WotC Mike Mearls: "D&D Is Uncool Again"

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In Mike Mearls' recent interview with Ben Riggs, he talks about how he feels that Dungeons & Dragons has had its moment, and is now uncool again. Mearls was one of the lead designers of D&D 5E and became the franchise's Creative Director in 2018. He worked at WotC until he was laid off in 2023. He is now EP of roleplaying games at Chaosium, the publisher of Call of Chulhu.

My theory is that when you look back at the OGL, the real impact of it is that it made D&D uncool again. D&D was cool, right? You had Joe Manganiello and people like that openly talking about playing D&D. D&D was something that was interesting, creative, fun, and different. And I think what the OGL did was take that concept—that Wizards and this idea of creativity that is inherent in the D&D brand because it's a roleplaying game, and I think those two things were sundered. And I don’t know if you can ever put them back together.

I think, essentially, it’s like that phrase: The Mandate of Heaven. I think fundamentally what happened was that Wizards has lost the Mandate of Heaven—and I don’t see them even trying to get it back.

What I find fascinating is that it was Charlie Hall who wrote that article. This is the same Charlie Hall who wrote glowing reviews of the 5.5 rulebooks. And then, at the same time, he’s now writing, "This is your chance because D&D seems to be stumbling." How do you square that? How do I go out and say, "Here are the two new Star Wars movies. They’re the best, the most amazing, the greatest Star Wars movies ever made. By the way, Star Wars has never been weaker. Now is the time for other sci-fi properties", like, to me that doesn’t make any sense! To me, it’s a context thing again.

Maybe this is the best Player’s Handbook ever written—but the vibes, the audience, the people playing these games—they don’t seem excited about it. We’re not seeing a groundswell of support and excitement. Where are the third-party products? That’s what I'd ask. Because that's what you’d think, "oh, there’s a gap", I mean remember before the OGL even came up, back when 3.0 launched, White Wolf had a monster book. There were multiple adventures at Gen Con. The license wasn’t even official yet, and there were already adventures showing up in stores. We're not seeing that, what’s ostensibly the new standard going forward? If anything, we’re seeing the opposite—creators are running in the opposite direction. I mean, that’s where I’m going.

And hey—to plug my Patreon—patreon.com/mikemearls (one word). This time last year, when I was looking at my post-Wizards options, I thought, "Well, maybe I could start doing 5E-compatible stuff." And now what I’m finding is…I just don’t want to. Like—it just seems boring. It’s like trying to start a hair metal band in 1992. Like—No, no, no. Everyone’s mopey and we're wearing flannel. It's Seattle and rain. It’s Nirvana now, man. It’s not like Poison. And that’s the vibe I get right now, yeah, Poison was still releasing albums in the ’90s. They were still selling hundreds of thousands or a million copies. But they didn’t have any of the energy. It's moved on. But what’s interesting to me is that roleplaying game culture is still there. And that’s what I find fascinating about gaming in general—especially TTRPGs. I don’t think we’ve ever had a period where TTRPGs were flourishing, and had a lot of energy and excitement around them, and D&D wasn’t on the upswing. Because I do think that’s what’s happening now. We’re in very strange waters where I think D&D is now uncool.
 

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He touched on that elsewhere in the video. He suspects "fastest-selling" is a weasel word designed to conceal the fact that it's not doing as well as they want to project.
What exactly are they supposed to be concealing... is it or is it not the fastest selling edition at this point...Regardless of why, unless WotC made a definitive statement about that. This statement by Mearls feels like he's insinuating they are lying but doesn't state what they are supposedly lying about.
 

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If, say, 20% of the now 30m players picked up the PHB in physical or digital format, with some small-to-tiny minority picking it up in both
the DDB bundle was pretty attractive, $10 for the digital with the book at full price. Given that Amazon gives about a 10% discount rather than the 40-50% when it was categorized as a book makes that pretty compelling, and I assume they count that as two sales
 

What exactly are they supposed to be concealing... is it or is it not the fastest selling edition at this point...Regardless of why, unless WotC made a definitive statement about that. This statement by Mearls feels like he's insinuating they are lying but doesn't state what they are supposedly lying about.
I don't think they are lying and Mike doesn't think they are lying... but rather WotC is just choosing the best version of their situation to highlight in order to use it as promotion and advertisement. So they are being selective with their language to choose things that make it seem like something might be more important or bigger than it otherwise would be.

It's like what a movie company says "Biggest four-day holiday weekend opening ever!" for some film. They have chosen a very specific subset of time to use as their way of using the advertising buzzwords of "biggest" and "ever" to make the film seem more important. Are they lying? No, the film might very well be the biggest ever over a "four-day holiday weekend"... but it doesn't mean it's the biggest ever over a four-day weekend that wasn't a holiday weekend. And it certainly isn't the biggest opening ever over a standard 3-day weekend. And it also says nothing about how the film did over the entire week's box office, or the second weekend, or it's entire run... etc. etc. etc. They chose a specific set of terms in order to pump the film up to make it appear bigger.

Advertising and hype are advertising and hype... and the entire purpose is to highlight the things that are technically true... but aren't necessarily as big or as great as they might seem if you just take a few minutes to parse the language used. But because lots of (in fact most) people don't bother taking those minutes to parse the language and instead just take the claim on its face... the hype does exactly what it was hoping to do. Someone will see "biggest" and "ever" and think "Well, this film must be awesome, I gotta go see it!"... and they buy a ticket they might not otherwise have done had they not seen that promotion.
 


