Unofficial D&D 4th Edition Info Page

• Physical product (core rules, adventures, supplements, tiles, miniatures); 
• Organized Play (Living Campaigns, convention play, special events, connecting players and DMs in new ways);
• Community (Gleemax.com, a suite of social networking tools, ways for players to communicate with each other and with WotC, organise characters); 
• Digital Offerings (DND Insider: collection of online tools for DMs, character creation, editorial game content, online expanded content for books, behind the scenes content for books, designer commentaries -much of this was analogous to the second disc in a DVD box set: every physical product will have a code which can be entered into D&D Insider which will unlock the product's digital version for you online, along with extra content).

Release Schedule (PDF press pack / Core Rules PDF press pack): Pre-4E releases. Wizards Presents: Races and Classes: December 2007. From the editor of Wizards Presents: Races and Classes, in her blog:  "It's all new art, from concept sketches to finished pieces. It's all new text, essays from the design/development staff about the making of 4E (including a design timeline) and the new status quo for races and classes. It's not a history of D&D as a whole, but an in-depth look at the making of this edition. This and the companion book, Wizards Presents: Races and Classes, give a complete picture of how we concepted, designed, and wrote 4th Edition. This new art and text? WILL NOT be repeated in the Player's Handbook as a whole. It's possible that, say, an unfinished sketch in the preview book might be finished and turned into a color piece later--but I've seen the PH art order, and that's all new too. Similarly, the races and class writeups ARE NOT what appear in the PH. How could they be? These essays were written months ago, and a few things have changed since then. But you'll be surprised by how much we're saying here......and by the new things exclusive to this book that no one's talked about yet. Occasionally, we DO manage to keep some secrets." In his blog Rich Baker comments on the forthcoming Races & Classes book. They received their copies in the office and are please how it turns out. There are no mechanics, but lots of flavor and behind the scenes comments: "But there are dozens and dozens of anecdotes, observations, and comments strewn through the book from all of us who have been working on 4e. It's a little like the Rules Compendium that way. If you liked those "Behind the Scenes" comments in Rules Compendium, you'll like the Races and Classes book." A look at Races & Classes from an EN World member who saw a copy of the book in his local game store. You can read the first review of Wizards Presents: Races & Classes at RGP.net. Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters: January 2008.  See a fan summary of the book here.  There are now some excerpts from Worlds and Monsters as downloadable PDFs up on wizards.com. Adventure H1: Keep on the Shadowfell: April 2008.  This is a quick-start adventure, which will include pregenerated characters -- "Get a jump on 4th Edition with Keep on the Shadowfell™, a D&D® adventure for characters of levels 1–3. This adventure includes a quick-start rulebook, an adventure booklet, a players’ booklet, 3 poster maps, and pre-generated characters. Additional adventure content will be presented on D&D Insider™ (www.dndinsider.com)."  96 pages.  [The "H" in "H1" stands for "Heroic"]. Mike Mearls comments on H1: "While H1 is far from a mega-dungeon, I've tried to incorporate at least some sense that the PCs can wander around the dungeon, exploring different sub-sectors and having a really different experience based on what they do....The really nice thing is that there isn't much of a sense of an XP grind in 4e." Keep on the Shadowfell has appeared on Amazon and Amazon UK as a hardcover book: "A D&D adventure for characters of levels 1-3. The town of Winterhaven stands watch over a ruined keep that was once a bastion of good in the realm. This keep overlooks the Shadow Rift, a dark scar in the world that was once a gateway to the Shadowfell but has been dormant for many years. Now, an evil cleric of Orcus, Demon Lord of the Undead, seeks to re-open the gate, and the only thing standing in his way is a small yet determined band of heroes from Winterhaven. Keep on the Shadowfell is an exciting Dungeons & Dragons adventure designed for characters of levels 1-3. It includes three double-sided poster maps suitable for use with D&D miniatures, as well as information on the town of Winterhaven and environs." Mike Mearls with some tiny hints: "There's a riddle in H1. Also, there's a secret room that you can find only by piecing together a few clues (or seriously dumb luck/thoroughness). No skill checks, just good, old fashioned brain processing power." It's not an earth-shattering revelation, but we have confirmation that H1 will contain rules to play from Greg Bilsland: "Keep on the Shadowfell....Shadowfell’s text remains unstable because rules in the PH continue to fluctuate. Since Shadowfell comes out a month before the PH, the other challenge is trying to include all the necessary rules so someone can play the adventure without the help of the PH. Turns out this is kind of difficult because Dungeons and Dragons has a few rules. Just a few." D&D Miniatures Game Starter Set: April 2008 -- "This new starter set for the D&D® Miniatures Game includes everything 2 players need to play, including revised rules that will appeal to experienced players as well as players new to the game. Now anyone can experience an adventure right out of the box with this comprehensive set. Included are: 5 exclusive, non-random pre-painted plastic D&D minis, including a new Green Dragon Battle map d20 die Rulebook Stat cards and damage counters" You can now download the new D&D Miniatures  rulebook for free (48 page PDF file, 11.5MB) from the official site. The D&D Miniature Rules are being brought in line with the D&D 4th Edition rules, so there should be plenty of crunchy observations made possible by looking at the changes to the DDM rules.
Dungeons of Dread: April 2008.  Miniatures expansion -- "Battle the D&D game’s most iconic monsters with Dungeons of Dread™, a 60-figure expansion for the D&D Miniatures Game. Creatures are drawn from the pages of the new 4th Edition Monster Manual. Each booster pack contains: 8 pre-painted plastic D&D minis, randomized with varying degrees of rarity to enhance collectibility Stat cards and damage counters Set checklist" Player's Handbook: June 2008 (hardcover, 288 pages) -- "The Player’s Handbook® features a new cover design, a fresh new page layout, new character options, new magic items, and new rules that facilitate faster and more exciting gameplay from level 1 to level 30."  (Cover may change). Amazon.com is listing the 4th Edition PHB for $29.95 USD. Amazon.ca is listing it for CDN$ 23.95. Amazon.co.uk lists it for £15.36.  "The Player's Handbook presents the official Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game rules as well as everything a player needs to create D&D characters worthy of song and legend: new character races, base classes, paragon paths, epic destinies, powers, more magic items, weapons, armor, and much more. " The PHB cover IS set to change!  Scott Rouse confirms in this video snippet that the current artwork on the Player's Handbook is changing. Wayne Reynolds has been commissioned for the new piece, which will not feature the tiefling.  There will also be a Player's Handbook Deluxe Edition, released around the same time (Amazon).  Scott Rouse: "It's an embossed leather bound version with gilded edges and a ribbon bookmark  The release date is in flux and it will likely come out later in 08, probably a holiday item." Character Record Sheets: May 2008 -- "Design of the new 4E character sheets is underway. A lot of learning has gone into the initial design. The good news is that we can fit everything on one double-sided page, without making the lines and boxes so small that you can't really write in them. That might not seem like a big deal in the context of the greater game, particularly with all of the other interesting 4E things going on, but it's still something to sing about." (source). Amazon UK. Monster Manual: June 2008 (hardcover, 288 pages) -- "Classic D&D® monsters and fearsome new foes populate the pages of the Monster Manual®. The book presents monsters of all levels, along with full-color monster illustrations and easy-to-use monster statistics."  The cover depicts Orcus, and Scott Rouse confirmed that the encounter range within the book would run from 1st-30th level.  Orcus is one of the critters in the MM.  Amazon UK. "The Monster Manual presents more than 300 official Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game monsters for all levels of play, from aboleth to zombie. Each monster is illustrated and comes with complete game statistics and tips for the Dungeon Master on how best to use the monster in D&D encounters." Adventure H2: Thunderspire Laybrinth: [was "Labyrinth of Lost Souls"] June 2008. A 4th Edition D&D® adventure for characters of levels 4-6 Beneath Thunderspire Mountain lies a sprawling network of mazes, tombs, and caverns collectively known as the Labyrinth of Lost Souls. In recent years, this vast labyrinth has become a living dungeon where trade between the surface and subterranean worlds is possible. However, beyond the well-lit halls where prospectors, merchants, and traders convene lies a darker world where adventurers battle monsters and fiendish beings perform secret rituals for their dark masters. . . H2 Thunderspire Labyrinth is a D&D adventure designed for heroic-tier characters of levels 4-6. This product includes an adventure booklet for the Dungeon Master, a player's booklet containing new character options and campaign information, player handouts, and a full-color poster map, all contained in a handy folder. H2 Thunderspire Labyrinth is the second adventure in a three-part series that began with H1 Keep on the Shadowfell and concludes with H3 Pyramid of Shadows. It can also be played as a stand-alone adventure. Dungeon Master's Guide: June 2008 (hardcover, 224 pages) -- "Weave thrilling tales of heroism, filled with magic and monsters, with the new Dungeon Master’s Guide®. This book helps Dungeon Masters run great games, create exciting adventures, and build their own D&D campaigns." [Note: the D&D Q&A panel at GenCon Indy said the DMG would have 256 pages; the press release says 224]. "The Dungeon Master's Guide gives the Dungeon Master helpful tools to build exciting encounters, adventures, and campaigns for the 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game, as well as advice for running great game sessions, ready-to-use traps and non-player characters, and more. In addition, it presents a fully detailed town that can serve as a starting point for any D&D game. " Chris Perkins: "...For example, in the Dungeon Master's Guide we're aiming to include a fully-detailed town or village that DMs can use as the starting point for their 4th Edition campaigns..." Chris Perkins: "We're planning to include a fully detailed "starting town" in the 4E DMG. It's a wonderful time-saver for DMs who need a ready-to-play town around which to base a D&D campaign. We tried something similar in the 3rd Edition DMG II with Saltmarsh, and we learned a lot from that experiment. The town we're thinking about for the 4E DMG is even more iconic than Saltmarsh. Can you guess what it is?" David Noonan speaks about the DMG and how a large chunk of it will contain the infrastructure to manage varied encounters: "...lots of stuff going on during a fight, and a great DM will mix it up and employ lots of combat, social challenges, hazards/obstacles, and who knows what else." Rich Baker has posted about the 4th Edition DMG and, more specifically, the "starter town" to be found within it.: "The town is called Fallcrest, and I'm pretty proud of it. It's a trading town located at the falls of a big river, where folks stop and portage cargo around the falls. I've made sure to include several potential dungeons right in the town (Fallcrest is a small town built atop the ruins of a larger city). At the moment I've also got a good-sized area around the town included in the description, so that you know where the nearby towns are too, and half a dozen good potential dungeon sites and adventures within a couple days' travel." DM's Screen: July 2008 -- "Ryan Sansaver, one of our D&D art directors, recently showed us final art for the new DM screen. It's a sprawling, beautifully lit Underdark scene filled with all sorts of D&D monsters lumbering, lurching, slithering, and crawling toward the viewer. It's really quite beautiful ... in a horrifying way. I'm sure the screen will hypnotize more than a few players!" (source). Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition For Dummies. The book is by Bill Slavicsek and Rich Baker, and has a release date of July 21, 2008. Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide: August 2008. Ed Greenwood working on the 4E FRCG.  He has been hired to write 50,000 words for the book.  Forgotten Realms will have a DM's book, separate to the Campaign Guide. See "Settings", below, for further information on FR. Magic Item Compendium I: September 2008.  The title of the Amazon entry for Magic Item Compendium I has changed to Tome of Treasures. Scepter Tower of Spellgard (Forgotten Realms adventure): September 2008. Forgotten Realms Player's Guide: September 2008. This post [unconfirmed] indicates that one year after the Core three books are released there will be a Players Handbook 2, DMG 2, and Monster Manual 2 and a new one every year after that.  Each will contain new races and classes. Adventure H3 Pyramid of Shadows -- mentioned in the Amazon blurb for H2. A paragon level (11-20) adventure. Adventures, including at least one starring Formorians; Chris Perkins:  "one of our 4E adventures revolves around the schemes of a fomorian king". Will any classic dungeons throughout the editions make their return in 4E? Bill Slavicsek and Chris Perkins confirm that they will: Bill: ... As for classic dungeons, we plan for all of them to exist in the new edition. We’ll talk more about that in the near future. Chris: In addition to publishing new adventures, we have a long tradition of publishing adventures in Dungeon magazine, which now lives online. Some of the best adventures of previous editions appeared in Dungeon magazine, and that trend will continue with 4th Edition.

• Many of the products between now and May will have 4E material for them on D&D Insider (see pre-4E releases).
• Some new monsters from the 4E Monster Manual will debut in D&D miniatures in November.
• No video game licenses announced yet (note - this is a different statement to "there are no video game licenses"): "No licensing plans have been announced at this time, and nothing is likely to be announced until after the 4th Edition rules are finalized."

• 4th Edition Teaser
• 4th Edition presentation part 1
• 4th Edition presentation part 2
• 4th Edition presentation part 3
• 4th Edition presentation part 4
• Minis in 4th Edition
• Designing Encounters with Mike Mearls
• James Wyatt
• Chris Thomasson, producer of D&D Insider (part 1, part 2)
• Rob Heinsoo, lead designer on D&D 4E.
• Catching up with: Chris Perkins, Bill Slavicsek
• Andy Collins Behind The Scenes (part 1, part 2)

• The Sagamore Ballroom stage and its protectors
• Two full-size props on display in front of the stage:
• Troll and Beholder

• Green Dragon
• Halfling Cleric
• Human Cleric
• Dwarves
• Fighter-Rogue
• Eladrin Wizard
• Troll
• Dwarven Warlock
• Tiefling
• Beholder

• Why isn't there more information about 4E? "There's been some recent comments and discussion about how much information there is or isn't regarding 4e....The challenge we face right now is that we've announced the game, but we are still not ready to show everyone all aspects of that game. We can release tidbits here and there, but there's still quite a bit of change that might occur as we move through the playtest phase and the finalization -- which makes it hard for us to explain the "Why". The changes we've made are the result of significant discussion and design, but providing a glimpse of that process at this stage wouldn't have the context of the final end state."
  
• The meaning of "Core": will include expansions and D&D Insider materials, not just the first three books, when referred to by WotC.
• Are the standard 6 ability scores used? Will they range from 3 to 18? "Yes, it's a d20 game."
• "The Core Mechanic" deals with the "roll d20 plus modifier to beat a target number" dice roll which is the core of the system. As the article points out, it's still the 3rd Edition core mechanic, but there are a few differences in its application:
  
• Life-or-death saving throws: gone.
• Spellcasters get to roll attack rolls and can achieve critical hits.
• Touch and flat-footed AC: gone.
• AC is one of four standard defences (AC, Reflex, Fortitude, Will), and all four work in the way that AC did in 3rd Edition - in other words, an attacker rolls to beat it: "When a dragon breathes fire on you, it attacks your Reflex and deals half damage if it misses. The DM rolls a d20, adds the dragon’s modifiers, and asks you what your Reflex score is." These attacks can all automatically miss on a 1 or critical on a 20.
• Challenge Ratings are gone!  WotC's Greg Bilsland: "I remember specifically asking Logan Bonner about the 3.5 problems with level adjustment and challenge rating. With a wry grin, he replied, “Challenge rating, what’s that?”
• Mike Mearls:  "[3E]... assumed that the party fought only one monster. In 4th Edition, we’re doing things a bit different. We’re shifting to a system that assumes a number of monsters equal to the number of characters."
• A hazard simply fits in in the same way that a monster does: "That makes it much easier to design green slime, pit traps, whirling blades, fountains that spray acid, and crumbling stone walls. One such hazard can simply take the place of one monster, leaving you with three or four monsters in the encounter. Since monster level is a more rigorous measure of power, we can turn those measures and scales around and use them to create environmental hazards, traps, set pieces, and other interesting tactical twists. ... A swaying rope bridge battered by howling air elementals fits under the encounter building system. A burning building that collapses around the PCs as they fight the evil hobgoblin wizard fills a similar role, as does a bizarre altar to Vecna that randomly teleports characters around the room. Hazards, traps, and other dangers simply fill in for one or more creatures in a fight."
  
• James Wyatt discusses conversion of characters from 3.5 to 4th Edition. Or, more to the point, he says that "You can't really just convert a character directly from 3e to 4e." The post also mentions that the Knight class' abilities were, to an extent, split between the Fighter and Paladin for 4E ("The fighter and the paladin pretty well ganged up on the poor knight and divvied his stuff between them"), and the Swordsage is not, at this stage of design, a concept which is easy to translate.
• Chris Perkins on switching to 4E: "We faced a similar situation with the change from 2nd Edition to 3rd Edition, so we assume that not every 3rd-Edition player will switch over to the new game overnight. All in all, 4th Edition offers a much better gaming experience for players and Dungeon Masters. Even though 3rd Edition is an excellent game, 4th Edition gives players better character options at every level, makes DM-ing less of a chore, and (as mentioned above) speeds up round-by-round combat. I expect that the improvements in game play will convince even reluctant players to switch over to 4th Edition. I also anticipate that the majority of d20 publishers will support 4th Edition going forward."
• Bill Slavicsek's column, Ampersand, covers the subject of 4th Edition rumors and speculation. He reiterates the point that D&D is still a tabletop roleplaying game, and that electronic gaming is not going to replace traditional dining-table gaming. He also talks about conversion from 3rd Edition to 4th Edition, pointing out that straight character conversion will not be possible, and that you'll need to reinvent your character for 4th Edition - 3rd Edition has been around for eight years and has spawned a ton of books; not all of the options in those many, many books are going to fit in a 288-page Player's Handbook. Finally, he mentions that the new game is still a d20-system game, and that those familiar with the 3rd Edition rules will know, basically, how to play 4th Edition in a broader sense, although the details will be new.
• Mike Mearls -- "3e got a lot of things right, but anyone who has played it for a time knows that it gets things wrong. There are also legacy issues with the game that have persisted unquestioned for years. 4e is all about taking the things that work in D&D, keeping them in the game, and fixing everything else."
  
• The iconics will remain as a mix of old and new iconics (source: Scott Rouse at GenCon 2007).
• James Wyatt "[shares his] thoughts about creating a new campaign for 4th Edition, and ... sketch out [his] own campaign as [he goes]". 4th edition tidbits in the article include:
• "The Player's Handbook suggests that the last powerful empire before the fall of the present darkness was a human one...." 
• "Eladrins are a new race in the Player's Handbook. They're akin to the elves, but they more often make their homes in the Feywild." (The Feywild is one of the new planar areas in 4E.)
• Shifters are "not in the Player's Handbook, but they are in the Monster Manual, so ... players could make shifter characters if they want to." 
• Bahamut, the platinum dragon, is a full-fledged part of the 4E pantheon. "He's the god of justice, protection, and honor." 
• Pelor, Moradin, and Kord are also mentioned as gods.
• Star Wars Saga Edition and Book of Nine Swords were both "significant previews" of 4th Edition.
• D20 gaming system – this is still a d20 game and game system. "We got rid of the parts that didn’t help it out, but most of the things that work continue to be used." (source).
• Check out some of the Star Wars Saga Edition previews, which touch on talent trees, simplified skill system, saves, iterative attacks, and critical hits.
• WotC has uploaded a new podcast entitled "You May Already Be Playing 4th Edition": "In this episode, we look at how certain elements of 3.5 rulebooks functioned as precursors to 4th Edition mechanics...In other words, interested in playtesting 4th Edition? Then you might try incorporating the following elements into your current 3.5 campaigns. We even go a step further, explaining—if you’re so inclined—how you can make these elements even more 4E-like, to get an even better grasp of 4th Edition mechanics."
• 4 player groups as the baseline? They are aiming for right around 5. Encounters are more modular, and now that there are a bunch, it’s a lot easier to scale it. Most data is 4-6 players are 80% or more of the gaming groups out there. (source).
• The D&D economy is a major concern. "Fundamentally the D&D economy is not one".
• James Wyatt writes about the "quest rules" in the latest Design & Development article. It discusses what a quest is, hints at quest-related rewards, and suggests that each quest be physically represented by an index card or the like.
• The "christmas tree" effect, whereby characters are loaded down with magic items, buff spells and other magical effects was one of the designers' goals to remove (source: Scott Rouse at GenCon 2007).
• Iron Heroes vs. 4th Edition – Mike Mearls: "Yes, there are some similiarities, ie, putting more emphasis on the class vs. the items for characters." (source).
• Traps will go up to level 30 -- Dave Noonan: "Traps! ... Specifically, Powers Greater Than I took a look and the DMG and said: "Needs more ready-to-play traps." And I'm happy to comply. In some significant ways, trap design is a lot like monster design, so it's a fun task. And the other thing I like? No more of this "traps cap out at CR 10" nonsense. In 4e, traps--and more broadly, other hazardous traplike things--go all the way up."
• Dave Noonan has spoken a little more about traps in his blog.
• You can read all about the 4th Edition approach to traps in this article on the official site. The article says that "We think that our ideal encounter consists of some of the PCs battling monsters while some PCs deal with a trap or similar hazard." and mentions the way in which a trap is now treated like a monster (or a group of monsters for traps with different components). The Encounter Trap system from Secrets of Xen'drik is an influence here: "treating a trap like a group of monsters with different components operating on different initiative scores..."
  
  The article also addresses the question of "who wants to roll an endless series of mostly pointless Search checks?", highlighting the asssumpion that PCs are searching all the time, and that the trap's [static] DC is compared against the PCs' [static] Perception scores when appropriate. Also notable is that "skills such as Arcana, Dungeoneering, or even Nature can give a PC the ability to learn of the existence of a trap, figure out its workings, or even find a way to counter it."
  
• Greg Bilsland's update covers errata:
  

  Once 4th Edition is released, the 3rd Edition errata will stop and we will focus on concerns with the present edition (which hopefully—given the amount of development and playtesting going in–will be few).
  
  Another factor that will change the face of errata is the implementation of the database, which plays such a central role in our management of 4 Edition. With the institution of ebooks that accompany one’s physical copy, we have the option of keeping one’s ebook updated with the latest changes, from the very small (a “+2” instead of a “+3”) to the very big (changing the text of an ability or feat). That’s not to say there still won’t be a physical copy of the errata, but we might simply compile quarterly changes made in the database into a readable format, rather than the sporadic release that now exists.
  

• Rodney Thompson -- "After having played (and worked on, a bit) D&D 4E, I really feel like a lot of things get blown out of proportion. When I play my 4E rogue, I feel like I'm playing what I call "3rd Edition ++" to steal a computer programming colloquialism. My rogue still sneaks around, leaps from the shadows, stabs a bad guy, and retreats just like in 3rd Edition. But my 4E rogue does all that, then leaps over the heads of a line of enemies, waits for an opening when an opponent attacks him and then counterattacks immediately, and twists the knife to create a huge gash in the enemy. I'm still finding traps, unlocking doors, ambushing bad guys, leaping from rooftops, and all of those things, but as I do so I'm far less distracted by the rules than I am under 3E."
• Rodney Thompson -- "Going back to some 4E specifics, one of the the things I have enjoyed about 4E is that it's very much a "yes you can" game. It lets people do fun and exciting things, and it lets them do them without much complication. My character is Thicket, a brawny-dextrous rogue that's not too up on social graces and has some friends in low places (I can't believe I just quoted that song). At one point out tougher fighter-types and gone down and I was the #1 target for the monsters. While the other players whittled the enemies down, I was leading them around in a chase across the battlefield, running up walls and flipping over bad guys to keep them from laying down the inevitable smack. I'd built the character to be kind of a mobile combatant and it worked to my advantage. Thanks to one of my magic items I would occasionally dash across the battlefield when an enemy got too close, and we barely made it out alive. It was very exciting, and I essentially played the defensive role in the party once the fighter-types were down, just in an unusual way."

