Mike Mearls

Mike Mearls
Occupation Writer, game designer
Nationality United States
Genre Role-playing games
Children 1

Michael Mearls is a writer and designer of fantasy role-playing games (RPGs) and related fiction. He is the senior manager for the D&D research and design team. He led design for the 5th edition of the game. He also worked on the Castle Ravenloft board game, and various compendium books for 3rd and 4th edition D&D.

Education

Mearls is an alumnus of Dartmouth College.[1] While at Dartmouth he was a member of Sigma Nu fraternity, and became known for a satiric letter to the campus paper.[2]

Career

Mearls wrote the adventure To Stand on Hallowed Ground/Swords Against Deception (2001) for Fiery Dragon Productions[3]:226 and the last product from Hogshead Publishing, a Warhammer adventure titled Fear the Worst (2002) that Hogshead released for free on the internet.[3]:307 He also designed the game Iron Heroes (2005) for Malhavoc Press.[3]:226

In June 2005, Mearls was hired as a designer by Wizards of the Coast; he came to Wizards through the community of third-party d20 designers.[3]:301 At Wizards, he served as a lead developer for Dungeons & Dragons R&D working on the new 4th Edition.[4] Between the "Orcus I" and "Orcus II" design phases for fourth edition, Mearls spliced the encounter-power mechanics of fourth edition into Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords (2006), which was in process during development of the new edition.[3]:298

Along with Andy Collins, David Noonan, and Jesse Decker, Mearls was part of Rob Heinsoo's "Flywheel" design team for the fourth edition of Dungeons & Dragons, and did the final concept work from May 2006 to September 2006, before the first books for the edition were written and playtested.[3]:297 After Heinsoo was laid off in 2009, Mearls stepped up to become the new D&D Lead Designer.[3]:301 He co-designed the Castle Ravenloft Board Game (2010) with Bill Slavicsek.[3]:302

Mearls was, together with Jeremy Crawford, lead designer for the fifth edition of Dungeons & Dragons.[5][6][7]

Writing credits

References

  1. ↑ TheDartmouth.com | Graduation List as of June 5, 1997
  2. ↑ College Should Look Into Robot Workers, Cloning and Zombies
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN 978-1-907702-58-7.
  4. ↑ Mike Mearls' blog – Wizards Community
  5. ↑ Wizards RPG Team (2014). Players Handbook. Wizard of the Coast. ISBN 978-0786965601.
  6. ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/2l69tp/ama_mike_mearls_codesigner_of_dd_5_head_of_dd_rd/
  7. ↑ http://dnd.wizards.com/taxonomy/term/396
  8. ↑ Crawford, Jeremy; Mearls, Mike; Wyatt, James. "Contents". Player's Handbook 2. Wizards of the Coast. Retrieved 2011-10-05.
  9. ↑ "Mike Mearls | Dungeons & Dragons". dnd.wizards.com. Retrieved 2017-10-08.
  10. ↑ Mearls, Mike. "Playtest: New Hybrid and Multiclass Options". Dragon magazine #400. Wizards of the Coast. Retrieved 5 October 2011.
  11. ↑ Mearls, Mike (2007-09-21). "Encounter Design in 4th Edition". Dragon magazine #360. Wizards of the Coast. Retrieved 2012-08-23.
  • "Mike Mearls in the Pen & Paper RPG Database". Archived from the original on January 1, 2009.


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