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Layoffs at WotC

Posted by michael on from the failed-their-saving-throw dept.

Abies writes "During last year or so, quite a lot of people were fired from WotC - current owners of the D&D line. A few days ago, _most_ of big names out there had to quit - including Skip Williams and Jeff Grubb. Official WotC press info, Enworld news about that and a Monte Cook thread contain some more detailed info. Do you think it will spell an end to D&D ? After something which seemed to be a ressurection of old-time RPG, Hasbro seems to kill the biggest RPG company out there. Will OGL and the D20 license be enough to preserve the genre ?"

5 of 278 comments (clear)

  1. Re:They can Coast a long for quite a while... by dorward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Apparently the Epic (levels higher than 20) rules D&D are already designed so they have their next cash cow in the bag already.

    Designed? The Epic level rules are published

  2. Nethack RULES THE WORLD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative
    Okay. Here's the deal. If you have never played Nethack before, you must now IMMEDIATELY go to www.nethack.org and download the binaries for your system (source weenies can get source too). If you played any Nethack before 3.0, you STILL must go get the latest and see just how AMAZING a game Nethack is. Go get falcon's eye too if you want, but we're talking NETHACK. If you play D&D, and you have a good imagination, you will absolutely love Nethack.

    And the biggest bonus, if you learn to play nethack, you'll be an expert at navigation in VI (it uses the same keys, but you don't have to).

  3. Correlation is not causation by fm6 · · Score: 3, Informative
    Sure PB promotes Monopoly, because that's what big companies do with their products. But how much has that to do with the product's success? The damn thing's an institution. Did anybody here not have access to a Monopoly set when they were growing up? In fact, Monopoly attained its vaunted status back during the Depression -- when makreting wouldn't have done a lot of good.

    Corporate marketing people will always concede that the ultimate promotion is word-of-mouth. They do their best to create this, but they'll readily admit that it's mostly beyond their control.

    Another parallel with DnD: in both games, players tend to improvise rules not approved by the publishers. In Monopoly, most players make the fine revenue into a prize you get by pulling a card at the right moment. (This change makes the game too random for my taste, but most people seem to like it.) And of course, serious Dungeon Masters use the TSR books as departure point, not a bible. In both cases, game is sustained by a critical mass of enthusiasts, not by corporate marketing.

  4. Re:OGF != OGL by Strenoth · · Score: 2, Informative

    OGF is the foundation, OGL = Open Gaming License. You have to copy a part of the OGL into any D20 product you publish.

    --

    "It takes a very long time to count to 2 in binary." ~'Fourlegged'

  5. Re:Online Muds: Free and Non-commercial by freest · · Score: 2, Informative

    If you liked IRC playing you should try www.openrpg.com The great thing about it is that it has whispers, maps, miniatures, chat system with dm and player roles... it's opensource and specific to roleplaying online...