• James Wyatt updates on math and the "sweet spot" -- 

• Mike Mearls talks about the stewardship of D&D and the emotional investment of fans:

• What changes are in store for alignment? "In the end, there's still alignment. There will be some changes though. There'll be some tweaks... Even non-gamers know what a 12th level lawful good paladin is."
• Will alignment be a factor in the new edition? "It’s not going to be what it is now. Alignment is part of the story, part of the character. It is a useful shorthand, but too many books and too many players mistake it for limitation. We want to treat alignment as something bigger than that. We won’t get rid of it, but we don’t want it to be a replacement for character and personality." (source).
• One major change to this system in 4E is the fact characters can choose to be “unaligned,” having no significant impulses towards good or evil. Characters can still choose to be good or evil (law and chaos are not mentioned), but most characters and monsters will be unaligned. Unsurprisingly, most spells and powers that revolve around alignment are now gone.

• The D&D cosmology is being revised to the planes work better as adventure sites -- "Case in point, the individual Elemental Planes (as decribed in 2E and 3E) aren't the most interesting adventure locations... In the Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters book, we'll present in more detail 4th Edition's alternative to the Elemental Planes of Water, Fire, Earth, and Air."
• There's a big Design & Development update which deals exclusively with 4th Edition Cosmology.
• The Feywild -- "...the realm of faerie. It is an “echo” of the mortal world, a parallel dimension in which the natural features of the lands and seas are arranged in much the same configuration."
• Worlds & Monsters has more info on The Feywild: 
• Mentioned inhabitants include hags, yeth hounds, centaurs, eladrins, treants, fomorians, unicorns, elves, firbolgs, the Wild Hunt, red caps, quicklings, will-o'wisps, dark ones, pixies
• There is a fey reflection of the underdark, ruled over by fomorians
• The Isle of Dread is mentioned as a Location of Note
• Gnomes are a possible fey-dwelling race
• Pixies, well, don't want to ruin the surprise
• Download The Feywild, an excerpt from Wizards Presents: Worlds & Monsters from the official site.
• The Shadowfell -- "...the Shadowfell mimics the mortal world in a different manner. The Shadowfell is the land of the dead, where the spirits of the deceased linger for a time in a dark reflection of their previous lives before silently fading beyond all ken. Some undead creatures are born in the Shadowfell, and other undead are bound to it, but some living beings dwell in this benighted realm."
• Worlds & Monsters has more info on The Shadowfell:
• Merges Negative Energy Plane and Plane of Shadow, removing the irritating bits that make these places a pain to visit
• Shadow is a power source. Involved with stealth, illusion, dread, 'devastating enemies' and 'necrotic energy'
• They've re-concepted the undead, adding the animus, providing 'vitality and mobility', as a companion to the soul and the body.
• Very interesting descriptions of how different varieties of undead are now explained.
• Shadow are the animus freed of body and soul, for example.
• Lots of details about how the new cosmology explains resurrection and reincarnation
• Shadowfell is inhabited by ... the Shadar-kai.
• The Elemental Chaos -- "...a place where all fundamental matter and energy seethes. Floating continents of earth, rivers of fire, ice-choked oceans, and vast cyclones of churning clouds and lightning collide in the elemental plane."
• Worlds & Monsters has more info on The Elemental Chaos:
• An evolution of the inner planes better suited to adventuring (and not just one homogenous mass of element) - more dangerous than lethal.
• Inhabitants include: Primordials, Elementals, Efreet, Djinn, Demons, Slaads, Titans, Githzerai
• The City of Brass is mentioned as a location of note
• The concept of "Elemental Evil" as represented in TOEE is recognized as core, on par with the Nine Hells
• Consists of four factions with noteworthy differences between them. A 'fire elemental' can refer to any of a number of different shaped creatures, which can be composed of more than just fire; a 'serpentine trail of flame that spits magma' or a 'hill-giant sized humanoid of burning cinders who breathes gouts of fire' are given as examples
• The Abyss is now part of the Elemental Chaos, with the stock Demon Princes recast as corrupted primordials
• "At least one Demon Lord" appears in the Monster manual as an epic level adversary [Edit - we know already that's Orcus].
• They were considering at time of press allowing demons to gain immunity to a damage type of their choosing a few times per day
• Mezzoloths and Nycaloths are now Mezzodemons and Nycademons (of which the first is confirmed to be in the Monster Manual)
• The Astral Sea -- "If the Elemental Chaos is the manifestation of physicality, the Astral Sea is a domain of the soul and mind. The divine realms, the dominions of the gods, drift within Astral Sea’s unlimited silver deeps. Some of these are realms of glory and splendor—the golden peak of Mount Celestia, the verdant forests of Arvandor…. Others belong to dark powers, such as the Nine Hells where Asmodeus governs his infernal kingdom."
• Worlds & Monsters has more info on The Astral Sea
• Counterpart to the Elemental Chaos
• Inhabitants include: Gods, Angels, Devils,
• Dominions, especially Abandoned ones, found throughout the Astral Sea are 'adventure sites custom made for epic characters'
• Continuing the theme, the Astral Sea and its Dominions are much easier to play in, at least for epic level characters.
• There are Angels for all gods, both good and bad- they are described as 'the cold, clinical expression of a deity's plans' and 'the frontline warriors in the wars amongst the gods'. Some interesting fluff to back all that up.
• Demons and Devils are more distinct in battle. This is summarized as:
• 'Demons are chaotic, Devils are organized'
• 'Demons kill, Devils subvert'
• 'Demons are tough, Devils are slippery':
• The Nine Hells have become "an astral dominion among other deific abodes in the Astral Sea", with Asmodeus as the resident deity. Asmodeus follows the "fallen angel" model, as do his followers. The Abyss, on the other hand, "gapes like a festering wound in the landscape of the Elemental Tempest". Demons are elemental beings who came too close and became trapped (source).
• This post by WotC's Michele Carter, which indicates that a paragraph about Sigil will appear in the 4th Edition DMG. Also, she says: "Sigil is still under development, as it were, and you'll see more about it in future projects. But it still exists, and the Lady of Pain still rules it, and it's still the City of Doors. Purely for my own amusement I've done some speculation about Sigil's place in the 4E cosmology, and I'm very, very excited to see where it goes. The soul of Planescape (near and dear to me) will remain very much alive."
• Rich Baker on the cosmology: "Here's one of the really cool features of the new cosmology that isn't explicitly called out in the article: Each world has its own set of astral dominions. You can make up as many celestial courts or reeking hells as you need to support your pantheon. So, for example, just about all of the godly planes listed in Forgotten Realms "Great Tree" cosmology can fit right in, no shoehorning necessary. Customize your own pantheons, and you can create each outer plane you need. I think it's good if some planes appear in every world's cosmology (the Nine Hells spring to mind), but there's no reason they have to. The constraints imposed by the Great Wheel aren't tying our hands anymore (but if you really really like the Great Wheel, well, no reason you can't have each of those planes as the astral dominions for your own campaign)....Oh, and regarding the Abyss: When I said thousands, I think I was thinking of Jupiter thousands. Jupiter's like 80,000 miles across and 300 times the size of the Earth. The Abyss is big like that."
• And Chris Simm's thoughts: "Those who see my article as broad strokes are on track. Those who see demons as forces of unmaking are on track. The article's (and Rich Baker's) generalities will get their refinement as the game evolves. Graz'zt won't need to be a devil, for example. He can have his place in the Abyss, right alongside Lolth (but below her, since she's a deity) without contradicting the broad strokes at all. Each specific entity can heve exceptions to the general."
• Rich Baker on whether the new core cosmology will be adopted for FR:  "I'm sure this is probably more than I ought to say right now, but yes....Of course, the particular astral dominions that will exist in Faerun's cosmology will correspond to the Realms pantheon. So you'll see Arvandor, House of the Triad, Warrior's Rest, etc., as shaken up by events of the Spellplague (no more Dweomerheart, for example)....Faerie's been touched on several times in Realmslore (for example, Elaine's novels). The Shadowfell and Plane of Shadow are pretty much the same thing. The Inner Planes are getting resorted to the Elemental Chaos, but no one ever went there before anyway, so it should be fine. We've got some details to work out on the interaction of the Fugue Plane with all this, but other than that, the new cosmology is going to be Faerun's cosmology."
• A comment from Rich Baker on the official messageboards indicates that WotC are strongly considering dropping Tyr and and including Torm in the FR pantheon: "This is a really interesting suggestion, and a well-reasoned argument. So interesting and so well-reasoned, in fact, that I took the liberty of forwarding it to the other designers working on FR 4e. We had a brief huddle this morning, and I think we're going to implement it: Torm in, Tyr out. More details than that I can't reveal yet, but it actually helps "spackle in" a couple of pantheon events we were working on anyway."
• From Worlds & Monsters, a look at the Far Realm:
  

• A  Design & Development article by James Wyatt deals with the 4th Edition pantheon. It mentions Corellon, Moradin, and Pelor, plus Zehir, Torog, and, most surprisingly, Bane, who has usurped Hextor as the resident evil war deity. The article also discusses Bahamut's new position as a core god of paladins.
• Known gods include Bahamut, Corellon (god of magic), Io ("the ancient diety," now dead and split into Bahamut and Tiamat), Lolth, Moradin, Obad-Hai (god of the wilderness), Sehanine (goddess of the moon), Tiamat, and Zehir (god of night).
• The pantheon mentioned in Worlds & Monsters is: Bahamut, Vecna, Avandra, Zehir, Ioun, Pelor, Tiamat, Gruumsh, Lolth, Corellon, Moradin, Kord, Bane, The Raven Queen, Asmodeus, Torog.
• The full pantheon has 'twenty plus one' gods
• The gods are less connected with Race
• On the question of Torm's role, he reveals that there will be no intermediate gods: "Torm is probably going to be a demigod. We think he works best as a champion or hero in the service of other LG powers. He might be a lesser god, which means he's got clerics and worshipers and temples, but doesn't rate his own plane. (We've only got greater, lesser, and demigod; no real reason to distinguish intermediate, really.)"
• Rich Baker talks about deities in a post on the official boards. 
  
  
  1) Yes, we think the alignments for FR deities are certainly known to players/DMs. We're not trying to create ambiguity with the pantheon, we want you to be able to pick sides and feel confident about your decision. Whether they're widely known to characters in the world is a trickier question. For example, I suspect that deities such as Bane or Cyric must present some "redeeming qualities" to gain a wide support base of basically neutral townsfolk, commoners, etc. For example, maybe the average Zhent looks at Bane as a god of kingship and divine authority, as opposed to tyranny. But that's about as much gray as we'd want to see in that.
  
  2) I think that in general one deity per portfolio is better. Some very broad portfolios can support a couple of overlapping deities, but even then I think each deity has a particular slant on the topic. War, destruction, and misfortune all overlap at least a little bit, but there is certainly room for Tempus, Talos, and Beshaba.
  
  3) I'm of the opinion that if you're playing the highest-level characters possible, and you decide to rid the cosmos of an evil god, your DM should be able to craft that adventure for you. There are plenty of examples in fantasy fiction of heroes destroying gods (the Elric series springs to mind). So maybe 30th-level heroes (remember, there's a new level scale) who decide to take on Bane should be able to succeed... if they do everything right, such as questing for the right artifact ahead of time, paying attention to ancient prophecies about eclipses and people of unique ancestry, and so forth. It shouldn't ever be a "routine" adventure to take down a god, but I think it ought to be possible.
  

• Fewer than 11 core classes (source). James Wyatt -- Although two PCs may serve the same role, they may do it in different ways. (Like fighters with different styles.) The roles are geared towards combat; a PC's non-combat aspects can differentiate him further. He also said that they are still considering the possibility of there being a class or two that doesn't quite fit the four "roles".
• Update on number of classes from 4E Mechanical Designer Logan Bonner -- "There are 8 classes in PH1, but more will come out later in other books and the magazines. Think of it this way: There are many classes, but each will fit into one of the four roles. This way you have plenty of variability, but you can always be sure that the class is filling a basic function it's expected to."  Note, though that 11 classes have actually been mentioned so far (below), implying that while all of those classes are in 4E, they're not necessarily in the [first] PHB.
• Although Mike Mearls disagrees on the number of classes:   "Mearls said 8 was about the 'middle range' of the number of classes that might be in the PH when I asked him about it yesterday, specifically mentioning that the Internet was taking 8 classes as confirmed."
• Logan Bonner (WotC designer): "Nobody has said which 8 classes are in or out of the PH1. We've talked about classes in seminars and on the boards, and we've mentioned way more than eight classes in them. All the classes in the 3.5 PH will appear at some point in the game's lifespan, but the only ones you can call "confirmed" in the PH1 are fighter, rogue, cleric, and wizard." 
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Unified progression of defense, BAB and saves. A 10th level character will have +5 of those (thus +0.5 / level). Even at 1st level classes can significantly alter the base value. Class abilities modify them further.
• Characters no longer have different rates of progression for attack bonuses and saving throws based on their class—these all progress at the same rate now. Every 10th level character will have a +5 bonus to AC, to hit, and all three saves, though class abilities, feats and ability scores will influence these. Presumably, Defenders will have more class abilities that grant attack bonuses to make them the best combatants. Every character at first level possesses certain boosts to these traits as Star Wars Saga Edition characters do (so a fighter probably starts with a +2 Fortitude save bonus, etc.).
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Ability score adjustments have a net positive benefit (i.e. not of the type -2 / +2). 
• Character Powers are to be sorted into at will, per encounter and per day abilities.
• Logan Bonner briefly mentions class powers here: "Generally speaking, your powers use the ability score your class should be good at. So, for example, a rogue's per-encounter power would be Dexterity vs AC (or whatever). So many of the "enabling" feats of 3.X are now default parts of classes."
• There are three sample power writeups from the PHB. These are in draft form, and their names will be changed before publication (I personally like the names, along with Feather Me Yon Oaf!)
• I'm Batman: a ranged attack gets your opponent's attention and lures it towards you. You then jump up and deliver a follow-up attack.
• The Rabble Yammer In Terror: A stinging blow to an enemy causes his allies to shirink back unwilling to get too close to you.
• Go Ahead And Hit Me: A glare gives you an edge over foes.
• All classes will have resource management aspects.
• Resource Management: All classes have defined roles – a fighter is never penalized for being a “tank”, a “healer” is never penalized for curing, a mage is never penalized for “magic missiling”.
• More options, not restrictions. Everyone will be a constructive, useful member of the party, no accidental lame characters. (source).
• Less feat trees, easier for characters to swap out abilities much easier and try different things out. Each level from 1 – 30 each character will have interesting character development options to choose (source).
• Wisdom helps with power selection.
• More on martial abilities: "A skilled halberdier can hack a foe with his weapon’s blade and spin around to smash a second foe with the haft. A fighter with a longsword disarms her foe with a flick of her wrist, while a battle hungry axeman cleaves through shields, armor, and bone." "Rogues have a similar relationship with skills. A nimble rogue dives through the air to tumble past an ogre, while a charismatic one tricks an enemy into looking away just before she delivers a killing blow with her dagger. Just as fighters do more with weapons than any other character, rogues push skills beyond the limits that constrain other PCs."
• Chris Perkins on character abilities: "Fourth Edition gives characters interesting things to do and interesting choices to make during each round of combat. For example, characters always have some cool at-will powers they can use even after they've used up their 'heavy artillery.'"
• Chris Perkins on Talent Trees: "Talent trees aren’t unique to MMORPGs. Wizards has produced other games that use talent trees, such as the d20 Modern Roleplaying Game and the Star Wars Roleplaying Game Saga Edition. The theory of game design, regardless of platform, is constantly evolving. We’ve taken our gaming experiences over the past decade, as well as player feedback on the games and supplements we’ve produced in that time period, to build a system for character creation and advancement in 4th Edition that draws inspiration from numerous sources, but isn’t exactly like anything that’s been done before."

• Levels run from 1-30; these levels attempt to capture the feel of the "sweet range" of 3E, which is levels 7-14.
• 1-10 Heroic: foes are orcs and ogres, some giants, small dragons. Adventures tend to be local.
• 11 - 20 Paragon: on par with the current low to mid teens right now. Bigger threats are faced that might threaten a kingdom.
• 21 - 30 Epic: world or planar threats.
• Heroic, paragon, epic tiers are "not hard-edged boundaries", so a 9th-level character isn't all that different from a 11th-level character, but there are some mechanical differences. "The mechanics are informed by what tier you're in, but it's not a major change by any means." Different "tiers" do have different rules; not terribly different, but not exactly the same.
• The paragon path and epic destiny thing - PrC's are gone completely. You pick up your paragon path at 11th level, and your epic destiny at 21st level. You get those abilities as you level up in addition to your main class stuff, not instead of. Some look like old PrCs, and weapon master, prince of knaves and cavalier mentioned. There are currently 12 PPs and "fewer" EDs. The EDs give big benefits and are things like being the right hand man to a god, undying warrior or calling dragons with a wave of your hand.
• XP remaining, and for those not comfortable with eyeballing it will have a clear time as to when to advance. Much easier for the DM. "I’ll build a level 8 encounter, totaling 8000 xp, this one, plus this one = 8000 done." No tables. Monsters have a level, just like characters. “A group vs. a “group” of 5th level is about the same as an EL5 encounter today.  (source).
• The goal is to have the levels play in a similar manner - they don't want a 25th character overwhelmed with 80 abilities. The main differences should be in the story, not how they play.
• Chris Perkins on the rate of advancement: power level is increasing (although not by a "startling" amount); 20th level in 4th Edition is a little more powerful than 20th level in 3rd Edition. However, you'll reach 30th level in the same time you used to reach 20th level -- 

• Will there still be XP? How will it work? "We still have XP, very similar to now... It's not an exponential power curve anymore. You go up more smoothly."
• Levelling up geared towards every two or three sessions.
• Personalizing and specializing your character is amped up, it’s one of the most powerful things about 4th edition. If you’re a barbarian, you’re not a frenzied berserker. If you’re a barbarian, you’re a barbarian for your entire career. The frenzied berserker and bear warrior will be at the very end (source).
• David Noonan -- "Plus I had a nice, meaty design assignment to work on. Suffice it to say that I'm working on a significant customization choice your character makes midway through his or her career--and it's a choice that'll evolve over, say, ten levels or so. More on those when I get 'em written."
• There will be rules akin to the retraining rules in PHBII - they don't like the idea of people planning their careers from level 1 to 30.

• Every class will have a "power source". Every class will have actions based on powers... "You can customise your fighter in many different ways."
• Power sources mentioned on the cover of the PHB: Arcane, Divine, Martial.  [Speculative power sources from fans (non confirmed - these are just thoughts on where WotC may go with it): Nature, Ki, Pisonics.]
• Additional power sources will be added in subsequent handbooks. It is stated, as an example, that there will be a Psi power source later on for psionics. Given this, the mind-affecting spells of wizards and clerics will be toned down or removed so that psions will have their own flavor. This is because the designers felt psionics weren’t different enough from magic before.
• The Worlds & Monsters entry on the Shadowfell indicates that Shadow will be a future power source.

• From GamerZer0's interview with James Wyatt: There are four "roles".
• Defender: fighter & paladin classes
• Leader: cleric & warlord classes
• Controller: wizard class
• Striker: rogue & ranger classes [later info confirms the warlock is also a striker]

• Chris Perkins on roles: "Party roles existed in 3rd Edition, but they were never discussed openly in the core rules. We simply assumed that a typical group of players would know enough to make sure their party included a front-line fighter-type character, a cleric or other healer-type character, a wizard or other artillery-type character, and so forth. In the interest of helping less-experienced players build stronger parties, we’ve addressed the issue of party composition more openly and directly in 4th Edition by explaining party roles and the importance of having characters who can fill these roles. Each base class in 4th Edition has been designed to fill a specific role, but that’s not all the class aims to do, and every base class has things that it can do outside of its primary role."
• Roles such as the "leader", into which the warlord and cleric fall [and, presumably, bard, if that class makes it in], won't require the character to stand around doing nothing but making other people better (through songs, or healing), but rather will gain access to those abilities in addition to actions he or she might want to take.  Lead designer Rob Heinsoo on PC roles: "Unlike their 3e counterparts, every Leader class in the new edition is designed to provide their ally-benefits and healing powers without having to use so many of their own actions in the group-caretaker mode. A cleric who wants to spend all their actions selflessly will eventually be able to accomplish that, but a cleric who wants to mix it up in melee or fight from the back rank with holy words and holy symbol attacks won’t constantly be forced to put aside their damage-dealing intentions. A certain amount of healing flows from the Leader classes even when they opt to focus on slaying their enemies directly."

• Fills the "Defender" role, along with the paladin.
• Fighter's "powers" depend highly on the weapon they chose as primary - spears have different "powers" available than axes; swords and greatswords are very flexible in terms of said "powers".
• The human fighter mentioned in a podcast has an ability which allows him to do strength damage even on a miss. In addition, it is mentioned that the fighter's gear in this particular example contains no magical items. He can self-heal using his own abilities. Is "actually able to inflict some damage with a thrown spear".
• Attacks of opportunity may work differently for different classes; there's reference to a fighter's multiple attacks of opportunity, although it seems that fewer actions provoke AoOs.
• Mentioned a "rain of blows" power or maneuver for swords; mentioned making a choice between taking the abilities "Supreme Cleave" or "Massive Strike".
• Design & Development: Class, on fighter weapon choices: "Fighters care about which weapons they use much more than other characters. Other character classes have specific weapons and weapon types that they tend to rely on while still maintaining access to a larger chunk of the weapon chart. The fighter is the only current 4th Edition class with capabilities that depend on the weapon they have chosen to train the most with. Even at 1st level, a fighter who uses an axe has a different power selection than a fighter who relies on a flail or a rapier or a pick. In the long run, fighters can diversify and master powers related to a few different weapons, but most will opt to focus on the weapon that suits their personal style, helps their interactions with the rest of the PCs in the group, and carries all the magical oomph they’ve managed to acquire."
• On the suggestion of magic/anime feel to fighter powers, WotC Logan confirms that the majority will be non-magical: "...at high levels, the fighter does push beyond the limits of human (or elf or dwarf) ability. Also, if someone wanted to make their fighter more magical-feeling, they could muck about with the flavor of the powers to make them less mundane."
• Rich Baker mentions a 1st-level fighter power (seems the terminology is "powers") which had a placeholder name of "Wallop", which has been renamed "Dragon's Tail Cut". It knocks you prone.
• And "Dragon's Tail Cut" is gone... Rich Baker:  "OK, no Dragon's Tail Cut. Plenty of people wasted no time telling me it was dorky, not cool. My bad....It's worth mentioning that 90% of the fighter power names we've currently got are pretty straightforward, and aren't terribly "Nine Sworded up." So we've still got a wide variety of Whirlwind Attack, Spring Attack, Cleave, etc. type powers and names. My Dragon's Tail Cut effort was simply a matter of cherrypicking the handful of powers that had pretty bad names (or simply placeholder names) and trying out a new spin on them."
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:
• You chose to fight with a two-handed weapon or a weapon+shield. Other abilities build on this choice.
• Powers can be divided into assault, defense and control. Assault is best suited to two-handed weapons, and ephasize offense and damage. Defense is about higher AC and such things. Control hinder and constrain the enemy.
• Some stunt a better if carried out with a specific weapon. Hammer are perfect for stunning opponents, while great swords for cleave.
• A fighter feat allows Dex to be added to AC even when wearing hvy armor.
• Fighters can keep monsters focused on them, by having bonuses on opportunity attacks and by following enemies. They guard allies by "battlefield control".
• An example of at will power is the defensive strike. If you hit, you get bonus to AC against this foe.
• Per encounter: dance of steel (just the name is given)
• Per day: great surge which is a powerful attack combined with some healing of yourself.
• And more from R&C: In addition to receiving powers akin to the maneuvers in Tome of Battle, they will have a number of other abilities to increase their hardiness, “stickiness” (meaning the difficulty foes encounter in getting past/around them) and armor proficiency (they will have the exclusive ability to retain a greater amount of their Dex bonus than other classes while wearing heavy armor). Feats and fighter powers will allow a sword & shield fighter to accumulate greater AC bonuses and the ability to defend others.
• Fighters will be able to self-heal more often than any other class.
  

