# The State of D&D: Products, Psionics, Settings, & More



## Demetrios1453 (Nov 9, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> Every product being released in 2018 has either been written, or is being written. One is at the tail end of the editing/layout process. Another is in the playtest phase. A third is in the finalizing development phase. And a fourth Mearls won't talk about at all. So, looks like four major products for 2018.




If that's not just Mearls mistakenly referencing a 2019 product, or making a lesser product seem to be a major one, this is HUGE news. I've always thought they could ramp up to quarterly releases without seriously causing bloat, and it appears that they may now be going that route. Combined with what you say later about campaign settings, as well as campaign settings being mentioned in the recent WotC job posting, makes me wonder if we'll be seeing a campaign setting book later in 2018 as the fourth yearly product. I'm guessing (should this all pan out), that a four releases a year schedule will continue to have the September release be the big adventure path, with the other two being rules supplements (I wouldn't be surprised if one of these we see a continuation of Volo's-type monster books for dragons, fiends, undead, etc. as one of the yearly releases), and the fourth yearly release being a campaign setting book, quite possibly tied to the yearly adventure release.

(My guess for the first setting would be Planescape, as it would allow them to test the waters without it being fully committing to a completely different setting than the Realms/generic D&D, as the planes are built into duch settings by default. The planes would also function as a bridge to other settings).


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> If that's not just Mearls mistakenly referencing a 2019 product, or making a lesser product seem to be a major one, this is HUGE news. I've always thought they could ramp up to quarterly releases without seriously causing bloat, and it appears that they may now be going that route. Combined with what you say later about campaign settings, as well as campaign settings being mentioned in the recent WotC job posting, makes me wonder if we'll be seeing a campaign setting book later in 2018 as the fourth yearly product. I'm guessing (should this all pan out), that a four releases a year schedule will continue to have the September release be the big adventure path, with the other two being rules supplements (I wouldn't be surprised if one of these we see a continuation of _Volo's_-type monster books for dragons, fiends, undead, etc. as one of the yearly releases), and the fourth yearly release being a campaign setting book, quite possibly tied to the yearly adventure release.
> 
> (My guess for the first setting would be Planescape, as it would allow them to test the waters without it being fully committing to a completely different setting than the Realms/generic D&D, as the planes are built into duch settings by default. The planes would also function as a bridge to other settings).



The key to that might be what they say about settings as "themes": a Gothic Horror book, more than a Ravenloft straight gazeeter?


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## lowkey13 (Nov 9, 2017)

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## Mortellan (Nov 9, 2017)

Well not touching Greyhawk or if they do it will be distilled somehow because they said they don't want new fans burdened by prior knowledge in these setting treatments.


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## Coroc (Nov 9, 2017)

[MENTION=5089]Mortellan[/MENTION] the only Setting not needing anything 5e specific than maybe an themed adventure imho is greyhawk.

The other Settings like DS Eberron lack more, specifically game mechanics in how to do certain things and be 5E conform.
That is especially psionics which might be resolved in a more General way but also some campaign sepcific rulings which are in no way simple to convert from 2e / 3,5e / 4e and which are no Problem at all for greyhawk or FR or even plansescape.


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## lowkey13 (Nov 9, 2017)

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## kenmarable (Nov 9, 2017)

Mortellan said:


> Well not touching Greyhawk or if they do it will be distilled somehow because they said they don't want new fans burdened by prior knowledge in these setting treatments.




Given how much setting information exists in prior editions, I think it would be great if they included even just a single page of “For more information on X part of this world, check out this pdf on DMsGuild” etc. with a couple sentences about some useful prior edition PDFs. It shouldn’t be hard to have a standard disclaimer of “The rules are for a different edition of the game, but the locations, NPCs, and events can serve as inspiration for more adventures in this world.” or something to avoid confusion for new players. 

I can understand not wanting to require prior knowledge of the setting for a new book (and agree entirely) but it can definitely be a great way to concretely introduce newer players to these settings to help enrich their games. I know page space can be at a premium, but even a half page of call outs to specific older edition titles would be wonderful.


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## dropbear8mybaby (Nov 9, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> The PHB is selling so well they're afraid to make any changes to the PHB...not even changing the index or footers which they want to badly do and know needs to be done. They would consider posting a better Index online though for people to print.




This seriously irritates me. This is the exact same logic they used for not fixing 4e. The CharOp forums had easy fixes that could easily be implemented with only a few changes to the books but WotC insisted that changing anything in the game would annoy too many people.

This is not a smart strategy in my opinion. There are some desperately needed updates and fixes. You can't just lock the edition in stasis, flaws and all, and expect it to have longevity. An update, at some point, has to come.


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## kenmarable (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> (My two cents are that a Planescape "setting" will be incredibly unlikely in the near, 1-2 year, future.)




When they do Planescape, my personal guess is what Volo’s Guide is to the Monster Manual, that book would be to the Manual of the Planes. It will fill the same sort of role, but in a reimagined and heavily flavored way. Which I would be overjoyed with, so maybe there’s some wishful thinking.


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## ChapolimX (Nov 9, 2017)

In the audio they mentioned something I couldn't understand about new classes beyond the artificer and the mystic. Does someone know what classes they possibly mentioned?


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## lowkey13 (Nov 9, 2017)

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## Coroc (Nov 9, 2017)

[MENTION=6799753]lowkey13[/MENTION] i did write the same in other words. FR as well as Greyhawk are pretty close to the standard rules. The only thing interesting for these settingsare new adventures which can be quite generic. The official lore for FR is continued of course, but that also happens with the novels.

On your other Point: I is not about genre. You can do a FR or GHK campign as a Pulp or noire style. That is not the Problem

It is really about crunch in this case game mechanics. DS and Eberron is lacking a Ppsionic System 1-20 which i wrote could be resolved in with general rules for psionics, but DS also needs some mechanics for statting of some races otherwise you would have to leave them out as playable races (kreen / Halfgiants, they break the established race scheme no matter how you look on this), some rules for inferior weapons (and eventually armor), some rule about preserving / defiling and templars maybe being some Kind of warlocks or priests.

There are some nice threads on this Forum with houserules trying to resolve These things but no official clarification not even in form of UA.


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## SharnDM (Nov 9, 2017)

I love the energy and optimism I'm seeing from WotC these days. Slow playing things, taking some real time to produce quality content has been working very well for the company and every book I review for them has earned some truly high marks from me. 

Waiting this long to produce a quality supplement book (re: Xanathar's Guide), one that was playtested through Unearthed Arcana, was very well handled. 

I may not always get exactly what I want from WotC because I want Eberron and I want it fully realized in the 5th edition, but I'm not even all that bent out of shape about how they are handling settings like Eberron. They are producing super quality stuff so I feel like when they tack a crack at Eberron in the future, and it looks like they will, I'm probably going to like it.

In any event, I'm loving what I see from them right now. I do wish they'd come back to GenCon though (personal preference). Hell, I just love the apparent enthusiasm for the game that is obviously buzzing through their team!


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## lowkey13 (Nov 9, 2017)

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## Bolares (Nov 9, 2017)

well, they have beeing publishing Greyhawk APs... In FR. A lot of inspiration for the APs comes from Greyhawk, but the setting is "genre interchangeable" with FR, and by waht they say they don't want the setting to compete for the audiences interest.


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## Dungeonosophy (Nov 9, 2017)

Cool.
As a historical aside, I think I may have invented the word "Psion." Back on the old WotC message boards, back in the run-up to 3E, back when Ryan Dancey was posting a lot...in those conversations I posted a list of core classes I'd like to see for 3E. At that time, I assumed that the 2E "class groups" (Priest, Rogue, Warrior, Wizard, Psionicist) would continue in 3E. In my chart of proposed classes, I introduced "Psion" as the name of the class group. I felt the "-icist" was not essential to the name. Soon after that, "Psion" entered the discourse.

Of course this more succinct name could have been readily intuited/invented by others, and it would be hard to prove, without looking back at the msg board archives and interviewing the designers from back then. Anyway, it's just a little detail within the D&D Multiverse. And, off hand, I don't even remember my msg board handle from that time. But a bit of speculative history.


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## TwoSix (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> I can't speak to what they will, or can, or should do. All I can say is that based on this, it looks like they view other settings as genre, and that you will not need more than the core rulebooks to run an adventure in that genre (perhaps with some additional, "genre specific" rules). As such, I can see them publishing APs set in a post-apocalyptic (Dark Sun) setting, but I don't see why they would publish a Greyhawk AP, since they already are using FR as the default.




Yep.  Putting out settings to be primarily vehicles for deploying crunch that supports the vision of previous editions is not something that's a major, or even a minor, priority for them.  They're going to use the recognizable brand names of the settings as a backdrop to developing different "flavors" of D&D, but with a focus on keeping a coherent multiverse and overall D&D feel.   I'm pretty sure that means the settings with really different flavors will be more of a focus, to diversify the offerings.  Dark Sun and Planescape would be obvious candidates (and Planescape would have the guidelines as to how all these settings connect and can be used together.)


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## AriochQ (Nov 9, 2017)

With all the talk about psionics, my guess is Darksun will be the next setting they will introduce.  No chance I would move my home game, but I wouldn't mind playing/running some Adventurer's League content in that setting.


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## Eltab (Nov 9, 2017)

There is a thread somewhere on EnWorld that has an improved PHB Index.  The D&D team could ask the author (and Morrus) for permission to use IT, with appropriate credit (and royalties of course).


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## Dragonblade (Nov 9, 2017)

I agree that changing the PHB significantly would be bad juju now. But you can incorporate errata and a new index. That won't disrupt anyone's game.


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## Dragonblade (Nov 9, 2017)

I'd also like to a deluxe core book treatment. I'd pay the premium price to get an enhanced set of core books with all errata, higher quality paper, binding, etc. and ideally a Sage Advice inspired FAQ appendix at the back of the books.


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## DEFCON 1 (Nov 9, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> This seriously irritates me. This is the exact same logic they used for not fixing 4e. The CharOp forums had easy fixes that could easily be implemented with only a few changes to the books but WotC insisted that changing anything in the game would annoy too many people.
> 
> This is not a smart strategy in my opinion. There are some desperately needed updates and fixes. You can't just lock the edition in stasis, flaws and all, and expect it to have longevity. An update, at some point, has to come.



I imagine they think the number of people who feel desperate changes or corrections are needed to parts of the game *and* who are unwilling to make those changes themselves to their own games pales in comparison to the number of people who will get pissed off thinking they now have to buy the PHB again because otherwise they are using an outdated rulset.

Sent from my SM-J320V using EN World mobile app


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## Mercule (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> (I also really like the stuff in there about settings as genre ... which means they probably aren't touching Greyhawk)



I'm actually OK with this. The Greyhawk base was kinda split between the red & gold box, Greyhawk Wars, and From the Ashes. The options available to WotC are to pick one of those or add yet another option that satisfies no one. Personally, I'd be happy with a higher production value, hardcover version of the red and gold box, but I'm afraid they'd lose the uniquely Gygaxian flavor in the process. It also isn't likely to be that appealing to modern audiences, so pure vanity product. 

Do I think the setting could be revived and serve as the flagship vanilla setting? Actually, yes. I just think it'd take quite a bit of care to do so and I'm skeptical that the current team has the mindset to do it.

What I do think would be nice, for Greyhawk, is to have them do a one-off adventure set in Greyhawk that really hearkens back to the original "evil-hating neutrals" and mercenary tone. Maybe do a companion DM screen that had a poster map of the Flanaess, which would be hard to replicate on the DM's Guild. Otherwise, Greyhawk really is the one setting where they're justified in saying, "It's part of the history of D&D and you should look at earlier products for more info."


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## lowkey13 (Nov 9, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> There's a lot of good stuff in there! Thanks Mistwell!
> 
> I was curious about this-
> 
> ...



Don't be so sure on the last point: the DMG goes to great pains to make Greyhawk distinct in feel, as Swords & Sorcery that "crosses the streams."

Probably they mean overall sales and continuing sales. Mearls has stated on Twitter that the 5E core books have outsold 3E and 3.5 combined life time totals so far, and sales continue to be brisk based on all evidence. The TSR sales data is supposed to be pretty fuzzy, but they have some information to compare against, I'm sure.


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> I don't think that is quite right. Let me explain.
> 
> If they aren't doing settings as campaigns worlds (as indicated) but, instead, settings as genres, then they don't need Greyhawk. Because they have the FR. I suppose you could argue that Greyhawk is more S&S than FR, but that's neither here nor there.
> 
> ...



Depends on what you mean by a "Planescape Setting." They are testing Planar races and rules in the UA right now, and are dropping lots of Planes related hints. Arguably, both the PHB and DMG contain Planescape gazeeters, making Planescape the actual default setting (at least metasetting). 

If they don't have a Manual of the Planes equivalent lined up, I would be somewhat surprised. The Modron March will probably come up soon, too, given how they keep bringing it up in every single book.


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## Mercule (Nov 9, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> This seriously irritates me. This is the exact same logic they used for not fixing 4e. The CharOp forums had easy fixes that could easily be implemented with only a few changes to the books but WotC insisted that changing anything in the game would annoy too many people.
> 
> This is not a smart strategy in my opinion. There are some desperately needed updates and fixes. You can't just lock the edition in stasis, flaws and all, and expect it to have longevity. An update, at some point, has to come.



Well, the "living errata" of _polymorph_* was one of the key reasons I started to get dissatisfied with 3.5E and didn't stick with 4E (the digital tools for which were, at least initially, supposed to incorporate errata and rules updates).

Something like improving the index doesn't bother me and seems completely innocuous in a 2nd (or beyond) printing. Typos fall into the same category, for me. Things happen.

There's a gray area with errata, though. Errata is an implicit (maybe even explicit) acknowledgement that something got missed during the editing process and the finished product wasn't as intended. That could be because everyone involved was part of the conversation and took assumptions for granted. It could be simple human error in getting text from a prior draft. It could be something else, too, but it isn't a rules change.

