Comments on: Interview with Mike Mearls

By: Martin

Martin — Mon, 04 Sep 2006 16:16:35 +0000

I don’t think the Open modules are ever published, but I could be wrong.

I know Dungeon printed a tournament adventure years ago, for AD&D 2e — it’s one of my favorite modules ever. So maybe there’s hope.

By: Bill \

Bill \ — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 16:32:24 +0000

Nice interview! Thanks for posting that.

I particularly want to second Mike’s insights upon tournament play. Short hooks, short descriptive text, and interesting options add to play, not take away from it. Do these Opens ever get published? I’d be curious to look at this year’s now that I see Mike wrote it.

By: Martin

Martin — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 14:21:11 +0000

Thanks for clearing that up, Mike.

By: Mike Mearls

Mike Mearls — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 17:01:02 +0000

Ha! When I said “D&D is the only game…” I meant all RPGs. I wish I could be more provocative with that, but it’d be foolish to say that Vampire or Mutants & Masterminds don’t encourage creativity!

The basic idea is that in an RPG, a player can create solutions and options that the designer/DM never thought of or accounted for.

By: Martin

Martin — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 22:37:45 +0000

I don’t know if Mike will stop by to comment or not, but I’d love to hear what he has to say about “D&D is the only game.” If he means it literally, it’s a controversial statement (not unusual for Mike, of course ); if not, I’m curious what he’s getting at.

Thanks for the feedback on follow-up questions. I really liked how they turned out in this interview — helped along by the fact that Mike gives a great interview.

By: pduggie

pduggie — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:14:03 +0000

So how did Mearls re-write the swim rules? Huh? Huh?

By: ScottM

ScottM — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 20:14:28 +0000

Great interview. I particularly enjoy the follow-up questions– they help the interview flow a bit more like a natural conversation.

The books he’s written or contributed list is insane– though I guess I lucked out when I ordered Dungeon Crawl Classics #2: Lost Vault of Tsathzar Rho, since it’s the only DCC he participated in (and the only one I own).

By: John Arcadian

John Arcadian — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 19:46:25 +0000

Mearls is probably using D&D as a place holder, and what I’m really trying to get across here is that there are a lot of new games coming out that fit a lot of different styles. They are hard to classify. Traditional RPGS are expanding in scope, a whole wave of games (which don’t get classified into board games) are sold alongside, and as, RPGs because the traditional RPG players are the ones who purchase them. There are a whole load of games that are done as advanced boardgames, and there are a whole load of people making RPGs that stretch from beyond the boundary’s. These are all in the “indie” category. Most, not all, of these games are trying to be completely opposite of what has come out before in order to gain some credibility. They go a pendulum swing away from the way things are now. The next revolutions of the pendulum are going to fall closer to the center.

Really, all these games are great, they just fit different tastes.

By: Eisel

Eisel — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 17:54:02 +0000

The interview was great, and I think you should definitely leave in the follow up questions. It gives us a little more than the usual list of questions and answers – more depth to the interview.

. . . and he’s my hero. How does any one person accomplish so much, so well?

By: Fair Play » Blog Archive » The Roach Tells You What To Do

Fair Play » Blog Archive » The Roach Tells You What To Do — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 17:14:18 +0000

[...] That’s what Mike Mearls says, anyway! He’s referring to the focused design sensibility often present in games like The Roach, and puts us in good company – with Dogs in the Vineyard, InSpectres, and Agon. Thanks, Mike! [...]

By: Buzz

Buzz — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 15:55:45 +0000

The only thing I definately disagree with is, what he said about “D&D is the only game where you have truly creative game play.”

I think that, for the most part, Mearls is using “D&D” as a placeholder for “RPGs” in that statement.

I think a lot of the new breed of RPG’s, the indie games are very 2 to 4 hour advanced board games.

I don’t think that the focused nature of many indie RPGs justifies the phrase “advanced board games.” I think that’s unfair. If anything, I think that the truly focused, do-one-thing games (e.g., SAH-Roach) are more the exception than the rule. E.g., Burning Wheel and The Shadow of Yesterday are no different from D&D in scope, and games like Sorcerer or PTA are no more limited than their mainstream counterparts, IMO.

I think what it really boils down to is the broadening of the definition of an RPG. A lot of indie games are choosing focus, IMO, as a reaction to decades of a decided lack of focus in most RPGs. They’re pursuing the idea of an RPG you can understand and play to an endpoint in 2-4 hours. But, they’re not doing this in the name of “RPGs should all be like this,” but rather “Why can’t RPGs sometimes be like this?”

Anyway, what I think Mearls is talking about is basically his wonderful Core Story concept, i.e., that an RPG should give you a clear idea of what you’re supposed to do with it. Whether this focus is broad or narrow, the point is that it should exist and be communicated to the reader… and that this rarely happens is one of the great failings of most RPGs.

By: John Arcadian

John Arcadian — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 15:20:15 +0000

Wow. This is a great interview. Everything mike said about his gaming style, even his flaws, sounds like something I might have said about my own gaming style. I like his insight, and what he said about not being afraid to (as a writer) send out rules that could be broken easily. In the end it’s up to the GM to throw that final balance in. Not easy sometimes, but very true. The only thing I definately disagree with is, what he said about “D&D is the only game where you have truly creative game play.”

D&D and other broader, old style, games allow for longer game play, and wider rules that allow for you to do “anything” with them. I think a lot of the new breed of RPG’s, the indie games are very 2 to 4 hour advanced board games. They’re fun, they’re great, they don’t offer the “do anything” that a mainstream game does. The mainstream games aren’t good enough at giving the game masters focus for their games. I think the next generation of games will combine the indie style and the mainstream, and make something truly great.

I think you can have creative gameplay in both styles, just different kinds of creative. The creative elements are made for you in the newest “indie” games, while in the older broader games you have to make the creative yourself with the game master. It takes more work for that, but I feel more satisfied after games like that. In the end I think it’s that the industry is starting get stratified, with a lot of options for a lot of people.