Hello everyone, Darryl here with this week’s gaming news! More previews of Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica and Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage, new Pathfinder 2nd Ed playtest version plus the new Pathfinder 1st Ed adventure path release, big Judge Dredd & the Worlds of 2000 AD news, and a lot more!
We’re not far off of the release of two new Dungeons & Dragons books and Wizards of the Coast has certainly ramped up the teasers. Dragon+, the digital magazine for D&D, has a preview of Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage in the newest issue featuring new art with descriptions giving some context, and thus clues as to what will be included in the adventure. Also, the Twitch channel Saving Throw is producing a new show for the official Dungeons & Dragons Twitch channel called Ravnica: The Broken Pact which is set, as the title implies, in the Ravnica setting featured in Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica. The first episode aired this past weekend with a follow-up chat show on Saving Throw’s Twitch streaming afterward, with several details about the setting coming out. If you’d rather skip to the information rather than watch the episodes, EN World has a quick summary here. EN World has also been publishing articles about the presentation of Ravnica in Magic: The Gathering and extrapolating from existing 5e rules, starting with class options last week and (posted just this morning) another on races here. The newest expansion of Magic: The Gathering, Guilds of Ravnica, is available now while Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition releases to mass market on November 20 (along with a new custom dice set that includes a special ten-sided die with each side having symbols for each of Ravnica’s ten guilds), and Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage comes out in mass markets on November 13. I’m pretty sure if I type “Ravnica” one more time, my spellcheck is going to come to life and try to throttle me.
While the DNDCollecting Twitter account has been around for a while showing off rare books and memorabilia from D&D’s past and present, they’ve gotten a bit more attention recently with an action announcement. Six corroded brass sculptures of the Lady of Pain from the Planescape setting were made (with the construction process detailed on their Twitter account), and now one of them is going up for auction. No details have been announced yet beyond the auction will start “in a few days” (with the announcement going out late last night), so there’s no information on starting bid or any reserve. However, you can follow their Twitter account for more information if you’d like to grab this luxury piece.
The Pathfinder 2nd Edition playtest is still going strong, with the fifth version (1.4) now available. This release also includes part five of the Doomsday Dawn playtest adventure path, “The Heroes of Undarin”. The biggest change in this playtest update is the change to the half-elf and half-orc ancestries, which are now part of the heritage system rather than taking up a feat. Other changes were made to the ancestries, including additional high-level ancestry feats. The three open-ended surveys are still up to provide feedback, but there’s currently an Ancestry and Background survey active to get your thoughts of these changes and the ancestry system in general.
Paizo hasn’t forgotten those still playing the first edition of Pathfinder as the third adventure in the Return of the Runelords adventure path, Runeplague, is due out this month. Designed for characters of 9th level, this adventure takes place in Varisia and features a few special rules including magical pools that can grant you increased power or possibly a curse and a new version of the demigod Yamasoth. However, descriptions are a bit bare at the moment because, well, spoilers. Runeplague will be available to mass markets in softcover on October 30 and is available now from Paizo in PDF and softcover with a retail price of $24.99 (softcover) and $17.99 (PDF).
Fantasy Ground released their usage statistics for this quarter. The chart above illustrates player usage from October 2017 through September 2018 broken down by rules set. It’s no surprise that Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition (67%) leads by a wide margin with Pathfinder (11%) and Savage Worlds (5%) filling out the bulk. One thing that’s important to note when analyzing these usage statistics is that Fantasy Grounds doesn’t have officially licensed product support for all game systems, so while you can purchase official Wizards of the Coast Dungeons & Dragons module packs or Pinnacle Entertainment Group Savage Worlds rules and adventures, you can’t do the same for Pathfinder or Star Wars which may skew numbers (particularly when comparing with similar reports from Roll20, who has a different set of licenses). However, it’s still a good barometer of what people are playing online.
So remember a while back when Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner was on Mad Money and there was a big discussion because the description of the video talked about Dungeons & Dragons as an esport and many people (myself included) said it wasn’t what people thought? Well, this week RPGSports was announced, a D&D tournament of party vs. party combat with a grand prize of $5000. However, no “I told you so”s just yet as this is not sponsored by Wizards of the Coast, but by Encounter Roleplay, DnDBeyond. The tournament will be live streamed starting on November 10 at 12 noon Pacific time, with three more streams following weekly until the Grand Finals on December 1. Matches will be best-of-three with each of the four teams of four competing in arena combat using 5e rules over Roll20 with some “MOBA-esque mechanics” included to increase strategy. Teams will choose between fifteen pre-generated characters before each match. Events will be live streamed on the RPGSports Twitch channel with archives uploaded to their YouTube channel afterward. (Also, if you’re wondering why the original article linked above says the name of the channel is “DnDSports”, they changed their name to “RPGSports” about an hour before this column was posted and the original hasn’t been updated yet.)