• Fills the "Striker" role, along with the rogue and warlock.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Nothing more that we already know. Some scoutish abilities focus on movement, good with a bow.
• Ranger mentioned multiple times:
• Playtest mention.
• Mentioned as a "striker" in the class roles interview.
• Mike Mearls mentions that WotC are working on multiclassing, and how they're trying to get a ranger/cleric/wizard to work.
• Rangers have a power called Careful Strike. Originally it allowed the ranger to choose the better of two attack rolls; now it appears to be a flat +4 bonus to the attack.

• Fills the "Defender" role, along with the fighter.
• Mentioned that paladins can be of other alignments other than lawful good.
• On paladin mounts appearing from nowhere: "No".
• Mentioned in a playtest report.
• "Divine Power" ability mentioned, directed at enemies.
• Smite mentioned.
• Reference to the paladin's healing ability.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Still have smite ability but there are more types of smites (different form of attacks). Paladins and fighters are both defenders, but paladins rely on divine powers. There are evil paladins.
• The paladin also has a power called "divine challenge" which makes monsters attack the paladin rather than someone else.
• The paladin has "a strike...that heals bloodied allies." (Bloodied, at our best guess so far, means half hit points).
• Their powers are being completely redone, as the designers felt they were lacking in 3E (notably the Smite ability). Unsurprisingly, they will possess several different kinds of smiting abilities.
• The paladin's smite ability is the subject of the latest Design & Development article. Another crunchy preview, this one shows us three different smites. Safeguard Smite is the basic, entry-level smite which deals double base damage plus the paladin's Charisma modifier whilst simultaneously granting an AC bonus to nearby allies. Renewing Smite is a 13th level ability which again deals double damage, and heals a friend within five squares. The Binding Smite, for epic level (27) paladins again dishes out the double damage, and prevents the target from attacking anyone but the paladin for the next round. Smites are described as per-encounter abilities, and the attack rolls vary - the first two (Safeguard and Renewing) use "Charisma vs AC", whilst the Binding Smite uses "Charisma vs. Will".
• Rich Baker comments on optional paladin mounts and paladin multiclassing restrictions:
  
  
  We're leaning toward making paladin mounts optional, not a built-in part of the class. So you might gain access to a cool mount by deciding to take the right paragon path or spending the appropriate feat. Paladin players who don't want the complexity of a mount can avoid it easily enough, but those who do want the mount can still make the decisions to get a unique mount.
  
  Paladin multiclassing restrictions are gone.

• "...nifty synergies between elf abilities and paladin abilities, like the additional movement that lets me get away with heavy armor and not lag behind the rest of the party. "
• In response to a poster asking whether WotC considered changing the name of the paladin in light of the fact that paladins can be of any alignment, Rich Baker had this to say:: "Yes, the question was considered, but ultimately it boils down to this: We want one class in the job of "holy warrior", not nine...Currently the text in the Player's Handbook says something to this effect: Paladins are almost always lawful or good. Chaotic or evil paladins do exist in the world, but they're almost never heroes; go see the DM if you want to play one."

• Fills the "Leader" role, along with the warlord.
• Cleric mentioned creating a "surge of healing power" alongside a critical hit. This hints (yet unconfirmed) to mechanics similar to some Crusader maneuvers, from Tome of Battle.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:
• All classes will get some self-healing power (already known). Cleric enhance the self-healing capabilities of nearby allies.
• Bigger spell will be rituals (raise the dead for example). Rituals are different from spells (as of how I do not know).
• Summoning spells are removed along with alignment specific ones (at least for now).
• More from R&C: One major change the cleric has undergone is that in addition to spells he or she will also possess rituals and healing prayers, which will encompass most of the healing spells the cleric possessed in 3E. (Presumably, these will be at-will, per-encounter or per-day abilities.) Consequently, cleric spells will now mostly involve buffs and combat spells (and a great many brand-new spells have been created for the cleric). Also, all classes will possess the ability to heal themselves to some degree (possibly the SW Saga Ed. second wind?), and Leaders are able to grant an increase to this ability. In sum, clerics will no longer be called upon to heal as much as they used to, and will be able to participate in battles more. It is also stated that clerics will not be as powerful vis-à-vis the other classes as they were in 3E, and that summoning spells have been removed from their spell lists (likely to appear in a later volume).
• Regarding Cleric Buffs: Most short-term buffs will last until the end of the encounter. That's it. It's simple, it's clear and the effects are more powerful since the duration is shorter.
  

• Fills the "Controller" role.
• ".. direct control powers affect targets for a much shorter duration."
• Will the Wizard and Sorcerer merge? No (source). Sorcerer will be different from wizards in more ways than just resource management.
• Wizards have spells and power words. Power words drain your energy and can be used time and time again. The wizard is designed to "make things go boom". Metamagic and Item Creation feats are gone. Item Creation is now a ritual.
• Rich Baker clarifies wizards' use of Enchantment, Illusions, Necromancy in a post here:
  
  
  An aside on this one: Even though we want wizards to have a little less "concept sprawl" into all forms of arcane magic, that doesn't mean that every necromancy, enchantment, or illusion spell will be stripped out of their spell lists. Your core D&D wizard will still have a smattering of classic enchantments, like Sleep and Charm Person and Hold Monster. Ditto with classic illusions and classic necromancy spells. You won't be able to really build a specialist Enchanter, but you can still build a wizard with a couple of handy enchantments.
  
• Schools of magic are gone, replaced by foci (orb, staff, wand, with more to come in later books possibly). The orb foci involves terrain control and retributive and perception effects, staves ranged blasting, and wands long distance control and defense. In addition to spells, wizards will also possess rituals that deal with item creation. Metamagic feats are gone, though spells can still be boosted by Wizard powers and other feats. In addition, since characters can buy any kind of feats they want, it is mentioned that you could turn a Wizard into a 3E-style Warmage or Duskblade by buying weapon, armor and melee attack feats, as 4E Wizards no longer suffer from arcane spell failure in armor.
• Schools are heavily redesigned: lots of stuff moved to rituals (Abjuration's long term wards and restorative spells, Conjuration's teleportation, all of Divination, Enchantment reduced and saved for "future classes", Evocation expanded for more blowing-up potential, Illusions still common, Necromancy nerfed, Transmutation's polymorph gone). School is gone as a mechanical division.
• "I’ll take magic missile and fireblast for my at-will powers. Oh! Burning hands for an encounter power, and, let’s see, sleep for my daily." Interesting; in 3E they're all 1st-level spells, except fireblast which is new.
• "Power of Thunder" ability mentioned.  Could be a spell or a class ability.
• See the extensive "Magic" section, below, for much more info on magic.

• Fills the "Striker" role along with the ranger and rogue [source].
• The warlock can "explode, cause mental anguish and then teleport away", and also point at a guy and just keep pushing him around [source].
• The warlock has a short range line-of-sight teleport as a class ability [source].
• Another power, this for a halfling warlock: "daily power to make one of the giants play whack-a-mole with an ally."
• A reference to the warlock: "interesting "riders" on her damage powers, things that grant temporary hit points or slide creatures across the battlefield."
• There's a section on how the warlock is a striker, despite being able to do controller-like things. "a controller can affect not only multiple opponents on the battlefield, but the battlefield itself. Fogs and walls? Controller. Reshaping the terrain? Controller. " Whereas the warlock, a striker, "can push opponents around the battlefield as an occasional effect, but she's still "built" to do striker damage".
• The warlock definitely, definitely, definitely appears as a core class in the Player's Handbook.
• Fine-tuning the warlock (Rich Baker): "Tomorrow I'll be working on the warlock class description. The development's done, so I'm really going to be looking to fine-tune the presentation and the flavor. We're going to have a "warlock flavor meeting" to talk about "developing" the class flavor. Just how close can we skate on the dark-and-sinister angle? What sort of naming themes do we want to use for powers? Would it be cool to give the warlock a strong planar theme and use names like Mire of Minauros and Armor of Agathys? (I sorta like 'em, they've got a nice Doctor Strange ring to them). Or would it be better to stay off of obscure previous-edition references like that? I'm looking forward to the conversation."
• There's a Design & Development article up, which is a flavour piece about the warlock:
• Warlocks make a pact with one of three types of supernatural patron.
• After killing an enemy [that "you've marked" - not sure if that bit's a mechanical requirement or just fluff] your patrons grant you a "Boon of Souls".
• Along with eldritch blast, warlocks have curses ("send enemy directly to hell for a round, then bring them back in more pieces"), conjurations ("maws materialize to chew your enemies"), and movement powers ("teleport and turn invisible, anyone?").
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:
• They make pacts with devils, feys, the starts, elemental powers. Their initial pact determines a large part of their powers. There are four types of it: Infernal, Fey, Vestige and Star.
• Primary attack is eldritch blast and soul ruin.
• You can transport yourself and later others as well.
• Invocation can summon.
• Curses are an integral part of your power. Curses are associated with your pact. They are per encounter damage dealing / crippling powers. Cursed creatures are easier to damage with your blast or soul ruin. When a cursed creature is dropped to 0 hp, you gain a powerful follow up attack against nearby foes.
• In 4E, Warlocks are arcane Strikers, able to do a great deal of damage to one or two foes at a time. They can align themselves with fey spirits, devils, demons or the “stars and the darkness between them.” Their abilities will include transportation effects, invocations, curses and a powerful melee attack called Soul Ruin. They also have the ability to use Pacts, meaning that it looks like they absorbed the Binder, and each Pact will grant per-encounter curses.
• Gains a significant damage boost for his eldritch blast and soul blast attacks when he targets a creature he has already cursed. Finally each curse is reduced to 0 hitpoints, the warlock often gains a powerful follow-up attack against other nearby foes. Warlocks excel at weakening, immobilizing and hindering foes with their curses.
• A warlock's eldritch blast seems to be flexible, affected by feats - set it afire, hit multiple enemies, turn it into a "force of crawling darkness". They can also use something called soul ruin in melee, short range teleports (and later, teleport enemies closer or farther), delvier curses (cage of blood, emerald coils, turn blood into acid). The warlock's main tools are pacts (fey, infernal, star or vestige) each of which is associated with a bunch of curses, which are per-encounter and deal high damage and/or restrict movement and action; plus the cursed critter takes extra damage from eldritch blast and soul ruin. The class uses "over-the-top" power names (curse of the bloodfang beast, chains of misery).
  
• ".. gave him some unique new tricks so that he isn't playing in the wizard's sandbox so much (duplicating spell effects and the like)"
• Curses have been cranked up, they do a ton of damage and impose huge penalties on the target's actions.

• Fills the "Striker" role, along with the ranger and warlock.
• Backstab mentioned.
• Some other rogue abilities/skills: "...from tumbling past enemies without provoking opportunity attacks, to the extremely useful enhanced ability to escape a grab... to the power that lets me switch places with the target."
• Scott Rouse has droppped a hint about a Rogue ability in his blog: "I was then able to use a cool attack that gives me a 3 step shift and got back behind our two tanks."
• The half-elf rogue "smashed a harpy out of the sky and into a chasm by using a power that knocks the target prone; when the harpy tried to fly out of the pit, the aftereffects of the power knocked her down again and she fell to her death."
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:
• Sneak attack is easier. Apart from flanking, some spell and special abilities will also give combat advantage to rogues. 
• Combat advantage is the name for the state when a rogue can sneak attack a foe.
• Immunity to sneak attack is nearly gone. Immunities are almost gone from 4th ed, replaced by damage threshold (something like DR).
• Rogues have follow-up attack after successful attacks (extra damage or penalties).
• High powered abilities allow multiple attack and tactical movement.
• Rogues are still skill monkeys.
• Trapfinding is a feat (rogues have it by default), but others can have it too.
• Not too much has changed—sneak attack will still be vital for this class, but it will be even easier to set up. Virtually all monsters can be sneak attacked now, even golems and such. Rogues will still be the most skill-based characters, but the skill list has been streamlined and cut in half as it was in SW Saga Ed. (Hide and Sneak are one skill, etc.). 
• An interesting reference to the rogue's attack reads "He doesn’t like the look of the bulette’s heavy armor, so he tries to slip his short sword between two stony plates before the bulette can react and he draws blood." Is this a sneak attack or some other ability? It appears to ignore armour.
• Sneak Attack is now easier to pull off [snip] Not only will the fighter give the rogue a flanking bonus, but more spells and attack powers will set up sneak attacks.
• "Combat advantage" is mentioned in Races & Classes as a combat modifier gained when your oppponent's defenses are compromised. Example situations are flanking and other special abilities. Rogues can sneak attack when they have combat advantage, which apparently happens a lot.
• Another source of extra damage comes from a rogue's follow up attacks, which can be tacked on to successful attacks. These allow a rogue to turn a normal attack into a truly vicious one, dealing huge amounts of damage and dishing out major damage.
• Trapfinding is a feat that rogues get for free, but which other characters can take.
• ".. rogues, who can use their skills more effectively than other classes and can move in ways utterly impossible for other characters."

• Fills the "Leader" role, along with the cleric.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: A martial leader, with the ability to buff and control over battlefield positioning.
• Mentioned a warlord class spotted on one of the DnD Insider screenshots.
• "There is a warlord class".
• Warlords don't get much by way of ranged area attacks.
• Domna, a warlord, uses some kind of bard-like ability to boost her allies in addition to attacking a wolf.  It sounds like the "Leading the Attack" White Raven combat maneuver from Book of Nine Swords.
• Domna, the warlord, "uses her tactical acumen to attack in such a way that the wolf she hit opened itself up to Robozcniek". Sounds like some kind of bardic ability.
• Rich Baker on warlords: 
• Warlords (one of the new classes) have need for a high Int score and their abilities "are often reminiscent of the White Raven maneuvers from Tome of Battle."
• Warlords also have class features that use Charisma.
• The character is "a competent healer, like any leader."
• "My warlord powers help to increase the party's damage output."
• One such power is called Hammer and Anvil: "The warlord takes a swing at [an enemy], and he picks an ally who threatens the same target and grants that ally an immediate attack against [the enemy]."

• Warlord abilities that "help keep allies up and fighting".
• "Andraste [eladrin warlord] hit hard and fast with a powerful daily ability that gave allies a bonus to hit the target. She also used a very, very effective positioning strike to move an ally into flanking position for better attack odds."
• Use of  "an instantaneous magic missile attack from me thanks to one of Abraxus' [the warlord's] powers."
• Warlord ability that "gives bonuses to his allies when they score criticals".
•  [R&C] also mentions an example of a Warlord power called “Feather Me Yon Oaf!” (they often use humorous titles as stand-ins until they come up with the real one). When the Warlord uses this ability, his allies get an immediate action to draw a missile weapon and shoot the Warlord’s designated target.
• The warlord provides "a steady stream of healing magic and bonus attacks". 

• Other classes are likely to appear in later books.
• Druid mentioned in D&D's seminar's summary.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Their spellcasting takes second seat. The primary ability is wildshape, which they can do a lot more often, but only shapes they have picked (like spells). They have some nature related spells to cast when in humanoid form.
• The 4E Druid will heavily emphasize sharp-changing abilities, and will possess a spell list with ranged firepower and utility effects.
  
• Monk mentioned in a rather ambiguous way by WotC Logan.
• Will there be a monk in the PHB? "Murky."
• If so, will it be unique among the PHB classes in having an Asian flavour? "Any monks will have an Asian flavour."
• Some current base classes disappear; classes yet to be mentioned and therefore good candidates are Monk [update - now mentioned, above] and Bard. Classes that don't appear in the PHB will appear in future products.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Monks are still in the design stage, but it will be a mobile striker.
• Bard - From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:  Gets power from otherwordly patrons (?). Its powers focuses on illusions and confusions, so that enemies hinder themselves. They can also inspire their allies.
• Drawing their powers from “otherworldly patrons,” Bards will possess many abilities related to illusion and mental trickery. They will retain their inspirational and lore knowledge abilities.
  
• Barbarian - From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: The ability to rage is the centerpiece ability of this class. There are different rages. There is a mention of a “lightning panther strike” that allow movement and multiple attack. Barbarians are more feral, and bite attack was mentioned .
• The 4E Barbarian will be all about the rage, with many different rage effects to choose from. They will also be more feral—one cited barbarian ability involves him biting his opponent after his melee attack.
  
• Sorcerer - From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Made more distant from the wizard. They barely control their spells, but unleash enough energy every time that some remains around them. For example after a fireball, they are cloaked in fire which sears enemies nearby.
• It is stated that Sorcerers will barely be in control of their magical abilities, but whether or not this means they’ll function somewhat like wild mages is unclear. It does mention that a Sorcerer who casts a cold spell might have a protective aura of freezing cold around him afterwards for a short while.
• Psionics not to be included in core, though they'll have support.
• On psionics: "They will be a "power source" {but not in the PHB}. The PHB power sources will be "arcane", "divine" and "martial".
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Psi will appear sometime and it will be a different power source. They design arcane and divine magic so that psi can fit in. Power over mind will be the main (or a flagship) feature of psi, thus charms are going to be nerfed (the avoid too much overlap).
• Swordmage - From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:: An arcane defender with magic shields and armor, flaming sword and some self-bluff abilities.
• Arcane Defenders who use magical protection as opposed to armor. They are designed as melee specialists with few ranged attack powers.
• Rich Baker on the Swordmage: "We're working on some swordmage rules right now for a 2008 release, and the class is really shaping up to be something special. He's an arcane defender; not really a gish, because his spells are generally melee range and tend to augment his melee attacks."
• What's all this about the Swordmage?  Rich Baker talks a bit:
• It's a class we are going to design and publish someday, but it probably won't be in 2008.
• Swordmages aren't "gishes" or bladesingers. Someone over on EN World made an uncannily accurate prediction about the class, which I can confirm here: A swordmage is a warrior who uses magic to fight better.
• Swordmages use spells of armorning and protection instead of wearing heavy armor. At the most basic level, it's something along the lines of an always-on mage armor spell, renewed each morning. Since they're defenders, they need hit points and AC comparable to fighters, and swordmages get there by using persistent magic effects.I think there are other persistent wards in play too, spells that provide some energy resistance, mental defense, things of that sort.
• Swordmages have lots of room for fun, combat-focused "immediate" spells and "move" spells. For example, my character Geran makes use of a few short-range teleports and transpositions, as well as instant shield-like effects. The movement effects will work great for a defender--what better way to get the troll to stop beating on the wizard than to simply trade places with your unarmored friend?
• Swordmages have room for fun attack powers, too. For example, I have Geran make use of a short-duration, self-only strength spell, as well as another one that wreathes his sword in magical flames. There are a few others I touched on in my novel, but I don't want to give any more away 'cause I don't want to spoil things.

• Will there be prestige classes? "There will be functionality equivalent to that."
• Prestige Classes: Gone. There are replaced by Paragon paths (Levels 11-20) and Epic Paths (21-30). These paths will include new abilities characters of the appropriate classes can select, and some are taken from the old prestige classes (mystic adept, arcane archer, and weapon masters are mentioned, as are some new options like Prince of Knaves). Epic Paths also have something to do with the character’s destiny, and also open up new powerful abilities.
• The paragon path and epic destiny thing - PrC's are gone completely. You pick up your paragon path at 11th level, and your epic destiny at 21st level. You get those abilities as you level up in addition to your main class stuff, not instead of. Some look like old PrCs, and weapon master, prince of knaves and cavalier mentioned. There are currently 12 PPs and "fewer" EDs. The EDs give big benefits and are things like being the right hand man to a god, undying warrior or calling dragons with a wave of your hand.
• Power progression from Races & Classes: "There is 2 or so pages on tiers of power (heroic, paragon and epic). The important part is the paragon paths and epic destinies. They replace prestige classes. They are additional power/abilities, that you can choose once you hit 11th or 21st level. They are very much like prestige classes and battle captain, mystic theurge, weapon master, prince of knaves and cavalier are mentioned....Epic destiny gives few but very powerful ability. Also it describes how you exit the world (seem like at level 30 you retire). You can become a demigod for example.Epic level game is much about slaying gods and clearing the Nine Hell. In the cleric section they muse about gods being redesigned, and one of their goals is, that they can be challenged by epic level characters."
• Rich Baker mentions the Bladesinger and Battlerager as future paragon paths: "Yes, we'll definitely pick up bladesingers quick. Paragon paths seem like the right way to go there. I don't think anyone's earmarked the battlerager yet, but I imagine you'll see it down the road."

• 
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Each race seems to have a clear “homeland”. Dwarves live in mountains, elves in forests. Now they come up with something for all major races. Humans are tied to plains, Halfling to rivers (swamps and marshes), Dragonborn to deserts (at least their great empire was in desert).

• What's in store for humans? "Humans will be more "flavourful". There will be mechanical flair to make humans as exciting as any other race."
• Bruce Cordell has posted a tiny snippet from Wizards Presents: Races and Classes. The snippet, only a paragraph or two in length, deals with humans.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: 
• They will remain the flexible, adaptable race as in 3.x.
• Their negative personality flaw is corruptible (I don’t think it is mechanic, just fluff or the basis of some racial feat).
• The text mention that humans never give up, and try thing again-and-again; this can be a racial characteristic (allow retry in some cases).
• Each of them know how to handle at least one weapon (fluff or ability?).
• Their homeland is the plains. Horses are important to them.
• Now referred to as the most “resilient” race, humans receive some kind of feat bonus (“a little extra treat”) and racial feats that involve “dramatic action and dramatic recovery.”
  