Despite my group having completely replaced the PHB Ranger with the latest UA Ranger, at our table, I would find it incredibly inappropriate for the next printing of the PHB to incorporate the UA Ranger (or something like it). That's not errata. That's a rules change. If they wanted to do a 5.5 or 5E Revised, so be it. Within an edition, though, I shouldn't have to even know that I may need to check print runs on my books.

Digital tools (DDB) are in the same boat, IMO. Fixing typos are fine, but I don't want an argument at my table because I'm running from DDB while a player is looking at the rules in their PHB. They can have a certain tolerance for typos, but they shouldn't be expected to invest time online to keep up with "official" changes.

* The fact that I disagreed with the changes didn't help. I saw that more as beating the creativity out of the game than fixing a loophole. Regardless, I refused to invalidate my players' books and we never adopted that particular set of errata.


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## Fandabidozi (Nov 9, 2017)

That’s Eberron mentioned a whole lot. My favourite setting. Awesome!


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

dropbear8mybaby said:


> This seriously irritates me. This is the exact same logic they used for not fixing 4e. The CharOp forums had easy fixes that could easily be implemented with only a few changes to the books but WotC insisted that changing anything in the game would annoy too many people.
> 
> This is not a smart strategy in my opinion. There are some desperately needed updates and fixes. You can't just lock the edition in stasis, flaws and all, and expect it to have longevity. An update, at some point, has to come.



The fixes being mentioned are organizational: I wouldn't expect to see any substantial changes to the core books before 6E.


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## Mistwell (Nov 9, 2017)

A couple of notes:

1) When I wrote this up, I had not anticipated it as a news item, and assumed others would listen and comment on what they heard as well. So I am sorry for all the typos, and...

2) I probably skipped some things. I was not listening carefully for the entire thing. In fact I know there was a section in there I didn't write up much on, starting around the 38min mark through the about 50 min mark.

3) This was a Q&A session. So if you see focus on something, it may just be a sign that's what they were asked by an audience member, as opposed to something they intended to focus on.


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## lowkey13 (Nov 9, 2017)

*Deleted by user*


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## Koren n'Rhys (Nov 9, 2017)

Dragonblade said:


> I agree that changing the PHB significantly would be bad juju now. But you can incorporate errata and a new index. That won't disrupt anyone's game.



Agreed with this. If they can work errata into each updated printing of the PHB, they can certainly replace the index int eh back with something that's actually useful. I printed a copy of the one mention above that I grabbed from here and stuck it in the back if my book.  Of course, it's irrelevant now, since I switched over to Beyond where it's all fully searchable on my various devices.


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## Koren n'Rhys (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> As a 1983 Box Enthusiast, I am okay with this as well.



Thirded. They can simply add appendices with notes on changes and the updated timeline for the later eras of Greyhawk.


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## bmfrosty (Nov 9, 2017)

Koren n'Rhys said:


> Of course, it's irrelevant now, since I switched over to Beyond where it's all fully searchable on my various devices.




Bingo bango bongo.  

I think next edition there's a chance that digital aids take a front seat.  If 6th edition in the mid 2020s is mostly compatible - same math but rewritten classes, races, spells, monsters, and a few more rules options - hopefully we see dndbeyond version of the content available on day one instead of several years in.  

I wonder what that does to the sales landscape and patterns.


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## Mercule (Nov 9, 2017)

Fandabidozi said:


> That’s Eberron mentioned a whole lot. My favourite setting. Awesome!



Agreed. I'm a bit nervous because the team seems to be so intent on explaining everything. That runs counter to some core Eberron concepts.

Even more, though, I think it runs counter to having distinct setting flavors. The bit about the mind flayers controlling most of the prime material, jumped out at me. That's a bit more story than I really think core D&D needs. My setting doesn't even have mind flayers, so that's a weird assumption to have to deal with. It just seems like they're trying to nail down too much, too specifically. Trying to tie psionics to the Far Realm, in the UA articles, is another example.


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## neobolts (Nov 9, 2017)

*Upcoming Content.* My wish list still includes psionics, Oriental Adventures, a "worlds of D&D" type gazetteer, and a Manual of the Planes type book. Looks like I'll be getting some of what I want. 

*Life Cycle.* I am pleased with 5e in terms of both release pace and intended life cycle. The edition is performing well, so the wind down at the end of an edition's life cycle seems a long way off for 5e. 

*Revision. *The edition is performing reliably in terms of rules and really doesn't need an update. It may not 100% match every DM's desires but its not fundamentally busted in any way. The occasional flaw can be easily house ruled.


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## Bolares (Nov 9, 2017)

Mercule said:


> Agreed. I'm a bit nervous because the team seems to be so intent on explaining everything. That runs counter to some core Eberron concepts.
> 
> Even more, though, I think it runs counter to having distinct setting flavors. The bit about the mind flayers controlling most of the prime material, jumped out at me. That's a bit more story than I really think core D&D needs. My setting doesn't even have mind flayers, so that's a weird assumption to have to deal with. It just seems like they're trying to nail down too much, too specifically. Trying to tie psionics to the Far Realm, in the UA articles, is another example.




Dind't Perkins play a major part in the development of Eberron? I believe they can stay true to the settings core (are at least I hope they do).


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## Lord_Blacksteel (Nov 9, 2017)

Based on this discussion I'm not sure we will see a traditional "setting" book. I know that's what most of us are used to, but I think it's more likely we will see setting as an element of an adventure book (more like Strahd). They seem very reluctant to dive into those DM-only type books beyond the obligatory monster books and even those include some player material. The SCAG might be their least-well-received book and it's the closest thing we have to a campaign setting so I would assume that's a factor too.

As far as doing best since the 80's, I have a firm "maybe":

The launch of 3E in my view was pretty comparable to 5th: several years of dissatisfaction with the prior version of the game and how it had been handled by the company that led into a new edition with new management, a "back to the dungeon" philosophy along with a serious rules cleanup to better fit the tastes of the time, a lot of returning players, and an explosion of supporting material from third party producers. Necromancer Games, Green Ronin, and Goodman games all sprung up at this time and all of them are still around today. Those first few years, until the 3.5 release at least anyway, were a pretty exciting time when it felt like the games was on fire and just exploding all around us - in a good way.


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## IchneumonWasp (Nov 9, 2017)

I'm happy to hear they think of 5e as long term and don't see the need to continuously re-invent the wheel with new editions.

I'm also happy they don't want people to have to buy multiple books, but I am curious what this means for things like Psionics and the Artificer. Will they be released for free or in a Xanathar's type book down the line?


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## Koren n'Rhys (Nov 9, 2017)

bmfrosty said:


> Bingo bango bongo.
> 
> I think next edition there's a chance that digital aids take a front seat.  If 6th edition in the mid 2020s is mostly compatible - same math but rewritten classes, races, spells, monsters, and a few more rules options - hopefully we see dndbeyond version of the content available on day one instead of several years in.
> 
> I wonder what that does to the sales landscape and patterns.



I hope 6E is FAR, FAR away, as they've hit a homerun with this one, IMO, but that's out of our hands. Introducing good digital tools is certainly a game-changer as far as the sales landscape is concerned. I don't see myself buying another physical book, to be honest, and I expect there are lots of others who feel the same. WotC will get their money no matter what, but it will be interesting to see how the FLGS factors in.  I'd like to see DDB gift cards for sale at the store, that can be used to purchase the content online so that everyone wins.  You can buy XBox cards, or whatever, to support your local GameStop, so it's not unreasonable.


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## Mistwell (Nov 9, 2017)

I can think of a unique genre for Greyhawk that would work - Oldschool Adventuring.

That would mean much more difficult natural healing rules, xp for gold, a lot more save or die elements to the game, followers, morale and loyalty rules, stronghold rules, a much wider and less balanced range of wandering monsters, etc.. Much like this thread by [MENTION=61252]Frankie1969[/MENTION]. 

They could even make it a lower magic setting. 

I think the look and feel of that type of setting and associated rules is as much a "genre" as any of the other genres mentioned by Mike Mearls during the panel.


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## Erdric Dragin (Nov 9, 2017)

Why are they still calling it a Mystic? What's wrong with Psion? It's classic D&D and it sounds more like someone with Psychic powers than Mystic, which has magical powers.

I hope they change it. I hate when they destroy sacred cows.


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## bmfrosty (Nov 9, 2017)

Koren n'Rhys said:


> I hope 6E is FAR, FAR away, as they've hit a homerun with this one, IMO, but that's out of our hands. Introducing good digital tools is certainly a game-changer as far as the sales landscape is concerned. I don't see myself buying another physical book, to be honest, and I expect there are lots of others who feel the same. WotC will get their money no matter what, but it will be interesting to see how the FLGS factors in.  I'd like to see DDB gift cards for sale at the store, that can be used to purchase the content online so that everyone wins.  You can buy XBox cards, or whatever, to support your local GameStop, so it's not unreasonable.




That would be a way to do it.  There could also be bundling with a book too.  They could try lots of different sales models.  Curse seems like they're working out well, and the other content delivery partners seem to do the same.  

And yes, I hope that we're at at least the 8 year mark before this happens and preferably year 10 or 12.  I think the great thing for them is that if they're staying with the same math for two editions, then 6th edition becomes a refinement.   

There's another question of a 5.5.  Do a new edit pass on the three main books and put in new art.  Update the PHB, MM, and DMG with content from the EEPG, the Tortle Package, VGTM, SCAG, XGTE, 2018 crunch, 2019 crunch, 2020 crunch, and 2021 crunch.  Thicker books, big cleanup.


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## MechaTarrasque (Nov 9, 2017)

I am good with pretty much everything they said.  

For Planescape, I would be good with a focus as a  Sliders/AMBER thing where you jump from world to world (or plane to plane) and the players are just based in Sigil.  A scheme that starts in Sigil can still involve the factions.

If you had to chose between "pulp D&D" than "noir D&D" for Ebberon, I would go with "pulp D&D", but I hope they have a little of both.


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## Elderbrain (Nov 9, 2017)

Erdric Dragin said:


> Why are they still calling it a Mystic? What's wrong with Psion? It's classic D&D and it sounds more like someone with Psychic powers than Mystic, which has magical powers.
> 
> I hope they change it. I hate when they destroy sacred cows.




Didn't they use the term "Psion" in Volo's Guide to Monsters? I'm pretty sure they did with that variant Flayer with Psionic powers (think it was in the Mind Flayer chapter, not the Bestiary section).


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## Francisco Grillo (Nov 9, 2017)

Well no Dragonlance love.


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## TrippyHippy (Nov 9, 2017)

I think that one factor that is contributing to the success, is that they aren't setting ridiculously high expectations any more. The RPG hobby won't ever match the sales of miniatures or collectible card games these days, but the brand value is still the key thing for D&D. If they make the RPG popular within it's own sub-hobby (which it is proving to be) then the brand will increase in value - meaning really big profits can be made in other ventures like TV shows, online games and movies. 

In terms of improvements/developments, I am please that the game is not making big changes in the foreseeable future. I could see a few corrections and aesthetic alterations from time to time (the cover art wasn't well selected in my view), but the guts of the game is as good as it has ever been. That is why it is doing well.

Oh, and let's see a Planescape Campaign release!


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## lkj (Nov 9, 2017)

In the part where Mike is discussing their rough map of how all the settings tie together and where they fit in, he specifically says that it is in terms of a product that they would be a part of. A few seconds later, as he mentions how the worlds all tie together, he says something like 'Greyhawk already has that'. And I couldn't decide if he meant they already had a product plan or whether he meant that Greyhawk already has an obvious tie-in cosmologically.

Probably the latter. But it got my hopes up for a minute.

As far as Dragonlance-- they don't mention it. But I wouldn't make too much of that. It's pretty clear they have thought about all the settings, and I think Crawford is a Dragonlance enthusiast. Doesn't mean it will get love. But a lack of mention in a free flowing conversation probably doesn't mean much.

AD


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## Mistwell (Nov 9, 2017)

Erdric Dragin said:


> Why are they still calling it a Mystic? What's wrong with Psion? It's classic D&D and it sounds more like someone with Psychic powers than Mystic, which has magical powers.
> 
> I hope they change it. I hate when they destroy sacred cows.




They did not say they were settled on Mystic and in fact took a quick poll of the audience between the two names. He did not mention the result of that quick poll though so I left it out of my summary.


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

Lord_Blacksteel said:


> Based on this discussion I'm not sure we will see a traditional "setting" book. I know that's what most of us are used to, but I think it's more likely we will see setting as an element of an adventure book (more like Strahd). They seem very reluctant to dive into those DM-only type books beyond the obligatory monster books and even those include some player material. The SCAG might be their least-well-received book and it's the closest thing we have to a campaign setting so I would assume that's a factor too.
> 
> As far as doing best since the 80's, I have a firm "maybe":
> 
> The launch of 3E in my view was pretty comparable to 5th: several years of dissatisfaction with the prior version of the game and how it had been handled by the company that led into a new edition with new management, a "back to the dungeon" philosophy along with a serious rules cleanup to better fit the tastes of the time, a lot of returning players, and an explosion of supporting material from third party producers. Necromancer Games, Green Ronin, and Goodman games all sprung up at this time and all of them are still around today. Those first few years, until the 3.5 release at least anyway, were a pretty exciting time when it felt like the games was on fire and just exploding all around us - in a good way.



Not as much pop culture penetration 15 years ago, and certainly fewer sales than 5E by all accounts.


----------



## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

IchneumonWasp said:


> I'm happy to hear they think of 5e as long term and don't see the need to continuously re-invent the wheel with new editions.
> 
> I'm also happy they don't want people to have to buy multiple books, but I am curious what this means for things like Psionics and the Artificer. Will they be released for free or in a Xanathar's type book down the line?



They want people to buy books, they just want the number of products to be manageable and not intimidating to new folks.


----------



## darjr (Nov 9, 2017)

This edition is firing in all cylinders and this talk shows they get it and will keep leaning back. Nice!


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## darjr (Nov 9, 2017)

Greyhawks Genre is “Oldschool” is a fanfreakingtastic idea!