EN Publishing has a new setting for the WOIN system, Dark Decade: From Dust to Dawn. On this week’s podcast, Morrus described it as inspired by Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Blade (and considering he wrote it, he should know), but it feels to me as though it has more in common with the 1980s vampire films such as Near Dark, Lost Boys, The Hunger, and Fright Night with its combination of 80s style and supernatural horror. In the 1980s of New York City, the rising crime rate hides a darker problem with “dust”, a powder that gives the user the abilities (and hungers) of a vampire. It includes new heritages (dhampir and werewolf*) along with five new careers for WOIN (I’m curious how much the Sorcerer resembles John Constantine myself).
There’s also the Judge Dredd & the Worlds of 2000 AD Kickstarter, which is in its final week. In case you missed this week’s Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk podcast, there was a bit of an exclusive announcement about future products for the line. First are two new settings, Luna-1, which features rules for space travel and adventures among the stars, and Cursed Earth, which expands the areas outside the MegaCities and expands rules for mutants. Additionally, the first two non-Judge Dredd expansions were announced, those being the popular Rogue Trooper and Strontium Dog. Very little information is available at this time, but be sure to check the Kickstarter and EN World for updates. And in case it wasn’t clear, Disclosure: EN Publishing is the tabletop game design and publishing arm of EN World.
Humble Bundle’s store has a big sale going on with up to 90% off of tabletop video game titles. Virtual tabletop software like Tabletop Simulator; licensed games like Ogre, Blood Bowl, and Talisman; and games inspired by tabletop like Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation are all discounted. There’s also a completely free limited-time bundle for the Neverwinter MMORPG accompanying the new Ravenloft expansion that gives you a leg up with a stone of health, bag of holding, and Ensorcelled Mulhorand weapon. If you need some inspiration for your games, there’s the Tales of Horror Bundle also live now featuring novels, graphic novels, and short story collections of horror and urban fantasy with authors including Neil Gaiman, Kelley Armstrong, George R. R. Martin, Patricia Briggs, Clive Barker, Carrie Vaughn, Harlan Ellison, Anne Rice…and that’s just at the $1 level. The Tabletop Sale runs through this weekend, the Neverwinter MMO pack is available through October as codes last, and the Tales of Horror Bundle runs until Wednesday, October 31.
Zombie Orpheus (the studio behind The Gamers and Dark Dungeons) is crowdfunding increased production for JourneyQuest. Set somewhat in the same world as The Gamers, this series is about the other side of the shared world with the show taking place entirely in the fantasy world and is available for streaming on The Fantasy Network. Now this Kickstarter is labeled as “JourneyQuest 2.5 and Campaign Setting” but it’s a bit more than that. The Kickstarter will fund production of scenes that had to be cut from Season 2 and 3 for budgetary reasons as well as scenes for the upcoming Season 4 and 5 that would also need to be cut to stay under budget, allowing fans to make sure that the vision of screenwriter Matt Vancil makes it to the screen. On top of that, the Kickstarter will fund the creation of a JourneyQuest World Bible usable as a tabletop campaign setting or, under the Shared Cinematic Universe License Agreement, the creation of your own derivative works set in the world of Fatherall. A $10 pledge gets a one month premium subscription to The Fantasy Network (which will also allow streaming of the new season of JourneyQuest), a $20 pledge adds the World Bible in PDF format and a digital download of the completed third season, a $30 pledge adds a DVD or Blu-Ray, and $50 pledge adds a physical copy of the Fatherall World Bible. You don’t have long to push this Kickstarter past its funding goal as it ends on Saturday, October 20 at 11:00 PM Central. Disclosure: The author of this column has previously performed paid work for Zombie Orpheus in a freelance capacity.