• The tiefling definitely, definitely, definitely appears as a core race in the Player's Handbook.
• Tieflings are not human and demonic offspring, but are the true-breeding descendants of an ancient empire that made dark and terrible pacts with the Nine Hells. Their fiendish visage is actually a manifestation of a curse, due to their progenitors' crimes. They're more closely tried to devils than demons.
• The 4E Tieflings evolved from the corrupt nobility of an ancient, powerful human empire that trafficked with devils to increase their power. As mentioned above, this empire was destroyed in a titanic war with the Dragonborn empire. Not much is said about their racial abilities, other than they have been expanded since 3E and they make good Warlocks. It is also once mentioned that they are “charming,” so I suppose the Charisma penalty is gone.
• Tieflings have "hellfire blood" as an option (appears to allow some kind of attack bonus). Also mentioned are "infernal wrath", and two feats: Toughness, and Ferocious Rebuke which "pushes your enemy back one square after taking a hit".

• The new race looks very likely to be Dragonborn from this look at Races & Classes: "The races mentioned in detail are Humans, Dwaves, Eladrins, Elves, Halflings, Tieflings, and the "mystery race", Dragonborn. Each of these races gets some pages, humans I think had the most with 4 or 5, eladrin the least with 1,5. There are 4-5 paragraphs each on some other races as well. I remember drow and gnome, but there were maybe 2 or 3 more. The gnome part was titled "The problem with gnomes" or something like that. The Dragonborn in their picture looked like big and well muscled lizardmen. They were antropomorphic, had two legs and no wings. It looked as if their hands had claws."
• Dragonborn are kin to dragon, they are egg laying . They are a strong race with martial incline. 
• At higher levels they can choose racial feat that gives them breath weapon or wings.
• Dragonborn scales are bronze or golden in color.
• No longer the race born of a special pact with Bahamut as presented in Races of the Dragon, Dragonborn have been the lesser cousins of dragons since the beginning. In the Points of Light setting, they once ruled a mighty empire later destroyed in a cataclysmic war with the Tiefling empire, and are now organized into wandering clans which sometimes serve as mercenary companies. They have a reputation as honorable warriors who keep their word, but are sometimes arrogant and easily offended. Their racial feats involve things like breath weapons and wings.

• WotC has presented us with the full elf entry from the PHB.
• Elves are about the same height as humans, but considerably lighter.
• No more racial stat penalties, only bonuses (elves get +2 to Dexterity & Wisdom).
• The elf "racial power" is Elven Accuracy which lets them reroll one attack roll per encounter. This can presumably be improved, as a feat is given that improves it in the entry.
  • That feat is an elven racial feat called Elven Precision. It grants a +2 bonus to the new attack roll.
• Elves gain two skill bonuses (+2 to Nature and Perception).
• They give nearby non-elf allies a +1 to Perception checks.
• They still can use the longbow and shortbow (but none of the other "elven weapons").
• They have an ability to ignore difficult terrain when they "shift" (presumably the 4E "5 ft. step").
• Elves move a base of 7 squares.
• "Eladrins are a new race in the Player's Handbook. They're akin to the elves, but they more often make their homes in the Feywild." (The Feywild is one of the new planar areas in 4E.) - James Wyatt.
• A new article, A Fractured Family: Elvish Strife, Separation, and Rebirth, deals with the history of the eladrin, elves and drow, and their gods, Corellon, Sehanine and Lolth. It also reveals that drow will be presented as a character race in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting in summer 2008.
  
• There's a fluff piece on the official site (no rules info) which presents elves as wild, woodland, tribelike folks; very different to those in 3rd Edition with their Wizard favoured class. It mentions that elves are called wood elves, wild elves, or sylvan elves -- "Most elves are wild, free forest-dwellers, guarding their lands with stealth and deadly arrows from high boughs.... elves have gone a different route than their cousins, the eladrin. Elves rely on hard-won intuition and senses tuned to an arrow’s point instead of reason, intellect, or debate as eladrin are more wont to do.... They prefer the magic of the natural world to arcane magic. Elves are drawn to the worship of both the fey god Corellon and Obad-Hai, the god of the wild." Eladrin are mentioned in the article as cousins of the elves. The analogy seems to be that elves are what were wood/wild/moon elves, while eladrin may be gray/high/sun elves.
• To the suggestion by EN World member Mouseferatu (Ari Marmell, whose name you'll see on Tome of Magic and Heroes of Horror) that: "Perhaps the eladrin known to dwell amongst mortals are simply the weakest of their kin, the fey that interact most frequently with the material plane. In other worlds, places with strange names like Arcadia and Arborea, far more alien eladrin, with powers beyond those comprehensible to mortals and strange titles like "ghaele" and "bralani," are said to dwell",  Michele Carter, RPG Senior Editor, replied: "You're a smart guy, Ari."
• Rich Baker comments briefly on the nature of the various elven races, and how they elate to the "Elf" and "Eladrin" stats: "Actually, I expect that sun elves, moon elves, and star elves would all fall into the description of "eladrin" for game stats, while wood elves and green elves would be "elves." But we're still going to call them sun elves, star elves, etc., for the most part. Nobody in Faerun would call those folks eladrins, they'd call them ar-tel-quessir, sun elves, or gold elves."
• Elves are now as tall (or taller) than humans, though still very slender and graceful.
• Half-elves "multiclass well".
• "...nifty synergies between elf abilities and paladin abilities, like the additional movement that lets me get away with heavy armor and not lag behind the rest of the party. "
• "Eladrin have a movement ability that's hella fun to use when you're a PC and annoying/amusing to deal with as an opponent."
• The eladrin wizard has a power called fey step (a short range teleport).
• Eladrin again: "I felt particularly warlord-y in that fight, using the eladrin movement ability to position myself for a flank and a nifty strike that allowed the cleric to get in a solid hit on an opponent when I missed. I set 'em up, my allies take 'em down."
• Eladrin in Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: 
• They are the magical high elves. Both elves and eladrins were elves, but one preferred magic and stone, while the other nature and the woods.
• One of their racial feats allows them to briefly enter Feywild and reemerge at another place, making a short teleport. 
• More from R&C: These were once the same race, along with the drow. They inhabited the Feywild, a faerie realm that exists alongside the human-dominated one, but a war precipitated by the drow split the race into three. Basically, elves embody the nature-oriented aspect of elves, and eladrin the magical one. Other elven subraces will exist, but the differences between them will simply be cultural—gray elves, sun elves and moon elves will be eladrin and wood, green and wild elves just elves. Not much is said about the racial abilities elves and eladrin possess, other than elves make for good rangers and eladrin good wizards.

• Dwarves - From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: 
• Resilient industrious folks.
• One of their racial feats allow a second “second wind”.
• They no longer have darkvision, only low light vision (most races will have only normal vision).
• Dwarves are pretty much the same, but their back history now involves an era in which they were slaves to giants, which explains the enmity between the two races. It is also mentioned that most races, including dwarves, no longer possess darkvision (but dwarves have low-light vision). Dwarves also no longer possess a Charisma penalty, and their racial abilities are oriented towards the defender role and underground adaptation.
• As an aside, it is mentioned that dwarf women do not have beards, and the new artwork makes them look a lot more feminine, which was intentional on the part of the designers.
• Azers and galeb-dur are mentioned as once-dwarves who became completely enslaved by their ancient giant masters.

• Halflings are described as having the tendency to "acquire" things due to intense curiosity (much as the Dragonlance kender do). They are now a bit taller than before, about 4 feet on average, weighing about 65 pounds.
• Halflings get a stature boost, and will now be about four feet tall on average. They are now presented as a nomadic race that travels on river barges, one that is instrumental in promoting trade amongst the races, granting them something of an “invisible empire” across the land. They are differentiated from hobbits in that they are lean and athletic rather than portly (and now they wear shoes, too). Their racial abilities evidently involve luck, trickery and trade. It is also mentioned they are good at raising and training animals.

• It seems that there will be a mystery race in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide. Rich Baker:
  "Yes, there's another PC race fleshed-out in the FRPG. It'll have drow and Race X with full PH-style writeups."
• Following up from last month's interview with the beholder, The Tiefling and the Gnome: On the Set of 4th Edition is another cartoon short featuring an interview with the titular races.
• It looks likely that gnomes will not be in the PHB. When asked at GenCon UK, Bruce Cordell said "wait and see."
• We're all pretty sure that gnomes won't be in the 4th Edition Player's Handbook. Fortunately, WotC's Logan Bonner confirms here that they will be appearing in the Monster Manual.
• Rich Baker comments on a few non-core races:
  
  
  Gnomes will likely get a "full" PC race writeup in 2009. We *might* have a little material in the FR Player's Guide, but I'm not sure about that--I'm not working on that book.
  
  In general, we're not going to provide a lot of support for marginal races in our printed product. We might be able to give them some more attention on D&D Insider. I wouldn't expect to see avariels or aquatic elves touched on in the FR Player's Guide.
  
  Sorry, no immediate plans on the saurials as PCs. They're really something different from the dragonborn.

• Shifters are "not in the Player's Handbook, but they are in the Monster Manual, so ... players could make shifter characters if they want to."
• No illumians: "We don’t have illumians [from Races of Destiny] developed for 4e yet, and they’re pretty low priority."
• Aasimar are not in: "Less chance of that."
• And drow? "Possibly but not confirmed."
• A Celestial race, Drow, Gnomes and Warforged are also evidently in the works, but little had been decided on at the time the book was printed, so I guess they won’t be in the first Player’s Handbook. Warforged will apparently be a core race, and it is mentioned that construct immunities will be toned down in 4E. The Celestial race will not be called the Aasimar, and will be a race “plunged through the same transforming fires” as the Tiefling. Gnomes are apparently proving problematic to design--they went through several concepts and rejected them all, with no decision having been reached at the time the book was finished.
• A Fractured Family: Elvish Strife, Separation, and Rebirth reveals that drow will be presented as a character race in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting in summer 2008.
• Rich Baker reveals that half-orcs should be on D&D Insider shortly after the launch of 4E.
  
  
  Well, they're not in the Player's Handbook. I'd hope to have them available on DDi pretty soon after the PH hits, though, since players out there with half-orc characters are going to want to be able to convert or re-create their character concept, as the case may be.
  
  Half-orcs are a bit tricky, because they imply a very ugly backstory that we frankly don't want to dwell on very much. I think it's possible to posit a better backstory, like "long ago a god of evil mixed the races of orcs and humans, and to this day atavistic throwbacks are born to each from time to time." We'll see where we get to on that score when we get serious about updating the half-orc. So far we've just had other fish to fry first.
  
  Oh, and regardless of what core D&D does with half-orcs, they've got to be in the Realms at least as a NPC race (or "playable monster" race); they've been in Faerun in 3e and earlier editions, and we wouldn't retcon them out of existence.

• All races can select racial feats that allow racial traits to develop and expand as the character rises in level. Level adjustments are gone, with all the new races largely equal in power. It is also mentioned that when drow finally appear in some future text, many of their powerful racial abilities (levitation, darkness, etc.) will be relegated to feats to balance them out.
• There is a tiefling in the player’s handbook. There may also be a changeling (from Eberron).  Mike did all the talking, where there will be a very REAL ACTIVE difference within the races that will really make a difference between the Dwarf Fighter and an Elven Fighter. (source).
• Will we be doing ECL? "That’s a good example of something applied to the game to help make somethings work easier. We don’t want to recreate this. We’re not going to give you rules to play a blink dog fighter… There will be many more choices, however, and we want to make sure they are all playable right out of the gate. If say, for instance, we put a tiefling in the PH, we would certainly want to make it playable right out of the gate. So, for example, we might have had to make a lot of the other races a little bit cooler to keep the balance straight between the races." (source).
• Design & Development: Race, which discusses some of the choices that informed the way race was thought of as 4e started to be designed: -- "In the final version of 4th Edition, most of your racial traits come into play right out of the gate at 1st level—dwarven resilience, elven evasion, a half-elf’s inspiring presence, and so on. As you go up levels, you can take racial feats to make those abilities even more exciting and gain new capabilities tied to your race. You can also take race-specific powers built into your class, which accomplish a lot of what racial substitution levels used to do: a dwarf fighter with the friend of earth power can do something that other 10th-level fighters just can’t do."
• "Dwarven resilience, elven evasion, a half-elf’s inspiring presence" mentioned as racial traits
• Classes can be improved by racial feats, in a similar way to how current racial substitution levels work.
• Peter Schaefer talks about racial traits ("Being really lucky, for example, works with the halfing rogue really well, and being durable is perfect for the dwarven fighter.") and how different classes can perform the same role without looking like clones of each other.
• A racial change which may raise some eyebrows? "Races were fun to develop, fast and easy. Each race works best with two or three classes, thanks to a stat bonus or other feature, and none suck at any class; a couple tweaks here and there let us reinforce those connections without weakening the races' flexibilities. Only one race gave us any trouble and got a bit of a change in return. It's the sort of thing that would raise some eyebrows in the playing public - and also in the office, I'm told, so we'll see if it makes it to your eyes. I hope it does, because it makes everything about the race simpler and just as effective."

• Multiclassing – lots of compelling and interesting choices. A fighter who dabbles in wizard or dabbles in cleric is something compelling, Andy’s brother is playing a rogue wizard and he’s said in the conversion "this is the character I wanted to play all along". The choices and powers are good powers on both sides. Backstab, throw chromatic orb across the room, then teleport across the room. There is no more “crappy fighter” attached to a “crappy wizard” (source).
• You can grab some basic class abilities if you want to dabble in another class - a wizard could take the Fighter Training feat, or a rogue could take Wizard Training. These allow you to flavor your class but don't dilute it. 
• Mike Mearls mentions that WotC are working on multiclassing, and how they're trying to get a ranger/cleric/wizard to work.
• Michelle Carter confirms here that multiclass penalties and favored classes are gone, and she mentions here that retraining rules are in place
• Multi-classing: "any combo, any level, always works."
• "There will be multi-classing in the game but it will be better."
• David Noonan -- "Gish lovers (and those who are, um, gish-curious), I've got your back. Terminology Note: When I say "gish," I'm not referring specifically to githyanki fighter/wizards. Nor am I talking about a really good Smashing Pumpkins album, Gish. I'm talking more generally about characters who are capable melee combatants and reasonably good arcane spellcasters, too.
  
  One of the things I'm working on is some character-building pieces to support the archetype. And as I write, I wonder, "I'm not sure the gish needs the help. He might be OK with just our crazy new multiclassing rules."
  
  Multiclassing: New multiclassing rules, you ask. Yep, we've got 'em. Multiclass characters are running at a couple of our internal playtest tables right now. Early results are promising, but we're talking about only a couple of characters, so we haven't seen broad proof of concept yet.
  
  It's easy to critique 3e multiclassing, but it's also important to remember that they represent a massive, double-quantum leap from multiclass/dual-class rules in 1e/2e. We really like the configurability and freedom of 3e multiclassing, the way it's extensible even when you add new classes to the mix, and how it respects (to a degree, anyway) the changing whimsy of players as their characters evolve.
  
  But it's got some problems--and in particular, it doesn't tackle the gish very well. There's the arcane spell failure problem, which takes some levels of the spellsword PrC, a little mithral, and some twilight enhancement to take care of. But beyond that, the low caster level can be just crippling for the fighter/wizard who wants to blast the bad guys into oblivion, rather than use his spellbook as a really good utility belt.
  
  So that's one big problem--the caster level situation. In 3e, we've cemented over that with some prestige classes and feats. But there's another problem: Your journey through the "Valley of Multi-Ineffectiveness." For the gish, it's hard to truly be, well, gishy at low levels before you've figured out a reasonable answer to the armor problem. You can't really wade into melee like a fighter, because you're gonna get creamed. So you have to take an "I'm basically a wizard for now" or "I'm basically a fighter for now." That works, but you're just biding your time until you get to play the character you want to play.
  
  And for the gish's cousin, the wizard/cleric, his "Valley of Multi-Ineffectiveness" isn't quite as deep, but it lasts a little longer--until he qualifies for mystic theurge, anyway.
  
  So the improvement we're seeking from the multiclass system is something that solves some specific math problems (the caster level thing) and some specific career-path problems (letting you feel like a blend of classes from the get-go).
  
  The Gish, Today: So what does this mean for our gish PCs at the playtest tables? Well, from very early levels, he's weariing armor, stabbing dudes, and casting spells. He's not as good at stabbing as the fighter, nor as good at casting as the wizard. But he's viable at both. In theory.
  
  In theory? Well, like I said, the gish characters don't have a lot of mileage on them yet. And creating hybrid characters involves a careful balancing act. Multiclass characters can't be optimal at a focused task (because that horns in the turf for the single-class character) and they can't be weaksauce (because then you've sold the multiclass character a false bill of goods and he doesn't actually get to use the breadth of his abilities). There's a middle ground between "optimal" and "weaksauce" that I'll call "viable." But it's not exactly a wide spot of ground.
  
  Finding that viable middle ground isn't a problem unique to 4e. The 3e designers (myself included) took lots of shots at it; the bard, the mystic theurge, and the eldritch knight are all somewhere on the optimal-viable-weaksauce continuum. And any WoW shaman, druid, or paladin knows firsthand the sorts of continual rebalancing they've undergone as Blizzard tries to keep their hybrid classes in the middle of that continuum."
  

• Vancian 'spell slots' will be reduced in how much they control a caster's total ability -- "Vancian magic system – there’s an element of that we held on to, but it’s a much smaller fraction of their overall power. A wizard will never completely run out of spells. They can run out of their “mordenkainen’s sword, however” (source).
• Mike Mearls -- "BTW, who knew that so many people disliked Vancian spellcasting? The entire audience in yesterday's seminar cheered and clapped when we told them it was (mostly) gone."
• Vancian system survives, but it's only a "fraction" of the magic (or magic options) available to characters: "a wizard who casts all his memorized per day spells should be at about 80% of power."
• Chris Perkins on Vancian magic -- "It’s safe to say that the “Vancian” spellcasting system has received as much scrutiny as every other aspect of the D&D game. One thing we don’t want is a character running out of cool things to do in combat. In 4th Edition, all characters have a selection of at-will, per-encounter, and per-day resources. The exact mechanical execution of this base concept will be disclosed in the coming months on D&D Insider and the Wizards Presents: Races and Classes preview book, so no spoilers here!"
• Will the new wizard resemble the 3.5 warlock {given the reduction in Vancian magic)? "Wizards will more resemble 3.5 wizards than 3.5 warlocks."

• It seems like four "classic" wizardly implements - the orb, staff, tome, and wand - are to play a more central role in the Wizard character class. Each implement is associated with certain types of magic: orb for terrain control, manipulation and divination; staff for forcefully projected powers as well as flight and telekinisis; tome for teleportation, summoning, shapechanging; and wand for long-range effects and protection.  The wizard can cast without the items, but is likened to "a slightly near-sighted man with glasses"; holding the associated implement grants a benefit to the wizard’s attack. The article refers to "the wand spell cinder storm", which implies that each spell will be an orb, staff, wand or tome spell.
• Update - conspiracy theorists ahoy! All references to the "tome" have been edited out of the above article, leaving orb, staff and wand only. Why? I don't know! But there were references to the "tome" before, and now there aren't. Instead, we have extra flavour text, referring to Iron Sigil [potent defenses when invoking spells of thunder or force] and Serpent Eye [enchantment, beguiling, and ensnaring] traditions (orb), disciplines of the Hidden Flame [fierce powers of fire and radiance] and the Golden Wyvern [battle-mages] (staff), and Emerald Frost adepts [powers of cold and deadly acidic magic] and Stormwalker theurges [spells of lightning and force] (wand).
• Bart Carroll on the change: "Hmm, well we do say it in the Design & Development column intro: "Keep in mind that the game is still in a state of flux, as refinements are made by our design and development staff." Case in point -- take another look at the most recent Wizards and Wizard Implements article. A revised version has just been posted, with several changes to the original article posted Friday [Note from Morrus - it wasn't there on Friday; it appeared today]. The version you see now is the version that should have originally gone live."
• Note: breschau posted the original article.
• Dave Noonan has spoken a little more about wizards implements (the orb, staff, wand, and elusive tome). He mentions that the level of importance attached to these items has not yet been finally decided ("The pendulum has swung around a lot during design on the implement issue... Right now the pendulum is resting somewhere in the middle.") He compares it to a fighter and his weapons: "...it might be worthwhile to think of a wizard's implements as analogous to a 3e fighter's weapon choice--if you assume that the fighter hasn't deeply, deeply specialized in that weapon through feat choice. Mid-level Tordek prefers axes, sure, and he probably has an advantage with an axe that's substantial but not overwhelming. You put a polearm in his hands, though, and he functions just fine. And he's accessing the salient properties of the polearm--reach, for example."
• He also confirms that the design intention is that these things be adjustable to work in your campaign -- "You can add your own implements and disciplines/traditions to the mix. Doing so takes some work, but it's not a massive undertaking."
• And on the nature of the described traditions: "...traditions are not groupings (fluffy or otherwise) of spells/spell schools/etc... I can see how someone could read the preview article and make the reasonable speculation that the traditions we mention are analogous to spell schools or domains. While that's a decent guess, and it fits the available data, it's not a correct guess."
• Wizardly orders: "They're not really specializations in the sense of 3rd Edition specialist wizards; choosing one doesn't make the spells belonging to another unavailable to you. Basically they're a mechanism by which we answer the question, "How did your wizard learn magic? Was he trained in a magical academy, tutored by a single mentor, etc., etc." So each order provides a subset a spells your character is *best* at, but doesn't replace the notion of spell school from previous editions."
• Implements: "Wizard implements now provide your character with a reason to care about a signature weapon in much the same way that the fighter cares about a signature sword. We think it's a good thing. Many other implements have been suggested, including things such as mask, dagger, and (of course) tome."
• Implements updated -- WotC's Michele Carter has posted a brief update on the use of wizards' implements: "Well, I know better than to poke the bear(s), but I've been working on magic items all day and I'm punchy:  [Regarding: ] "Staffs are for rays and cones, wands for long distance control, while orb stands for blasts, terrain control, and retributive and perception based effects." This was true at the time it was written, and as with a few other small details, it's changed since then. Spells are not based on the implements you use to cast them. Wizards still choose a primary implement (and that choice is a meaningful one), but you can cast any spell through any implement with equal effectiveness. "

• To the question of whether XP will be required to make magic items Andy Collins replied, "No, Hell No." How magic items will be made in character wasn't discussed beyond a vague statement that you wouldn't be burning a feat on it, and out of character the structure of magic item creation will become more loosened.
• Magic Item Creation. "We tried to fool ourselves into the fact that there was a hard pricing, but we started recognizing that with MIC, that we should look at them more wholistically. There will not be magic item creation rules for DM’s as we realize that as professional game designers we don’t even get it right every time. We’re going to give you lots and lots of examples and suggest that you build it, test it, etc. " (source).
• Will it be easier for a wizard to create magic items? "Yes, characters can still build magic items, it will be a way for characters to acquire things, but it will be more flexible and easier. There will be a preview article on this in two weeks on D&D Insider. Three releases a week (this one will be on Wed).". (source).
• Designer Dave Noonan has posted in his blog on Gleemax that he is working on designing rods. Noonan writes that he's considering two possible designs: one that "constrains the design space" from the very beginning (in other words, there's a finite number of rods that can be designed) and the other that allows an "expansive design space."
  