 [MENTION=697]mearls[/MENTION]


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## MechaTarrasque (Nov 9, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> They did not say they were settled on Mystic and in fact took a quick poll of the audience between the two names. He did not mention the result of that quick poll though so I left it out of my summary.




I don't know, they keep mentioning psychics and Dark Sun, and then Dark Sun is "Post-Apocalyptic D&D", and honestly I don't see either mystic or psion having a particularly good claim to "Post-Apocalyptic D&D" (unless psion becomes a sorcerer subclass to get the mutant vibe). The only thing that supports psion over mystic is the whole Mindflayer bit, which, while I liked it, caused a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth here on Enworld.


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## PabloM (Nov 9, 2017)

Francisco Grillo said:


> Well no Dragonlance love.




Dragonlance is the niche inside the niche, I´m afraid. 



lkj said:


> As far as Dragonlance-- they don't mention it. But I wouldn't make too much of that. It's pretty clear they have thought about all the settings, and I think Crawford is a Dragonlance enthusiast. Doesn't mean it will get love. But a lack of mention in a free flowing conversation probably doesn't mean much.




I´ll be truly happy with a digital gazetteer, or even an UA article.


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## PabloM (Nov 9, 2017)

Also, I noted a very big fan base of Dragonlance in spanish-speakers people (from Spain AND Latin American). I suppose that is because of the 2e Tales of the Lance box released in Spain in the early 90´s.


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## OB1 (Nov 9, 2017)

I love the setting as genre idea, which could also function as the fulfillment of the "modular" promise from the playtest.  Each setting could become a home base of a particular style of play.

Trying to think of how this could play out.  Please do not take the following as anything more than spit-balling to get the idea across.

*Forgoten Realms* - Heroic Fantasy - Base rules 
*Greyhawk* - Gritty/Historic Fantasy - Old School rules 
*Eberron* - Pulp/Noir Fantasy - Narrative rules 
*Dark Sun* - Post Apocalyptic Fantasy - RAW rules 
*Spelljammer* - Sci-Fi Fantasy - ??? rules
*???? *- Superhero Fantasy - Power based Rules
*Planescape* - Mythic Fantasy - Advanced rules (Backdoor 6e?)


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## Raith5 (Nov 9, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Not as much pop culture penetration 15 years ago, and certainly fewer sales than 5E by all accounts.




What evidence is there for this? 3e felt like a much bigger deal than 5e too me. I spent a lot more $ on 3e than 5e. But, sure it hard to compare in terms of sales because 5e is so lean in terms of products and 3e had more books. I do feel anecdotally that 5e has brought back quite a few lapsed gamers back into the game, but are they buying many 5e products?


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## PMárk (Nov 9, 2017)

> So if they ever put out one Eberron book and  then a second one, the second one would not assume you owned the first  one. And they always want you to use most of a book they put out, rather  than just a small part of it. And they want you to be able to pick up a  setting book and use it right away rather than spend a lot of time on  preparation.




So, it sounds only APs for the future, with some setting material, so no change there.

No novels neither, in the foreseeable future.

Oh well, that's life, I guess, I just go back spending time with other stuff until the next checking-in. Thanks for the reporting!


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## Thac0 the Barbarian (Nov 9, 2017)

*The State of D&amp;D: Products, Psionics, Settings, &amp; More*

(Tapatalk error)
Carry on

Sent from my iPhone using EN World


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

Raith5 said:


> What evidence is there for this? 3e felt like a much bigger deal than 5e too me. I spent a lot more $ on 3e than 5e. But, sure it hard to compare in terms of sales because 5e is so lean in terms of products and 3e had more books. I do feel anecdotally that 5e has brought back quite a few lapsed gamers back into the game, but are they buying many 5e products?



I bought one 3E book (PHB), and a dozen 5E books. But anecdotes aren't meaningful, particularly.
 [MENTION=697]mearls[/MENTION] was asked straight out recently if 5E core books have sold more than 3E and 3.5 lifetime combined total, and he said that 5E had already outsold the lifetime totals for both editions. That is significant, that and the continued gangbuster sales.

I don't recall the sort of mainstream attention 5E has gotten the past few years (New Yorker article, TV shows, late night talk shows, etc.) at any point in 3E's lifespan.


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## Parmandur (Nov 9, 2017)

PMárk said:


> So, it sounds only APs for the future, with some setting material, so no change there.
> 
> No novels neither, in the foreseeable future.
> 
> Oh well, that's life, I guess, I just go back spending time with other stuff until the next checking-in. Thanks for the reporting!



Actually, APs are going from two thirds of the yearly material to one third or even one quarter. That's a major slide in AP output.


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## PMárk (Nov 9, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Actually, APs are going from two thirds of the yearly material to one third or even one quarter. That's a major slide in AP output.




That wasn't the point. The quoted text said to me than I still can't expect setting material outside of APs in the future. That's the point.


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## Sword of Spirit (Nov 9, 2017)

lowkey13 said:


> In 1978, the PHB was released.
> 
> In 1989, the Second Edition was released, streamlining the rules.
> 
> That's 11 years. Worked out pretty well.




And since 2e was mostly backwards compatible with 1e, you can extend it to 20-21 years (I don't remember exactly when 3e came out).

That's what I want to see. Heck, I'll go further. I want to see them get the game so well-refined that they never make another edition again. I bet they can pull that off with a 7th edition, which hopefully won't be here for a loooong time. The post AD&D edition tread was annoying.


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## Mistwell (Nov 10, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> And since 2e was mostly backwards compatible with 1e, you can extend it to 20-21 years (I don't remember exactly when 3e came out).
> 
> That's what I want to see. Heck, I'll go further. I want to see them get the game so well-refined that they never make another edition again. I bet they can pull that off with a 7th edition, which hopefully won't be here for a loooong time. The post AD&D edition tread was annoying.




You got it almost right from memory. AD&D 1e PHB was 1978. 2e PHB came out in 1989. 3e PHB was 2000. So it was an 11 year cycle for each. Then 4e was 2008, and 5e was 2014.


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## Valetudo (Nov 10, 2017)

ChapolimX said:


> In the audio they mentioned something I couldn't understand about new classes beyond the artificer and the mystic. Does someone know what classes they possibly mentioned?



Warlord, ofcourse....


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## OB1 (Nov 10, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> And since 2e was mostly backwards compatible with 1e, you can extend it to 20-21 years (I don't remember exactly when 3e came out).
> 
> That's what I want to see. Heck, I'll go further. I want to see them get the game so well-refined that they never make another edition again. I bet they can pull that off with a 7th edition, which hopefully won't be here for a loooong time. The post AD&D edition tread was annoying.




I'm sure this is what Hasbro wants as well.  A refined "final" game engine that like Monopoly or Risk remains the same decade after decade and that parent's teach to their children without having to relearn a bunch of new rules.  The aesthetics and fluff can and will change, but not the game itself.  I'm not sure if 5e is that final engine or not, but if it isn't, I'd guess the next version will be.


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## Valetudo (Nov 10, 2017)

Do planescape and spelljammer need their own seperate books? I think they are fun, but have always seemed as add ons compared to darksun or ebberon. Im also still hoping they take some pieces out of the mystic and turn them into subclasses for fighter, rogue, etc.


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## Twiggly the Gnome (Nov 10, 2017)

Thac0 the Barbarian said:


> P




[video=youtube;wi-H6ohY37k]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wi-H6ohY37k[/video]


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## darjr (Nov 10, 2017)

OB1 said:


> I'm sure this is what Hasbro wants as well.  A refined "final" game engine that like Monopoly or Risk remains the same decade after decade and that parent's teach to their children without having to relearn a bunch of new rules.  The aesthetics and fluff can and will change, but not the game itself.  I'm not sure if 5e is that final engine or not, but if it isn't, I'd guess the next version will be.



This is a stunning idea! I hope that it is undead the goal and that it’s a huge success.


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## Winterthorn (Nov 10, 2017)

darjr said:


> This is a stunning idea! I hope that it is undead the goal and that it’s a huge success.




Ah-Ha!  An Immortal Edition!


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## Raith5 (Nov 10, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> I bought one 3E book (PHB), and a dozen 5E books. But anecdotes aren't meaningful, particularly.
> [MENTION=697]mearls[/MENTION] was asked straight out recently if 5E core books have sold more than 3E and 3.5 lifetime combined total, and he said that 5E had already outsold the lifetime totals for both editions. That is significant, that and the continued gangbuster sales.
> 
> I don't recall the sort of mainstream attention 5E has gotten the past few years (New Yorker article, TV shows, late night talk shows, etc.) at any point in 3E's lifespan.




Interesting. Thanks. I agree with the higher profile of 5e. But the thing I notice is that many people in my circle who play 5e dont buy many of the books because the rules of this edition are so light and free from splatbook crawl expectation. Hence my line of questioning of whether the profile of 5e has translated into volume of sales. But, yeah I know anecdotal experience can be misleading: 4e was very popular in my gaming circle long after the tide turned against it online!


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## Raith5 (Nov 10, 2017)

OB1 said:


> I'm sure this is what Hasbro wants as well.  A refined "final" game engine that like Monopoly or Risk remains the same decade after decade and that parent's teach to their children without having to relearn a bunch of new rules.  The aesthetics and fluff can and will change, but not the game itself.  I'm not sure if 5e is that final engine or not, but if it isn't, I'd guess the next version will be.




This "end of line" thinking worries me a bit though. Doesnt this go directly against the ethos of 5e that the game should be customizable to each table? I guess I would like to see a basic game that does do the core game experience for people new to the hobby, but I hope there is a big part of D&D that continues to be rethought and reworked, as well as allows houseruling.


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## Mercule (Nov 10, 2017)

Bolares said:


> Dind't Perkins play a major part in the development of Eberron? I believe they can stay true to the settings core (are at least I hope they do).



It's not so much about Eberron -- I'm cautiously optimistic that they can pull that off, in a limited scope. It's more that they seem to be letting their "we're all in the same multiverse" idea get a bit out of hand and have a hard time setting boundaries.

I haven't used the Great Wheel since 1E. I rarely use aberrations (especially beholders and mind flayers) and explicitly don't use the Far Realm. I don't like the Blood War and have a preferred go-to for the model of why the fiends behave as they do. That's all OK and true to the spirit of D&D. We aren't all playing in the same multiverse -- unless we are. 

I think it's great that they've opened the possibility for the published settings, but it shouldn't be a straight-jacket. If someone is using SpellJammer, then the Realms and Greyhawk exist in the same plane, for them. If you're a 1E grognard, then they exist in parallel primes. Some editions have said you can move between primes using the astral. Others say the ethereal. Still others have said the plane of shadow. I think there are actually more answers to that than there are editions. And that's the way it should be. Go ahead and pick a default, but don't make too hard of a push for it.

It's OK for psionics in the Realms to come from some interaction with the Far Realm, but be a product of natural mutation in Dark Sun. Likewise, all magic in the Realms might be a manipulation of the Weave, but it's also OK for my setting to have arcane magic as using the words of Creation, druidic magic as commanding spirits to do things, and divine magic to be the gods having angels watch over you -- all without anything that looks like the Weave.

So, my real concern with 5E is that the team has a hard time telling the difference between inspiration and definition. None of the examples above require any changes to rules. They're all just fine inspiration regardless of rules. The ideas that the team has presented are generally good inspiration, but shouldn't be definition or any form of canon.

This is something Gygax excelled at and one reason why I think the game succeeded where competitors (even some with arguably better rules) didn't: He knew how to present lore as inspiration. That's probably a thread all in itself, though.


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## Mistwell (Nov 10, 2017)

I asked Mike Mearls this one Twitter:

Re: Settings as Genres. Could Greyhawk = Oldschool genre? More difficult natural healing rules, xp for gold, more save or die elements to the game, followers, morale and loyalty rules, stronghold rules, a much wider and less balanced range of wandering monsters, etc.?

Mearls responded:

Potentially - also consider the presence of Iuz and the Great Kingdom, the ascendance of evil, lack of clear heroes, makes for an interesting direction when combined with old school, hard core approach.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Mercule said:


> It's not so much about Eberron -- I'm cautiously optimistic that they can pull that off, in a limited scope. It's more that they seem to be letting their "we're all in the same multiverse" idea get a bit out of hand and have a hard time setting boundaries.
> 
> I haven't used the Great Wheel since 1E. I rarely use aberrations (especially beholders and mind flayers) and explicitly don't use the Far Realm. I don't like the Blood War and have a preferred go-to for the model of why the fiends behave as they do. That's all OK and true to the spirit of D&D. We aren't all playing in the same multiverse -- unless we are.
> 
> ...



Ship's sailed on that score: this is all already in the three core books, and they see the strategy as paying off. Indeed, it is easier to ignore and remove the default than try to make a whole cosmos from whole cloth, and they are appealing to folks who want a prepackaged product, which would indeed seem to be the point of a setting product.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> I asked Mike Mearls this one Twitter:
> 
> Re: Settings as Genres. Could Greyhawk = Oldschool genre? More difficult natural healing rules, xp for gold, more save or die elements to the game, followers, morale and loyalty rules, stronghold rules, a much wider and less balanced range of wandering monsters, etc.?
> 
> ...



Some of that certainly seems baked in to the DMG presentation of genre in general, and Greyhawk specifically.


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## KentDT (Nov 10, 2017)

Dragonblade said:


> I'd also like to a deluxe core book treatment. I'd pay the premium price to get an enhanced set of core books with all errata, higher quality paper, binding, etc. and ideally a Sage Advice inspired FAQ appendix at the back of the books.



Yes, this. With a leather cover and foil stamped title, etc. 
I have that for several kickstarted titles, definitely want it for the core books of the #1 game on my shelves.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Listened to most of the podcast now: interesting to note that Perkins revealed that the 17 pages of name tables were an early part of the outline for XGtE, based on feedback from customers wanting such material.


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## Elf_flambe (Nov 10, 2017)

Raith5 said:


> What evidence is there for this? 3e felt like a much bigger deal than 5e too me. I spent a lot more $ on 3e than 5e. But, sure it hard to compare in terms of sales because 5e is so lean in terms of products and 3e had more books. I do feel anecdotally that 5e has brought back quite a few lapsed gamers back into the game, but are they buying many 5e products?