When you think of comic strips and roleplaying games, one of the first titles that comes to mind is the long-running and iconic Dork Tower by writer/artist John Kovalic. If not, you most likely know his work through the art of the vast majority of Munchkin games, the roleplaying game Kobolds Ate My Baby, or the tabletop game Apples to Apples. Either way, The Tao of Igor is the first print collection of Dork Tower comics in a decade and features a self-contained storyline told over 160 pages (with a potential of topping 200 pages with stretch goals). The PDF is available for a $10 pledge, trade paperback for $25, and adding on a 9 x 12 frame-ready print of the cover art for $35 plus other levels with more great stuff. This Kickstarter is fully funded and runs until Thursday, November 15.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.comand you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitter @Abstruse where I’m going to announce some test streams for my new layout on Twitch as I get into the spirit of things to stream Judge Dredd: Dredd vs Death (for really-reals this time), subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube featuring videos on gaming history and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
We’re not far off of the release of two new Dungeons & Dragons books and Wizards of the Coast has certainly ramped up the teasers. Dragon+, the digital magazine for D&D, has a preview of Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage in the newest issue featuring new art with descriptions giving some context, and thus clues as to what will be included in the adventure. Also, the Twitch channel Saving Throw is producing a new show for the official Dungeons & Dragons Twitch channel called Ravnica: The Broken Pact which is set, as the title implies, in the Ravnica setting featured in Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica. The first episode aired this past weekend with a follow-up chat show on Saving Throw’s Twitch streaming afterward, with several details about the setting coming out. If you’d rather skip to the information rather than watch the episodes, EN World has a quick summary here. EN World has also been publishing articles about the presentation of Ravnica in Magic: The Gathering and extrapolating from existing 5e rules, starting with class options last week and (posted just this morning) another on races here. The newest expansion of Magic: The Gathering, Guilds of Ravnica, is available now while Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition releases to mass market on November 20 (along with a new custom dice set that includes a special ten-sided die with each side having symbols for each of Ravnica’s ten guilds), and Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage comes out in mass markets on November 13. I’m pretty sure if I type “Ravnica” one more time, my spellcheck is going to come to life and try to throttle me.
While the DNDCollecting Twitter account has been around for a while showing off rare books and memorabilia from D&D’s past and present, they’ve gotten a bit more attention recently with an action announcement. Six corroded brass sculptures of the Lady of Pain from the Planescape setting were made (with the construction process detailed on their Twitter account), and now one of them is going up for auction. No details have been announced yet beyond the auction will start “in a few days” (with the announcement going out late last night), so there’s no information on starting bid or any reserve. However, you can follow their Twitter account for more information if you’d like to grab this luxury piece.
The Pathfinder 2nd Edition playtest is still going strong, with the fifth version (1.4) now available. This release also includes part five of the Doomsday Dawn playtest adventure path, “The Heroes of Undarin”. The biggest change in this playtest update is the change to the half-elf and half-orc ancestries, which are now part of the heritage system rather than taking up a feat. Other changes were made to the ancestries, including additional high-level ancestry feats. The three open-ended surveys are still up to provide feedback, but there’s currently an Ancestry and Background survey active to get your thoughts of these changes and the ancestry system in general.
Paizo hasn’t forgotten those still playing the first edition of Pathfinder as the third adventure in the Return of the Runelords adventure path, Runeplague, is due out this month. Designed for characters of 9th level, this adventure takes place in Varisia and features a few special rules including magical pools that can grant you increased power or possibly a curse and a new version of the demigod Yamasoth. However, descriptions are a bit bare at the moment because, well, spoilers. Runeplague will be available to mass markets in softcover on October 30 and is available now from Paizo in PDF and softcover with a retail price of $24.99 (softcover) and $17.99 (PDF).
Fantasy Ground released their usage statistics for this quarter. The chart above illustrates player usage from October 2017 through September 2018 broken down by rules set. It’s no surprise that Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition (67%) leads by a wide margin with Pathfinder (11%) and Savage Worlds (5%) filling out the bulk. One thing that’s important to note when analyzing these usage statistics is that Fantasy Grounds doesn’t have officially licensed product support for all game systems, so while you can purchase official Wizards of the Coast Dungeons & Dragons module packs or Pinnacle Entertainment Group Savage Worlds rules and adventures, you can’t do the same for Pathfinder or Star Wars which may skew numbers (particularly when comparing with similar reports from Roll20, who has a different set of licenses). However, it’s still a good barometer of what people are playing online.
So remember a while back when Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner was on Mad Money and there was a big discussion because the description of the video talked about Dungeons & Dragons as an esport and many people (myself included) said it wasn’t what people thought? Well, this week RPGSports was announced, a D&D tournament of party vs. party combat with a grand prize of $5000. However, no “I told you so”s just yet as this is not sponsored by Wizards of the Coast, but by Encounter Roleplay, DnDBeyond. The tournament will be live streamed starting on November 10 at 12 noon Pacific time, with three more streams following weekly until the Grand Finals on December 1. Matches will be best-of-three with each of the four teams of four competing in arena combat using 5e rules over Roll20 with some “MOBA-esque mechanics” included to increase strategy. Teams will choose between fifteen pre-generated characters before each match. Events will be live streamed on the RPGSports Twitch channel with archives uploaded to their YouTube channel afterward. (Also, if you’re wondering why the original article linked above says the name of the channel is “DnDSports”, they changed their name to “RPGSports” about an hour before this column was posted and the original hasn’t been updated yet.)
