Mearls is the new manager of D&D

[Fifth Element]

Incidentally, I seem to recall your signature line during the first year of 4E mentioning that you didn't play 4E but that never seemed to stop you from posting opinions on 4E.

Not sure how that's relevant. Not yet having played the game, and having zero interest in playing the game, are rather different things.

However, is it really that you don't understand

I think I understand, but I ask so as not to assume.

 

[porpentine]

Thought about starting another thread, but since the title of this one isn't 'Congrats Mr Mearls!' I figure comment on the appointment is legit.

Then you probably missed the bit up-thread where we asked people not to turn this thread into an edition debate. While I understand the sentiment, this isn't the place for it. Don't follow up on this please, everyone. ~ PCat

As a longtime player who gave 4E many throws of the dice and moved away, this is not an appointment that fills me with expectation of a return. If WotC had an interest in healing the rift in the game - in luring back the exodus - they would not have promoted Mearls, whose design philosophy is well-expressed by that edition.

To me (for me), that's a shame. I believe the great game would be better served were the rifts healed, and this appointment suggests to me that WotC are resigned to the game's division.

Hope I'm wrong,

The Porp.

 

[DaveMage]

Thought about starting another thread, but since the title of this one isn't 'Congrats Mr Mearls!' I figure comment on the appointment is legit.

As a longtime player who gave 4E many throws of the dice and moved away, this is not an appointment that fills me with expectation of a return. If WotC had an interest in healing the rift in the game - in luring back the exodus - they would not have promoted Mearls, whose design philosophy is well-expressed by that edition.

To me (for me), that's a shame. I believe the great game would be better served were the rifts healed, and this appointment suggests to me that WotC are resigned to the game's division.

Hope I'm wrong,

The Porp.

The good news is, though, that even if WotC continues its present 4E course, there are still lots of alternatives from the OSR to Pathfinder that still continue the rules and/or spirit of the earlier editions.

I admit, it's still very weird that I'm not buying the latest Dungeons & Dragons official products anymore (after 28 years of doing so), but it is what it is. Time to move on.

 

[doctorhook]

Go with the half-spleen and use your WoW names.

Isn't Mike the one who said something like, "I find World of Warcraft about as fun and exciting as banging my head against the wall" in an early 4E interview?

 

[Peraion Graufalke]

Isn't Mike the one who said something like, "I find World of Warcraft about as fun and exciting as banging my head against the wall" in an early 4E interview?

I think I saw that in diaglo's sig.

 

[TheYeti1775]

What's the issue with the conversions? You don't play 4E, I don't see why you'd care.

The conversions matter a lot in the scheme of things. Not as much to a new player, but to your older established base of players.

Even the jump 2E to 3.5E is fairly painless. Homebrewed innate powers translated well to various Feats (Custom in some cases), the proficiencies right to skills. Really the hardest part to overcome was the fact higher was always better now.
So you didn't 'leave behind' too many players, heck you brought quite a number of older players back into the fold of buying the products again. And Mike, himself, is an example of that in his own words.

The jump to 4E brought a lot more change to the D&D world than many cared for. The conversion becomes important in the fact if folks can't easily convert there characters into the new edition, guess what they are going to continue playing the older edition.

Personally I fine with admitting I was happily in the "I hate 4E" camp. I checked out the PHB/DMG/MM1 when they came out, I didn't like them.
Recently I have played in a 4E game, there are facets I've liked about it. But it doesn't hold me like the prior editions have.

As Brand Manager Mike will be tasked with three things primarily.
1. Bring new players in to buy WotC stuff.
2. Keep the players we have buying WotC stuff.
3. Bring older players back int and buying WotC stuff.
All boiling down to finding out what the market wants and trying to fill that need.

Personally I have a few ideas on various things that could be done, but most of it has been hashed out before.

...snip...
People learn game rules from the books; people learn how to make the game breath from the adventures.
...end snip...

No they learn them from their fellow players. I've yet to pick up a 4E book to learn the rules of the game. Yet I've successfully handled playing just on the basises of my fellow players explaining a few finer points to me.

 

[pneumatik]

Hey Mike:

Iron Heroes was awesome. Yeah, it needed a little more playtesting and editing, but all the PCs were awesome and spent time doing awesome things. Every session was awesome, so the game was awesome.

4E isn't quite as awesome. The rules make it too hard to do backflips off of chandeliers and land on your enemy's head, or to kill 15 people in one round with a dagger. If you could make 4E more awesome like that, I would like it more.