Original 1E gamer here. Watched 2E from afar, but didn't play due to Real Life. I played a couple of 3.0/3.5 sessions when my kids' homeschool group started dabbling in RPGs, and picked up a new 3.5 paperback Player's Handbook and some other books used. Avoided 4E like the plague. But 5E has grabbed me from the Starter Set onwards. I've bought most of the books new, as well as a frightening number of miniatures. I don't get to play as much as I like, but hope that will change. I also played in a couple of AL games at a recent con, and enjoyed the experience.

I may not be typical, but I doubt that I'm alone in my experiences.


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## Azzy (Nov 10, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Listened to most of the podcast now: interesting to note that Perkins revealed that the 17 pages of name tables were an early part of the outline for XGtE, based on feedback from customers wanting such material.




I'm not surprised. Casual players have far different desires than the hardcore.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Raith5 said:


> Interesting. Thanks. I agree with the higher profile of 5e. But the thing I notice is that many people in my circle who play 5e dont buy many of the books because the rules of this edition are so light and free from splatbook crawl expectation. Hence my line of questioning of whether the profile of 5e has translated into volume of sales. But, yeah I know anecdotal experience can be misleading: 4e was very popular in my gaming circle long after the tide turned against it online!



From what they've said, the same thing happened with 3.x: tons of people never bought books, hence leading to lots of books unsold. Now the strategy is to design books around selling large quantities: their stated goals, from previous such talks as this, is ~100,000 sales per book. That's a fraction of the people playing, which means they don't expect most to buy books, straight up: reality based marketing.


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## Lost One (Nov 10, 2017)

I'm sorry, until good digital games come out using ALL of the D&D 5E rules and features it's never going to be as good as the 80s, 90s or 00s.
All the D&D games I have fond memories of date back to Eye of the Beholder, Menzoberranzan and leading to Baldurs Gate and NWN. 
While PnP is nice and all, the fact is there are  people like me who crave badly for a good D&D computer or videogame that sticks to the rules. None of the MMO or Sword coast legends crap. I mean, if I'm 40 by the time cool D&D digital games reappear I don't care, I just need them back in my life.
A NWN type multiplayer remake for 5E with better graphics/playability, that's all you need.  
Stop making stupid board games with simpler rules. ALL the rules, ALL the customization,  in a fun digital game. Make it happen.


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## jaynay27 (Nov 10, 2017)

Lost One said:


> I'm sorry, until good digital games come out using ALL of the D&D 5E rules and features it's never going to be as good as the 80s, 90s or 00s.
> All the D&D games I have fond memories of date back to Eye of the Beholder, Menzoberranzan and leading to Baldurs Gate and NWN.
> While PnP is nice and all, the fact is there are  people like me who crave badly for a good D&D computer or videogame that sticks to the rules. None of the MMO or Sword coast legends crap. I mean, if I'm 40 by the time cool D&D digital games reappear I don't care, I just need them back in my life.
> A NWN type multiplayer remake for 5E with better graphics/playability, that's all you need.
> Stop making stupid board games with simpler rules. ALL the rules, ALL the customization,  in a fun digital game. Make it happen.




And gold box, don't forget goldbox.

You could also try Low Magic Age for a good simple diversion.

*Edit* 6 Posts in 9 years...I am on fire!


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## Mortellan (Nov 10, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> I asked Mike Mearls this one Twitter:
> 
> Re: Settings as Genres. Could Greyhawk = Oldschool genre? More difficult natural healing rules, xp for gold, more save or die elements to the game, followers, morale and loyalty rules, stronghold rules, a much wider and less balanced range of wandering monsters, etc.?
> 
> ...




Good job planting that in his head Mistwell.  

The point of your transcript I referred to earlier in the thread was this one (emphasis mine):



> They have a rough draft cosmological ties for how all the settings could come back and fit together and have products, including even Spelljammer and Dark Sun and Eberron and Greyhawk. They want to make sure *for each setting product, they assume this is the first time you're seeing that setting, and not require prior knowledge of it*.




They said not just a single product, for each setting product. And the part about seeing for the first time and not requiring prior knowledge, to me is aimed at Greyhawk the only one burdened by several editions worth of canon.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Mortellan said:


> Good job planting that in his head Mistwell.
> 
> The point of your transcript I referred to earlier in the thread was this one (emphasis mine):
> 
> ...



To a certain extent, despite the context of the question, it wasn't really even aimed at setting books entirely: that's just their overall book philosophy: each book has to stand alone, apart from the core rules.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Lost One said:


> I'm sorry, until good digital games come out using ALL of the D&D 5E rules and features it's never going to be as good as the 80s, 90s or 00s.
> All the D&D games I have fond memories of date back to Eye of the Beholder, Menzoberranzan and leading to Baldurs Gate and NWN.
> While PnP is nice and all, the fact is there are  people like me who crave badly for a good D&D computer or videogame that sticks to the rules. None of the MMO or Sword coast legends crap. I mean, if I'm 40 by the time cool D&D digital games reappear I don't care, I just need them back in my life.
> A NWN type multiplayer remake for 5E with better graphics/playability, that's all you need.
> Stop making stupid board games with simpler rules. ALL the rules, ALL the customization,  in a fun digital game. Make it happen.



I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you: the last attempt ended badly (Sword Coast Legends), but who knows what they will do in time?

They do have a successful MMO, and a number of smaller games out, so there is activity on that front.


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## Henry (Nov 10, 2017)

PabloM said:


> Dragonlance is the niche inside the niche, I´m afraid.
> 
> 
> 
> I´ll be truly happy with a digital gazetteer, or even an UA article.




Dragonlance fits a genre, too - Romantic Fantasy (In the Mercedes Lackey / Diane Duane / Thomas Mallory sense). Knighthoods, close friendships, torn family members, personal relationships between gods and men, etc. it's just that you don't need a ton of special rules to make that happen. There would be a few - the moons and orders of Magic, for one.

But Dragonlance could handily fit in Romantic Fantasy as a genre.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Henry said:


> Dragonlance fits a genre, too - Romantic Fantasy (In the Mercedes Lackey / Diane Duane / Thomas Mallory sense). Knighthoods, close friendships, torn family members, personal relationships between gods and men, etc. it's just that you don't need a ton of special rules to make that happen. There would be a few - the moons and orders of Magic, for one.
> 
> But Dragonlance could handily fit in Romantic Fantasy as a genre.



Epic Fantasy, too, though Birthright fits there as well..


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## TwoSix (Nov 10, 2017)

Henry said:


> But Dragonlance could handily fit in Romantic Fantasy as a genre.



Reflavoring Dragonlance to be D&D's version of Blue Rose seems like it could be a winner in today's market.


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## darjr (Nov 10, 2017)

About a neverwinter nights style game, go do it. They are not, they are willing to license out to someone who can. Go find that group or company and natter at them Till they do it.


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## Koloth (Nov 10, 2017)

As far as the PHB update, they should take a lesson from Steve Jackson Games.  Update the PHB and publish free errata for the prior version(s).  If WOTC has figured out pdfs by now and sold PHB in pdf, provide updated versions for all owners free of charge.  Make sure you note on the books what print version it is so folks can download the proper errata.

In my experience, the amount of material from a PHB or other core books used at any one game session per player is fairly small and easily checked against a well indexed errata/update document.  

Glad to hear the current version is likely to have a long life.  Version churn caused my group to walk away from D&D when they did the hard switch to V4.


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## Francisco Grillo (Nov 10, 2017)

PabloM said:


> Dragonlance is the niche inside the niche, I´m afraid.
> 
> 
> 
> I´ll be truly happy with a digital gazetteer, or even an UA article.




True when you think of it all has been written unless you want to expand Age of Mortals. All I think is needed is the rules for the setting's exclusive classes, the moons, and pardon de redundancy, all setting exclusive material. This could be done in one book like Xanathars Guide to Everything, including other settings exclusive material.


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## Parmandur (Nov 10, 2017)

Francisco Grillo said:


> True when you think of it all has been written unless you want to expand Age of Mortals. All I think is needed is the rules for the setting's exclusive classes, the moons, and pardon de redundancy, all setting exclusive material. This could be done in one book like Xanathars Guide to Everything, including other settings exclusive material.



Basically, Dragonlance Adventures, but with 5E rules. I could dig it.


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## Sword of Spirit (Nov 10, 2017)

Raith5 said:


> This "end of line" thinking worries me a bit though. Doesnt this go directly against the ethos of 5e that the game should be customizable to each table? I guess I would like to see a basic game that does do the core game experience for people new to the hobby, but I hope there is a big part of D&D that continues to be rethought and reworked, as well as allows houseruling.




These aren't totally incompatible concepts. Take the examples of Monopoly or Risk. They have themed versions that come out without really changing the rules. I assume if/when we hopefully get a final version of D&D, they will still continue to make exactly that sort of thing. The difference is that the rules of the game won't change. After a hundred years you'll probably have more subclasses and options than Pathfinder, but you'll _never_ have to learn a new PHB (just buy new copies when you wear out your old ones--probably with choices of art, bindings, etc). D&D would become just D&D rather than X edition, and eventually the idea of different people playing different editions would fade into history (of course, with modern/future information preservation, there will still be those who choose and can play older editions, but it will be an enthusiast experience, rather than a question you have to ask before joining a new group).



Parmandur said:


> I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you: the last attempt ended badly (Sword Coast Legends), but who knows what they will do in time?




Thing is, that _wasn't_ an attempt though. That was an "inspired-by" D&D game. A real D&D game would attempt as faithful a rules presentation as it could make. There is a whole series of such games, running from 1e through 3e. And there were some really popular games there--the kind that introduced a lot of us to D&D. Then for some reason they stopped trying to do that. It seems like maybe it's similar to the 4e experiment. It made sense at the time, but perhaps they need to go back and give the previous model another go. I know I have virtually no interest in these more recent ones that don't use D&D rules.


----------



## DM Howard (Nov 10, 2017)

Honestly?  I think this news has kind of dampened my enthusiasm for 5E a little bit.  I want comprehensive setting guides, and I want novels.  It doesn't look like WotC wants to cater to these two aspects that I am still looking for in my D&D experience, so maybe my customer purchasing cycle has come to an end?


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## Demetrios1453 (Nov 11, 2017)

Bravesteel said:


> Honestly?  I think this news has kind of dampened my enthusiasm for 5E a little bit.  I want comprehensive setting guides, and I want novels.  It doesn't look like WotC wants to cater to these two aspects that I am still looking for in my D&D experience, so maybe my customer purchasing cycle has come to an end?




I think you are a bit down on the setting guides - it seems that they might be ramping up to starting them. It seems to me from what they said that campaign setting books are on the table, they just want to do them right and make it so you don't need to buy multiple books for a single setting. And since the recent WotC job posting (which is the subject of another thread in this form) seems to indicate that the person hired will be helping with updating a setting to 5e, that seems to me that we'll start seeing campaign setting books in the relatively near future. 

Novels, on the other hand...


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## Parmandur (Nov 11, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> I think you are a bit down on the setting guides - it seems that they might be ramping up to starting them. It seems to me from what they said that campaign setting books are on the table, they just want to do them right and make it so you don't need to buy multiple books for a single setting. And since the recent WotC job posting (which is the subject of another thread in this form) seems to indicate that the person hired will be helping with updating a setting to 5e, that seems to me that we'll start seeing campaign setting books in the relatively near future.
> 
> Novels, on the other hand...



I predict we will see novels again...probably post-movie, should it come to pass.

The job posting doesn't necessarily mean they will be producing a setting book...it is an example of the kind of task somebody might undertake, I think. We will see something for settings, I'm sure, they keep saying that we will.


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## DM Howard (Nov 11, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> I think you are a bit down on the setting guides - it seems that they might be ramping up to starting them. It seems to me from what they said that campaign setting books are on the table, they just want to do them right and make it so you don't need to buy multiple books for a single setting. And since the recent WotC job posting (which is the subject of another thread in this form) seems to indicate that the person hired will be helping with updating a setting to 5e, that seems to me that we'll start seeing campaign setting books in the relatively near future.
> 
> Novels, on the other hand...




You might be right, but I think I'll take a step back.  Really, I already have what I need to play and DM.  So, if WotC does actually come out with a campaign setting guide that is worth a darn, or novels (/tears) then I'll just be pleasantly surprised.


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## PabloM (Nov 11, 2017)

Francisco Grillo said:


> True when you think of it all has been written unless you want to expand Age of Mortals. All I think is needed is the rules for the setting's exclusive classes, the moons, and pardon de redundancy, all setting exclusive material. This could be done in one book like Xanathars Guide to Everything, including other settings exclusive material.






Parmandur said:


> Basically, Dragonlance Adventures, but with 5E rules. I could dig it.




Keeping the nostalgia aside, I think the 3e Dragonlance Campaign Setting is better introducing the setting. But yes, I agree: we all want a short document with some backgrounds, races and other stuff and a bit of fluff. This can be a short UA article or something like that. 

OR they can open the permission to other settings as well as Forgotten Realms and Ravenloft to the DMsGuild. I´ll be glad to upload my own conversion.


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## chibi graz'zt (Nov 11, 2017)

awesome stuff, this is why 5e is succeeding more than any previous edition; I am glad for the slow production pace, lets me get through a story without rushing; lets me plan out my stories. And again so happy that Forgotten Realms is the default product setting for now; previous editions had WAY too many settings; for a newb entering that is WAY too much. Keep it simple, stupid, because it sells.


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## OB1 (Nov 11, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> I think you are a bit down on the setting guides - it seems that they might be ramping up to starting them. It seems to me from what they said that campaign setting books are on the table, they just want to do them right and make it so you don't need to buy multiple books for a single setting.




Thinking about the PHB +1 philosophy, settings as genre and the Playtest era ideas about making the game modular for different play styles, I wonder if we could see something like the following be the standard for different campaign settings.

