Andy Collins speaks - Upcoming Products

It's amazing what people will tell you if you just ask. Recently, I asked Andy Collins for his opinion on what we should be looking forward to in the next few months. Here is his reply:

Andy Collins:
I think that the next eight months hold some pretty interesting & exciting titles. Below are a few of my thoughts on the ones I'm most familiar with.

Magic of Incarnum represents something we haven't done since the first psionics rules were ever published: present a brand-new system of magical effects for the game. For mechanics junkies, this book represents an entirely new way of thinking about character power management. And for those looking for new character hooks, well, if you can't find a dozen interesting ideas for a new PC in here you're just not trying. I led a painstakingly diligent development team on this book and look forward to seeing people experiment with the new ways we've provided to stretch their assumptions about the game.

I'm incredibly stoked to get my hands on the Fantastic Locations products. I've been seeing the maps come through development over the last month or so (and have even skirmished on a couple of them), and I think they'll be a godsend for DMs who love interesting map layouts but don't have the time or creativity to build 'em.

Magic of Eberron is a very solid book, full of inventive Eberron-themed crunchiness and lots of flavor as well. I led development on "Moe" (as we called it) and was quite pleased by the final result. I'm often disappointed by how campaign-themed rule sourcebooks balance those two needs, but I think we hit pretty close to the right mark on this one.

Dunno what needs to be said about Spell Compendium other than it's brought to you by the number 1000. I'll let y'all figure out that one.

I admit the possibility of positive bias toward Races of the Dragon (design was led by my lovely wife Gwendolyn), but I really do think that it represents a huge step forward in the "tech" of designing race books. The loudest single concern we heard about the earlier books in the series was how hard it was for DMs and players to use the brand-new race. Well, both of the new dragon-related races in RoD are designed to be friendlier to ongoing campaigns as well as to players already attached to the familiar races of the PH. (Plus--hey Roalnd--it's got kobolds!) I worked on the dev team for this one, and I think it'll make a great companion volume to Draconomicon.

Player's Guide to Eberron shows off a brand-new layout format designed to make the book feel (and function) very differently from our traditional products. James Wyatt & the editors worked really hard to pull it off, and I'm excited to see it in print.

I haven't talked about Heroes of Horror, Tome of Magic, or Complete Psionic (since I wasn't significantly involved with any of them), but I can say with confidence that these are all books that I'd be grabbing off the shelf of my FLGS.

Finally, for a while now we've been hearing folks calling for more adventures, and you're now seeing the answer. Between Sons of Gruumsh, The Red Hand of Doom, Voyage of the Golden Dragon, and three different Fantastic Locations products (each with adventure material that supports the included maps), that's an average of almost one new adventure-related product every month for the next eight months! (Add a copy of Paizo's massive new hardback compilation of their Shackled City adventure path, you'd have enough adventure material for a whole campaign!)

Apologies to those products I haven't discussed here--even a nosy developer like me can only get good looks at so many books.

--
Andy Collins
Developer
Wizards of the Coast Roleplaying R&D

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The original post is here:
http://p198.ezboard.com/fgameschat19968frm10.showMessage?topicID=1009.topic

Cheers!

Thanks for posting that, Merric!

I can't wait to hear more about "Races of the Dragon." I'm hoping for more spells than other race books have gotten, given how important sorcery is to apparently at least two of the races listed. And will there be a minor races section, too?

I think I'm going to gouge my eyes out with boredom.... :\

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Any ideas on what the new format/layout is that Andy mentions for the Player's Guide to Eberron ?

Magic of Incarnum sounds interesting and really cool. I'll probably get it, but don't know how much use it'll see, since I'm trying to scale back my rules-tweaking.

Magic of Eberron sounds interesting, and may get purchased if my Age of Worms campaign, in Eberron, goes well. Eberron Player's Guide is a definite purchase, if I decide I like Eberron in practice, as well as theory.

Heroes of Horror is definitely my schtick, but I've been emphatically told by all of my players that fantasy and horror are not a combination in which they are interested. If I buy it, it will be only for a fun read.

Otherwise, bleh. Oddly, I'm one of those looking for more adventures, but none of those listed sound interesting. Which makes me ask myself, "So, self, what exactly do you want in a published adventure?" Unfortunately, I don't have an answer. Whatever it is, though, I really, really want it. I suspect Age of Worms may be pretty close, especially having just read the "Age of Worms Overload".

Thanks for posting Merric! The developer's insight is always nice to read.

Mercule said:

Otherwise, bleh. Oddly, I'm one of those looking for more adventures, but none of those listed sound interesting. Which makes me ask myself, "So, self, what exactly do you want in a published adventure?" Unfortunately, I don't have an answer. Whatever it is, though, I really, really want it. I suspect Age of Worms may be pretty close, especially having just read the "Age of Worms Overload".

Click to expand...

It's a bit of a problem, isn't it? I've run one session of Age of Worms, and it was a lot of fun, but it still leaves unanswered the questions of "Will I enjoy the rest of it?" and "Will my players enjoy it?"

I have that problem looking back at the classic adventures as well - even the ones I've run and enjoyed. The gap between the printed word and the actual play experience is broad - and can go either way.

Most of Wizards' releases for the first third next year are very odd. They're trying new things, but that takes them outside of my comfort zone. I'm used to D&D-style fantasy, and now they're doing some different things. "I want my lucky blanket!!!"

OTOH, Wizards are trying new things.

Luckily for me, even if I don't like the FL adventures, I'll still be able to use the maps in DDM. On the rare occasions I get to play it these days, admittedly, but there's still that potential.

What encourages me is that some of my players are reacting well to news of upcoming products. Getting "Races of the Dragon" is thus great, when my players will want to use it, even if I won't have immediate use of it. (Kobold PCs!)

Cheers!

Incidentally, I posted this on my minis news site a few days ago, but you might find it interesting:

Stephen Schubert: (Talking about the Fantastic Location series)
Some of the maps include new terrain features (instead of existing terrain like blood rock or spike stones) that impact skirmish play. A small portion of the text in each product mentions the impact of such terrain features, and also describes how to use the maps instead of tiles when playing a skirmish game (think Victory Areas).

There are not scenarios on the same level of Assault or Quickstrike presented in either of the first two FL products.

All 4 maps in the first FL product are skirmish-legal. Subsequent products use 1 of the 4 maps to detail a non-skirmish-legal area, thus only 3 of the 4 maps in FL2 and FL3 are skirmish legal. When maps become the standard for play in the next starter, there will be 12 or 15 maps legal for skirmish play (depending on the timing of the FL3 release). Yes, my math is correct.

Also note that we will be paying close attention to reaction to this product line, so we are all looking forward to feedback.