I don't think they are lying and Mike doesn't think they are lying... but rather WotC is just choosing the best version of their situation to highlight in order to use it as promotion and advertisement. So they are being selective with their language to choose things that make it seem like something might be more important or bigger than it otherwise would be.

It's like what a movie company says "Biggest four-day holiday weekend opening ever!" for some film. They have chosen a very specific subset of time to use as their way of using the advertising buzzwords of "biggest" and "ever" to make the film seem more important. Are they lying? No, the film might very well be the biggest ever over a "four-day holiday weekend"... but it doesn't mean it's the biggest ever over a four-day weekend that wasn't a holiday weekend. And it certainly isn't the biggest opening ever over a standard 3-day weekend. And it also says nothing about how the film did over the entire week's box office, or the second weekend, or it's entire run... etc. etc. etc. They chose a specific set of terms in order to pump the film up to make it appear bigger.

Advertising and hype are advertising and hype... and the entire purpose is to highlight the things that are technically true... but aren't necessarily as big or as great as they might seem if you just take a few minutes to parse the language used. But because lots of (in fact most) people don't bother taking those minutes to parse the language and instead just take the claim on its face... the hype does exactly what it was hoping to do. Someone will see "biggest" and "ever" and think "Well, this film must be awesome, I gotta go see it!"... and they buy a ticket they might not otherwise have done had they not seen that promotion.
Agreed. Marketing is mostly deception and manipulation for profit, and that's why I dislike it as a rule.
 

I don't think they are lying and Mike doesn't think they are lying... but rather WotC is just choosing the best version of their situation to highlight in order to use it as promotion and advertisement. So they are being selective with their language to choose things that make it seem like something might be more important or bigger than it otherwise would be.

It's like what a movie company says "Biggest four-day holiday weekend opening ever!" for some film. They have chosen a very specific subset of time to use as their way of using the advertising buzzwords of "biggest" and "ever" to make the film seem more important. Are they lying? No, the film might very well be the biggest ever over a "four-day holiday weekend"... but it doesn't mean it's the biggest ever over a four-day weekend that wasn't a holiday weekend. And it certainly isn't the biggest opening ever over a standard 3-day weekend. And it also says nothing about how the film did over the entire week's box office, or the second weekend, or it's entire run... etc. etc. etc. They chose a specific set of terms in order to pump the film up to make it appear bigger.

Advertising and hype are advertising and hype... and the entire purpose is to highlight the things that are technically true... but aren't necessarily as big or as great as they might seem if you just take a few minutes to parse the language used. But because lots of (in fact most) people don't bother taking those minutes to parse the language and instead just take the claim on its face... the hype does exactly what it was hoping to do. Someone will see "biggest" and "ever" and think "Well, this film must be awesome, I gotta go see it!"... and they buy a ticket they might not otherwise have done had they not seen that promotion.
Yes but the term weasl words implies they are being dishonest or at the least misleading... what is misleading about the statement? It's a precise single fact that isn't elaborated on with unknowable speculation. In fact I'd argue trying to pull it apart as opposed to taking it at face value is apt to create more misunderstanding than the initial statement. Is it an attempt to make them look good, yes but then why would they mention something that would paint them in a bad light.
 


Is it an attempt to make them look good, yes but then why would they mention something that would paint them in a bad light.
Sure, but it's intentional ambiguity, which is literally the dictionary definition of "weasel words", right next to the alternative of "misleading".

If they wanted precision, they could easily say how many copies they'd sold by X date.

But they didn't do that. And we're not babes in the woods here, are we? We've all seen companies do this before - when companies make vague claims like "fastest selling", rather than proudly boasting "YO WE SOLD 10 MILLION COPIES HOW ABOUT THAT??!?!?!? HOW YOU LIKE THEM APPLES?!?!?", questions are naturally raised. Because the natural suspicion, based on the history usage of this behaviour, this method of speech, is that they're covering up lower-than-expected sales - though the "expected" might on our end or theirs.

To be clear, I feel certain WotC are being technically truthful when they say "fastest selling", but I've followed media (including games) for too long to not have my interest piqued by the decision to go vague and relative instead of saying "X copies sold by Y date!", which is the normal and often quite powerful way of doing things (we've seen video games really get a boost just by saying that, for example, as people go "Wow, I guess it is good!").
 

What are they deceiving you about in the statement given?
In the example, they are clearly trying to get you to think the movie is objectively very popular by presenting a technically true statement in a bombastic and exciting way that in reality covers only a narrow span of time or circumstance. In actuality there is no way to know for certain the true popularity based on what they present, but they nonetheless want you to draw that general conclusion. Thus, it is deceptive.
 

Yes but the term weasl words implies they are being dishonest or at the least misleading... what is misleading about the statement? It's a precise single fact that isn't elaborated on with unknowable speculation. In fact I'd argue trying to pull it apart as opposed to taking it at face value is apt to create more misunderstanding than the initial statement. Is it an attempt to make them look good, yes but then why would they mention something that would paint them in a bad light.
What difference does it make?

There's nothing more pointless (hyperbole used) to argue against or defend for advertising and hype. It is an utter waste of time trying to "discredit" WotC for what they are saying or trying to "defend" WotC for what they are saying. Because we all know what advertising and hype are here for and what it does.

WotC's hype machine doesn't need people defending their use... and people trying to catch the hype machine in some sort of lie are just blowing smoke up their own rear ends.
 
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