The more things change for Todd Kenreck, the more they seem to stay the same. From the outside, being made redundant from Wizards of the Coast looked like a seismic shift for the former face of D&D‘s marketing videos. But, in a live Discord AMA, Kenreck paints a different picture. “I had a two-day break after the layoff, and then I started up again”, he tells me. “I’m just doing the same thing I’ve always been doing.”
That’s not to say the change wasn’t painful. The layoff came after Kenreck had worked on Dungeons and Dragons, on and off, for almost a decade, first as a creative manager at D&DBeyond, then as a video marketing strategist for Wizards of the Coast. “It’s never great to be laid off, I’ll be honest”, he says. “But everyone reached out after the layoff, and it was nice that there was very little interruption of service.”
In between his work at Wizards, Kenreck created his own YouTube channel to discuss the tabletop RPG in detail. Its older videos, dating back as far as 2017, are a time capsule of stories from designers, actors, and YouTubers who all share Kenreck’s love of the game.
When Kenreck says ‘everyone’ reached out after the layoff, he really does mean everyone. In the two months since he returned to producing YouTube videos full-time, he’s shared interviews with the world’s biggest actual play stars, successful D&D YouTubers, and old friends like former designers Jeremy Crawford and Chris Perkins. There’s even a few videogame actors who’ve stopped by to chat (often at length about the logistics of Chromatic Orb).
When he describes the support he’s received, Kenreck calls it “intense”. “If you have imposter syndrome and you get that many nice comments in a week, it’s alarming, but also lovely and kind.”
Love is a lot of the driving force behind Kenreck’s continued video production. “I love talking to people and learning about them”, he explains. “It’s a borderline obsession, even though I’m a deep introvert.” “You get to connect with people and try to find out what they’re passionate about.”
Naturally, there’s also a built-in love for RPGs. Kenreck has been playing D&D since he was eight years old, and his videos are an outlet for that continued enthusiasm. “I’m going to start doing class builds”, he tells me, “goofy builds, like how to push someone 65 feet in one round.” “I build characters every day”, he adds. “It helps me relax.”
Loving the game doesn’t guarantee wins, however. When asked about the challenges his channel faces, Kenreck is frank. “There’s no money in YouTube; the ad revenue is really low.”
“You feel, as a creator, the fear of having a video that doesn’t do well”, he explains. “You’ll make a video that might be breaking news, and it’ll get 82,000 views, and you’ll make X amount of dollars – and then you’ll make a video you really love, but it doesn’t resonate with the people who follow you at the moment, and it’ll get 5,000 views.”
This has happened to Kenreck before. Of all the DnD classes, he’s particularly wild about Wild Magic Sorcery. “I had it in second edition, and I just really love the idea of chaos magic”, he says. “It’s nuts, because the Wild Magic Sorcerer now is so greatly improved compared to how it was.” Apparently, when Kenreck took the time to make a video on the subject, “no one cared”.
“You have to be conscious of your time, and you can’t have too many bad days”, he continues. “You’re so tied to your analytics, almost in an emotional way, and in a survival way, because you’re trying to pay the rent.” “I don’t think people realize how scary it is, even for people famous for being creators.”
Crowdfunding has apparently been a fresh source of anxiety. “Patreon is terrifying”, Kenreck tells me, “but it really does help content creators get to do what they’re doing, and that’s 100% true for me”. Support on Patreon is how Kenreck afforded the pricey flights and hotels for this year’s Gen Con – where he produced some of his most successful recent videos.
As an interviewer, one of Kenreck’s talents is exploring the human behind the tabletop RPG. It’s his best piece of advice for this line of work, in fact. “Relate to people as human beings, and don’t forget that they’re human beings.” Whether he means to or not, Kenreck has effortlessly humanized the content creators trying to survive an algorithm-driven media landscape.
“There’s all this public relations and marketing training that happens to people, or there’s this desperate need to survive by pushing your Patreon or your YouTube channel”, he tells me. “It’s hard to break through all that, because a lot of content creators are just fighting for survival.”
“Just humanize people where you can, because they are”, Kenreck says. “Except for me – I’m not human.” At this point in the conversation, it’s heavily implied that Todd Kenreck is a swarm of Cranium Rats wearing a trench coat.
I cannot confirm that Todd Kenreck is human, but I can vouch for his humanity. His passion drives him to think creatively and work hard, even if he’s still learning to lean on the support of the community around him. He loves to create unexpected D&D characters, like a shady Cleric who hands out healing spells in a manner inspired by the American Healthcare System. In trading stories about the game he loves, he reminds us to see the people behind the media we consume, trying their hardest to make things they’re proud of.
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