80 Pages - Player options and rules for a setting
80 Pages - DM advice and lore for the setting including magic items.  Include advice for adjusting APs to the specific setting.
80 Pages - 2-3 stand alone adventures (think YP) that give the flavor for the setting along with setting specific monsters.

So to play Greyhawk, Eberron, Dark Sun, etc, you would only ever need the PHB plus the setting guide to play a specific version.


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## Parmandur (Nov 11, 2017)

OB1 said:


> Thinking about the PHB +1 philosophy, settings as genre and the Playtest era ideas about making the game modular for different play styles, I wonder if we could see something like the following be the standard for different campaign settings.
> 
> 80 Pages - Player options and rules for a setting
> 80 Pages - DM advice and lore for the setting including magic items.  Include advice for adjusting APs to the specific setting.
> ...



Something like that could be brilliant, and I'd buy it.


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## Demetrios1453 (Nov 11, 2017)

OB1 said:


> Thinking about the PHB +1 philosophy, settings as genre and the Playtest era ideas about making the game modular for different play styles, I wonder if we could see something like the following be the standard for different campaign settings.
> 
> 80 Pages - Player options and rules for a setting
> 80 Pages - DM advice and lore for the setting including magic items.  Include advice for adjusting APs to the specific setting.
> ...





I like the idea, but where would the geographical description of the setting be placed? I assume in the DM section? I would have to say that section would need to be larger, since looking over previous setting books, the physical and historical description of the setting tends to be larger than the others.

Just going over setting books I have near at hand, the 3e Forgotten Realms setting had 42% of its page count for geography, the 3e Greyhawk Gazetteer had 72% of its page count for geography, and the 3e Eberron had 30% of its page count for geography.

Since the 3e Eberron and Forgotten Realms setting books were similar (both 320 page books) and both pretty highly regarded, let's look at the player/DM/adventure breakdown for both:

Player information - races, classes, prestige classes (which would translate to subclasses for a potential 5e book): FR 14%,  Eberron 24%
Player/DM shared information - geography, history, magic, religion, organizations: FR 71%, Eberron 50%
DM information - running the setting, magic items, monsters: FR 7%, Eberron: 18%
Sample adventures: FR 3%, Eberrron: 3% (both had exactly 10 pages set aside for adventures, which I bet isn't a coincidence)
... with the remainder in introductions, indices, and so on.

So, I would say that, with the caveat that this is of course a small sample size, setting books would be broken down into those that hew close to the standard rules and those that deviate substantially from them. With the former, the book can spend up to 3/4 or more of its page count describing the setting, since you don't need to use space for specialized rules. But since the latter type of setting needs extra room for such rules, the description of the setting would only take up half or so of the page count. But in either case, just that portion alone tends to take up the lion's share of the page count.

And one further caveat - the timeline in the Realms has moved substantially forward, with massive catastrophes and counter-catastrophes in the meantime, while one of Eberron's conceits is that the timeline does *not* progress. This means that a lot of the 3e information for Eberron could just be repeated, while much of the FR info is outdated (and even if the geography has settled back down near to the old version, most of the NPCs, barring a few long-lived ones, mentioned in the setting book would long since be dead).


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## Parmandur (Nov 11, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> I like the idea, but where would the geographical description of the setting be placed? I assume in the DM section? I would have to say that section would need to be larger, since looking over previous setting books, the physical and historical description of the setting tends to be larger than the others.
> 
> Just going over setting books I have near at hand, the 3e Forgotten Realms setting had 42% of its page count for geography, the 3e Greyhawk Gazetteer had 72% of its page count for geography, and the 3e Eberron had 30% of its page count for geography.
> 
> ...



However, that geographical catalog is something that Perkins specifically calls out in the podcast as problematic and to be overcome rather than emulated. Geography I would expect more in AP material.


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## Demetrios1453 (Nov 11, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> However, that geographical catalog is something that Perkins specifically calls out in the podcast as problematic and to be overcome rather than emulated. Geography I would expect more in AP material.




But those are my favorite parts! But I'm something of a history and geography geek though.


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## OB1 (Nov 11, 2017)

I probably over estimated how much is needed for the player guide. Maybe more like

40 pages player options and rules
40 pages dm advice and rules
80 pages setting lore and maps
80 pages 3 stand alone adventures
20 pages monsters and magic items

That gets to 260 pages, about the same as an AP. The adventure, monster and magic item page counts are straight out of YP. SCAG had 100 pages for lore, but the adventures could contain some of that info as well. 


Sent from my iPhone using EN World


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## Parmandur (Nov 11, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> But those are my favorite parts! But I'm something of a history and geography geek though.



For sure, I have a lot of fun with that stuff myself. But, given everything they have said over the past few years, they do seem to be trying to think outside the box with settings as done previously. This "setting book as genre adjustment" seems intriguing: imagine they release a Ravenloft "Gothic Fantasy" book the same year as "Van Richten's Guide to Horrors" in the style of Volo's: useful for those playing straight Ravenloft, but also generally useful to any DM who wants more options in their arsenal.


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## Demetrios1453 (Nov 11, 2017)

OB1 said:


> That gets to 260 pages, about the same as an AP. The adventure, monster and magic item page counts are straight out of YP. SCAG had 100 pages for lore, but the adventures could contain some of that info as well.





I would hope that they would give us larger books for campaign settings.

That is what I hope. What we're actually likely to get, on the other hand...


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## Parmandur (Nov 11, 2017)

Demetrios1453 said:


> I would hope that they would give us larger books for campaign settings.
> 
> That is what I hope. What we're actually likely to get, on the other hand...



Forget larger books, I want box sets! But other than the MM, 256 is probably the max size for a book this edition.


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## Enevhar Aldarion (Nov 11, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Forget larger books, I want box sets! But other than the MM, 256 is probably the max size for a book this edition.




I think with the way WotC is doing things, other settings will be lucky to get a SCAG-like book, describing one region in detail, rather than the whole world. I doubt even the Realms will ever get another book describing the entire world in detail.


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## Parmandur (Nov 11, 2017)

Enevhar Aldarion said:


> I think with the way WotC is doing things, other settings will be lucky to get a SCAG-like book, describing one region in detail, rather than the whole world. I doubt even the Realms will ever get another book describing the entire world in detail.



Probably not, since they questioned the value proposition of such a product in the panel here.


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## gyor (Nov 11, 2017)

Other setting are going to get an AP at best,  like Ravenloft. 

  As for novels,  if they are open to partners,  the TEGG (The Ed Green Wood Group)  is a no brainer,  he is the guy who created the Forgotten Realms. 

 Alternatively Paizo seems like an intelligent choice as well. Oh heck and partnership between Paizo and TEGG could even work,  Ed has worked for Paizo. 

 There is no excuse for no FR novels.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

gyor said:


> Other setting are going to get an AP at best,  like Ravenloft.
> 
> As for novels,  if they are open to partners,  the TEGG (The Ed Green Wood Group)  is a no brainer,  he is the guy who created the Forgotten Realms.
> 
> ...



Sure, there is, and they gave the perfectly valid reason on this panel: they are a game company, not a novel publisher.

They don't have any sort of moral obligation to publish novels, but I'm sure those will come with some license deal down the line. Maybe Tor or somebody like that. Time will tell, but lying fallow can be a good thing.


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## Zarithar (Nov 12, 2017)

gyor said:


> Other setting are going to get an AP at best,  like Ravenloft.
> There is no excuse for no FR novels.




Agreed. I thought that many of the FR books made the best seller lists. Salvatore, Kemp, Weiss & Hickman most certainly. Please bring back the novel line.


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## Staffan (Nov 12, 2017)

Mercule said:


> It's not so much about Eberron -- I'm cautiously optimistic that they can pull that off, in a limited scope. It's more that they seem to be letting their "we're all in the same multiverse" idea get a bit out of hand and have a hard time setting boundaries.
> 
> I haven't used the Great Wheel since 1E. I rarely use aberrations (especially beholders and mind flayers) and explicitly don't use the Far Realm. I don't like the Blood War and have a preferred go-to for the model of why the fiends behave as they do. That's all OK and true to the spirit of D&D. We aren't all playing in the same multiverse -- unless we are.
> 
> I think it's great that they've opened the possibility for the published settings, but it shouldn't be a straight-jacket. If someone is using SpellJammer, then the Realms and Greyhawk exist in the same plane, for them. If you're a 1E grognard, then they exist in parallel primes. Some editions have said you can move between primes using the astral. Others say the ethereal. Still others have said the plane of shadow. I think there are actually more answers to that than there are editions. And that's the way it should be. Go ahead and pick a default, but don't make too hard of a push for it.




I'm with you on this. I would like individual settings to remain true to their origins in this regard - if they publish Eberron, I don't want them to say things like "The natives of Eberron call Hades Dollurh." or something like that. Dollurh is its own realm of the dead, and has nothing to do with the morality-based Great Wheel. Some might say "What's the big deal?", but the nature of death and the planes in Eberron is crucial to at least one important religion which plays a major part in the setting, and if you change that the religion in question makes no sense.

However, if the perspective was reversed, I wouldn't have any problem with a Planescape product referencing Eberron. I'm perfectly fine with Eberron existing from the perspective of Planescape (or Spelljammer), I just don't want it forced in from the perspective of Eberron.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

Staffan said:


> I'm with you on this. I would like individual settings to remain true to their origins in this regard - if they publish Eberron, I don't want them to say things like "The natives of Eberron call Hades Dollurh." or something like that. Dollurh is its own realm of the dead, and has nothing to do with the morality-based Great Wheel. Some might say "What's the big deal?", but the nature of death and the planes in Eberron is crucial to at least one important religion which plays a major part in the setting, and if you change that the religion in question makes no sense.
> 
> However, if the perspective was reversed, I wouldn't have any problem with a Planescape product referencing Eberron. I'm perfectly fine with Eberron existing from the perspective of Planescape (or Spelljammer), I just don't want it forced in from the perspective of Eberron.



But, they already have said they plan to do as much: isolated settings aren't viable for them from a product line perspective, though it can be done at the table certainly.


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## Mercule (Nov 12, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Ship's sailed on that score: this is all already in the three core books, and they see the strategy as paying off. Indeed, it is easier to ignore and remove the default than try to make a whole cosmos from whole cloth, and they are appealing to folks who want a prepackaged product, which would indeed seem to be the point of a setting product.



I didn't say that setting products should be opinionated. That is, as you say, the point.

What I'm saying is that the core rules shouldn't be particularly opinionated. I'm also saying that I don't trust the current staff to know the difference between the two.

I'm really not sure what the impact of an opinionated D&D is on the revenue of the product line. I don't necessarily care, either. I do know that it decreases my overall satisfaction with the product. Whether the "ship has sailed" or not, is really irrelevant. There's a better than fair chance that I'll get tired of the rules including too much fluff and that the only actual setting getting any support is one that I loathe. When that happens, I'll move on to a different system*. Until then, I'm going to continue to comment on it because I hope the trend reverses itself.

* In truth, I've already hit that point. If I didn't have a couple players who weren't adamant about not learning a new system, I'd have moved to either Fate or Savage Worlds, last spring.


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## Mercule (Nov 12, 2017)

Staffan said:


> However, if the perspective was reversed, I wouldn't have any problem with a Planescape product referencing Eberron. I'm perfectly fine with Eberron existing from the perspective of Planescape (or Spelljammer), I just don't want it forced in from the perspective of Eberron.



Definitely agree.

If you're playing Spelljammer, it makes sense that it'd include the existing worlds and use flogistan (or whatever) to explain travelling between them. In Planescape, it's a similar idea, but the settings are probably alternate primes.

Your Oerth might have a crystal sphere and spell ships, but mine doesn't have to. Trying to decree/explain otherwise isn't beneficial. Let things be vague until/unless they need explained.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

Mercule said:


> I didn't say that setting products should be opinionated. That is, as you say, the point.
> 
> What I'm saying is that the core rules shouldn't be particularly opinionated. I'm also saying that I don't trust the current staff to know the difference between the two.
> 
> ...



Well, they have asked people many ways, in many surveys. While they might lack metaphysical certitude of the way people will take a default setting, they can easily have moral certitude.


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## gyor (Nov 12, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Sure, there is, and they gave the perfectly valid reason on this panel: they are a game company, not a novel publisher.
> 
> They don't have any sort of moral obligation to publish novels, but I'm sure those will come with some license deal down the line. Maybe Tor or somebody like that. Time will tell, but lying fallow can be a good thing.




 D&D has been printing novels since I was a a young child,  maybe before I was born. Literally hundreds of novels. Pull my leg again.  What they really mean is after they staff levels were butchered by greedy corporate weasels,  they couldn't handle it any longer. 

 Besides I pointed out 2 companies more then capable of taking over publishing the novels.


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## Mistwell (Nov 12, 2017)

gyor said:


> D&D has been printing novels since I was a a young child,  maybe before I was born. Literally hundreds of novels. Pull my leg again.  What they really mean is after they staff levels were butchered by greedy corporate weasels,  they couldn't handle it any longer.
> 
> Besides I pointed out 2 companies more then capable of taking over publishing the novels.




This seems...not accurate. They can, and have, outsourced the novels. It's not a staff level issue. I believe they have strongly implied the novels were no longer profitable for them. People remember the bestsellers, but they have not been bestsellers for a while as far as I know. I think they were just not making enough money to justify the venture for now.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

gyor said:


> D&D has been printing novels since I was a a young child,  maybe before I was born. Literally hundreds of novels. Pull my leg again.  What they really mean is after they staff levels were butchered by greedy corporate weasels,  they couldn't handle it any longer.
> 
> Besides I pointed out 2 companies more then capable of taking over publishing the novels.



They have published many novels, yes: a big part of what killed TSR was the mishandled novel business, and rarely have the novels been of very high quality to speak of. You keep talking about staff levels being "butchered," but they seem to have plenty of resources to pursue what they wish to do: currently hiring, too.