• David Noonan's latest blog post mentions the Eye of Vecna, the Axe of Dwarvish Lords, and Purple Worms: "A significant breakthrough with artifacts—the new direction looks promising, and the two I’ve written so far (Eye of Vecna and Axe of the Dwarvish Lords) are things I’d put into my campaign in a heartbeat. The only significant downside? Each individual artifact takes up some real estate—more than we planned. But they’re frickin’ artifacts, man! So we’ll see. My next step is to wave them under the noses of some colleagues and see if we can’t get another page or two for the artifacts section. And it’s also a good time for me to ask the “Is Dave crazy?” question of my colleagues, because artifacts have become more than just really good magic items with backstories."
  
• Rodney Thompson on how magic items won't be as necessary to character advancement -- "Last night at dinner Andrew Finch and I had an interesting discussion about the way magic items are going to work in 4th Edition. Since I was busy running Star Wars games and hosting my own seminars I didn't get to go to any of the D&D panels, so I don't know how much they revealed about magic items. Anyways, Andrew and I were having a bit of a disagreement about the way magic items contribute to the D&D experience. (As an aside, Andrew and I have had many such conversations back at the office, especially in a Star Wars context where loot and gear are almost meaningless). We both agree on this: finding a magic item is a tangible player reward that helps keep the game moving forward for the players. While XP may be its own reward, it's a delayed reward. When I conclude an encounter, I get XP, but I don't get its effects for another few encounters. The presence of magic items provides an immediate reward (or, at least, the potential for an immediate reward) at the conclusion of the encounter. You don't have to actually get a new magic item for the potential for reward to be there, and in many cases you'll feel as though you've been rewarded when someone else gets an item. In 4E, I think there is going to be a very interesting dynamic between magic items and players. I believe it was mentioned that some traditional things about magic items were going the way of the dodo, and that magic items aren't going to be required to do cool things at high levels. While that may be true, I think people are still going to want magic items because they are going to provide some cool and exciting effects. There's going to be a new dynamic where players are going to want new things but not necessarily need them as much to remain competitive, which I'm thinking is going to actually cause the "I'm happy for someone else when they get loot" mentality to spread. If I don't get new magic items for a while, I'm not becoming underpowered per se, so it's much easier for me to feel rewarded when someone else picks up a new magic item."
  
• On magic items and their decreased emphasis: "I'm working on magic items right now. A previous version of the rules had magic items that were just too complex and too numerous, so we're stripping off a couple layers of complexity. You won't be a magic item Christmas tree any more, but you might be a Christmas shrub or a Charlie Brown Christmas tree.
  
  The items are generally focused on one thing to keep players from forgetting what the items do. We don't want too many conditionals, nor do we want effects that fight for the same ground as powers. In 3.5, if a fighter had a magic item with an activated effect, it was easier to remember and use because he didn't also have powers.
  
  Though we're still working on magic items, the really cool parts of items are alread done, in a sense. We've removed or changed items like headband of intellect and ring of protection so they're no longer required just to get the numbers you need. The items like that that are still around fill just a few slots. We've also gotten rid of the need for tons of expendable items. They'll still be around, but you'll no longer need to buy a wand of cure light wounds every adventure."
• A Design & Development article deals with magic items; or, more specifically, magic item levels: "...all 9th-level magic items now cost the same number of gp to craft or to purchase. This makes it even easier to gauge a magic item's appropriateness for your game at a glance. Don't know if it's OK to drop a flying carpet into the hands of your 9th-level PCs? Well, the fact that the carpet's listed as an 18th-level item should clue you in that it'd have an enormous impact on your 9th-level game." Magic items mentioned in the article are (although I imagine this is all subject to change):
  
  • Flying carpet (18th)
  • +2 thundering mace (9th)
  • +2 staff of the war mage (9th)
  • Rope of climbing (10th)
  • +2 flaming longsword (10th)
  • slippers of spider climbing (7th)
  • Boots of levitation (13th)
  • +3 vicious sword (12th)
  • +2 lightning sword (9th)
• Mike Mearls comments here on magic item dependency and rules transparency:
  
  Q: Just give PCs steadily increasing, additional bonuses to their AC, saving throws, and attack and damage, directly proportionate to the enhancement bonus they're "expected" to get, and eliminate the enhancement bonus those items provide.
  
  
  Yup, that's pretty much the intent. We went out of our way to embrace transparency in the rules, to better help DMs understand how magic items interact with PCs, how they interact with the system math, and what happens when you start to change things.
  
  It's also why items have a level as a guide for their power, rather than a gp cost. It's a lot easier to look at an item's level and determine how powerful it is compared to a character, rather than look at its price, compare that price to expected wealth, and then try to figure out the impact of an item that's worth 10% of a PC's total treasure compared to one worth 20% of a PC's treasure.
  
  When I designed Iron Heroes, it took a TON of work to rip out magic items and work in new mechanics to replace them.
  
  With 4e, it'll take even a newbie DM maybe a half hour once he has learned the rules.
  
  
  
  Q: If you take all those separate items together, in all their different slots where they don't overlap, how does that not accumulate into a giant pile of combat-related awesome, even if it doesn't give a single enhancement bonus?
  
  
  The key is that, in most cases, magic items give more options, rather than improvements to existing options.
  
  Strictly speaking, the fighter with no items is less powerful than the fighter with a ton of items, yet if the campaign tends toward few or no items, the game still functions fine. For instance, the math behind monsters looks to magic items only for the static bonuses that they grant.
  
  Primarily, the benefits conferred by magic items are useful in specific situations or they cater to specific tactics. Many also are limited in scope, such as providing a benefit for the length of one encounter per day.
  
  The important thing to remember is that, in monster and math design, only the static benefits had an effect on the math. If you change how items work, everything works out fine as long as you are consistent wtih that change. We've shifted away from making some classes, like the fighter, heavily gear dependent, while others, like the wizard, don't need it as much.

• A new design and development article deals with magic item slots.
• The goal was to reduce magic item reliance.
• Primary slots are Weapon/Implement, Armor, Neck.
• Secondary slots are Arms, Feet, Hands, Waist, Head, Rings. These will nt have enhancement bonuses and are considered optional.
• Non-slotted items are Potions, Wondrous Items.
• You can't use a ring at the Heroic tier (1-10); you can use one at Paragon (11-20), and two at Epic (21-30).
• Item effect types depend on the location - "hand" items help with dexterity or attacks, "feet" items focus on mobility, "head" items deal with mental skills or senses, etc.
  
      Example
  
      Here’s what my 11th-level gnome warlock, Dessin, is wearing right now:
  
      Implement: +3 rod of dark reward
      Armor: +3 leather armor
      Neck: +2 cloak of survival
      Arms: Bracers of the perfect shot
      Feet: Wavestrider boots
      Hands: Shadowfell gloves
      Head: Diadem of acuity
      Rings: None right now, sadly
      Waist: Belt of battle
      Wondrous Items: Bag of holding

• The mind-affecting spells of wizards and clerics will be toned down or removed so that psions [in a later book] will have their own flavor.
• On spell selection: "Every class gets cool "non-attack" power choices as well as attack power choices. Wizards will still be able to cast spells such as Disguise Self, Jump, or Levitate. It's true that we'd like to "narrow" wizards a bit, and save (for example) some illusion spells for an honest-to-gosh Illusionist class down the road, or necromancy spells for a Necromancer. But wizards will still "splash" at least a few of the iconic powers in these themes of magic. For example, wizards still have Invisibility available to them. But when the Illusionist class comes around, he'll have better Invisibility options."
• "Wizards will be able to cast 25th-level spells." 4E mechanical designer Logan Bonner also comments very briefly on the rumours of 30th level spells -- "Power level corresponds to the character level at which you gain the power."
• Dave Noonan: "30 discrete levels of spells would be too fine a level of gradation, so we shouldn't expect to see spells occupying every spell level."
• Fireballs don't deal 1d6/level damage any more. Also, game breaking spells pells that fundamentally change the gaming scenario, like etherealness, scrying, and save or die effects) "have been addressed as well". 
• The 4th Edition fireball has not only an attack roll, but you can crit with it? "A brief playtest note from last night's game, DM'd by Dave Noonan: I rolled not one, but *two* critical hits with fireball attack rolls last night. The second actually one-shotted a tough troglodyte skirmisher; just smoked him outright, full hp to dead in one go. Oh, and I had a great initiative roll, so it was the very first thing that happened in the fight. Hee hee hee! Scoring criticals with attack spells is *fun.* My warlord/wizard sure feels like he kicks some butt!"
• "Certain spells are gone, period (wish for sure)."
• Mentioned a "ray of freezing cold".
• "The new revision of the wizard gave me an additional power (I picked ray of frost so I could slow enemies down)" - so the wizard is getting more powers, and previously low-level spells seem to be amongst those options.
• ".. the frequency with which I could use my wand power" - the wizard has a "wand power". Presumably that could have been an orb power, or a staff power.
• The eladrin wizard has a power called fireblast (presumably a wizard power)
• Warlock seen using "Mire of Minauros" which dissolved a couple of vampires, with an acidic bog.
• Reference to sleep, magic missile and a "short teleport" (dimension door, or a new teleport variant?)
• Wizards have been seen to use a "wizard strike" (twice in a single combat) and a "once-per-day scorch" which blasted three opponents who were lined up in a row.  Neither appear to be spells.
• Wizards get a couple of decent ranged area attacks per encounter.
• Wizards have a "wizard strike" which injures and pushes foes; warlords have a "tactical acumen" ability which can give bonuses to allies (source).
• Will we still have x/min level Buffs? "Nope. Buff durations will be drastically modified."
• On save-or-die spells -- "We're trying to get away from mages that rely primarily on Save or Lose/Die spells. For example, we're basing most things around doing HP damage, then tying conditions to HP loss. We do not want characters dying from a single failed die roll.... "
• Increase of magic across the board in all aspects of the game.
• Disrupting spellcasting has been removed: "...he pointed out that it was largely a one-skill tax on PC spellcasters, and it tended to swing to extremes. Either you had your Concentration maxed and could ignore the problem, or you didn't and it was far too easy for a spellcaster to be unable to cast. Instead, you can pick up powers that can mess with spellcasting and other abilities."
• David Noonan on spells:
  
  
  "After two class meetings yesterday, I discover that I'm still smitten with the way we're "siloing" PC capabilities now. For example, it was always unfortunate how phantom steed had to compete with fireball on a wizard's "Spells Prepared" list. Don't get me wrong: Both spells are great, and they both have their place. But when all eyes at the table turn to you, it's a lot better to say, "I didn't prep phantom steed, but I've still got fireball," rather than "I didn't prep fireball, but I've still got phantom steed." Phantom steed suffers by comparison, despite its coolness, and thus it's relegated to scroll use and the occasional splash from a high-level wizard.
  
  Not so in 4e. We've devised various ways of grouping like capabilities with like capabilities, so you don't have to sacrifice phantom steed's utility for fireball's killin'-the-bad-guys effectiveness. You'll get both. And one of the clever bits in D&D--figuring out combat uses for utility spells and vice versa--remains.
  
  In some ways, it's like having a major and a minor in college. And 4e characters are looking a lot more well-rounded than their 3e counterparts."

• Some information about wizards (the 4E class, not the company) from our Hungarian Races & Classes-owning friend, Kumadan!
  
  We know the wizard. Their focus is not more an evoker than anything else. They blast enemies while remaining in the back.
  
  Spells are divided among at will (lesser power than a fighter’s melee attack), per encounter, per day (the really powerful stuff, these are the most powerful abilities in the game) and rituals. Rituals cover magic item creation, and non-combat spell (divinations are prime examples).
  
  Schools are dead, long live the implements: the orb, the staff and the wand (with others, such as the dagger, possible in later supplement). Staffs are for rays and cones, wands for long distance control, while orb stands for blasts, terrain control, and retributive and perception based effects.
  
  Divinations, long range teleport, restorative effects (the cleric’s remove disease for example) are rituals.
  
  Evocation and illusion is there and now they are the focus of wizardry.
  
  Necromancy was nerfed mostly by removing save or die effects.
  
  Transmutation was a haphazard pile of powers (according to them), and some part remains, other do not.
  
  Enchantment is nerfed to be saved for other classes (others they state that it will be the psi).
  
  Wizards spell failure due to armor is gone (hurray!). Picking the right feats wizards can go around in heavy armor.
  
  Feats don’t have class as a prerequisite. Race, level or skill training might be needed, but no class. You can steer your character wherever you want.
  
  There are class training feats (Fighter training, Wizard training, Warlock training, etc.) that gives some power of that class to someone not in that class.
   

• Monster Manual is a 288 pagebook, with over 300 monsters. New format for stat blocks, simpler and easier to use. (source).
• The Spined Devil is the bonus miniature being given out at the Worldwide D&D Game Day, and it comes with both a 3.5E and 4E stat card (pictured right).  As can be seen, it's much more streamlined than the 3.5E example below it, and there are quite a number of changes.
• You can listen to a new podcast on the official site. Monsters, Monsters, Monsters features Dave Noonan, James Wyatt and Mike Mearls speaking about the 4th Edition Monster Manual.  Loads of information, and well worth the listen.  Some key points:
• Some seemingly "core" monsters left until later Monster Manuals to reinforce that they are all "core". Example given is the Frost Giant.
• Elementals that were only differentiated by size and element are gone - elementals are now more varied and interesting.
• Monsters fight and feel different to each other: gnolls fight in packs, hobgoblins like legionairies in a line, and goblins dance around just out of reach.
• Full level range in MM1 from 1-30.
• Monster roles - brute, soldier, artillery, controller, lurker, skirmisher.
• Elite versions of a monster cound as two of that monster type for balancing purposes.
• Monsters designed for use in large numbers; monsters designed for use in small numbers.
• Drow are a type of fey.
• Briarwitch dryad - new monster?
• "Exceptions Based Design." That phrase got use a lot. Basically it's just a fancy way of saying monsters "just do what they do."  Allows for more flexibility, and for monsters to have unique abilities which don't conform to rules the players understand.
• Azres are now level 14-17; that's to make sense with their working with fire giants.
• James Wyatt - "what are these hit dice you speak of?"
• Who's in and who's out? "...plenty of monsters will be in MM1, but not all the monsters you expect to see in D&D will be. Those that have a home in the new edition will eventually see release, however. Sometimes they'll even get a polish that makes them into something more useful and compelling, and maybe even more mythologically accurate."
• Orcus will be in the MM. Grazzt will be in the Demonomicon on D&D Insider in October. (source).
• Chris Perkins -- "In case you're wondering, Asmodeus won't be joining Orcus in the new MM because, as I previously hinted, the Lord of the Ninth is getting a promotion to god status in 4E. His holy (unholy?) symbol will be among those appearing in the Player's Handbook"
• 
• Challenge Ratings are gone!  WotC's Greg Bilsland: "I remember specifically asking Logan Bonner about the 3.5 problems with level adjustment and challenge rating. With a wry grin, he replied, “Challenge rating, what’s that?”
• David Noonan mentioned on his blog that the DMG will have a section on customizing monsters that will include rules for making monsters weaker.
• Desert of Desolation Preview: they mention that the Capricious Copper Dragon was made Chaotic Neutral in the miniatures game "partly to illustrate the 4th edition concept that not all metallic dragons uphold what is right and good." What's not clear is how far this concept will be implemented in the game. We also get a peek at the cyclops, which we learn will be in the 4E Monster Manual. It also hints at ties between cyclops, fey, and fomorians.
• David Noonan mentioned on his blog that the DMG will have a section on customizing monsters that will include rules for making monsters weaker.
• A brief update in Rich Baker's blog: he's working on the Monster Manual, specifically writing what he calls "mission statements" for various monsters. That includes guidelines to "help the DM with target designation" for monsters (like attacking the nearest enemy, or attacking whomever damaged it the most). Baker is also working on morale notes for monsters -- which "are likely to run away when they're hurt, and which are fanatical or bloodthirsty enough to fight to the death."
• Greg Bisland writes in his blog that he too is working on tactics for the Monster Manual. Bisland says that in addition to the tactics writeups, "monster strategies are much more intuitive in 4th edition" because you can "study the stat block for a few moments and see [...] what the monster should be doing." Bisland also notes that monster "roles" are a big help in running them. There remain some monsters, such as the beholder, "that have enormous tactics blocks just because they have so much cool stuff they can do."
  
• Monsters won't have feats - at least that's what Logan Bonner is implying. 
• Monsters will have roles outlined in the MM. Monster design will be more open ended. Not all monsters will have information necessary to make them playable characters.  Example mentioned roles include "Brute" and "Artillery", and their stats will be affected by their role.
• Additional mentioed monster roles: Skirmisher, Lurker.
• The fog of war is much more interesting because when you approach an orc, he isn’t a set of specific stats. He has a very specific role, and you won’t know what it is until he unleashes it on the battlefield.  (source).
• "There will be many more monsters for PC’s to fight. It’s more fun that way. There are very few encounters that are built to be all the PC’s against one big powerful bad guy. There will be more mechanics built to leverage the monsters and THEIR fundadmental roles. An ettin will be talking to itself throughout the encounter. This is the “monster’s job on the battlefield” this is how he reacts." (source).
• Monstrous races? Can you still make kobold barbarians? "We’re not going to put limitations on the way we build monsters to make them work right. We know there are monsters that will become player character races. For example, it will be obvious how to play a goblin PC right out of the monster manual and PH." (source).
• Since we're mentioning kobolds - it's barely a news item; it's barely even a hint. However, a Mike Mearls blog post,  makes a reference to kobolds and their affinity for traps: "... such as when James came over and talked about making the mechanics for kobolds really speak to our trap rules."
• Chris Perkins on the ease of running monsters: "The game makes the DM's life easier in many ways. For one thing, monsters are more fun to play. A monster doesn't need thirty spell-like abilities to be cool. Given that the typical monster has a lifespan of 3 to 5 rounds, it really only needs one or two 'signature' abilities in addition to its normal attacks. The new game also makes it a lot easier for the DM to determine appropriate challenges for the party with an encounter-building system that's much more intuitive than the current EL/CR system. It also doesn't hurt that we'll have a data-driven, plug-n-play encounter builder tool on D&D Insider."
• Monsters no longer drain XP (implied no draining of levels?)
• Mike Mearls has been putting up some 3.5E monsters on his blog. One of them is the Drider, which has an interesting mechanic for its paralyzing poison: "Drow Paralysis Poison: Fortitude save DC 18, 1 point of paralysis. Each point is –1 square movement, each 2 points is –1 attacks and AC. If points are greater than Constitution bonus + 2, save at start of turn or be paralyzed for 1 round, save every round. No secondary effects, fades in 5 minutes." The interesting part is the "1 point of paralysis" - is this a hint at condition effects in 4th Edition?
• Vulnerability to energy likely to work differently in 4e, with additional effects (like slowing in the case of cold) instead of (or in addition to?) extra damage.
• Templates mentioned.
• Worlds & Monsters -- Also mentioned is that aberration is not a type. Type is now distinct from Origin - so you have Humanoids (type) with an Origin of fey (eladrin) , aberration (mind flayer), elemental (archon) , natural (man).
• Finally there's a page and a half or so on the mind flayer: in short: they are essentially the same as in the previous edition just with fewer powers (taken from the set of those that most define them) that are easier and clearer to run. There are a few mechanical tidbits about mind blast and dominate each being a 'renewable power - useable once per encounter', whereas tentacle lash and grab are basic attacks backed up by situational powers 'bore into brain', 'thrall' and 'interpose thrall'
• Matthew Sernett had a lot to say about monsters:

• Download The World & Dragons, an excerpt from Wizards Presents: Worlds & Monsters, from the official site.
• On dragons during playtests: "Obviously I can't say a lot about mechanical details, but the black dragon has a schtick that is truly dangerous--keeping the PCs on the defensive a lot of the time. It was able to hold out for seven rounds against an entire party and caused them to use up pretty well all their limited resources. Its ability to respond immediately to PC actions was a nasty surprise as well for those used to earlier-edition dragons."
  
• A copper dragon is dealing acid damage every round. It also displays "an instant breath weapon attack when the dragon was bloodied and then its bite plus ongoing acid damage"
• The PCs suffered a "hit and run by a dragon", proving "with certitude that dragons can indeed be lurkers."
• Ancient (red?) dragons apparently now can do a lot of things ((the dragon can't do all those things every round - that was clarified by Wizards' staff in the gleemax forums):
  • An inferno aura, useable as a free action.
  • A tail slap attack with an added pushback effect, useable as a free action.
  • Two claw attacks, useable as a standard action.
  • A fireball spit that sticks to the target dealing extra damage, useable as a standard action.
  • A breath weapon, but we don't get to see what kind of action it normally takes - a free one like the inferno aura, as different uses of the same ability?
  • A special action granting an extra standard action.
  • They may take an immediate action to use their breath weapon when reduced blow half damage.
  • They may take an immediate action to use their tail slap when about to be flanked.
• Said dragon would have around 1000 hit points.
• There are six pages of  dragon information in Worlds & Monsters.  Highlights include:
• The different colors of Dragon have different monster roles - in other words, some are artillery (blue), some are brutes (white), some are soldiers (red) and so on
• Dragons are solo monsters who 'get to do more on their turn than most monsters do' and also 'get to do a lot when it's not their turn' (like the tail slap we already knew about, but also mentioned is the green dragon's ability to poison you if you get too close)
• Dragons have fewer abilities, focused on the most iconic ones (continuing the theme). For example, the oldest black dragon is said to have only five possible standard actions, with unique magical abilities taking the place of spells simply taken from the wizard's lists.
• Dragons aren't forced into specific 'alignments'. Their motives can vary from a baseline - chromatic are wild, metallic like to be in control but good and evil manifests in each.
• There are two new flavours of metallic dragon which displace bronze and brass from the core group. The new metallics are Iron and Adamantine.
• Chromatic dragons grow in raw elemental power as they age which manifests as unique new powers related to the appropriate element. An ancient red's breath weapon, for example, can 'scour the fire resistance right off you'
• An all new look and set of powers for the green dragon; they are back to breathing poison!
• Bronze and brass dragons will be released by WOTC in a future supplement.

• Jennifer Clarke Wilkes, compiler and editor of Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters, is the subject of a spotlight interview at the official website. The interview doesn't offer much new information, although it does have some very pretty artwork as well as a neat summary of the new approach to dragons - and a nice little hint right at the end which makes it look like the purple worm is going to come into its own in 4E!
  
  
  In 4th Edition D&D, dragons have been redesigned as satisfying solo opponents. They can do things to interfere with PCs’ actions, take extra actions on their own turns, and stand up to the pounding of a group of opponents—essentially behaving as a group of monsters. Each dragon has an iconic suite of powers that is no longer diluted by additional details such as minor spell-like abilities or arcane spellcaster levels. We’ve simplified the age categories, eliminating those at the younger end and consolidating others, so that good dragon challenges exist at each adventuring tier.

