to WotC's Kyle Brink (executive producer, D&D) about the recent Open Game License events, amongst other things. It's an hour-plus long interview (which you can watch below) but here are some of the highlights of what Brink said. Note these are my paraphrases, so I encourage you to listen to the actual interview for full context if you have time.

OGL v1.1 Events

• There was a concern that the OGL allowed Facebook to make a D&D Metaverse without WotC involvement.
• Re. the OGL decisions, WotC had gotten themselves into a 'terrible place' and are grateful for the feedback that allowed them to see that.
• The royalties in OGL v1.1 were there as a giant deterrent to mega corporations.
• Kyle Brink is not familiar with what happened in the private meetings with certain publishers in December, although was aware that meetings were taking place.
• When the OGL v1.1 document became public, WotC had already abandoned much of it.
• The response from WotC coinciding with D&D Beyond subscription cancellations was a coincidence as it takes longer than that to modify a legal document.
• The atmosphere in WotC during the delay before making an announcement after the OGL v1.1 went public was 'bad' -- fear of making it worse if they said anything. The feeling was that they should not talk, just deliver the new version.
• Brink does not know who wrote the unpopular 'you won but we won too' announcement and saw it the same time we did. He was not happy with it.
• 'Draft' contracts can have dates and boxes for signatures. Despite the leaked version going to some publishers, it was not final or published.
• There were dissenting voices within WotC regarding the OGL v1.1, but once the company had agreed how to proceed, everybody did the best they could to deliver.
• The dissenting voices were not given enough weight to effect change. Brinks' team is now involved in the process and can influence decisions.
• The SRD release into Creative Commmons is a one-way door; there can be no takeback.

One D&D

• The intention is that all of the new [One D&D] updates they are doing, "the SRD will be updated to remain compatible with all of that". This might be with updted rules or with bridging language like 'change the word race to species'.
• Anything built with the current SRD will be 100% compatible with the new rules.
• Brink does not think there is a plan to, and does not see the value, in creating a new OGL just for One D&D. When/if they put more stuff into the public space, they'd do it through Creative Commons.
• WotC doesn't think of One D&D as a new edition. He feels it's more like what happened with 3.5. They think 5E is great, but coud be better and play faster and easier with more room for roleplay, so there is stuff they can do to improve it but not replace it.

Inclusivity

• WotC is leaning on the community to discourage bad actors and hateful content, rather than counting on a legal document.
• They are working on an adaptable content policy describing what they consider to be hateful content which will apply to WotC's work (no legal structure to apply it to anybody else).
• They now have external inclusivity reviewers (as of last fall) who look over every word and report back. They are putting old content through the same process before reprints.
• Previously cultural consultances were used for spot reviews on things they thought might be problematic, but not everything (e.g. Hadozee).
• The problematic Hadozee content was written by a trusted senior person at WotC, and very few people saw it before publication.
• 'DnDShorts' video on the internal workings and management culture of WotC is not something Brinks can talk on, but it is not reflective of his team. Each team has its own culture.
• In the last couple of years the D&D team hiring process has made the team more inclusive.
• When asked about non white-CIS-men in leadership positions at WotC, Brinks referred to some designers and authors. He said 'guys like me, we're leaving the workforce, to be blunt' and 'I'm not the face of the hobby any more'. It is important that the creators at WotC look like the players. 'Guys like me can't leave soon enough'.

Virtual Tabletops (VTTs)/Digital Gaming

• Goal is to make more ways to play ('and' not 'instead') including a cool looking 3D space.
• Digital gaming is not meant to replace books etc., but to be additive.
• The strategy is to give players a choice, and WotC will go where the player interests lie.

​

 

[gametaku]

Just as an aside as I'm only getting to this video now, Kyle says WotC spoke to the biggest content creators during this entire process - is the Enworld community + content created such as A5e and the weekly/monthly mini-mags really not considered large enough for them to speak to Morrus?