I am sure D&D novels will make a comeback: with Tor, or Del Rey or some other third party company (Tor does Paizo's fiction now, don't they?) that will pay for the license. Bet on it by the time a movie hits the screens.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> This seems...not accurate. They can, and have, outsourced the novels. It's not a staff level issue. I believe they have strongly implied the novels were no longer profitable for them. People remember the bestsellers, but they have not been bestsellers for a while as far as I know. I think they were just not making enough money to justify the venture for now.



Actually, one major point against the cessation of D&D novels being related to any imagined staff shortage: Magic novels. WotC used to do Magic: the Gathering novels, even sharing a lot of the backend publishing staff IIRC, and they stopped doing Magic novels a few years back, well before the D&D team took a break.


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## Morrus (Nov 12, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> They have published many novels, yes: a big part of what killed TSR was the mishandled novel business,




And yet one thing which propped them up were the bestselling _Dragonlance_ novels. Well handled, the novels have been goldmine.

I've not ready any Forgotten Realms novels, so I can't speak to those.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

Morrus said:


> And yet one thing which propped them up were the bestselling _Dragonlance_ novels. Well handled, the novels have been goldmine.
> 
> I've not ready any Forgotten Realms novels, so I can't speak to those.



I did enjoy the Dragonlance novels back in the day. I think the point the WotC guys make in the panel is that they don't have the publishing industry know-how to handle novels well: hence why they would be open to a liscence partner who did (as Paizo has with Tor).


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## Morrus (Nov 12, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> I did enjoy the Dragonlance novels back in the day. I think the point the WotC guys make in the panel is that they don't have the publishing industry know-how to handle novels well




But they used to have. That's why they were on the New York Times bestseller lists time and time again. You don't do that by accident.

It sounds like they've lost a lot of expertise over the years.


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## Parmandur (Nov 12, 2017)

Morrus said:


> But they used to have. That's why they were on the New York Times bestseller lists time and time again. You don't do that by accident.
> 
> It sounds like they've lost a lot of expertise over the years.



Yeah, that's true: it has been 4-5 years since the Magic team did a novel, because they saw them as a poor return on investment. Wouldn't surprise me if that lack bled over into the D&D side, though they got out a few more novels after that (not many, though).


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## happyhermit (Nov 13, 2017)

gyor said:


> D&D has been printing novels since I was a a young child,  maybe before I was born. Literally hundreds of novels. Pull my leg again.  What they really mean is after they staff levels were butchered by greedy corporate weasels ...




Not really, "D&D" has never printed any novels. 

What "greedy corporate weasels" are you talking about though? Mearls? Or do you think it goes up to Chris Cocks or even Goldner, it is actual people making these decisions you know (or at least the actual decisions as opposed to this "butchering staff levels").


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## Sword of Spirit (Nov 13, 2017)

In 2e the settings were all presented from their own perspective, and then Spelljammer and Planescape combined them together and presented them from that perspective. That's already the precedent.

What I think some people might be objecting to is that TSR decided that there really _is_ a true version of the multiverse, and other perspectives are basically wrong.  Although _even then_, Planescape, which is the one with the clearest picture of that version, has a built-in "but who really knows who's right?" philosophical point.

In reality, I think the problem is that people aren't looking at what was actually done in 2e (and the current design seems to be an enhanced version of that), and are creating a mental image taking 3e's "every setting in it's own unique universe!" and then being concerned with how preserve the flavor of those worlds while still putting them all together in a unified multiverse.

It's already been proven doable. And 5e is even more sensitive to these concerns, because the DMG specifically highlights that there is no way to tell which version is actually true. So people on Eberron only know about certain planes, so they only ever interact with them. From the the perspective of the average guy from Sigil, that Eberron-specific plane is just a domain out in the Hinterlands of the Outlands, or in the Gray Waste or something. But from the meta-perspective, if the only way in or out of it is from the Eberron methods (and maybe portals to it on the Gray Waste if you're already there), you really can't say whether or not it is true.

The only thing that this current method (or at least, the method as I'm interpreting it) requires that imposes on anyone's game even theoretically is that it is officially true that all of those other places actually exist. The fact is, they either have to say they do or they don't. 2e said they do. 3e said they don't. 5e is going with 2e, but emphasizing the subjectivity of the details.

If that isn't good enough for everyone...well that's just silly.


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## Parmandur (Nov 13, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> In 2e the settings were all presented from their own perspective, and then Spelljammer and Planescape combined them together and presented them from that perspective. That's already the precedent.
> 
> What I think some people might be objecting to is that TSR decided that there really _is_ a true version of the multiverse, and other perspectives are basically wrong.  Although _even then_, Planescape, which is the one with the clearest picture of that version, has a built-in "but who really knows who's right?" philosophical point.
> 
> ...



That seems a very excellent breakdown of the situation and the background. One of my takeaways from this panel is that in exploring Psionics in Eberron the WotC meta-setting is evolving to encompass more than 2E.


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## PabloM (Nov 13, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> The only thing that this current method (or at least, the method as I'm interpreting it) requires that imposes on anyone's game even theoretically is that it is officially true that all of those other places actually exist. The fact is, they either have to say they do or they don't. 2e said they do. 3e said they don't. 5e is going with 2e, but emphasizing the subjectivity of the details.
> 
> If that isn't good enough for everyone...well that's just silly.




Nice summary, I only have one question: what about 4e? I didn´t play it, so I don´t know how WOTC treated the settings back then.


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## Shroomy (Nov 13, 2017)

PabloM said:


> Nice summary, I only have one question: what about 4e? I didn´t play it, so I don´t know how WOTC treated the settings back then.




The Forgotten Realms, Eberron, and Dark Sun all used variations of the default World Axis cosmology.


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## Parmandur (Nov 13, 2017)

PabloM said:


> Nice summary, I only have one question: what about 4e? I didn´t play it, so I don´t know how WOTC treated the settings back then.



Much like 3E, but more so (creating a whole new example setting with a new cosmology, different settings mileage may vary).


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## Yaarel (Nov 13, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> The only thing that this current [5e] method (or at least, the method as I'm interpreting it) requires that imposes on anyone's game even theoretically is that it is officially true that all of those other places actually exist.




Actually, this ‘only thing’ is highly objectionable.

The DM says Cthulu doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong. Prepare for the objectively existing Farrealms to rip thru the reality of My Little Pony.

The DM says polytheism doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong. Prepare for the Forgotten Realms religion and its fanatic idolatrous Clerics to invade the multiverse.

The ‘only thing’ is one thing too much.


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## Parmandur (Nov 13, 2017)

Yaarel said:


> Actually, this ‘only thing’ is highly objectionable.
> 
> The DM says Cthulu doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong. Prepare for the objectively existing Farrealms to rip thru the reality of My Little Pony.
> 
> ...



Nothing stops a DM from limiting anything in their game: the DMG spends a lot of time on the topic.


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## Yaarel (Nov 13, 2017)

Regarding the multiverse, I got the following vibe from this State of D&D panel.

The official multiverse will have one setting per genre, that are all interconnected.

Forgotten Realms (≈ Greyhawk ≈ Dragonlance): polytheism
Eberron: pulp
Ravenloft: gothic
Dark Sun: post-apocalyptic

Plus maybe a few more genres, such as a Feywild take on fairytales, and a Farrealms take on Lovecraft.

These specific genre settings will be interconnected, sharing the same multiverse. But other settings need not be.

There is little need for a one-size-fits-all multiverse for 5e.

4e went too far by forcing all official settings to conform its World-Axis cosmology. Hopefully 5e avoids the same mistake by forcing all settings to conform to its multiverse cosmology.


----------



## Yaarel (Nov 13, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Nothing stops a DM from limiting anything in their game: the DMG spends a lot of time on the topic.




Especially if something is objectionable, writing official rules with a light touch is a better approach. Especially with clear opt-ins and opt-outs.


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## Zarithar (Nov 13, 2017)

Morrus said:


> But they used to have. That's why they were on the New York Times bestseller lists time and time again. You don't do that by accident.
> 
> It sounds like they've lost a lot of expertise over the years.




Paul S. Kemp's FR novels were brilliant, and possibly just a bit "too dark" for the Realms. I loved them though, and they rank #1 on my list of D&D based fiction. Salvatore's most recent novels, starting with _The Companions _have been excellent as well, and his books consistently hit the bestseller lists. I really don't understand the decision to drop the novel line.


----------



## pemerton (Nov 13, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> From the the perspective of the average guy from Sigil, that Eberron-specific plane is just a domain out in the Hinterlands of the Outlands, or in the Gray Waste or something. But from the meta-perspective, if the only way in or out of it is from the Eberron methods (and maybe portals to it on the Gray Waste if you're already there), you really can't say whether or not it is true.



But ignorance isn't the same as non-existence.



Sword of Spirit said:


> The only thing that this current method (or at least, the method as I'm interpreting it) requires that imposes on anyone's game even theoretically is that it is officially true that all of those other places actually exist. The fact is, they either have to say they do or they don't.



Why?

The original DDG offered a lot of pantheons for use, but it neither asserted nor denied that they existed. It was only the Manual of the Planes that decided that all the pantheons all exist in the same outer planes.


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## Sword of Spirit (Nov 13, 2017)

pemerton said:


> Why?
> 
> The original DDG offered a lot of pantheons for use, but it neither asserted nor denied that they existed. It was only the Manual of the Planes that decided that all the pantheons all exist in the same outer planes.




There wasn't such a thing as a D&D cosmology in Deities & Demigods was there? But then there was. And then there was a "just kidding, we aren't doing that anymore". And then there was a "now for something completely different."

So they really did have to say something about it when 5e came along. Since Spelljammer and Planescape rely on the settings being in the same multiverse, it was more inclusive to D&D tradition/material to include that element in some way.

I mean, I'd love it if they entirely split off the post 3e (at the latest) Forgotten Realms history and said it took place in a different multiverse, because it's really not going to compatible with the rest unless they advance all their timelines by 100+ years. But they wanted to be inclusive of those who liked 4e Forgotten Realms, despite undoing most of what it did. So my opinion on what they should have done instead is a passionate minority preference. I think wanting separate cosmologies is similar (although I don't share that preference--I like how they're presenting a recognizably D&D shared multiverse).


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## pemerton (Nov 13, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> There wasn't such a thing as a D&D cosmology in Deities & Demigods was there?



It replicated, and expanded on, PHB appendix IV (adding the Plane of Shadows and Concordant Opposition).



Sword of Spirit said:


> they really did have to say something about it when 5e came along. Since Spelljammer and Planescape rely on the settings being in the same multiverse, it was more inclusive to D&D tradition/material to include that element in some way.



You can present a "multiverse" without affirmatively asserting that it is all co-existent. Those who want to run PS or SJ can do so (combining all the stuff into one setting); others can refrain from doing so.

Clearly, different fictions can have different (and even inconsistent) contents, even if they're all published by the same publisher for use in the same game.

If market research in fact shows that the prospective audience _prefers_ a multiversal approach, then (to me) that suggests that the D&D market is more about being told stories, than about constructing their own fictions for their own games.


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## DEFCON 1 (Nov 13, 2017)

Yaarel said:


> Actually, this ‘only thing’ is highly objectionable.
> 
> The DM says Cthulu doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong. Prepare for the objectively existing Farrealms to rip thru the reality of My Little Pony.
> 
> ...




Sorry about that.  I guess you have to play a new RPG then, huh?


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## Parmandur (Nov 13, 2017)

pemerton said:


> It replicated, and expanded on, PHB appendix IV (adding the Plane of Shadows and Concordant Opposition).
> 
> You can present a "multiverse" without affirmatively asserting that it is all co-existent. Those who want to run PS or SJ can do so (combining all the stuff into one setting); others can refrain from doing so.
> 
> ...



Why not both? Yes, their market research showed that people like the multiverse approach... it's fun.


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## SkidAce (Nov 13, 2017)

Yaarel said:


> The DM says Cthulu doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong.
> The DM says polytheism doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong.




No I'm not.  Too bad...


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## MechaTarrasque (Nov 13, 2017)

SkidAce said:


> No I'm not.  Too bad...




It is like some people absolutely refuse to believe they are playing 5e instead of 3x or 4e.  Although I suppose it is kind of meta that in a fantasy game, they think that wishing really hard will change things.....


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## Sword of Spirit (Nov 14, 2017)

pemerton said:


> If market research in fact shows that the prospective audience _prefers_ a multiversal approach, then (to me) that suggests that the D&D market is more about being told stories, than about constructing their own fictions for their own games.




This is probably correct. I know that for me that D&D multiverse is my favorite thing about the game. Without it, I'd rather play something else.


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## gyor (Nov 14, 2017)

happyhermit said:


> Not really, "D&D" has never printed any novels.
> 
> What "greedy corporate weasels" are you talking about though? Mearls? Or do you think it goes up to Chris Cocks or even Goldner, it is actual people making these decisions you know (or at least the actual decisions as opposed to this "butchering staff levels").




 Higher up the food chain then Mearls, he's just the guy that the suits pawn off deliverying bad news onto.

 I was refering to the respective owners of D&D, TSR and WotC.

 I stand by my point that WotC saying they weren't in the novel business after publishing countless novels, some times as many or more novels then RPG products, makes that statement that they aren't a novel company a bad joke.

 5e is a great system, the Sundering in FR was interesting, but that the suits have so mismanaged things really sucks.


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## Mistwell (Nov 14, 2017)

gyor said:


> Higher up the food chain then Mearls, he's just the guy that the suits pawn off deliverying bad news onto.
> 
> I was refering to the respective owners of D&D, TSR and WotC.
> 
> ...




It's called focusing on core competencies. I'm glad you liked the novels, but the novel business wasn't working for them. It's not really their core competency despite having tried to do it for many years with only mixed results most of the time. It's sort of like calling Disney a Sports company because of ESPN. Sports isn't a core competency of Disney, despite tremendous work on ESPN, owning the Ducks hockey team, etc.. Sometimes a company just needs to focus on what they do best. And apparently, despite you enjoying their novels, they don't think it's what they do best.


