Hello everyone, Darryl here with this week’s gaming news! More Shadowrun 6th Ed news, a sneak peek at Ghosts of Saltmarsh, Bethesda allegedly plagiarizes Adventure League module, Paizo crowdfunding a 5e book, and so much more I had to do a rapid-fire round!
Following last week’s announcement of Shadowrun Sixth Edition due out this summer, Catalyst Game Labs has been busy with more announcements including the full product line for the Sixth Edition launch. The Shadowrun Sixth World Beginner Box will be out this June with a retail price of $24.99. If you’re curious what’s in the box, I did an unboxing video for my YouTube channel yesterday. Also due out in June for $34.99 is the Neo-Anarchist Streetpedia, a 128-page reference book for the Sixth World with entries written in-universe on pretty much anything in the setting you might want to learn about, from major NPCs to corporations to gangs to countries to cities and more for anyone who might feel a bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of lore in Shadowrun.
The media and entertainment sourcebook No Future is due in July for $49.99. “But Darryl, didn’t you write about that book a while back?” Yes, there was a digital release on Drive Thru for No Future for Shadowrun Fifth Edition, but a printing delay meant that the physical copy has been updated to Sixth Edition rules and the PDF will receive an update when the physical edition ships. Also, the physical release has a great gimmick in that it’s shipped with a slipcover that adds an Augmented Reality overlay to the cover, so the cover of the book is reality but the slipcover is the digital landscape laid on top of it for most people.
Anyway, Shadowrun Sixth World, the sixth edition core rulebook, will release in August for $49.99 with a limited edition for $99.99 and executive edition for $199.99. Also coming in August and all with a retail price of $19.99 are Rogues Gallery, a deck of cards featuring NPC stats, Dice & Edge Tokens which are dice designed for use in Shadowrun and tokens for use in the new Edge System, and the Prime Runner Miniatures, a set of unpainted miniatures featuring an elf shaman, human decker, ork street samurai, dwarf rigger, and troll weapons specialist. The Gamemaster Screen will be uniquely designed for the system with several card pouches on both sides so it can be customized on the fly with reference charts, NPC or gear cards, and more along with a reputation tracker for different factions in the world. Finally comes the two big plot books, Cutting Black for $49.99 in September which will be a sourcebook following the metaplot events of 2080 and 30 Nights in October for $39.99, an adventure path (usable individually or as a campaign) during a 30-night long blackout in Toronto.
Game designer and blogger Enrique Bertran (better known as NewbieDM) got his hands on a copy of Ghosts of Saltmarsh and did a very long Twitter thread on the upcoming Dungeons & Dragons adventure. Probably the biggest revelation from the thread: This is officially and firmly set in Greyhawk. This makes the fifth setting for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition now, following Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Eberron, and Magic: The Gathering’s Ravnica. There’s also a sidebar with advice on transplanting the adventures to other settings, including Forgotten Realms, Eberron, and…Mystara? That’s interesting… NewbieDM also has previews of some of the new backgrounds like the Smuggler, the new nautical combat rules, ships, random encounter generators for islands, and a lot more including answering some questions about the module. The adventure is due out May 21 and is available for pre-order.
Bethesda Netherlands pulled a promotional download for a tabletop scenario set in the Elder Scrolls world following allegations the adventure was plagiarized from a 2016 Adventure League adventure. Originally posted on May 7 on official social media accounts for Elder Scrolls Online, the download included PDFs of several pre-generated 5e player characters and an adventure to promote the new Elswyer expansion for the MMO. Several similarities between the module and DDAL05-02 The Black Road from the D&D Adventure League program were quickly noticed. Several passages were only barely modified while others copied word-for-word and even a key NPC had the exact same name. Bethesda pulled the downloads as reports began hitting media outlets including EN World and stated that they are “investigating”. This is the second major attempt at marketing off Dungeons & Dragons that has gone poorly for mainstream companies, following Old Spice’s attempt to make a Gentleman class last year that ran afoul of several OGL violations before being adapted to Pathfinder with help from Paizo.