 

[Fifth Element]

The conversions matter a lot in the scheme of things. Not as much to a new player, but to your older established base of players.

Even the jump 2E to 3.5E is fairly painless.

Sure, but I'm not sure of the reason for asking them to not do conversions. Converting from older editions to 4E is generally more difficult than conversions in the past, so it would seem to be a good thing if it's done for you.

The jump to 4E brought a lot more change to the D&D world than many cared for. The conversion becomes important in the fact if folks can't easily convert there characters into the new edition, guess what they are going to continue playing the older edition.

We're discussing the conversion of older modules into 4E versions (Revenge of the Giants, for instance). It's not about converting characters.

This is not the place. You may not have seen my warning in your previous post, but I suggest you go glance at it. ~ PCat

 

[Raven Crowking]

No they learn them from their fellow players. I've yet to pick up a 4E book to learn the rules of the game. Yet I've successfully handled playing just on the basises of my fellow players explaining a few finer points to me.

Fair enough.

But the point I was making is that the adventures make the game come alive, whether those adventures are homebrewed or packaged. The packaged adventures should make people eager to write their own.

I think that putting more energy into that direction would reap rewards. It would also potentially give me something from WotC to spend my money on.


RC

 

[doctorhook]

The conversions matter a lot in the scheme of things. Not as much to a new player, but to your older established base of players.

I guess I'm not really sure why we're talking about conversions here at all, though I must echo Fifth_Element in that I'm doubly unsure why someone wouldn't want classic modules converted to 4E (unless it was to the total exclusion of new, original 4E modules, I suppose).

Ultimately, I just wanna see more adventures! New ones! Old ones remade for 4E! Put 'em in boxes! Put 'em in folios! Give 'em numbers instead of names! I said more or less the same thing on the WotC forums back in early 2007, IIRC, and I guess enough other people must've been saying the same thing, because WotC has gradually started doing just that. Keep it up, Mike!

Even the jump 2E to 3.5E is fairly painless. Homebrewed innate powers translated well to various Feats (Custom in some cases), the proficiencies right to skills. Really the hardest part to overcome was the fact higher was always better now.
So you didn't 'leave behind' too many players, heck you brought quite a number of older players back into the fold of buying the products again. And Mike, himself, is an example of that in his own words.

The jump to 4E brought a lot more change to the D&D world than many cared for. The conversion becomes important in the fact if folks can't easily convert there characters into the new edition, guess what they are going to continue playing the older edition.

Remember that the jump from 2E to 3E was a mechanical one. Suddenly, D&D worked differently, but it still looked the same on top.

OTOH, the jump from 3.5E to 4E included a lot more superficial and flavour changes. This is what most irritated a lot of "haters". The mechanical aspect of that change was fairly subtle, especially for players who had been up-to-date with the incremental changes in 3.5E over its production lifespan. This gradual change is the "hidden edition" between 3.5E and 4E. If you used (for example) Complete Mage's Reserve feats, Book of Nine Swords, Tome of Magic, and Player's Handbook II, the 3.5E you were playing was a lot more like 4E than core 3.5E ever was*, and as explained up-thread, Mike Mearls was a part of this. (*It's said SWSE was yet more similar to 4E even than these products.)

As Brand Manager Mike will be tasked with three things primarily.
1. Bring new players in to buy WotC stuff.
2. Keep the players we have buying WotC stuff.
3. Bring older players back int and buying WotC stuff.
All boiling down to finding out what the market wants and trying to fill that need.

Is that Mike's new title, "Brand Manager"? I heard something about being "Manager" of D&D R&D, but are you sure you've got his new job description correct? I'm confused.

No they learn them from their fellow players. I've yet to pick up a 4E book to learn the rules of the game. Yet I've successfully handled playing just on the basises of my fellow players explaining a few finer points to me.

You mentioned that you were a "4e hater" earlier. Is it possible that your negative attitude towards it is due to attitudes that you learned from the people who taught you to play 4E?

I'll be less rhetorical: having studied some social psychology, I know that science says it's definitely possible that you did. Have you considered picking up the books? If you approach it with a fresh mind, you might find a new appreciation for Mike's work.

I'm excited about the way D&D is going these past few years! I think Mike is the right guy for the job today. And personally, as a 4E fan who is aware of Mr Mearls' strong influence on the recent direction of D&D, I'm growing interested in checking out this "Iron Heroes" thing he worked on previously. Since I like 4E, maybe I'll like Iron Heroes too.