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WotC Ray Winninger Is Head of D&D RPG Team; Mike Mearls No Longer Works on RPG

People have been wondering where Mike Mearls has gone for quite some time. It seems that he has not been working on the D&D tabletop RPG since some time last year, and the new head of the team and Executive Producer is Ray Winninger. Winninger is an RPG industry veteran. Amongst other things, he was co-designer of DC Heroes and Torg, and wrote the Dungeoncraft column for Dragon Magazine. He...

People have been wondering where Mike Mearls has gone for quite some time. It seems that he has not been working on the D&D tabletop RPG since some time last year, and the new head of the team and Executive Producer is Ray Winninger.

Winninger is an RPG industry veteran. Amongst other things, he was co-designer of DC Heroes and Torg, and wrote the Dungeoncraft column for Dragon Magazine. He has worked at a number of RPG companies including TSR, Mayfair Games, West End Games, and more.

Ray_Winninger_at_MIX08_2_crop.jpg



Winninger is Chris Perkins' and Jeremy Crawford's boss. And in further comments, Chris Perkins says that Mike Mearls has not been part of the tabletop RPG team since some time last year.


That explains why Mearls' Twitch shows, like Happy Fun Hour, have disappeared. Although he's made a couple of retweets since, his last tweet on Twitter was February 13th, 2019. He still works at WotC on the D&D brand in some capacity, but not the tabletop RPG itself (he did an interview about Baldur's Gate 3 on Polygon last year).

Ray Winninger introduces himself in the latest issue of Dragon+, WotC's online magazine. "My name is Ray Winninger and I’m the new Executive Producer in charge of the Dungeons & Dragons studio at Wizards of the Coast. In just a few months on the job, I’ve already been impressed by the skills and the passion of the designers, artists, editors, and production staff who bring you our terrific D&D products. They are a uniquely talented group, and it is an honor to work alongside them."
 

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Nikosandros

Golden Procrastinator
For 0e-1e-2e Dragonsfoot fills that role quite well; there's gobs of resources and material there and much if not all of it is basically free. In theory anyone can add material; in practice there's a vetting process.

If you're looking to make money on your material, though, that's a different question entirely.
Yes, I know about DF. I used to be a regular some years ago. They have quite a catalog, it's true and there is a lot of new "TSR D&D" material in the OSR sphere. But having full legal access to the rules, the settings and the rest of the IP might bring some cool stuff... but anyway, I don't see that happening.

OTOH, opening GH and Mystara for 5e material seems plausible to me.
 


Parmandur

Book-Friend
I also noticed he revered to the “D&D studio at WotC” — which may well have been how they referred to it all along, but it’s the first time I’ve heard it referred to that way.

I think that's fairly recent: Mark Rosewater on the Magic side was talking a bit ago about how WotC went through a reorg into "studios in the past year and a half.
 

I wouldn't imagine it was a secret. The info was probably there for people interested enough to look. Who's in charge of the Apple Watch division of Apple, or running World of Warcraft?

I don't think that's actually true, oddly enough. The reason I say that is, rather unusually, WotC employees don't all appear to use their actual job titles on LinkedIn, but rather like, generalized titles that do not match up with the titles they introduce themselves with and describe themselves as having (presumably they're using pay-grade titles or something?). And LinkedIn really the only way you'd find out, short of like, wandering around the WotC offices, looking at nameplates (good way to get stopped by security and asked if you "Need some help, sir?" in a slightly threatening manner), or emailing WotC people directly on their WotC emails and looking at the signatures (assuming they use them - and I don't know if they do, though I would suspect they do, as in the corporate world it tends to be "a thing").

Also, mate I can assure you that WoW fans as serious as we are D&D fans all know exactly who is running WoW (Ion Hazzikostas, for reference). They never stop talking trash about him.
 

Parmandur

Book-Friend
I also noticed he revered to the “D&D studio at WotC” — which may well have been how they referred to it all along, but it’s the first time I’ve heard it referred to that way.

"Last year, Wizards of the Coast went through a reorganization. We shifted to what is known as a studio model, where teams are built around supporting a particular product. The team you all know of as R&D along with a few other sections of the company (including art, design, and production folks) were combined to become the studio for tabletop Magic (aka the game played with the physical cards)."

"There are different studios associated with other aspects of Magic, such as Digital Games and Franchise (the people overseeing our new Netflix series, for instance), and we work closely with them, but our studio's primary focus is making the tabletop game."


Mostly Magic related, but it would seem that Crawford and Perkins now report to Ray Winninger in a "D&D TTRPG" Studio, that is all about the game, all the time, and includes everything related to that. Since there is a "Magic Franchise" specific studio, and Mearls official job title right now is "Dungeons & Dragons Franchise Creative Director" and his involvement with BG3 would suggest that Mearls is in charge of another Studio focused on licensing D&D and brand identity.
 



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