Wizards Hires Erin Roberts as Game Designer for D&D

Wizards of the Coast has made another D&D game designer - this time tapping Erin Roberts, creator of the Godsbreath setting seen in Journeys from the Radiant Citadel. Roberts announced the hire on social media over the weekend. Similar to the hires of James Haeck and Leon Barillaro, Roberts is an established TTRPG designer. In addition to her credits at Wizards of the Coast, she's also worked for Paizo and Haunted Table. Her Godsbreath campaign setting has appeared in two different D&D anthologies, first appearing in Journeys from the Radiant Citadel.

Wizards has restocked its group of designers over the last year, following the departure of Jeremy Crawford and Chris Perkins. This is the third designer hired over the past couple of months, alongside the aforementioned Haeck and Barillaro. Additionally, Wizards promoted Justice Ramin Armin as the Director of Game Design.

While the D&D design team has put out a steady stream of Unearthed Arcana releases, no announcements of 2026 D&D products have been made as of yet.

 

[Zardnaar]

That's a hot take you're going to be hard pressed to find a lot of agreement on!

Ive enjoyed 3 adventures out of candlekeep. Maybe 2 more I want to run.

Haven't noticed many in Radiant Citadel. I picked it up half price.

Both are near the bottom of the anthologies though in terms of quality.

Overall trend of downward spiral around Icewind Dale/Tashas.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Ive enjoyed 3 adventures out of candlekeep. Maybe 2 more I want to run.

Haven't noticed many in Radiant Citadel. I picked it up half price.

Both are near the bottom of the anthologies though in terms of quality.

Overall trend of downward spiral around Icewind Dale/Tashas.

I think it’s a matter of what you are looking for. Radiant Citadel is absolutely top quality. What it isn’t is traditional dungeon delving and fighting. What it has is exactly what I look for - new ideas. The Godsbreath adventure is a case in point. If you look at it and say “this adventure only has one monster, and it’s in a small hut” you have missed the point. What it has is a rich world of culture and mythology to explore that is significantly different to anything D&D has done before.

Candlekeep has quality issues - it’s editing by Chris Perkins is heavy handed, to the extent that several of the adventures lost their point. Yawning Portal also has quality issues - the colourised maps are unclear, and some mechanical things that needed updating, such as giants being too big for their corridors, where missed.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think it’s a matter of what you are looking for. Radiant Citadel is absolutely top quality. What it isn’t is traditional dungeon delving and fighting. What it has is exactly what I look for - new ideas. The Godsbreath adventure is a case in point. If you look at it and say “this adventure only has one monster, and it’s in a small hut” you have missed the point. What it has is a rich world of culture and mythology to explore that is significantly different to anything D&D has done before.

Candlekeep has quality issues - it’s editing by Chris Perkins is heavy handed, to the extent that several of the adventures lost their point. Yawning Portal also has quality issues - the colourised maps are unclear, and some mechanical things that needed updating, such as giants being too big for their corridors, where missed.

Isn't RC widely regarded as neh? Impression i fet. Similar to Candlekeep.

They're still better than typical larger adventures. Sea of Mediocre.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Isn't RC widely regarded as neh? Impression i fet. Similar to Candlekeep.

A lot of people think The Sunken Citadel (YP) is good. And in a way they are right. It's a well built dungeon crawl with an ecology that makes sense. However, it's also as generic as you can get, without any new ideas or imagination. Even the sunken dungeon concept had been done better before, by DL1, which really used all three dimensions to great effect.

Horses for courses. Just because something isn't the sort of thing you like doesn't mean it's not quality. It just means its for someone else.

Candlekeep, on the other hand, does have quality issues, given that several of the adventures where wrecked in the editing.

 

[Zardnaar]

A lot of people think The Sunken Citadel (YP) is good. And in a way they are right. It's a well built dungeon crawl with an ecology that makes sense. However, it's also as generic as you can get, without any new ideas or imagination. Even the sunken dungeon concept had been done better before, by DL1, which really used all three dimensions to great effect.

Horses for courses. Just because something isn't the sort of thing you like doesn't mean it's not quality. It just means its for someone else.

Candlekeep, on the other hand, does have quality issues, given that several of the adventures where wrecked in the editing.

YP also had forge of fury. Ive ran both. Rest of its ok. I put that one mid.

RC better than Strixhaven. Left that at the flgs even half price. The still have a dozen copies of that one down from close to 30.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

RC better than Strixhaven. Left that at the flgs even half price. The still have a dozen copies of that one down from close to 30.

Stryxhaven was abandoned and pushed out the door unfinished. The idea was sound and could potentially have hit the Romantacy zeitgeist (i.e. potential D&D players, not the current ones), the decision to tie it into MtG rather than set it in an established D&D world a prime example of corporate stupidity, and it needed to be a boxed set (as originally planned) or two books (player + DM).

 

[Zardnaar]

Stryxhaven was abandoned and pushed out the door unfinished. The idea was sound and could potentially have hit the Romantacy zeitgeist (i.e. potential D&D players, not the current ones), the decision to tie it into MtG rather than set it in an established D&D world a prime example of corporate stupidity, and it needed to be a boxed set (as originally planned) or two books (player + DM).

Ive used ENworld as a buying guide and cross reference other sources.

Mostly I mine the APs for maps or chapters

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Mostly I mine the APs fir maps or chapters

Which is why RC isn't for you. It doesn't have much in the way of maps, but you can mine it for settings, tone and ideas.

 

[Zardnaar]

Which is why RC isn't for you. It doesn't have much in the way of maps, but you can mine it for settings, tone and ideas.

None of the hooks grabbed me either though.

Ive used Lost Library and Creeping Darkness. Mining Icewind Dale for Sunday.

Might have use if the Radiant Citadel itself but I'll redo the fluff.