• James Wyatt on dragons: 

• The first Dragon Magazine article has hit the (virtual) newsstands and, as promised, it's Ecology of the Death Knight.  In terms of mechanics, the 4th Edition death knight has been designed as an undead knight with powerful melee abilities, including "special weapon and shield abilities, an ability that activates when foes flank it, a special mount power, and a melee-oriented fear ability". In addition, the abyssal blast ability and the undead leadership aspect have been implemented. 
• Zombies! A Design & Development article (requires D&D Insider to view) is about zombies. Author Chris Sims discusses how 4th Edition zombies are meant to feel closer to their monster-movie counterparts. 
• "The new zombie is a brute with just enough reasoning power to know who to kill."
• 4e zombies are vulnerable to critical hits.
• Another reference to zombies taking crits.
• Turn Undead still exists in 4e; "that power doesn’t send the zombies running off to gods knows where, but if it doesn’t turn them to putrid dust, it does hold them at bay."
• "You don’t want zombies close to you [because they] can take your head off with their vicious slams."
• "When zombies swarm you, some of them are going to grab you, maybe even pulling you to the ground."
• There's one set of Medium zombie statistics, so the DM "doesn't have to worry about creating the gnoll zombie or the orc zombie." (This strongly implies the zombie is no longer a template.)
• "At appropriate levels, a fight against zombies should look more like a horror movie scene. Protagonists have to maneuver to keep away from the possibility of devastating damage while trying to cut their way through a relentless wall of dead flesh."
• A small tidbit from Peter Schaefer's blog (on Gleemax) regarding monsters known as shadow bats -- the bats' "special power was partly nullified by our lantern and low-light vision." Some sort of darkness effect, perhaps?
• In Rich Baker's blog entry he discusses some design work on the unicorn. In one snippet he brings out something about alignment: "We had a fun over-the-cube-wall debate about the unicorn's alignment. We'd like to see most fey move from Good to unaligned and somewhat perilous." So, it seems that alignment is certainly in, but all creatures won't necessarily be aligned. In the end they decided the unicorn should be good, as one of the epitomes of good. However, we see what sort of things they are considering in monster design.
• Stephen Schubert mentions running an encounter with spiders without having stats for them in his latest blog entry. "I knew I wanted the small spiders to use webs to trap the PCs and pull them closer, and I wanted the large spider to be a more significant melee threat. With a couple of notes on those abilities, and using a generic set of level-appropriate attack bonuses and defenses, I was able to generate those monsters nearly entirely on the fly."
• "The ettin, for instance, has the whole two-heads thing, so it can go twice in one round, and take unrelated actions."
• A note on hobgoblin flavour: "Hobgoblins have a history of breeding beasts as guards and for battle. Among the few creatures hobgoblins have successfully bent to this purpose remain those still a work in progress. Like hairy-legged, poison-spewing arachnids that must be caged lest they begin snacking on their masters. A word to the wise: If you invade a hobgoblin warren and see a few defenders break for the iron cage rattling in the back room, consider trying to stop them before they open it."
• There will be a group of monsters called "foulspawn" in the Monster Manual that James Wyatt recommended be part of the family that includes dolgrim and dolgaunts (Eberron monsters).
• The purple worm is confirmed as a solo monster (i.e. one designed specifically to challenge an entire party).
• The Shrieking Harpy from DDM: "This creature is mechanically close to its 4th edition counterpart with its cone of sonic damage and its ability to lure foes into danger. The Lure ability is a way to lock down an opponent, forcing the target to move if it wants to do anything at all (of course, it could just stand there and do nothing)."
• The Feral Troll: "His abilities are a lot like previous trolls, though we swapped out his regeneration power for something more meaningful. In general, tracking small increments of damage or healing created a sort of 'upkeep' phase for such creatures. It's easy to forget to heal 5 damage on a creature each turn, but not so easy to forget the ability to heal 20 damage with a swift action."
• Vampire Lords and Vampire Spawn are discussed in this article.
• Reference to Shadowhunter Bats.
• Two monsters, a corruption corpse and deathlock wight , use their powers to aid some zombies and harm the PCs.
• Reference to a "werewolf lord and a bunch of normal werewolves".
• Elite Bulette is a short  article on the official website which looks at, naturally, the bullette (or land shark). It begins by introducing the concept of an "elite" type monster. We've heard about "minion" and "elite" monsters before, and the article defines an elite monster as "Elite monsters represent a greater challenge: They count as two monsters of their level for encounter building and rewards. Elite monsters have the word “elite” preceding their level and role."
• The article also summarizes how a combat might go, illustrating how a bullette bursts from the ground spraying dirt and stone; this does extra damage to prone characters, but is deflected by the fighter's shield.
• There's reference to flanking, opportunity attacks and a cleric "[placing] fear in the bulette’s tiny mind".
• "Bulette number one dives into the earth so rapidly that the heroes around it don’t get opportunity attacks" sounds like a mechanic similar to the 3.5 tumble. The bullette heals itself underground.
• The first Dragon article of the new year is Ecology of the Fire Archon. It include a couple of stat blocks which "use 3rd Edition mechanics to mimic the fire archon's 4th Edition rules".
  
  
  Early on in the process of designing 4th Edition, we had many discussions of the elements of 3rd Edition that we could carry forward. We took a long look at which cows really were sacred and which would make fine rump roast. The animal-headed archons weren't high on anyone's list. They exist to fill out an alignment wheel of outsiders -- a dubious purpose -- and they're an inherently strange concept. In D&D's universe, why do some angelic beings have horse heads? What population besides werebears and normal bears do bear angels serve? Add to their innate weirdness the fact that alignment and the planes work differently in 4th Edition, and there simply wasn't reason enough to preserve them.
  
  Yet the word "archon" is powerful, and we knew we wanted 4th Edition to use it in a cooler way that would be more likely to see play than the angelic furries. Giving it to the new elemental beings we wanted in the game seemed a perfect fit. There could be no confusing them with the old archons, and using a cool word that would be familiar to many players would raise their profile.
  
• Worlds & Monsters on giants:
• There are Huge versions of the standard giants called Titans - these are more closely tied to the elements and have greater power
  Giants in general are more elemental in nature, and there is greater variety between the standard types
  The Giant type is specifically for Giants. Trolls, ogres, ettins don't 'necessarily' have the Giant 'type' 
• Game Trade Magazine has two pages from Wizards Presents - Worlds and Monsters on giants:
  
  
  It gives a background on the giants as being servants to "primordials" during the shaping of the world. Titans were first and had elemental ties (earth titans, fire titans). They created the lesser giants.
  
  It also mentions similar creatures arose Feywild and Shadowfell. The formorians arose in the Feywild and death giants in the Shadowfell.
  
  The giants had large empires in the ancient world. The giants enslaved the dwarves and the formorians created the cyclops as slaves. The death giants created lesser versions of themselves. The death giants also took gnomes and fey as slaves as well as being worshipped by dark creepers. Those empires eventually fell during the war between the primordials and the gods.
  
  From a design standpoint they mention all giants have a more elemental basis. After a round with a storm giant you'll know what the monster has to do with both "storm" and "giant." They are distancing "giant" from including everything big & tall. Ogres, trolls, etc. aren't necessarily giants anymore.
  
  All giants have two versions, a Large and Huge version. The huge versions are tied more closely to their elemental natures and have stronger elemental powers.
  
  They have a picture of a cyclops (pretty much the Desert of Desolation miniature) and a mountain giant. The mountain giant looks pretty much like stone in a humanoid form (it's closer to an earth elemental than a stone golem).

• Download Demons and Such, an excerpt from Wizards Presents: Worlds & Monsters from the official site.
• Rich Baker on the changes to devils and demons:

• Lots more on demons and devils!  A Design & Development article focuses on the differences between demons and devils. "Throughout demons' and devils' existence in the D&D game, resemblances between them have been stronger and more numerous than differences.... Each member of both species has a wide array of similar (and often superfluous) supernatural powers."
  
  The article tells us that in 4th Edition, the Nine Hells have become "an astral dominion among other deific abodes in the Astral Sea", with Asmodeus as the resident deity. Asmodeus follows the "fallen angel" model, as do his followers. The Abyss, on the other hand, "gapes like a festering wound in the landscape of the Elemental Tempest". Demons are elemental beings who came too close and became trapped.
  
  The devils are cunning manipulators, seeking to gain influence among mortals, whereas demons are "savage and fearless engines of annihilation". The demon lords still exist, there's no structure or hierarchy there any more.
  
  "What does a clearer distinction between the two major species of fiends mean for your game? If you need a devious fiend that cares about souls and works on long-term schemes, use a devil. However, wholesale slaughter, pointless suffering, and terrifying devastation call for a demon."

• Bill Slavicsek's  Ampersand article, "The Devil is in the Details," gives the entire Monster Manual entry for the Pit Fiend. The Pit Fiend is a Level 26 Elite Soldier (Leader). See the stat block here.
• On the [lack of ] the Blood War:

• Rich Baker on monsters with teleport powers:
  
  
  Not all monsters that used to teleport at will do so in 4e. But there's no reason that archdevils or demon princes couldn't use teleportation rituals themselves to "beam up" minions to places they need to go. Those rituals may be expensive and tedious, so it might not be routine for demons to bamf into the middle of the town square--but it could happen if the DM needs it to. Anyway, I expect that most demons and devils rely on gates and portals now, too, which seems good to me. It means that dungeons containing gates to hell are important.

• Action points are core. They do different stuff than Star Wars force points and Eberron action points.
• Encounters will be built differently in 4th edition. There will be much more “situation” and complexity in the environment, swinging bridges, gouts of lava, etc. An encounter is like a scene of a play – could be talking to a town guard, could be defending a town gate, could be traversing the mountainside to enter the shrine of Asmodeus (source).
• Encounters are designed to handle more bad guys -- "In 4th Edition, your dungeons are going to be a lot more densely populated. The typical encounter has one monster per PC in the party, assuming that the monsters are about the same level as the PCs."
• A better mechanic for turning undead.
• You still die at -10 HP.
• Bisland's playtest tiefling rogue was "one [roll] away from dying" and "had roughly a 50% chance of survival;" he likens this to being at -9 hp in 3rd edition. The character was saved by the cleric "get[ting] over to [him] in time."
• Hit points appear to have level ranges during which certain abilities are accessible -- "For example, you drop below half HP, you become Bloodied. Then there are abilities you can only use while Bloodied, and abilities you can only use against Bloodied opponents. (Sounds like Fighters can get a Last Stand buff, while Rogues can unleash some nasty attacks against Bloodied enemies.)"
• Grapple got a major overhaul.
• Regarding the Shield: The shield will offer protection against spells, such as fireball: "No discussion of armor is complete without mentioning the humble shield, capable of turning away spear-thrust, arrow-shaft and fireball alike, this slab of wood or steel ...."
• "Changes to reach – some creatures may not be able to make an AoO with a bite attack for example, past a certain range. So maybe a Huge creature would have reach with its limbs out to 15 ft (3 squares), but only have a reach of 5 ft. (1 square) with its bite attack."
• James Wyatt -- "See, in 3e there's a basic assumption that an encounter between four 5th-level PCs and one CR 5 monster should drain away about 25% of the party's resources, which primarily translates into spells (and primarily the cleric's spells, which determine everyone else's total hit points). What that actually means is that you get up the morning, then have three encounters in a row that don't reallly challenge you. It's the fourth one that tests your skill—that's where you figure out whether you've spent too much, or if you still have enough resources left to finish off that last encounter. Then you're done. So basically, three boring encounters before you get to one that's really life or death....It kind of makes sense, mathematically. The problem is, it's not fun. So what lots of people actually do, in my experience, is get up in the morning and have a fun encounter: there are multiple monsters that are close to the PCs' level, so the total encounter level is higher than their level. There's interesting terrain and dynamic movement. Sometimes there are waves of monsters, one after another. Whew! It's a knock-down, drag-out fight that could really go either way. And it's fun!"
• Saves mentioned.
• "Saving throws will look more like a new thing."
• On saves vs. massive damage -- "You may have to make a Fort save or suffer penalties for the rest of the day, but you will not die from massive damage unless it drops you to -10."
• AC mentioned, apparently with the same function as it has today.
• Free, immediate, move and standard actions mentioned. (it stands to reason Swift actions will be present too).
• Critical hits mentioned.
• Confirmation rolls for critical hits possibly go away (no mention of confirmation in above linked playtest)..
• Critical hits are the subject of the latest article to be found on the official site. So, what does it tell us?
• As we'd already figured out, the confirmation roll is gone.
• Critical hits don't deal double damage.
• Instead, when you roll a critical hit, all the dice are maximized.
• Magic weapons deal extra damage on crits.
• Monsters don't get this benefit, so PC crits outclass monster crits most of the time.
• Weapons can have the high crit property, giving extra dice on a crit.
• Also interesting is the sample weapon stat block:
  

Weapon: War Pick
Prof: 2 [what does this mean?]
Damage: d8 [note, just one damage roll listed]
Range: -
Cost: 15gp
Weight: 6lb.
Category: Pick ["Pick" is a "category" of some kind]
Properties: High crit, versatile ["high crit" is mentioned above; "versatile" is something else]

• Grapple greatly simplified (the big joke at the 4E announcement at GenCon).
• Bullrush is in.
• You can cause falling damage to an opponent by leaping down onto him.
• Reference to "something being done" with hit points and with critical hits.
• Combat still uses a square grid
• DR may disappear (or be thoroughly changed)
• Some kind of rule for "minions".
• An article on the official site, The Importance of Terrain, deals with... well, terrain in 4E. The majority of the article reiterates that movement is more imortant in 4E, encounter areas are bigger, etc. It does have a good few items in it:
• A reference to how 100' chasms are deadly in non-paragon/epic (levels 11+) play.
• Information on a sample terrain type - the Doomspore, which includes an interesting insight into the poison mechanic (bold added by me): "If any creature enters a doomspore's square (or uses a standard action to kick or poke at it, if within reach), a doomspore releases a cloud of spores that provides concealment to all creatures within its own and adjacent squares. Furthermore, a bloodied creature in the area of a cloud when created, who moves into the cloud, or begins its turn in the cloud, is subject to a Fortitude attack (+10) that deals 1d10 points of poison damage on a hit. In addition, a target hit by a doomspore is weakened and takes ongoing poison 5 (save ends both conditions; creatures with immunity to or resist poison 5 are immune to the weakened condition also)." Note that a "bloodied" creature, to the best of our knowledge at present, is one at 50% or less hit points.
• Mike Mearls comments briefly on the approach being taken with shields in 4th Edition: "Shields are a little tricky, because if they're too good everyone wants one, but if they are too lame everyone wields a big weapon. For 4e, we've taken an approach with shields (and most other weapons) where classes that are supposed to be good with something have options and abilities that augment that thing....So, a fighter might take maneuvers or feats that improve his shield use. A cleric might carry a shield, but the cleric class lacks any specific mechanics to make the shield better."
• Mike Mearls has made an interesting post on the concept of armour as damage reduction, and why this wasn't implemented in 4th Edition. Check the link for the full post.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes: Immunities are almost gone from 4th ed, replaced by damage threshold (something like DR).
• A playtest report on the official site provides a number of clues regarding 4th Edition combat, including concepts such as a "second wind", a "wizard strike" and an "immediate counterattack".  The following can be noted from the report:
• First we have Heron and Tian being the only characters to spot the goblins, and thus the only ones to act in the surprise round.
• Flanking and tripping both appear to still be in.
• No mention of confirming a critical hit (although the author may have just not mentioned it).
• Seems the Tiefling has company in the new races, with Eladrin and Warforged. At the very least, it being mentioned as a converted 3.5 game, no mention of conversion issues is raised.
• We then have Heron, who uses an "immediate counterattack" upon being missed by a goblin bowman, and who takes two shots back on his turn (he's a 1st level character).
• Domna, a warlord, uses some kind of bard-like ability to boost her allies in addition to attacking a wolf.  It sounds like the "Leading the Attack" White Raven combat maneuver from Book of Nine Swords.
• Sasha uses something called a "wizard strike" with her staff, which both injures and pushes a wolf.
• Heron, the archer, moves away and regains some hit points on a "second wind" (Star Wars has a second wind rule: when your character is below half his total HP, he can regain points equal to 1/4 of his total or equal to his Con score, which is higher; usable once per day, takes a Swift Action; some feats, etc., allow more than once use per day, but never more than once per encounter; PC classes can do it, but NPC classes cannot.)
• Tian misses a goblin, who is then able to move away without provoking an attack-of-opportunity.
• An "initiative count" is mentioned "coming to the top again", which suggests there isn't a drastic change in that rule from 3rd Edition.
• Sasha uses another "wizard strike", which blasts two wolves, pushing one away again.
• Domna, the warlord, "uses her tactical acumen to attack in such a way that the wolf she hit opened itself up to Robozcniek". Sounds like some kind of bardic ability.
• Note that support activities, such as the warlord's "tactical acumen" are being used in addition to regular actions, supporting the PC Roles article which indicated that "leader" characters will get to act, rather than stand around merely enhancing their allies.
• In a discussion of weapon sizes (ala "how long is a pilum") James Wyatt mentions there will be medium weapons. More than likely weapon sizes won't be drastically changed.
  
• "Combat advantage" is mentioned in Races & Classes as a combat modifier gained when your oppponent's defenses are compromised. Example situations are flanking and other special abilities. Rogues can sneak attack when they have combat advantage, which apparently happens a lot.
• Full attack option removed -- WotC's Andy Collins posts in this thread (seventh post down) that the full-attack option has been removed from 4th Edition. He also briefly discusses the designers' goals to create more mobile combats. Removing this option reduces the "shall I stand here and fight or move?" choice prevalent in 3E combats; added to that, of course, is the previous info that Attacks of Opportunity (pasted below) have also been either changed or removed, presumably with the same intent -- "we're designing the game to encourage, even mandate movement from one place to another. More powers that reward movement, more short-range teleportation/flight, more powers that involuntarily move enemies...these all get us away from the static fights that 3E encouraged."
• Attacks of opportunity gone or greatly changed/simplified: a fighter charges a dragon and no AoO is mentioned.
• AoO - "It won't be the same thing, but the concepts are all there. Please note that things ARE still in development. Nothing's finalized yet." (source).
• Chris Perkins on running combats: "The 4E game system also speeds up round-by-round combat by smoothing out some of the clunky or less-intuitive mechanics. For example, we've made attacks of opportunity dirt-simple by reducing the number of things that provoke AoOs and keeping the list short, intuitive, and free of exceptions. We've also made it so that no single player's turn takes a lot longer than any other player's turn by eliminating things that cause players to stall on their turns (the shapechange spell as currently written is a fine example)."
• Second Wind, a power we've heard about a few times before, used to be a "minor action"; now it's not, although that version does still appear to be a racial power at the very least unavailable to halflings. Which race[s] get it is not mentioned, but humans have been described in fluff text as "resilient", and R&C tells us that dwarves get a second second-wind usage, so this would fit in either of those races.
• Mike Mearls comments on "healing surges":

• WotC's Chris Sims has commented on death and healing in 4E, and the tendency of D&D players to try to define hit points in "real world terms". 
  
  
  Your problem seems to be one of perception and trying to define abstract rules systems in concrete “this is how it looks in the world” terms. That can be difficult, and it always has been with the abstract nature of D&D hit points. With 4e, hit points and healing surges combine abstractly to define the resilience of your character. Like others have said, if you use a healing surge, it’s more like you weren’t hurt as badly as it seemed or you shook off the damage in a heroic manner. If you don’t manage to, you were hurt or at least left in a vulnerable position when it comes to the harm further hits deal. It might be a little hard to imagine in a narrative sense, but that’s not unlike D&D through the ages in any case. It certainly feels cinematic in play—more so if players use it as a roleplaying cue. It also gives each PC some control over his or her condition during combat, forcing no one PC to be the healer. That is, no one has to use all his or her actions to facilitate the fun of others by casting healing spells or using healing skills/abilities. Sure, that good cleric is still a healer, but he’s also a punisher of evildoers!
  
  Oh, and risk of death is still out there. Ask my players, including the one who's rogue went down in the second round of combat while next to creatures that automatically deal damage to you if you stay near them. Players just have a little more control and a few extra options. Tension is actually more fun when you have choices about what to do next. At least it seems that way to me.

• Rules for non-combat encounters. The example given was social interaction. Unlike 3E, where negotiation amounts to a single Diplomacy check, it's treated almost like a combat in 4E.  Ari Marmell's blog -- "Social encounters. For those who don't just want to RP such things without some mechanical impact, the game has rules for non-combat encounters. The example given was social interaction. Unlike 3E, where negotiation amounts to a single Diplomacy check, it's treated almost like a combat in 4E. I make a skill check, but I also tell the DM what/how I'm doing. The opponent responds with behavior (and a check) of his own. I counter with a new check, and new words. And so forth."
• Social interactions: Multiple checks between multiple characters (including back and forth) for a single social interaction, instead of a single roll as now.  Tools for helping DMs manage a social enounter which has suddenly been thrust upon them without warning; the example given is that the players suddenly decide to speak to the mayor, an event for which the DM is not prepared.
• Social interations completely revamped.  Dave Noonan: 

• Skills SPECIFICALLY mentioned (see below for cites):  Acrobatics, History, Streetwise, Religion, Diplomacy, Nature, Intimidation, Insight, Arcana, Perception, Dungeoneering, Thievery, Heal.
• Skill system – familiar but truncated. Getting rid of tailor, rope use, etc. Focus on the skills that are really useful in an encounter. Star Wars Saga Edition is a significant stride forward and should be considered a preview. Same for profession, etc. We want characters making acrobatics, bluff, jump, etc. No characters will be stuck at 10th level saying “oh I never invested in that.” Hide/Move Silent are brought together. Now an important part of your character, and here’s how to apply it to an encounter: "It’s rarely a check and done, it’s now, I make a check, and they react to it. What happens now?" (source).
• D&D 4th Edition skills are not exactly the same as Star Wars Saga Edition skills: "Also remember that we designed the skill system in Saga so that, when you reach 20th level and are fighting the Sith Lord, it makes more sense for you to whip out your lightsaber and have a climactic duel than it does to just use move object to throw him off of one of the many no-handrails walkways that populate the SW universe. Given the lethality of Star Wars weapons (dealing 3d6 damage for a standard blaster pistol) the Jedi also need something to keep them survivable at low-levels while they're out in the fray with no cover and such....Star Wars and D&D are very different animals thematically, and we designed the Star Wars skill system to fit the way Star Wars should play, not the way a generic d20 game should play. I'm not saying there won't be similarities between SWSE's skill system and 4E's, but I doubt you'll see it work exactly the same way."
• Skills are still in the game. There's a better implementation that's "easier and cleaner".
• A character rolls a "critical fail[ure]" on a skill check.
• Blood Road: Roll vs Role is a Dungeon article by Bruce Cordell and Chris Sims, and covers social encounters and vampire lords. The article mentions the following skill checks: History, Streetwise, Religion, Diplomacy, Intimidation, Insight. It's interesting to note that it doesn't say Knowledge (History) or Knowledge (Religion), referring to both just by the subject name.
• Skills mentioned: Arcana, Insight, History, Diplomacy, Dungeoneering.
• From Wizards Presents: Races & Classes:  
• Skill level rises with level. 
• Listen & Spot; Move Silently & Hide; Open Lock and Sleight of Hand is combined. 
• Knowledge (Arcana), Spellcraft and Read Magic is combined to Arcane. 
• Approximately the skill list is cut in half.
• Some uses of a skill, like the avoidance of AoO by Tumble will be tied to feats or class abilities.
• Trapfinding is a feat (rogues have it by default), but others can have it too.
• Two new skill mentions: Thievery and Acrobatics.
• "Feats remain; people like feats... Some 3.5 classes really suffered for not having enough feats."
• Feats still have prerequisites.
• Certain feats require a certain character level, race or skill, but none require a certain class. This makes it easier to expand characters beyond their intended role if desired.
• This Design & Development article is crunch-tastic - it delves into 4th Edition feats. Not only does it talk about the concept of feats as opposed to class powers, it even shows us four feats (with the caveat that they are subject to change) -- Toughness, Alertness, First Reaction, and Golden Wyvern Adept.
• Trapfinding is a feat that rogues get for free, but which other characters can take.
• You can grab some basic class abilities if you want to dabble in another class - a wizard could take the Fighter Training feat, or a rogue could take Wizard Training. These allow you to flavor your class but don't dilute it. 
• Mention of two feats: Toughness, and Ferocious Rebuke which "pushes your enemy back one square after taking a hit".
• Mike Mearls talks about "bad rules", hinting that the Dodge feat may be going away or changing.
• On spot checks and the like, in response to suggestions that the character's check be a static DC rolled by the hider/hidden object in order to not tip him/her off that he/she is making a spot check: "Way ahread of you."
• Dave Noonan on "skill challenges" -- "A little something for the DMG we've variously called "skill challenges," "extended challenges," and "complex challenges." And if we're calling it those three things, you can probably suss out where we're going with the system. The part that excites me is that these rules represent a broadening of what constitutes a fun, engaging encounter. If we pull this off, we'll deliver more variety for the players and some more narrative freedom for the DM when he's wearing his "adventure writer" hat.
  