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## grimslade (Nov 14, 2017)

Some novels may have been NYT bestsellers but it doesn't mean they were making much ROI. For every Dragons of Autumn Twilight (1984), there were lots of bargain bin copies of Tales of Uncle Trapspringer (1997) rotting. The publishing business is tough, especially as the market settles out, fiction doubly so. I imagine the promotional budget for the 4E books was astronomical and did not grow the core brand. Unless, I missed a lot of players brought to D&D by the Spellsword trilogy. 
Hasbro is not adverse to fiction lines, but they are adverse to the risk of bad fiction lines. Hopefully, they are as shy about bad movie franchises... Battleship the movie says no...


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## Mouseferatu (Nov 14, 2017)

Something else about publishing people need to understand...

Being a NYT bestseller doesn't automatically equate to a lot of money.

Yeah, really. While none of my own books have made the bestseller list (*sob*; seriously, more of you need to follow me over from RPGs to fiction  ), I'm friends with several people who have. Most of 'em ain't rich, by a long shot.

Now, some bestselling authors _are_ rich, of course. And a couple of them have written for TSR/WotC, and made the company a decent chunk of change. I'm just saying, a book being a bestseller doesn't automatically equate to windfall profits.


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## pemerton (Nov 14, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Why not both? Yes, their market research showed that people like the multiverse approach... it's fun.





Sword of Spirit said:


> This is probably correct. I know that for me that D&D multiverse is my favorite thing about the game. Without it, I'd rather play something else.



It's possible to facilitate the multiverse - by presenting all the components - without actually affirming or asserting it. I think the fact that they seem to be actually affirming it, in accordance with their market research, tells us something about the relationship of the D&D market to "canon".

After all, what's the difference between being given all the components, and being told as well "And these make up the D&D multiverse?" The difference is one of canon.


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## Parmandur (Nov 14, 2017)

pemerton said:


> It's possible to facilitate the multiverse - by presenting all the components - without actually affirming or asserting it. I think the fact that they seem to be actually affirming it, in accordance with their market research, tells us something about the relationship of the D&D market to "canon".
> 
> After all, what's the difference between being given all the components, and being told as well "And these make up the D&D multiverse?" The difference is one of canon.



They have also been very slippery on Canon, however: the nature of the current status of the Forgotten Realms has been put in quantum flux specifically to free up DMs from worrying about canonical shennanigans. A somewhat defined, brandable default metasetting that the books explicitly explain how to remove or avoid (repeatedly) if that's your jam is hardly creating a Star Trek sort of situation in terms of Canon.

It's easier to take a default metasetting out in a home game than to put it in, so WotC serves the greater need.


----------



## Doctor Futurity (Nov 14, 2017)

Yaarel said:


> Actually, this ‘only thing’ is highly objectionable.
> 
> The DM says Cthulu doesnt exist? Too bad, it does. The DM is officially wrong. Prepare for the objectively existing Farrealms to rip thru the reality of My Little Pony.
> 
> ...




Sword of Spirit is wrong (reading the DMG....particularly Chapter 1 and even Chapter 2 will verify this) but if you are playing "official canonical D&D" or whatever I guess you could argue that WotC's default universe implies FR and the other places do co-exist, linked by the planes. But again, the DMG provides extensive tools and advice on building universes that have nothing to do with any of that so YMMV.


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## Doctor Futurity (Nov 14, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> It's called focusing on core competencies. I'm glad you liked the novels, but the novel business wasn't working for them. It's not really their core competency despite having tried to do it for many years with only mixed results most of the time. It's sort of like calling Disney a Sports company because of ESPN. Sports isn't a core competency of Disney, despite tremendous work on ESPN, owning the Ducks hockey team, etc.. Sometimes a company just needs to focus on what they do best. And apparently, despite you enjoying their novels, they don't think it's what they do best.




I agree that if they've decided it's not working for them for whatever reason, it makes sense not support.

But WotC was in the novel business for close to 30 years, _and they invented the concept of the RPG/IP tie-in novel to begin with. _ To suggest that they did not (at one point) have a firm grasp on this (or think they did) is silly. They definitely commanded a major presence in the fiction market in the 90's and early 2000's. Countless other publishers have tried to emulate them on this course (including Paizo, which come to think of it, I should check and see if they still do....hmmm)

It is much likelier that as the market changes and WotC did as well, a combination of loss of talent plus a reduction in demand (for whatever reason, I have my opinions on that) led to a collapse in the ROI that they could get, and it was a corner of the brand that they could let go.


----------



## Mistwell (Nov 14, 2017)

Doctor Futurity said:


> I agree that if they've decided it's not working for them for whatever reason, it makes sense not support.
> 
> But WotC was in the novel business for close to 30 years, _and they invented the concept of the RPG/IP tie-in novel to begin with. _ To suggest that they did not (at one point) have a firm grasp on this (or think they did) is silly. They definitely commanded a major presence in the fiction market in the 90's and early 2000's. Countless other publishers have tried to emulate them on this course (including Paizo, which come to think of it, I should check and see if they still do....hmmm)
> 
> It is much likelier that as the market changes and WotC did as well, a combination of loss of talent plus a reduction in demand (for whatever reason, I have my opinions on that) led to a collapse in the ROI that they could get, and it was a corner of the brand that they could let go.




The entire fiction novel industry has taken a massive dip in the past 10 years. The quantity of fiction novels for sale has increased, but sales have stagnated and even decreased, even with e-books. Most books are only selling to people who previously bought books from that author or universe, and that number of people drops each year without replacement buyers. That, combined with a level of saturation for their stories, and I think it's pretty clear the market for these novels has meaningfully changed in the past decade. We're just not talking about the kind of market that was here in the 80s for the Gord and Dragonlance books, or the 90s and 2000s for Forgotten Realms books. 

It's not that WOTC couldn't try and break back into that industry, but the effort required to obtain a lot of new readers would mean a whole lot of focus and marketing on those products, which would distract from their focus on the successful game line. In some ways I guess you could say the massive success of the RPG line, which remains in the top 100 of all books sales even almost four years later, makes it more difficult for them to pull focus onto the novels. Even with more staff, it requires a level of coordination and dedication of time and resources that would necessarily cause some level of distraction from the more successful lines. And, it just doesn't seem like the potential payoff from that distraction would be worth it. 

As others have said, if the movie is a big success, I suspect that will be enough to justify the time and resources to devote to a novel line again. But right now, in this fiction market, with this level of saturation and other products to focus on, it just doesn't make enough sense to do it.


----------



## Hutchimus Prime (Nov 14, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Basically, Dragonlance Adventures, but with 5E rules. I could dig it.




Me too. The first D&D product that was mine and not stolen from my older brother. 

If it focused on the core of the original trilogies (and even the War Of Souls) you could use it as the “War Stories” RPG genre.


----------



## Doctor Futurity (Nov 14, 2017)

Mistwell said:


> The entire fiction novel industry has taken a massive dip in the past 10 years. The quantity of fiction novels for sale has increased, but sales have stagnated and even decreased, even with e-books. Most books are only selling to people who previously bought books from that author or universe, and that number of people drops each year without replacement buyers. That, combined with a level of saturation for their stories, and I think it's pretty clear the market for these novels has meaningfully changed in the past decade. We're just not talking about the kind of market that was here in the 80s for the Gord and Dragonlance books, or the 90s and 2000s for Forgotten Realms books.
> 
> It's not that WOTC couldn't try and break back into that industry, but the effort required to obtain a lot of new readers would mean a whole lot of focus and marketing on those products, which would distract from their focus on the successful game line. In some ways I guess you could say the massive success of the RPG line, which remains in the top 100 of all books sales even almost four years later, makes it more difficult for them to pull focus onto the novels. Even with more staff, it requires a level of coordination and dedication of time and resources that would necessarily cause some level of distraction from the more successful lines. And, it just doesn't seem like the potential payoff from that distraction would be worth it.
> 
> As others have said, if the movie is a big success, I suspect that will be enough to justify the time and resources to devote to a novel line again. But right now, in this fiction market, with this level of saturation and other products to focus on, it just doesn't make enough sense to do it.




Good overview, totally agree.


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## Parmandur (Nov 14, 2017)

Hutchimus Prime said:


> Me too. The first D&D product that was mine and not stolen from my older brother.
> 
> If it focused on the core of the original trilogies (and even the War Of Souls) you could use it as the “War Stories” RPG genre.



It's a perfect D&D example of Epic Fantasy as a genre: as gone over in the DMG, I could definitely see them fitting that in. Maybe a reboot War of the Lance AP, and a "Epic Fantasy" genre setting book with Kyrnn as an example...?


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## pemerton (Nov 14, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> It's easier to take a default metasetting out in a home game than to put it in, so WotC serves the greater need.



I don't think "need" is the right concept - anyone who wants to run a "multiverse" game can do so using pre-existing material.

I think it's about market demand.


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## Parmandur (Nov 14, 2017)

pemerton said:


> I don't think "need" is the right concept - anyone who wants to run a "multiverse" game can do so using pre-existing material.
> 
> I think it's about market demand.



Well, certainly: the market gets what the market demands. And the Great Wheel, everything is connected multiverse is the one folks were given throughout TSR era. One of the major disconnects between WotC and the players, pre-Next, seems to have been that people kept playing in the 2E multiverse, even though WotC did little to support it, and WotC didn't realize until they moved explicitly against it in 4E.


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## jasper (Nov 14, 2017)

....and they(wotc) invented the concept of the RPG/IP tie-in novel to begin with.........
Quag Keep. Dragonlance, hmm Nah. Wotc invented the concept.


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## jasper (Nov 14, 2017)

Winterthorn said:


> Ah-Ha!  An Immortal Edition!



HERE WE ARE! GAMERS OF THE UNIVERSE! (INSERT MUSIC)
FIGHTING FOR THE PRIZE
IN THE END
THERE CAN BE ONLY
ONE!


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## Sword of Spirit (Nov 15, 2017)

Doctor Futurity said:


> Sword of Spirit is wrong (reading the DMG....particularly Chapter 1 and even Chapter 2 will verify this) but if you are playing "official canonical D&D" or whatever I guess you could argue that WotC's default universe implies FR and the other places do co-exist, linked by the planes. But again, the DMG provides extensive tools and advice on building universes that have nothing to do with any of that so YMMV.




Specific evidence would be useful. Here's some:

"WORLDS OF ADVENTURE
...
The worlds of the Dungeons & Dragons game exist within a vast cosmos called the *multiverse*, connected in strange and mysterious ways to one another and to other planes of existence, such as the Elemental Plane of Fire and the Infinite Depths of the Abyss. Within this multiverse are an endless variety of worlds. Many of them have been published as official settings for the D&D game. The legends of the Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Dark Sun, Mystara, and Eberron settings are woven together in the fabric of the multiverse. Alongside these worlds are hundreds of thousands more, created by generations of D&D players for their own games. And amid all the richness of the multiverse, you  might create a world of your own." (emphasis in original) - PHB 5

"THE GREAT WHEEL
The *default cosmological arrangement* presented in the _Player's Handbook_ visualizes the planes as a group of concentric circles..." (emphasis mine) - DMG 44

Of course, they make it clear that you are encouraged to do whatever you want for you home game, as evidenced by rules for creating your own version of the multiverse (Chapter 2 DMG), and statements that your version of the official settings might differ from the published versions (multiple places). Here's one you might like:

"But if your campaign takes place on one of these world [examples of the official ones were given immediately prior to text], it belongs to your DM--you might imagine it as one of thousands of parallel versions of the world, which might diverge wildly from the published versions." - PHB 300

I never claimed otherwise.

What I claimed is that they have said that it is true (by default and officially of course--how could they claim what is true for our homebrew games?) that all of these worlds exist within the same multiverse, which I have now provided explicit textual evidence for.

I'm not sure what else we could validly expect from them. They've given us guidelines for creating our own multiverses, they've given us an official default inclusive multiverse, they've told us that it can be interpreted--in setting--in different ways on different worlds, and as bonuses they've told us that our own versions of published worlds are parallel versions that might differ (which is a neat little edition which allows you feel like you are still using the default multiverse even if your elves are short old-school like), and they've even implied that our homebrew worlds that we choose to set in the multiverse semi-officially count as part of it the same as published settings. 

Anything else would be catering to our individual whims at the expense of providing good options for others.


----------



## pemerton (Nov 15, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> One of the major disconnects between WotC and the players, pre-Next, seems to have been that people kept playing in the 2E multiverse, even though WotC did little to support it, and WotC didn't realize until they moved explicitly against it in 4E.



What does _support_ mean, here?

It mostly seems to mean _publish stuff that gives voice to the multiverse_. It's not about mechanics, after all - 3E had mechanics for the multiverse (in MoP and DDG); and 4e had the same (in the MoP, which included mechanics for the Great Wheel).

That's the distinction between publishing stuff which can be rendered multiversal, and _affirming_ the multiverse, that I mentioned in an earlier post.

There's a strong desire, in the market, for certain story elements not only to be _published_, but to be _official_/"canon".

EDIT: I think this can be seen in  [MENTION=6677017]Sword of Spirit[/MENTION]'s post just above mine.

I also have to admit that, reading what Sword of Spirit quotes, my first interpretation would be that "the multiverse" here is a type of metagame conceit - ie there is a "multiverse" of D&D games and gameworld, some published by WotC and most created by players for their own games, and together these constitute the "worlds" of D&D, somewhat analogously to the ways in which a body of works might constitute an artistic school or movement.

But I wouldn't naturally interpret this concept of a "multiverse" as having _in-fiction_ meaning, such that the default assumption is that the world of my D&D games is part of the same (imagined) cosmos as the world of (say) Parmandur's. The link between my gameworlds and Parmandur's is a metagame link - we use our worlds for the purposes of playing (more-or-less) similar fantasy RPGs. But that isn't a property of the worlds themselves within the fiction.


----------



## Doctor Futurity (Nov 15, 2017)

Sword of Spirit said:


> Specific evidence would be useful. Here's some:
> 
> -snip-
> 
> Anything else would be catering to our individual whims at the expense of providing good options for others.




