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Who Makes WotC's Adventures?
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<blockquote data-quote="Owen K.C. Stephens" data-source="post: 7676746" data-attributes="member: 3190"><p>Just because my name has been evoked: I am not one of the people who worked on this product. I desperately wanted to; I am still a huge fan of D&D, but simply couldn't make the tome. So I remain a Pathfinder-developer for the moment.</p><p></p><p>As for "outsourcing," it's worth noting that within the RPG industry, the use of freelancers is not normally spoken of in terms of outsourcing. Note that I am not just talking about freelance writing. I have been paid, as a freelancer, to conceive of and outline products (turning a company's vague desire to have a book that fills some business need, which may be "an adventure" or "a weekly line of products" or "A 300-page book"), name products (literally just paid to come up with better names for nearly-finished products), write the text for products, develop products (take finished text and make it better from a narrative, poetry, and rules perspective, separate from actual editing - which is often done with freelance editors), write an art order (which is then drawn by freelance artists, and may well be contracted and overseen by a freelance art director), work with a layout artist to establish a graphic design and match a desired level or aesthetic or utility (who is often a freelancer), write marketing text, and do a post-mortem analysis to figure out where a product went wrong.</p><p></p><p>In short I have personally been paid as a freelancer, or have worked with someone acting in a freelance capacity, to do every possible step in the creation of an rpg book. Not all of those were for WotC, but within the industry the idea of freelancing out even *most* of a book is just "hiring freelancers," unlike, say, when another company (say WizKids) literally oversees the production of a licenses product (say, pre-painted miniatures). All of my actual D&D credits are as a freelancer. Some of those D&D credits I was given, as *freelance* work, while working for WotC.</p><p></p><p>Those are some pretty blurred lines.</p><p></p><p>In the case of WotC's current projects, rather than hire separate freelancers for every step they don't want to do in-house, they seem to have contracted with other RPG companies that include people with experience they trust, to have all those freelance tasks handled by one interconnected group. And as long as every step of every process is either handled in-house by WotC staff (such as deciding on the name, topic, length, outline, quality of paper, level of color, *number* of illustrations - all things I would expect them to do in house even when working with a freelance design team - though again I don’t know because I wasn't working on any of these projects) or has regular input and feedback (and by regular I mean monthly to bi-weekly, which is WAY more than freelance writers get - when I am freelance writing, I normally have either *0* points opt contact before the end of the project, is *one* milestone that may or may not generate any commentary), then when talking to other rpg folks I would still call it a "WotC book" done with freelancers, rather than calling it "outsourced."</p><p></p><p>Indeed, given how little feedback I ever got when I was a freelance writer, and how often freelancers are used to outline, develop, edit, art direct, illustrate, lay out, and market a book, it's possible (though again, I cannot speak from direct experience) that on-staff WotC people were more directly involved in the various stages of creation of these books than the typical 3.5e or 4e release.</p><p></p><p>And if that were the case, or even if the level of involvement was essentially unchanged from previous editions, I'd understand finding it “bizarre” when people suddenly start referring to freelance-produced projects (even if the freelancers are a corporate entity that gets its own recognition, rather than just a collection of individuals) as “outsourcing,” even if that model seems to meet some common definitions of that term.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Owen K.C. Stephens, post: 7676746, member: 3190"] Just because my name has been evoked: I am not one of the people who worked on this product. I desperately wanted to; I am still a huge fan of D&D, but simply couldn't make the tome. So I remain a Pathfinder-developer for the moment. As for "outsourcing," it's worth noting that within the RPG industry, the use of freelancers is not normally spoken of in terms of outsourcing. Note that I am not just talking about freelance writing. I have been paid, as a freelancer, to conceive of and outline products (turning a company's vague desire to have a book that fills some business need, which may be "an adventure" or "a weekly line of products" or "A 300-page book"), name products (literally just paid to come up with better names for nearly-finished products), write the text for products, develop products (take finished text and make it better from a narrative, poetry, and rules perspective, separate from actual editing - which is often done with freelance editors), write an art order (which is then drawn by freelance artists, and may well be contracted and overseen by a freelance art director), work with a layout artist to establish a graphic design and match a desired level or aesthetic or utility (who is often a freelancer), write marketing text, and do a post-mortem analysis to figure out where a product went wrong. In short I have personally been paid as a freelancer, or have worked with someone acting in a freelance capacity, to do every possible step in the creation of an rpg book. Not all of those were for WotC, but within the industry the idea of freelancing out even *most* of a book is just "hiring freelancers," unlike, say, when another company (say WizKids) literally oversees the production of a licenses product (say, pre-painted miniatures). All of my actual D&D credits are as a freelancer. Some of those D&D credits I was given, as *freelance* work, while working for WotC. Those are some pretty blurred lines. In the case of WotC's current projects, rather than hire separate freelancers for every step they don't want to do in-house, they seem to have contracted with other RPG companies that include people with experience they trust, to have all those freelance tasks handled by one interconnected group. And as long as every step of every process is either handled in-house by WotC staff (such as deciding on the name, topic, length, outline, quality of paper, level of color, *number* of illustrations - all things I would expect them to do in house even when working with a freelance design team - though again I don’t know because I wasn't working on any of these projects) or has regular input and feedback (and by regular I mean monthly to bi-weekly, which is WAY more than freelance writers get - when I am freelance writing, I normally have either *0* points opt contact before the end of the project, is *one* milestone that may or may not generate any commentary), then when talking to other rpg folks I would still call it a "WotC book" done with freelancers, rather than calling it "outsourced." Indeed, given how little feedback I ever got when I was a freelance writer, and how often freelancers are used to outline, develop, edit, art direct, illustrate, lay out, and market a book, it's possible (though again, I cannot speak from direct experience) that on-staff WotC people were more directly involved in the various stages of creation of these books than the typical 3.5e or 4e release. And if that were the case, or even if the level of involvement was essentially unchanged from previous editions, I'd understand finding it “bizarre” when people suddenly start referring to freelance-produced projects (even if the freelancers are a corporate entity that gets its own recognition, rather than just a collection of individuals) as “outsourcing,” even if that model seems to meet some common definitions of that term. [/QUOTE]
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