  And I'm trying like crazy to keep the system simple enough that it'll be improvisable for an intermediate DM. That's a tricky part, to be sure."
• There's a new Confessions of a Full Time Wizard article up. In it is this little bit about the Heal skill in 4e: "Before 4th Edition, a Heal check meant looking down at your shoe to see what the heck you just stepped in. Now it's something I can actually do to help my fellow party members, such as Adam's wee halfing warlock, Atticus. The poor guy was knocked unconscious by a goblin on the high school javelin team. With the roll of a die and some simple addition, Tabitha gave Atticus the ability to use one of his healing reserves. He was back on his feet in no time. At least I think he was on his feet. With a halfling it's kind of hard to tell. I was filled with warm fuzzies from having saved a life, making my resolve even stronger to learn the equivalent of the Heimlich maneuver in the wizard's spellbook."

• At the GenCon Indy Q&A, the question of whether Greyhawk will be the the default world was avoided, however Greyhawk proper names will remain -- "Greyhawk will not be default setting in core. We want to leverage the assets of the assumed parts of a D&D world – Mordenkainen, Bigby, Vecna, Llolth, Tiamat, Asmodeus, etc. However, we also want to call upon the great mythology that is more commonly known such as Thor, etc."
  
• On the default setting: An article, by Rich Baker, has appeared on the official site entitled Points of Light. The article is about the default D&D campaign world, which has previously been cryptically described as "points of light in a dark world." The article certainly descibes such a world -- "Civilized folk live in small, isolated points of light scattered across a big, dark, dangerous world"... "Most of the world is monster-haunted wilderness. The centers of civilization are few and far between, and the world isn’t carved up between nation-states that jealously enforce their borders."
  
  "Another implication of this basic conceit of the world is that there is very little in the way of authority to deal with raiders and marauders, outbreaks of demon worship, rampaging monsters, deadly hauntings, or similar local problems. Settlements afflicted by troubles can only hope for a band of heroes to arrive and set things right. If there is a kingdom beyond the town’s walls, it’s still largely covered by unexplored forest and desolate hills where evil folk gather. The king’s soldiers might do a passable job of keeping the lands within a few miles of his castle free of monsters and bandits, but most of the realm’s outlying towns and villages are on their own."
• Rich Baker clarifies a few things regarding the default "points of light" D&D setting.
  
  We're not actually building a world out of the "core" setting. In a sense, the core setting is simply a collection of proper names, artifacts, and legends we expect many generic D&D games to share. This has always been true to some degree; even back in 1st Edition, just about *every* campaign every DM ran assumed that Corellon Larethian put out Gruumsh's eye, that the drow fought the other elves and were driven underground, that Acererak the lich created a Tomb of Horrors somewhere on the planet, or that the Rod of Seven Parts was lying around someplace waiting to be found.
  
  The big new thing in the "fluff" of 4e D&D is that we're not tethering these names and stories to the world of Greyhawk; we've created a new skeleton of linked assumptions (proper names, artifacts, stories) to anchor the fluff of the "implied" setting. Since we're telling a story that tieflings are the descendants of a ruling elite from a human empire that made pacts with devils, we might as well attach a "placeholder" name to it. Some DMs will use the name Bael Turath; other DMs will make up their own infernal empire. But "Bael Turath" looks nice than "[insert your chosen name here]".
  
  Now, for my own part, I favor the idea of sketching a simple map of that setting and thinking up a name for it. But many of my colleagues feel that doing so would simply replicate the Greyhawk phenomenon, and make it harder for DMs who build their own worlds to use the material we're creating. (So far, I've lost that argument; hey, it happens!) The idea is to create just enough flavor to have interesting proper names and links for DMs to pick up and use, without dictating how their worlds have to go together.
  
  All of that is not really relevant to the Forgotten Realms, of course; the Realms is an example of a specific world that is not beholden to core stories, names, or flavor. So there isn't a Bael Turath in Toril's past... but we do suggest that ancient Narfell might have been the place where tieflings first appeared in Faerun.

• Forgotten Realms will be the first setting released (Forgotten Realms campaign setting: August 2008; Scepter Tower of Spellgard [Forgotten Realms adventure]: September 2008; Forgotten Realms Player's Guide: September 2008.)
• Year of the Ageless One is a new Forgotten Realms article. It sets the year at 1479, and covers The spellplague, the Realms of 1479 DR, The Sword Coast, The Empire of Netheril, Imperial Cormyr, and Tymanther, Land of the Dragon Warriors.
• 'Points of light in a dark world' does NOT refer to existing settings  -- "One quick point of clarification I'd like to make... Don't assume that we're going to apply the 'Points of Light' conceit to existing campaign worlds. I think Realms and Eberron would prosper if they got just a little more points-of-lightish, but we're not going to overthrow worlds with that much breadth and history."
• Ed Greenwood has spoken out about the Forgotten Realms in 4th Edition.  To the question: "But I hope Ed can tell us this much: was this change "his idea"? Or is he along right now mainly to do damage control and try to salvage SOMETHING?", Ed replies:  "Not, it was not my idea... I see the risk Wizards is taking, and sure hope it pays off. Whatever happens, I intend to go on sharing the Realms with gamers and readers for as long as I last. I am hard at work on future Realms goodies now, and am acutely aware of the Border Kingdoms and the unpublished city of Teziir and other things too long neglected."  Click here for the full text of his lengthly answer (Ed's post is the sixth one down, posted under the name "The Hooded One").
• Ed Greenwood working on the 4E FRCS.  He has been hired to write 50,000 words for the book.
• On the FR pantheon: "Yes, we'd like a smaller pantheon in FR. However, that doesn't mean that three-quarters of the deities will kick off. It does mean that we're looking at a lot of marginal deities and asking ourselves, "Could this deity be a demigod--a divine figure who doesn't really have a continent-wide church with dozens of temples devoted to him or her?" For example, we like a lot of the demihuman deities as demigods who hang around with/work for the real heavy hitters like Moradin or Corellon."
• Rich Baker on whether the new core cosmology will be adopted for FR:  "I'm sure this is probably more than I ought to say right now, but yes....Of course, the particular astral dominions that will exist in Faerun's cosmology will correspond to the Realms pantheon. So you'll see Arvandor, House of the Triad, Warrior's Rest, etc., as shaken up by events of the Spellplague (no more Dweomerheart, for example)....Faerie's been touched on several times in Realmslore (for example, Elaine's novels). The Shadowfell and Plane of Shadow are pretty much the same thing. The Inner Planes are getting resorted to the Elemental Chaos, but no one ever went there before anyway, so it should be fine. We've got some details to work out on the interaction of the Fugue Plane with all this, but other than that, the new cosmology is going to be Faerun's cosmology."
• Rich Baker's defence of Realms changes.
• Chris Perkins has a lengthy blog update. He mentions that "the Spellplague is an event that allows us to incorporate 4th Edition elements into the existing scheme of the world" and that "there are things about the Spellplague that we deliberately haven't revealed". He also recommends that people check out the hints in the "Unsolved Mysteries of D&D" article in Dragon #359, and comments on a post where somebody picks up on the hints (the current theory is that this is the post).
• More importantly, he lists ten things you should know about the 4E Forgotten Realms. Check out the blog for the actual text (each of these gets a paragraph or so), but here's the basic message he's putting out:
• It feels like FR but uses 4E mechanics. They're not ignoring canon, rewriting history or blowing up large parts of the setting.
• 4E FR embraces, at least in part, the "points of light" concept.
• In 4E FR, the PCs matter, not the uber-NPCs.
• FR novels will remain part of the FR canon.
• Running 4E adventures doesn't require a masters degree in FR history.
• The pantheon will be smaller.
• Elminster, Drizzt and other NPCs are still part of FR.
• They started writing the Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide in early 2006.
• FR will get lots of support (Insider, official wiki, online tools).
• Various people were involved with 4E FR.
  
• Gamer Radio Zero just put up an interview with Chris Perkins about the 4th Edition Forgotten Realms, here.
• Year of the Ageless One is a new Forgotten Realms article. It sets the year at 1479, and covers The spellplague, the Realms of 1479 DR, The Sword Coast, The Empire of Netheril, Imperial Cormyr, and Tymanther, Land of the Dragon Warriors.
• The latest issue of Kobold Quarterly; its the one with the “red angel”, which might still be “next issue” on the page). Has a long (~4500 word) interview with Ed Greenwood. In addition to confirming that he still has a day job at a public library and talking about the death of Lucifer and sex in the Realms, he also says a little on 4th edition:
  
  
  At the time I’m making this reply, I am somewhat limited in what I can say by the non-disclosure agreements I’ve signed with Wizards of the Coast, and even more limited by what I just don’t know yet.
  
  Since the start of the published Realms, there have been ongoing discussions about its future: events, large and small, that happen in novels and game products that “change” the setting, building its imaginary history (much of which, for those interested, was recently summarized in the Grand History of the Realms tome).
  
  I have usually been involved in those discussions, and for the past few years have been part of meetings and talk leading to something called “the Spellplague,” and what the Realms looks like after its arrival. There’s a lot of buzz among gamers about this right now, and no wonder. Change is always both exciting and upsetting, and those who care deeply about the Realms care deeply about what happens to it. But there is very little useful that I can say, other than these tidbits: in real life, and in any imaginary world trying to seem real, change happens. Constantly.
  
  I can’t tell you a lot of the details of the changes planned for the Realms because many details haven’t been decided yet, and because I’m frantically trying to write three novels first, so I can clear my mental decks and get to work on the new Realms.
  
  Many gamers play the mental “If I ran WotC” game. When I do it, I can say that left to my druthers, I wouldn’t have made any timeshifting changes in the Realms until I’d detailed a lot more of its geographical surface. That includes the other continents, all the gaps around the Heartlands where we have maps but not much else, in-depth noble family histories, legal codes, and religious observances.
  
  However, I don’t run WotC, and it would probably be a running disaster if I tried! I would never finish detailing this little corner and that little corner; the more I paint over and fill in, the harder it gets for new gamers and writers to feel at home to tell new stories.
  
  So my take right now is: wait and see. Must finish novels … must finish novels …

• In this blog entry Bruce Cordell lists the things that have him excited about the upcoming Forgotten Realms Campaign release.
  
  
  One, the art is going to be sick. As in, really good. I just finished compiling the art and map order Friday, and we’ve got some epic pieces planned.
  
  Two, realms forgotten will be forgotten no more, and Ed Greenwood is personally behind that vision; who better? It is awesome.
  
  Three, a lot of lesser-known and well-known regions have seen exciting updates, advancing stories to leave room for new heroes to take up sword and spell and defend the Realms and have fabulous adventures while doing so.
  
  Four, the format for the release is going to be the most useful we've ever utilized for a campaign setting (I may be biased). The campaign book design is both approachable and bursting with directly useful information about Abeir-Toril. What’s more, you can begin running a campaign with the book about ten minutes after you pick it up. Bang, welcome to the Forgotten Realms!

• On the [lack of ] the Blood War:

• Rich Baker talks about evil organizations in the Forgotten Realms here. 
  
  
  Will we still have evil organizations other than the Netherese? Absolutely. Some have changed a lot in 100 years, but you'll still have Red Wizards, Zhents, the Cult of the Dragon, and quite a few others to play with.
  
  Likewise, you'll have some good organizations too. I'm sort of hoping we can successfully "rehabilitate" the Harpers this time around. I think Cloak & Dagger and several novels at the end of 2e really threw them off-course, and I'd like to hope that 100 years is enough time for the organization to get its feet under it again and be the sort of thing many players aspire for their characters to join.
  
  And yeah, genasi are still around. We've got some good stuff planned for 'em.

• Chris Sims talks about some of his work for the Forgotten Realms in this blog post. 
  
  
   “Lands of Faerûn” is the largest chapter in the Campaign Guide. It follows a nice, easy-to-navigate spread format, and almost every area includes an imbedded map of the region. Each entry focuses on places PCs can come from, pass through, and stay in, as well as cool experiences, sites, and plots to fuel DM imagination. It’s really the DM’s guide to Faerûn, and it acknowledges itself as just that.
  
  Its second largest section is dedicated to threats, retaining some old foes, putting a new spin on some recognizable adversaries, and adding a few new ones. Szass Tam still stands as Abeir-Toril’s mightiest necromancer; the Zhents still plot in the shadows, hoping to reclaim lost glory; gibberlings still pour from the Underdark, but the Spellplague changed some of them. Along with these, surviving Halruaans ply a mercenary trade from a floating fortress and their few remaining skyships, and warlocks tied to a mysterious primordial entity rule Vaasa. And these aren’t the half of my work. They don’t even touch on the work Ed Greenwood did in describing the threats in his parts of the world.
  
  The cool thing to me is that the Campaign Guide will be helpful on another level. In designing the threats, I took the approach that my design should supplement Paragon and Epic tiers, since the MM already has a great deal of support for Heroic-tier play. MM monsters are as much FR as they are D&D, and vice versa, so the FR threats can add to any DM’s toolbox. I’d happily use Manshoon’s statistics in my homebrew campaign, along with a lot of ideas for magic and such detailed in the Campaign Guide (and Player’s Guide for that matter). 

• Rich Baker talks about the Spellplague and more;
  
   Q: The Spellplague. Originally describes as a “sickness afflicting magic-users and killing or driving them insane” (or something like that) now seems to be more like “Time of Troubles on steroids”. As MarkusTay already mused on another thread: “[i]What, exactly, is the definition of "The Spellplague"? Its certainly NOT a disease, or even a magical illness, so the word 'plague' is a misnomer. What the Spellplague IS is a 'poetic' descriptor for a period of time (not a tangible 'thing') when Mystra was killed, and the Weave disappeared.”
  
  I might not have struck the right tone in the article. Spellplague isn't just a term for "the second Time of Troubles"; it's an actual phenomenon, a manifestation of magic that often appears as an aura of blue fire. You could bottle up a bit of Spellplague, take it somewhere, and let it go. It's like some sort of nanovirus whose eruptions/outbreaks appeared in many different places over the course of ten years or so, and still continue in a few very unlucky spots.
  
  Q: When Mystra died the last time, how come the Weave didn’t dissolve then, and why did the Spellplague not take place? And if Mystryl was able to “recreate” herself as Mystra -– in an instant –- why did not Mystra do it when Cyric and Shar assaulted Dweomerheart?
  
  Not to give a pat answer here, but I'd simply say that Shar, having observed the deaths of Mystryl and Mystra, realized that she needed to follow a very specific process when she arranged Midnight's murder, or else the goddess of magic would simply re-create herself. So Shar chose a method that hadn't been tried before and prevented such a rebirth.
  
  Q: I may be wrong, but since Mystra died and the Weave “dissolved”, how come not *all* “Epic” or “High Magic” Spells and “Mythal-like Magics” were affected?
  
  I'd say because mythals and such things have a special self-sustaining, "looped" nature. They're described as living magics in many ways. They have a lifeforce (of sorts) all their own, and I'd say that's what sustained them. But I don't know if we've specifically decided that is the reason, I'm just offering some speculation.
  
  Q: Along the same lines –- when the Shadow Weave dissolved, too, why did the Shade not lose their spellcasting abilities or were not driven insane? Why did the City of Shade not crash to ground? Just because it had a “Mythallar”? I point to my previous concern –- wasn’t this Mythallar part of the Weave?
  
  Because the Shadow Weave isn't the Weave, and does not actually rely on the Weave's existence. It's an alternate "interface," and was not directly damaged by Mystra's death. Although I think it's fair to guess that there might have been "blowback" Shar didn't expect, and the Spellplague didn't necessarily respect Shadow Weave users caught in its path.
  
  Q: I also seem to recall that the Weave upholds all life on Toril and all living things are connected to the Weave (I may remember incorrectly, but this might be something Ed has said on Candlekeep?) and if it collapses, *all life* on Toril should *perish*. I’m not sure if I remember correctly, but if I do, is there any particular reason why this should not have happened?
  
  Because total planetary death wouldn't be very useful to us? As far as I know, nothing about Realms says that the Weave *has* to be present for life to exist. If we ever said something like that before, I think we were wrong to do so, or else we've been portraying antimagic zones and dead magic zones all wrong for years.
  
  Q: So why did the Walking Statues go on a “rampage”, if by my logic either Waterdeep should have been *fully* protected *or* the rest of the Sword Coast (BG included) should have been utterly wiped out?
  
  Even if the Spellplague did not directly impinge in the area of ancient wards, powerful individuals driven mad or infected outside such wards sometimes walked into the protected places and then blew stuff up. Or so I would guess. Maybe the "animate the walking statues" idea was the work of a mighty archmage who had a really bad idea before adventurers stopped his plan.
  
  Q: I thought the Dragonborn were *already* introduced into Realmslore in ‘Dragons of Faerûn’ as children of Bahamut and Tiamat?
  
  That's an unfortunate coincidence; when naming the new PC race developed for 4e, our developers settled on the best available name from 3e. The dragonborn from Races of the Dragon introduced in Dragons of Faerun aren't necessarily the dragonborn of 4e.
  
  Q: Were Bards affected by the Spellplague, too? And what are you going to do with them (as FR has traditionally always had many bard NPCs) if there is no Bard class in PHB? And yet –- did the Spellplague affect Sorcerers, Arcane Archers, Bladesingers, Assassins, et al. or just the Wizards?
  
  Any Weave users, I'd say. But don't worry, bards are around in 4e. If they're not in the Player's Handbook we'll have them available soon after online or in another sourcebook. You can assume bards are still around..

• Eberron will remain without major shakeups.
• Although the timeline will be advanced two years: "We are planning to advance the timeline 2 years. As Keith has said, our reasons for doing so are primarily story-driven: We want the opportunity to introduce new villains, to mix things up so that players who know all the secrets of the world have some new things to discover, and to bring the setting in sync with 4E D&D. One of the driving conceits of the setting has been, "If it exists in D&D, it's in Eberron," and since D&D is changing, Eberron will change . . . to some extent.... I don't think that timeline advancement will change the tone of the world. The Treaty of Thronehold will be two years more distant in the past, but the shadow of the Last War will loom just as large over the political landscape—quite possibly more so."
• A note on novels: "No, we're not ever going to make a blanket declaration that all the Eberron novels are canon, as if we could somehow say that you must reflect every novel we publish in your campaign. That said, Keith and I are both actively writing novels, and we both have an interest in having our novels reflect the changes coming down the pike for the world. It would be almost impossible for me to continue working on my trilogy and on Eberron 4E at the same time without some cross-fertilization going on, and I've chatted with Keith a few times about directions he's taking in his current novels to make sure we keep things in line. I meet regularly with folks in our book department to keep on the same page, and they'll be actively involved in the design of Eberron 4E as well. So I hope for more synergy between novels and RPG products, and maybe some articles on D&DI that would help you incorporate stuff from the novels in your game if you want to. But a blanket declaration of canon? No."
• Eberron no longer to be advanced two years!  "Hey Eberron fans... I'm very pleased to be able to take a break from my work on the Player's Handbook to come on the boards today and tell you something I think you'll be happy to hear: We hear you....We've decided that the 4E Eberron Campaign Setting will not advance the timeline of the setting. The campaign starting year will still be 998YK, and we won't present major changes to the setting except as necessary to bring 4E elements into the world."

• Spelljammer/Ravenloft - no specific plans [that they can reveal].

• D&D Insider video preview
• "Meeting Gleemax" video
• A Technical Look at D&D Insider Applications is on the official website. It covers system requirements, the D&D Game Table, the Online Character Generator, the Dungeon Builder, the Encounter Builder, and the Character and Campaign Vaults.
  
• Video: Chris Thomasson, producer of D&D Insider (part 1, part 2)
• This is the "D&D Online" section of Gleemax.
• Pricing is $9.95 per month beginning in 2008.  Free previews are available until then.  Age limit of 12 and up.
• Scott Rouse: "We are looking at many forms of payment that will not require a credit card including paypal."
• It contains a "Dungeon Master's Kit" that includes the following:
  • dungeon builder (map tool)
  • adventure builder
  • PC generator
  • die roller
  • You will be able to choose the colour of your "virtual dice" in the die roller.
  • other things (Source)
  • "D&DI makes Dungeon Mastering easy with ready-to-use maps and stat blocks, a groundbreaking dungeon map builder, instant encounter and adventure builders, libraries of virtual miniatures and virtual dungeon tiles, and online tools to help you create and organize your D&D campaigns."
• "Character Generator" -- "Your character is the most important part of the game. D&DI™ allows you to create a 3D visual representation of your character that you can save and print. Create, update, and save your character sheets and images with a click of the mouse."
  • character sheets
  • character visualizer (Source)
• "My Campaign"
• "My Character" (Source)
• "D&D Game Table" (Source) -- "Can’t get the gaming group together on Saturday night? The D&DI game table allows you to play with friends 24/7, with a special online forum that allows DMs to find players and players to join games on the fly."
• "Dungeon & Dragon Magazines" (Source) -- "D&D Insider is the place to receive news about upcoming releases, errata and rules clarifications, previews of future 4th edition products, exclusive game content, and D&D adventures for all levels of play. Dragon and Dungeon magazines bring you the fun every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday — with collected “issues” at the end of each month."
• On the launch of the digital magazines: "At the end of October, our first pdf issues will be out. We finally have a page layout, which is great. It's also interim/test material. We'll be looking for feedback on everything. We're already working on the 4th Edition versions, which I'm more excited about. What we'll be rolling out in a month is a sort of hybrid in look between 3rd and 4th Edition. Our art director, Stacy, did an awesome job putting it together on short notice. It will be even better when we can fully commit to a 4E look."
• The intention is to provide subscriber services alongside the current free content, although some free content will move over.
  