I'm not sure you and I have a beef. But your original post had some other poster (no time to dig) spiralling out the deep end on the idea that he was locked in to some perceptually limited view from WotC of the game. My point to him was that the interpretation you provided in that post didn't jive (and by inference, for him to stop freaking out)....as your own example cited demonstrates. I have no issues here myself, D&D does what I want it to and I have no confusion about that.


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## Doctor Futurity (Nov 15, 2017)

jasper said:


> ....and they(wotc) invented the concept of the RPG/IP tie-in novel to begin with.........
> Quag Keep. Dragonlance, hmm Nah. Wotc invented the concept.




Well that is true, But Quag Keep was not a marketed IP written specifically as a tie-in. It was an author writing from the point of reference of the gaming world she liked/experienced and then getting it published. I read Quag Keep ages ago and did not even realize it's history until decades later, but I was never confused about what the first Dragonlance and FR novels were intended for.

Hell, Quag Keep is more like fascinating hidden history than anything else. But what it wasn't was a published and commissioned novel from TSR.


----------



## jasper (Nov 15, 2017)

Doctor Futurity said:


> Well that is true, But Quag Keep was not a marketed IP written specifically as a tie-in. It was an author writing from the point of reference of the gaming world she liked/experienced and then getting it published. I read Quag Keep ages ago and did not even realize it's history until decades later, but I was never confused about what the first Dragonlance and FR novels were intended for.
> 
> Hell, Quag Keep is more like fascinating hidden history than anything else. But what it wasn't was a published and commissioned novel from TSR.



Thieves world books, thieves game.
Star Trek Show, star trek books,Star trek cartoon, Star Fleet Battles. 
Hot Wheels, Hot Wheels cartoon. 
Star Wars movies, Star Wars Christmas Special, Star Wars comics. Of course Lucas then started the multiple canon stuff. 
I think Wotc was late to party about IP tie ins


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## jasper (Nov 15, 2017)

pemerton said:


> I don't think "need" is the right concept - anyone who wants to run a "multiverse" game can do so using pre-existing material.



But but I want the complete book of left hand spell cosmic caster, castes, cases, and cooks book. It must be "official" and "canon" or my players will cry. You could write the cross over were Tasselholf, meets the Hoff, Nexlix the Iron chief on the Planet of Sand witches.


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## Mercule (Nov 15, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Nothing stops a DM from limiting anything in their game: the DMG spends a lot of time on the topic.



There are ways to present "game lore" that make this easier and ways that make it harder.

I'm pretty clear, to my players, that I'm a world builder, as a GM and that I'm totally comfortable banning certain races, classes, monsters, etc. if they don't work within the confines of a given custom setting. This is how I've done things for 35 or so years. Sometime during 3E, there started to be a lot more friction with this. It seems to be mostly the new players, but there's a lot more explaining that needs to be done and a lot more assumption about things. Part of that is the coalescence (spell-check offered "convalescence", fittingly enough) around the Realms and that lore. I'd say that Mearls, in particular, has a way of painting the lore a bit too heavy-handed, even when he's trying to be setting neutral.


----------



## Parmandur (Nov 15, 2017)

pemerton said:


> What does _support_ mean, here?
> 
> It mostly seems to mean _publish stuff that gives voice to the multiverse_. It's not about mechanics, after all - 3E had mechanics for the multiverse (in MoP and DDG); and 4e had the same (in the MoP, which included mechanics for the Great Wheel).




Yes, essentially. 3E deemphasized the multiverse, but never explicitly disaffirmed it either: even some of us who started in 3E we're still working under that framework because it was out there, in video games (Planescape: Torment was a very influential game, for instance), older books and oral tradition (not to be underestimated in the TTRPG community).

4E made the decision to explicitly endorse a new specific metasetting approach that invalidated what folks had been using previously: then the knives came out.

5E revived a 2E style multiverse, which has been well received.

The common thread here is not the community changing, but WotC's approach: from indifference to what people are doing, to rejecting what people are doing, and to finally embracing what people are doing. But I haven't seen any change in what people are doing.



> That's the distinction between publishing stuff which can be rendered multiversal, and _affirming_ the multiverse, that I mentioned in an earlier post.
> 
> There's a strong desire, in the market, for certain story elements not only to be _published_, but to be _official_/"canon".




"Canon" is a malleable term here, since folks also do want to make it theirs. But couching the individual table in an infinite, comic book-esque multiverse...lots of fun.



> EDIT: I think this can be seen in  [MENTION=6677017]Sword of Spirit[/MENTION]'s post just above mine.
> 
> I also have to admit that, reading what Sword of Spirit quotes, my first interpretation would be that "the multiverse" here is a type of metagame conceit - ie there is a "multiverse" of D&D games and gameworld, some published by WotC and most created by players for their own games, and together these constitute the "worlds" of D&D, somewhat analogously to the ways in which a body of works might constitute an artistic school or movement.
> 
> But I wouldn't naturally interpret this concept of a "multiverse" as having _in-fiction_ meaning, such that the default assumption is that the world of my D&D games is part of the same (imagined) cosmos as the world of (say) Parmandur's. The link between my gameworlds and Parmandur's is a metagame link - we use our worlds for the purposes of playing (more-or-less) similar fantasy RPGs. But that isn't a property of the worlds themselves within the fiction.




I don't see why you wouldn't naturally interpret the multiverse that way, since the books affirm that option if so desired. Anything goes, and can go anywhere and anywhen.


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## Parmandur (Nov 15, 2017)

Mercule said:


> There are ways to present "game lore" that make this easier and ways that make it harder.
> 
> I'm pretty clear, to my players, that I'm a world builder, as a GM and that I'm totally comfortable banning certain races, classes, monsters, etc. if they don't work within the confines of a given custom setting. This is how I've done things for 35 or so years. Sometime during 3E, there started to be a lot more friction with this. It seems to be mostly the new players, but there's a lot more explaining that needs to be done and a lot more assumption about things. Part of that is the coalescence (spell-check offered "convalescence", fittingly enough) around the Realms and that lore. I'd say that Mearls, in particular, has a way of painting the lore a bit too heavy-handed, even when he's trying to be setting neutral.



As someone who started with 3E, I would say it has less to do with the Forgotten Realms, and more viewing D&D itself as a setting, with the Great Wheel, Sigil, the Prime Material and all that jazz. Playing with restrictions like that is completely valid, but it might be viewed by many as running a Shadowrun game and banning hacking, or Traveller and cutting out space travel as an option: you can do it, but many players might not want that set-up.


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## pemerton (Nov 15, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> The common thread here is not the community changing, but WotC's approach: from indifference to what people are doing, to rejecting what people are doing, and to finally embracing what people are doing.



Publishing something isn't _rejecting_ what someone else is doing, just because that someone else is doing something different from what you publish.



Parmandur said:


> I don't see why you wouldn't naturally interpret the multiverse that way, since the books affirm that option if so desired. Anything goes, and can go anywhere and anywhen.



Again, "anything goes" is a metagame notion - there is no limit on what a D&D game can include. But I wouldn't take it to entail that any given gameworld contains all of Elric, and all of Middle Earth, and all of Arthurian Britain, and all of the Journey to the West, and . . .


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## Parmandur (Nov 15, 2017)

pemerton said:


> Publishing something isn't _rejecting_ what someone else is doing, just because that someone else is doing something different from what you publish.
> 
> Again, "anything goes" is a metagame notion - there is no limit on what a D&D game can include. But I wouldn't take it to entail that any given gameworld contains all of Elric, and all of Middle Earth, and all of Arthurian Britain, and all of the Journey to the West, and . . .




Perhaps "rejecting" isn't the right term: perhaps instead read "being of no use for what people are doing." 

Any given gameworld could, though: and that's D&D for you.


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## pemerton (Nov 15, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Perhaps "rejecting" isn't the right term: perhaps instead read "being of no use for what people are doing."



I think there is both a descriptive element (your "of no use . . .") and a type of normative element. But I don't think the normative element is about "rejecting", so much as a type of affirmation of a certain "canon" (noting your caveats about canon, but ploughing ahead anyway). _Officialness_ seems very important to a certain segment of the D&D market.



Parmandur said:


> Any given gameworld could, though: and that's D&D for you.



Agreed. But _could_ doesn't entail _does_. That might seem a pedantic point, but I think it's actually pretty fundamental to understanding the fault lines around the multiverse, canon, the status/importance of GM worldbuilding, etc.


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## Uchawi (Nov 15, 2017)

For new players I imagine a typical D&D is the forgotten realms, for anyone that has played it gets more complicated based on what setting introduced you or which one you prefer. To limit it to genres is not doing a service for a specific setting. As to smaller budgets, less staff, etc. a slow approach makes sense for developing new material.


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## Mercule (Nov 16, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> As someone who started with 3E, I would say it has less to do with the Forgotten Realms, and more viewing D&D itself as a setting, with the Great Wheel, Sigil, the Prime Material and all that jazz. Playing with restrictions like that is completely valid, but it might be viewed by many as running a Shadowrun game and banning hacking, or Traveller and cutting out space travel as an option: you can do it, but many players might not want that set-up.



I hear what you're saying. I don't lay it entirely at the feet of the Realms -- in fact, the Realms may be more a symptom than a cause.

To me, as someone who learned with BECMI (before all the letters were there) and then migrated to AD&D shortly before the original UA was published, the idea of D&D as being/having anything resembling a cohesive "core" setting is absurd. Yes, "D&Disms" abound, but the system is a settingless as Savage Worlds, Fantasy Hero, or GURPS. It has a genre and some quirky convensions, but no inherent setting. 

I'd even go so far as to say that having a "core" setting is almost anathema to the game's purpose. One of the main reasons I keep coming back to D&D is because it's a toolkit that gives me a bunch of standard building blocks that can be used for whatever I want to do with the setting I create. Many games offer better sets of rules (more customization, more "realism", whatever) but lack in some area of the tool set (few monsters, incomplete magic system, etc.).

Yes, I could ignore the D&D meta-verse, and just do what I've always done. To a certain extent, I'm already doing that in ignoring all the FR content. At a certain point, it becomes, as you say, using Shadowrun rules without the setting (say, for a fantasy game). You can't tell people you're playing Shadowrun and have them actually get the message you're trying to send. Telling people "Let's play D&D" has generally meant "Let's play a fantasy game with a set of assumptions," but the setting wasn't one of those assumptions. As D&D approaches the point where "Let's play D&D" carries info about the setting, it stops relating what I want it to relate. That's a problem.


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## Parmandur (Nov 16, 2017)

pemerton said:


> I think there is both a descriptive element (your "of no use . . .") and a type of normative element. But I don't think the normative element is about "rejecting", so much as a type of affirmation of a certain "canon" (noting your caveats about canon, but ploughing ahead anyway). _Officialness_ seems very important to a certain segment of the D&D market.




Say what you will about the actual changes, the 4E marketing line was very blunt about the Novus Ordo Cosmica being normative, and aggressively so. 3E de jure deemphasized what remained de facto normative, but with 4E they found changing facts on the ground to be a tall order. 5E acknowledges and provides material for what is in reality normative play, while managing to still validate alternative playstyles. A pretty neat threading of the needle, really.



> Agreed. But _could_ doesn't entail _does_. That might seem a pedantic point, but I think it's actually pretty fundamental to understanding the fault lines around the multiverse, canon, the status/importance of GM worldbuilding, etc.




"Could," "does" are fine distinctions in theory: for most tables in actual play, "is" fits the bill, apparently. And I agree that is very important to understanding the fault lines, and WotC commercial offerings.


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## doctorbadwolf (Nov 17, 2017)

kenmarable said:


> When they do Planescape, my personal guess is what Volo’s Guide is to the Monster Manual, that book would be to the Manual of the Planes. It will fill the same sort of role, but in a reimagined and heavily flavored way. Which I would be overjoyed with, so maybe there’s some wishful thinking.



I agree that’s the way to go. It’s the best way to kick off exploring other settings.


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## Parmandur (Nov 17, 2017)

Mercule said:


> I hear what you're saying. I don't lay it entirely at the feet of the Realms -- in fact, the Realms may be more a symptom than a cause.
> 
> To me, as someone who learned with BECMI (before all the letters were there) and then migrated to AD&D shortly before the original UA was published, the idea of D&D as being/having anything resembling a cohesive "core" setting is absurd. Yes, "D&Disms" abound, but the system is a settingless as Savage Worlds, Fantasy Hero, or GURPS. It has a genre and some quirky convensions, but no inherent setting.
> 
> ...



Yeah, that's fair; but, it does seem that a certain assumed setting, or at least metasetting, has appealed to folks for a long time: even the 1E material has a suggestion of the kind of setting D&D inhabits.


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## Mercule (Nov 17, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> Yeah, that's fair; but, it does seem that a certain assumed setting, or at least metasetting, has appealed to folks for a long time: even the 1E material has a suggestion of the kind of setting D&D inhabits.



Agreed. Some of that falls under what I called "quirky conventions". Some of it falls under having some published settings -- which I think are a good thing, I just don't any specific setting to be synonymous with D&D.


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## pemerton (Nov 18, 2017)

Parmandur said:


> even the 1E material has a suggestion of the kind of setting D&D inhabits.



Absolutely D&D, at least since the late 70s, has had an implied setting. But that is different from a default "multiverse" setting.

Just to give one example: a fairly natural way of making sense of the clerics and paladins in AD&D might be with an assumptin that they serve a fairly conventional provodential god. (Whereas druids serve "nature" and its spirits; and anti-clerics serve dark gods, demons et al.)

If I develop my game that way, it makes absolutely no sense that the multiverse is in fact this polytheistic thing, in which all these other gods exist and exert divine power.

That's not to say that I think there's anything wrong with a polytheistic setting (I'm not  [MENTION=58172]Yaarel[/MENTION]); but I don't think it's a departure from the implied setting of AD&D to run a game which isn't polytheistic in the FR or GH sense.

More generally, there's nothing strange or at odds with the tenets of the game in envisaging a particular D&D setting is it's own thing, rather than a component of some bigger thing which contains everything everyone ever thought might be a tenable part of a particular D&D campaign. (Eg is Barsoom really supposed to be part of the FR or PS multiverse?)


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