Mike Mearls is polling about how much you'd pay for him to make you an AL legal custom subclass

[flametitan]

https://twitter.com/mikemearls/status/909977249843003392

EDIT: I should at least clarify that it's technically a donation for Extra Life, but my overall feelings still stand

On the one hand this seems kind of cool, but I don't know about the precedence this sets. It seems kind of wrong to be able to (with a donation to charity, yes) pay someone to essentially homebrew something for you and circumvent the guidelines of AL. Likewise, I have concerns about the possibility that this wouldn't be as stringently tested as something put together for a published book, or even UA.

 

[KahlessNestor]

Ugh. I agree. I didn't like it when Crawfors was signing free reroll boons at GenCon either. There's no way to verify this stuff, making me the "mean DM" if I don't allow it.

Sent from my SM-G900P using EN World mobile app

 

[ccs]

Does this count as your +1 source?

 

[flametitan]

Does this count as your +1 source?

As far as I've heard, certificates exist outside of the core+1 rules, but I'm not certain on that.

 

[darjr]

They do.

How many people it'll be, one maybe two, three people? Not really a big deal. Though I don't like pay to win, this isn't that.

 

[Eltab]

I think doing this for AL - which relies on a level of predictability and sameness to allow random tables to be built and succeed, no "I've got a special case" - is probably a mistake.

However, if we can get more neat ideas for subclasses out where people can 'kick the tires' and try them out, with the goal of eventual publication ... I would like that.

 

[Anthraxus]

While AL does have/need a level of predictability, this will affect very few people(one person and DM's for their games). Mearls will hopefully make it a little underpowered to account for lack of playtesting.

It's for charity and I have absolutely no problem with it.

 

[Pauper]

*sigh* Here we go again.

That link above goes to a special cert Mearls put together for his DDAO module he ran at Winter Fantasy 2016 that allowed the bearer to play a Mystic (the psionic playtest character class) legally in Adventurers League. Based on the conversation in that thread, and that there was (and still hasn't been, to my knowledge) any official AL announcement about the cert means that Mearls basically made the cert on his own and put it in the module without bothering to check with other AL staff to see if it was a good idea -- he just did it because he could.

Looks like the same thing is happening here. It'd be nice to see folks with official AL credentials chime in to say that doing this is a Bad Idea for Adventurers League, even if it is for charity.

--
Pauper

 

[kalani]

I have forwarded the link to the twitter thread to the AL group

 

[Warmaster Horus]

We live in an age of exclusivity. There are special editions of game books and dice. Conventions offer VIP experiences for those with the cash. Like everywhere else, conspicuous consumption opportunities abound.