EN Publishing has a new setting for the WOIN system, Dark Decade: From Dust to Dawn. On this week’s podcast, Morrus described it as inspired by Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Blade (and considering he wrote it, he should know), but it feels to me as though it has more in common with the 1980s vampire films such as Near Dark, Lost Boys, The Hunger, and Fright Night with its combination of 80s style and supernatural horror. In the 1980s of New York City, the rising crime rate hides a darker problem with “dust”, a powder that gives the user the abilities (and hungers) of a vampire. It includes new heritages (dhampir and werewolf*) along with five new careers for WOIN (I’m curious how much the Sorcerer resembles John Constantine myself).
There’s also the Judge Dredd & the Worlds of 2000 AD Kickstarter, which is in its final week. In case you missed this week’s Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk podcast, there was a bit of an exclusive announcement about future products for the line. First are two new settings, Luna-1, which features rules for space travel and adventures among the stars, and Cursed Earth, which expands the areas outside the MegaCities and expands rules for mutants. Additionally, the first two non-Judge Dredd expansions were announced, those being the popular Rogue Trooper and Strontium Dog. Very little information is available at this time, but be sure to check the Kickstarter and EN World for updates. And in case it wasn’t clear, Disclosure: EN Publishing is the tabletop game design and publishing arm of EN World.
Humble Bundle’s store has a big sale going on with up to 90% off of tabletop video game titles. Virtual tabletop software like Tabletop Simulator; licensed games like Ogre, Blood Bowl, and Talisman; and games inspired by tabletop like Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation are all discounted. There’s also a completely free limited-time bundle for the Neverwinter MMORPG accompanying the new Ravenloft expansion that gives you a leg up with a stone of health, bag of holding, and Ensorcelled Mulhorand weapon. If you need some inspiration for your games, there’s the Tales of Horror Bundle also live now featuring novels, graphic novels, and short story collections of horror and urban fantasy with authors including Neil Gaiman, Kelley Armstrong, George R. R. Martin, Patricia Briggs, Clive Barker, Carrie Vaughn, Harlan Ellison, Anne Rice…and that’s just at the $1 level. The Tabletop Sale runs through this weekend, the Neverwinter MMO pack is available through October as codes last, and the Tales of Horror Bundle runs until Wednesday, October 31.
Zombie Orpheus (the studio behind The Gamers and Dark Dungeons) is crowdfunding increased production for JourneyQuest. Set somewhat in the same world as The Gamers, this series is about the other side of the shared world with the show taking place entirely in the fantasy world and is available for streaming on The Fantasy Network. Now this Kickstarter is labeled as “JourneyQuest 2.5 and Campaign Setting” but it’s a bit more than that. The Kickstarter will fund production of scenes that had to be cut from Season 2 and 3 for budgetary reasons as well as scenes for the upcoming Season 4 and 5 that would also need to be cut to stay under budget, allowing fans to make sure that the vision of screenwriter Matt Vancil makes it to the screen. On top of that, the Kickstarter will fund the creation of a JourneyQuest World Bible usable as a tabletop campaign setting or, under the Shared Cinematic Universe License Agreement, the creation of your own derivative works set in the world of Fatherall. A $10 pledge gets a one month premium subscription to The Fantasy Network (which will also allow streaming of the new season of JourneyQuest), a $20 pledge adds the World Bible in PDF format and a digital download of the completed third season, a $30 pledge adds a DVD or Blu-Ray, and $50 pledge adds a physical copy of the Fatherall World Bible. You don’t have long to push this Kickstarter past its funding goal as it ends on Saturday, October 20 at 11:00 PM Central. Disclosure: The author of this column has previously performed paid work for Zombie Orpheus in a freelance capacity.
When you think of comic strips and roleplaying games, one of the first titles that comes to mind is the long-running and iconic Dork Tower by writer/artist John Kovalic. If not, you most likely know his work through the art of the vast majority of Munchkin games, the roleplaying game Kobolds Ate My Baby, or the tabletop game Apples to Apples. Either way, The Tao of Igor is the first print collection of Dork Tower comics in a decade and features a self-contained storyline told over 160 pages (with a potential of topping 200 pages with stretch goals). The PDF is available for a $10 pledge, trade paperback for $25, and adding on a 9 x 12 frame-ready print of the cover art for $35 plus other levels with more great stuff. This Kickstarter is fully funded and runs until Thursday, November 15.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.comand you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitter @Abstruse where I’m going to announce some test streams for my new layout on Twitch as I get into the spirit of things to stream Judge Dredd: Dredd vs Death (for really-reals this time), subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube featuring videos on gaming history and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