They did reach out to Morrus, the meeting just didn't pan out

OGL - Gizmodo Reveals OGL v1.1's 'Term Sheet' Carrots For Selected Publishers

In December, WotC arranged meetings under NDA with a number of prominent third party 5E OGL creators in order to persuade them to sign up to the new Open Game License v1.1. before it was revealed to the world. Part of this approach included 'Term Sheets'. According to Gizmodo, which has sources...

www.enworld.org

 

[Stefano Rinaldelli]

Yeah and I think you totally glossed over the complexities of why a statement like that directed at black people would be taken with more offense than when directed at white people. Hint: Only one race has a history of systemic racism implemented by the other... so stop trying to compare and make equivalent apples to oranges.

Imaro, this is not the place to talk about that. Don't want to slip in the slope of moderation. I'm not glossing, I'm arguing that lack of contextualization generates monsters. End conversation.

 

[Sacrosanct]

You trust WotC not to use optics?
I mean the interviewers in this interview didn't even believe what Kyle was telling them on certain topics why are you so confident in WotC not utilising the benefit of optics? I mean hiring could be run by a different department.

Sure I think they are looking at that. But I also think they are making sure the hire has the skills. This idea that PoC are being hired with no skills just isn't really true. It's a myth and often used as a dog whistle.

 

[Cadence]

You can have only one of two criteria: skill or representation. If you introduce a quote it is very easy that you will be forced to exclude somebody skilled. It is not impossible to build a dream team with representation criteria, since skill are equally distributed.

Skill development is often highly related to opportunity. Opportunity is often based on the social and fiscal capital in ones community and family. Those things are not equally distributed.

But you can easily risk to be forced to exclude the optimum team. It's a philosophical approach. I prefer skill based criteria and find quota based criteria simply wrong.

Candidate traits for most positions are highly multidimensional, and for any competitive hiring situation it feels like it is rare that someone is better on all of them - or that there is agreement on how the various traits are combined. If there are several similar candidates it feels like some tie breaker will be used. I'm not sure "my conversation with them went well [because we have a lot of social life things in common]" is a particularly good one - but I'm betting it is used a lot.

 

[AstroCat]

Anecdotally I think it's still overwhelming white males, but I don't have access to the survey results. He does, I would think.

Yes there are many in similar industries that do and I'm eluding to the fact that reality it is much different than the pr commentary.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Yeah, we see that a lot, following up the claim with a but. But nothing. You want to welcome any and all into the hobby, you have to do the work to do so.

I feel you badly misrepresented the previous poster by cutting them off on that but. The but had nothing to do with their previous sentence.

 

[Scribe]

If the population in their market is still mostly white male gamers, and they aren't the majority of the population in general, then it looks like there are certain other areas that offer some pretty good growth potential. Hence, the deliberate efforts at inclusion.

This is my assumption. It's not that their current majority (50.1%) is not 'white dudes' it's their target demographic is not, as that's the growth opportunity.

Which again means, I (the white dude) am not the target.

 

[dave2008]

I keep on prefer when people are not choosen by their color but by their skills...

Have you watched the new interview? Kyle goes more in-depth into the hiring process. They try to get a representative pool of applicants. Then they hire from that pool solely based on the applicant's skill, The hiring is as color-blind as possible because they want the best people regardless of anything else. This seems the correct way to do it IMO.

 

[dave2008]

This is my assumption. It's not that their current majority (50.1%) is not 'white dudes' it's their target demographic is not, as that's the growth opportunity.

Which again means, I (the white dude) am not the target.

That is not exactly true. If you are trying to sell something, everyone is a target.

 

[Stefano Rinaldelli]

Sure I think they are looking at that. But I also think they are making sure the hire has the skills. This idea that PoC are being hired with no skills just isn't really true. It's a myth and often used as a dog whistle.

You are bending the concept. I don't mean that PoC are hired unskilled. I simply say that if you have to respect quotas you can find yourself in the sad position of excluding some talented people because the black/white/red/yellow/female/trans places are ended. More: quotas are disqualifying for those who are chosen. I understand the rightfulness of the matter, but find quotas not a solution. It is my opinion. Nothing more.