It’s always tricky to get people to try a new TTRPG. Here’s what has worked for me.
I’ve been pretty negative on Mearls for a long time. Back when I still played D&D it always felt like between him and Crawford, he was the one always speaking up with nonsense whereas Crawford was the thoughtful designer. And he was still in charge of D&D during the period that I lost interest with the game in part due to the longer-term direction of the game and in part due to retroactive changes made to existing material.
But I’ve been watching his new YouTube channel a bit lately, and it’s not bad. This one was particularly interesting.
fwiw, i think mearls usually gets kind of a bad rap online because he usually has some pretty questionable hot take answers to things on platforms like twitter. I’ve actually met him in person a few times and played D&D with him; He’s an extremely nice person, and a very good DM. i think he’s just not so good at his own personal PR online.
I’ve never doubted that he’s a good person and I’m not at all surprised to hear he’s a good GM. I just questioned his game design skills.
But yes, I think you may be right that a large part of that comes down to his social media prowess…or lack thereof.