• Community -- "Get behind-the-scenes glimpses into the making of the D&D game, player rewards for participation in games, and quality time with the R&D team on D&D Insider’s new community forums."
• The whole digital thing is heavily linked in to the physical product line. In Indy 2007, WotC  empasized that they were marrying to two together. D&D books will have a code in them which, when entered into the online service, will provide digital access to that content.  The analogy used was that of a DVD box set - the book is the "movie disk", and the online content is the "extra material disk".
• Additional material is accessible for a "nominal fee".
• GenCon 2007 -- "The digital game table was a large part of the conversation, with screenshots on how you generate a character online using the physical books you own, customize its appearance, and then generate a "virtual miniature" for use in the online game experience. The online game is tool, not a game in itself - a mapping system with battlemaps, generators and so forth, all run by a DM. I saw a few screenshots, showing overhead and isometric views, and virtual miniatures including a PC and a green dragon."
• D&D Insider – DRM, Downloadable vs. view online. "We are still investigating, digital issues will be usable without being connected. Books – You will need to be logged in to use them. Still working out how to make this work for you and for us." (source).
• Will the D&D Insider authors be considered “canon”? "Yes, it is our intention to treat this material as integral to the game and to the campaign worlds." (source).
• Platform compatability? Starting with PC. (source).
• Online D&D games will run on a central server, not user-to-user, so if it goes down you're out of luck.
• Mike Mearls -- "The important thing to keep in mind is that we're not necessarily interested in changing things into completely new things. The core lies in making D&D an even better version of D&D, not some other, new game. I've said this a few times at the con, but we have no interest in turning D&D into a miniatures game, a computer game, a game that requires a laptop at the table, or a boardgame. We want D&D to be D&D."
• Chris Perkins on the role of Gleemax vs. D&D Insider -- "Gleemax provides D&D players with free access to a central repository of fan-created D&D content as well as a social network that includes customizable personal pages, blogs, friends lists, calendars, and more. Gleemax will also allow D&D players to store their characters and campaign notes in “vaults” that can be made public or private by the individual user. Some additional features of the Character Vault and Campaign Vault may be available to D&D Insider subscribers only, but the exact details and features have yet to be determined."
• Virtual miniatures will not be randomized: "There have been many discussions internally on the topic of randomization, and offering the V-minis for the D&D Game Table in randomized boosters is a concept that has gone by the wayside. It was considered, discussed and discarded."
• Scott Rouse on virtual miniatures: "You'll get a basic set of monsters and NPCs as part of you subscription to Insider. You'll be able to make PC based minis with the character creator (and I suppose NPCs within the core races/classes). New sets of monsters will be released that you'll be able to add to your game over time.There will also be tokens you can use on the game table to represent monsters/NPCs."
• 
• The nominal fee to access the electronic version of a book you already own on D&D Insider will be in the region of $1-$2.
• You do not need to be a D&D Insider subscriber to access the elctronic versions of these books. Each individual copy of a book will have a unique code used to access the electornic version.
• The electronic versions [are likely to be] PDF documents which you download to your hard drive. If you also happen to be a D&D Insider subscriber, that code will also automatically update your database for online tool content.
• Also worth checking out is former D&D Brand Manager Charles Ryan's comments on the reasoning behind the nominal fee.
• There's a  page on the official site: 4th Edition Compatibilty. Compatibility with 4th Edition is indicated by use of the D&D Insider Logo (pictured right). In addition, there's a list of already publicized 4E compaitble products over the next few months, along with "Edition-proof" products.

• A bunch of questions answered by WotC's Didier Monin (at various times); questions paraphrased:

• D&D Miniatures Game Starter Set: April 2008 -- "This new starter set for the D&D® Miniatures Game includes everything 2 players need to play, including revised rules that will appeal to experienced players as well as players new to the game. Now anyone can experience an adventure right out of the box with this comprehensive set. Included are:
• 5 exclusive, non-random pre-painted plastic D&D minis, including a new Green Dragon
• Battle map
• d20 die
• Rulebook
• Stat cards and damage counters"
• Dungeons of Dread: April 2008.  Miniatures expansion -- "Battle the D&D game’s most iconic monsters with Dungeons of Dread™, a 60-figure expansion for the D&D Miniatures Game. Creatures are drawn from the pages of the new 4th Edition Monster Manual. Each booster pack contains:
• 8 pre-painted plastic D&D minis, randomized with varying degrees of rarity to enhance collectibility
• Stat cards and damage counters
• Set checklist"

• Scott Rouse -- "We are not excluding Canadians (or other non-USA residents for that matter) as we discuss the plans. The only hitch I can foresee is because testers will be asked to sign a confidentiality agreement I am not sure how it would work with people outside the USA."

• "Playtest packets are coming together. I worked a bit yesterday with our Legal folks on the logistics for the NDAs. Suffice it to say that just as in previous playtests, mum's the word from the testers. They don't even admit that they are playtesters. We R&D guys can talk more of course, and we intend to.
  
  I know a lot of folks are waiting for their chance to contribute. It's coming soon, but any estimate I give could be off by +/- two days. So no promises. If you want to be eligible to contribute, assemble a group of six (DM and five players) people who are cool with NDAs and are reliable enough to show up at your table and participate meaningfully."

• Big News!  No d20 STL for 4E!  D&D Brand Manager Scott Rouse has confiirmed unequivocably that there will be no d20 System Trademark License for 4th edition. "There will be the OGL and Wizards D&D products period. No d20 STL (tiered or otherwise) to be even more clear." Note that the Open Gaming License will still be around (which allows for third party products) - the d20 STL deals with the logo usage only. Scott adds that "We are looking to incorporate some sort of compatibility language within the new version of the OGL. Something like "Compatible with the 4th Edition of the Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying game..."
• WotC has confirmed that the OGL will continue to be supported, and that there will be a 4E SRD.
• When will we see the SRD? "July 2008 at the latest but some publishers will get it early so they can develop products in advance."
• On the d20 STL (System Trademark License - the bit that allows you to use the logo): "There may not be a D20 STL in 4e just the OGL Nothing has been decided with respect to the d20 STL."
• "we (wotc) don't want to be in the position of having to review and approve 3rd party content."
• At GenCon Indy, 2007, WotC held an "emergency d20 publishers panel".  At this meeting, WotC asked publishers how they wanted to see third-party licensing for 4E happen.  At this point, no final decision has been made on how this will work, but there is talk of limiting the availability of licenses in some way in order to prevent the devaluing of the brand (as happened with "d20").
• Scott Rouse: "We had a great discussion and some good ideas were generated especially from Chris Pramas, Erik Mona, Joseph Goodman, and the folks from Adamant Entertainment. We have a few thing to discuss and chew on here and "ll keep you posted. One outcome was we have likely abandoned the idea of a fee based d20 STL."
• The Digital Front Podcast Episode 02 has been released featuring the entire OGL/d20 Panel held by Wizards of the Coast at Gen Con 2007 in audio format: "This panel was held Friday, August 17, at 6:00 pm, immediately after the closing of the Exhibit Hall, meaning a lot of publishers were either not present or arrived late. The panel, hosted by Scott Rouse and Bill Slavicek [sic], was meant to discuss the issue of the OGL and d20 Licenses under the newly-announced 4th Edition D&D, though it was more of a townhall meeting as WotC admitted they did not have a clear idea yet and wanted to hear opinions. The audio file is long, almost an hour and a half, but given the small amount of publishers that made it, we thought it a good idea to distribute the recording as widely as possible."
• D20 gaming system – this is still a d20 game and game system. We got rid of the parts that didn’t help it out, but most of the things that work continue to be used. (source).
• WotC announces plans for 4e SRD and OGL: On January 7th 2008, Wizards of the Coast held a courtesy call with the 3rd party publishers who had expressed close interest in gaining advance access to the 4e rules. Attending the call were:
  
  • Adamant Entertainment
  • EN Publishing
  • Expeditious Retreat Press
  • Fantasy Flight Games
  • Goodman Games
  • Green Ronin Publishing
  • Mongoose Publishing
  • Necromancer Games
  • Paizo Publishing
  • Paradigm Concepts
  • Privateer Press
    
  On the line for WotC were Scott Rouse, Linae Foster (Licensing Manager), Sara Girard, Andy Collins, Bill Slavicsek, and Chris Perkins.
  
  Their formal announcement can be found here, but here's what we learned from the call.
  
  4e publisher support will be released in two phases.
  
  Phase One is for publishers who want access to the 4e rules early. Taking a lesson from software publishers, WotC will be making available an OGL Designers Kit. This gives early access to rules and is offered to any publisher, not just the ones on the conference call. Access to the kit requires a legitimate business license, a signed NDA, and a one-time $5000 fee.
  
  This kit will be available within a matter of weeks, as soon as several legal logistics are complete. It provides three hardcopy pre-publication versions of the three core rule books, copies of the OGL and SRD, and a FAQ. Publishers will continue to receive updates to these rules as changes are made, one in the beginning of February and possibly one in March. Publishers will also receive advance copies of the final rule books. Importantly, publishers who purchase the kit may begin selling product on August 1, 2008 – earlier than other publishers.
  
  Phase Two is free and begins on June 6th, when the OGL goes live. Any publisher can then produce D&D supplements under the OGL, but these cannot be published until January 1, 2009.
  
  Effectively, this means that publishers who pony up the $5000 fee get four months of advance production time for their products, can sell their products at GenCon and Christmas without a whole lot of competition, and have a five month grace period when theirs are the only 4e products available. Publishers who choose not to pay the fee will enter the market at a later date.
  
  I took notes during the Question and Answer portion of the call, and the following Q&A comes from my notes. In some cases the information is paraphrased instead of an exact quote.
  
  1. What's the current status of the core rules?
  
  
  The Players Handbook heads to typesetting on Wednesday. The Monster Manual heads off at the end of January, and the Dungeon Masters Guide in the middle of February. Additional changes and corrections will continue to be made in the galley through the end of March, but the rules are largely complete. Lots of playtester feedback, both internal and external, has been incorporated.
  
  
  2. Tell us about the 4e OGL and SRD.
  
  
  The 4e OGL will contain some aspects of the old d20 license, and is more restrictive in some areas than the prior Open Gaming License. We are tying the OGL more closely to D&D. There is a free registration process, a community standards clause, enforceability clauses, and no expiration date. Phase One publishers who sign a NDA will have the opportunity to read the OGL before they pay the $5000 early licensing fee.
  
  The 4th edition SRD will be much more of a reference document than the 3e SRD. The current edition contains almost all of the rules and allows “copy and paste” publishing. WotC would prefer to see 3rd party publishers to use their creativity and talent instead of reformatting or slightly changing pre-existing rules. As such, the 4e SRD will contain more guidelines and pointers, and less straightforward rules repetition.
  
  The community standards clause will follow the same spirit as the current version. It will lay out in broad brushstrokes what’s appropriate and what isn’t in a D&D-compatible product. If publishers have any questions, they’re always welcome to ask WotC about specifics. This clause applies to content, and wouldn’t apply to (say) a shoddy or ugly cover. (Note that this is a rare occurrence anyways; according to Scott Rouse, there has only been one case in the last two years where the community standards clause came into effect, and that was amicably resolved.)
  
  In any case, material that’s open under the 3.5 OGL remains open, and there will be no language in the 4e OGL to restrict 3.0 or 3.5 products.
  
  
  3. How will publishers indicate 4e compatibility with D&D?
  
  
  There will be no front-cover logo. There will be specific compatibility language that indicates a book is “compatible with 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons,” or something similar. There will also be verbiage to be included in the book that includes an official “visual statement” linking the product to D&D.
  
  WotC will work to educate distributors and the market about D&D-compatible products, but expects publishers to help educate consumers as well.
  
  
  4. Will subsequent core releases be promptly added to the SRD?
  
  
  Subsequent content will be added when it is Open Source.
  (In my opinion, Scott Rouse sounded a little abashed when he added that subsequent rules would be added more promptly than 3rd edition rules were. That's probably a good sign for publishers who want to utilize rules and monsters from subsequent releases.)
  
  
  5. Under Phase One, how are rules distributed to freelancers?
  
  
  A company’s NDA covers their agents and contractors. As such, any freelancer for a publisher is legally bound by their NDA. The pre-release rules will be three copies of a physical document (although WotC is flexible on the quantity, and may provide more copies if necessary.) Companies working together as partners only pay one fee.
  
  
  6. Can 3rd party publishers get involved with Gleemax or DDI?
  
  
  Publishers are welcome to have a product support page in Gleemax. At this stage, plans to integrate 3rd party publisher support in the DDI have not reached beyond the discussion phase.
  
  
  7. With the OGL tied more closely to D&D, how would that impact the future impact of games like Spycraft or Mutants and Masterminds – games that in 3e used the core d20 concept but diverged radically from D&D?
  
  
  The new version of the OGL isn’t as open-ended as the current version. Any 4e OGL product must use the 4e PHB as the basis of their game. If they can’t use the core rule books, it won’t be possible to create the game under this particular version of the OGL.
  
  Future versions of the OGL, including a 4e d20 Modern version, may make certain games possible where they weren’t before.
  
  
  8. Does the NDA prevent publishers from announcing that they are participating in Phase One?
  
  
  Absolutely not. They’re free to promote their involvement.
  
  
  9. Will the Phase One program make subsequent releases (the PHB 2, for instance) available to publishers more quickly?
  
  
  No, it won't. The program only applies to the games’ launch and the first three core books. However, we will likely allow Phase One developers to distribute free 4e material on Free RPG Day, and to show (but not sell) sample books at Origins.
  
  
  10. Who's the contact person for publishers interested in Phase One?
  
  
  Linae Foster (linae dot foster at wizards dot com) is WotC’s contact person for purchasing or learning more about the OGL Developers Kit.
  
  
  
• On the WotC forums someone asked "Will you be able to use the SRD to play the game?" Andy Collins replied: "The SRD will not be a replacement for the Player's Handbook."
• After someone asked for clarification Scott Rouse chimed in: "To elaborate on what Andy said: The 4e SRD will be a "reference document" for publishers working under the 4e OGL to know what content can be used in their own products. It will reference sections and passages from 4e D&D books and will also contain table/formating guidelines like the monster stat block to allow for consistency among products. It will not be a stripped down core rulebook (PHB) that largely allows you to play D&D."

• I asked WotC's Linae Foster a couple of questions regarding the recent announcement concerning the OGL. Here were her replies:
  
  You mentioned that companies working as a partnership need only purchase a single Dev Kit. Does this apply only to to existing partnerships, or would partnerships created for that purpose be valid?
  
  Existing and new partnerships will be honored. However, we are only supplying three copies of the Kit to each Phase One purchaser. All copies will be printed on copy-proof paper and clearly marked with the recipient's company name. We are willing to make exceptions to the three copies rule. The key word being "exceptions."
  
  A few people have raised the concern that the cost of the Dev Kit means that a significant number of smaller publishers will find it necessary to continue to publish 3.x products in order to keep trading. Are there any concerns at WotC that this will prolong a secondary market for a continually supported 3.x system and possibly delay player upgrade to 4E in some cases?
  
  We feel our 4e products, and those published by Phase One third party publishers, will be compelling enough to bring players into Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition.
  
  What is in store for the 3.x d20 STL? We know that the 3.x OGL cannot be revoked; is there any intention to revoke the 3.x d20 STL, or will companies still be free to produce 3.x products bearing the d20 logo under that license?
  
  We have no intention of revoking the 3.x d20 STL.
  
  The question regards the requirement of a business license; how is this resolved for companies outside the US? Do you require such companies to register for and obtain a business license in the US, if there is no equivalent?
  
  I'm still waiting for confirmation from WotC legal. We are working to find a solution.
  
  Linae also mentioned that a video interview being put together will cover these and more questions, and that it is also worthwhile keeping an eye on her Gleemax blog for information.

• Tome of Horrors -- "A Tome of Horrors at or near launch is an obvious move. And we are already working on it."
• Judges' Guild: Tegal Manor --"Tegel is now 4E. Sorry guys." What's Tegal Manor? "Tegel Manor, originally published in 1977, was the first published fantasy adventure module to deal with the haunted house format. It has entered adventure game legend as one of the classic adventures of the early days of gaming."
• Other stuff -- "We have two other cool products in the works--a Hyboria-style setting and adventure path type product and one set in a setting so cool you will wonder why no one ever has done it like this. cant tell more right now."
• A freebie product -- "And there ABSOLUTELY will be a Wizard's Amulet-like freebie from us for 4E." Necromancer were, I believe, the first third-party company to release 3rd Edition material in the form of their free Wizard's Amulet adventure.
• The freebie will be called Winter's Tomb: "Hopefully Winter's Tomb can be a similar gateway to 4E. We plan to provide the same stuff--pregens and a story hook all in a package that you can print and run within 15 minutes. To me, that first night should be immersive right away. You want to pass out pregens and start playing right away. Heck, if you want to run your own campaign later, great; or make your own characters later, great. But lets get playing NOW!!!"
• Necromancer's Clark Peterson:    
  
  
   Look for a new freebie adventure from us a la Wizard's Amulet that you can download from the Necro website at the very first second that we are legally allowed to for 4E.
  
  It's called Winter's Tomb. I am writing it. It will be a kick off for 1st level characters that will include pregens and tips for running 4E adventures. It will be alot like Wizard's Amulet in that it will be ready to run right out of the box with some step by step tips for new DMs and everything. Like WA did with Crucible of Freya, etc., Winter's Tomb will tie into some upcoming products from Necro.
  
  It will be awesome.
  
  It will harken back to some classic adventures. It even steals a trick from the Hidden Shrine of Tomoachan, if you can believe it. Since Erik and I both feel a strong need to keep "our" D&D strongly tied to the traditions and references of the past versions of D&D and the shared history.
  
  A land where the elements collide.
  A frozen setting in a snowy mountain range.
  A battle with gnolls and frost hyenas.
  A cave in forces the characters to find a way out or perish.
  An ancient tomb of an unknown hero.
  An evil-looking magical weapon--a barbed glaive.
  An apparation with a strange message.
  An iron key.
  A return to the cavern-city of Tharza with more questions than answers.

• In this post and this thread, Clark Peterson discusses the plans Necromancer Games has for 4E.
  
  
  Necromancer Games is IN, most likely in conjunction with Paizo. We will have products for GenCon or shortly thereafter.
  
  Products include:
  
  1. Tome of Horrors 4E: if WotC leaves monsters out of the offial rules, we will put them back in (cant say which ones cause we dont have the rules yet). Plus all the classics from the original Tome that you want in your 4E game will be back.
  
  2. Advanced Player's Guide: Designed in part by industry insider Ari Marmell, if they left classes and races out, we put them back in (Of course, we can't say if bards or druids or barbarians or gnomes or half-orc are or arent in 4th edition, but we know some stuff has been cut, and whatever is missing we will create for you with work by respected designer Ari Marmell.)
  
  3. Tegel Manor. A 4E version of the 1E Judges Guild classic.
  
  4. Winter's Tomb. A free, downloadable PDF along the lines of Wizard's Amulet, Necro's Ennie-winning introductory adventure, that will help jump start your 4E campaign.
  
  Winter's Tomb will be available at the first day 4E products can be released. Tome 4E should be available at GenCon with the Advanced Player's Guide. Tegel is also targeted for GenCon. Dates could slip pending WotC's delivery of the design kits.

• The 3.5 Rules Compendium will be something of a last hurrah for 3e, "A celebration and compilation" (Bill Slavicsek). The book will feature an encyclopedia-like layout and have designer commentaries on why the rules were structured are the way they are.
• Many of the products between now and may will have 4E material for them on D&D Insider
• Elder Evils was discussed. It is a compilation of mini adventures structured around famous super monsters that aren't quite god level in power such as Kezef Chaos Hound and Dendar the Night Serpent.
• Some new monsters from the 4E Monster Manual will debut in D&D miniatures in November
• Books that are being put out between now and May will be of an "edition proof" nature.
• Dungeon Survival Guide was discussed. It will be a pictorial tabletop / coffeetop book that takes you through famous dungeons in D&D including the Tomb of Horrors and the original Castle Ravenloft.
• Innfighting was announced - it is a non collectabale dice game designed by Rob Heisno. It is to dice what Three Dragon Ante was to cards.
• In the Forgotten Realms A Grand History of the Realms will be released as a book. This is an adaptation of the web release of the same name with new art and additional entries from authors including Ed Greenwood and Eric Boyd.
• The Desert of Desolation miniatures set slated for November may appear at first glance to be just a D&D Miniatures item. But it's more than that - it's one of the pre-4th Edition releases which serve to preview 4E:
  

  Desert of Desolation also provides a look at some of the concept art we've been developing for use in the new Dungeons & Dragons game. While most of the monsters (and minis) you're used to from earlier products will look pretty much the same, 4th edition provided us an opportunity to revisit a few of the monsters and re-envision them with a different look.

  In addition, all but one of the miniatures in this set will appear in the 4th Edition Monster Manual.

• Scott Rouse on releases prior to 4E:

• On the brazilian forum RegeRPG, Douglas Ricardo Guimarães, one of the heads of Devir Publishing (who has the WotC publishing rights in Brazil), posted this reagrding Brazilian releases of 4E related materials [roughly translated]: "We have to wait to analyze the Races & Classes and Monsters & Worlds before we can define if they will be published [in Brazil]." Also, regarding the product covers in Brazil, he said: "The Player Handbook cover has changed. It’s not the same cover from the preview, but the artist is the same." Thanks to Rafael Rocha for the scoop. [Bruno Cobbi informs that the correct translation is "...before we can define WHEN they will be published..."].
• Ciro Alessandro Sacco says that "According to the publisher, the Italian edition should be out in the same time the English language edition appears (assuming the books will be completed by designers in due time...)"
• Ciro Alessandro Sacco reports on Italian language editions of Star Wars Saga Edition and D&D 4th Edition:
  
  
  1) According to reliable sources, there will be an Italian edition of the new version of the Star Wars RPG due at the end of October, during the big (85,000 attendees in 2006!) Lucca Comics & Games convention.
  
  2) It seems that the new D&D 4th Edition Gleemax area will be multilingual and that Italian could be one the first (if not the very first) non English languages used for it.
  
  3) Wyzard's Quest, a new Italian RPG magazine in print form, will have a 4th Edition feature in its second issue (due next week [week starting 24 Sep]."