Speaking of Paizo, Hell may have officially frozen over as the Kingmaker 10th anniversary crowdfunding effort includes material for 5th Edition. The crowdfunding campaign is on GameonTabletop.com and is for a Pathfinder 2nd Edition update to the Kingmaker Adventure Path clocking it at a massive 576 page. There are also books available for Pathfinder 1st Edition and a companion guide, but the biggest shock was the Kingmaker Bestiary for 5e. Yes, that 5e. Though Wizards of the Coast tends to refer to it as “the world’s greatest roleplaying game” when not wanting to use the trademark Dungeons & Dragons, but Paizo calls it “the world’s oldest roleplaying game” because they’re still Paizo. The Bestiary will include 140 monsters and NPCs from the adventure path, making it possible to play the adventure in 5e with only a little more modification to things like skill checks. The campaign is unlocking stretch go—err, I mean “level ups” until Wednesday, May 22.
Gen Con has grown rapidly to the point that attending the world’s largest* gaming convention (or second-largest, depending on how you count attendees between it and Essen-Spiel) requires planning a pretty much full year in advance with securing a hotel room becoming almost a roulette (with just as much odds of winning). For those who can’t attend, Gen Con has a brand new program called Pop-Up Gen Con starting with this year’s convention. The initiative in partnership with Alliance Distribution will allow local hobby game stores to have access to pre-release products launched at Gen Con along with demos of new and upcoming products. From the press release:
“We’re excited to bring the Gen Con experience to more tabletop gaming fans than ever before through our new Pop-Up Gen Con program,” said Gen Con President David Hoppe. “Local game stores that combine community space with traditional retail are the heart of the hobby, and we’re proud to be a part of that by connecting with gamers nationwide.”
In partnership with Alliance Game Distributors, the pilot-year program will deliver pre-release copies of new games from major publishers to participating stores, giving Pop-Up Gen Con attendees the opportunity to play and pre-order convention-release games before they hit the market.
“As a leader in the hobby game business, we are excited to be working with the clear leader on the hobby game convention circuit,” said Mike Webb, VP of Marketing for Alliance Game Distributors. “The opportunity to bring a slice of the excitement of Gen Con to Friendly Local Game Stores around the country is a dream come true.”
In the pilot year of the Pop-Up Gen Con program, activations will occur at approximately 40 game stores across the United States. In-store experiences will offer space to play pre-release copies of the featured games, and video content will be streamed live from the Indiana Convention Center.
More details will be announced on the Gen Con website as we get closer to the August 1-4 event in Indianapolis (and now, a game store near you).
There’s been a lot of big news this week, so I’m going to rush through a few stories that may have fallen through the cracks:
Original Traveller creator Marc Miller is Kickstarting a reprint of Traveller 5th Edition separated into their three iconic core rulebooks.
British creator Zatnikotel posted over one million square feet worth of battlemaps, available in 50x50 sections for a total of 16 interconnected maps, all available for free and ready for use in virtual tabletops.
A preview has been released for the Scarred Lands Creature Collection for 5e. The Creature Collection has a unique place in gaming history as it was one of the first major OGL products released and, because of a staggered core rulebook release for Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition, it was the first “monster manual” released for 3.0e, beating out the official Monster Manual by almost a full month.
Modiphius released a 43-page preview of the new Unity RPG, created by Zansara Studios. This grim fantasy world with hints of magitech came out last year and the core rulebook is currently available on Drive Thru.
WizKids announced a new expansion for HeroClix as part of their licensing deal with WWE. Yes, WWE wrestlers as HeroClix.
Pre-orders are open for the licensed Labyrinth storytelling roleplaying game. The game will include a 280+ core rulebook including random generation of a labyrinth unique for each playthrough and a pair of custom six-sided dice.
Designer Owen K.C. Stephens posted a blog about the design choices made for the Starfinder Beginner Box and how they narrowed down a 500+ page core rules down to a pair of 96-page booklets including examples for starting players. The Starfinder Beginner Box is available now.
The new edition of Cyberpunk has a name and release date. Due out on August 1, 2019, we’ll get Cyberpunk Red, the fourth edition of the Cyberpunk roleplaying game. This new edition will take place in the 2040s era as a stepping-stone between the tabletop game and the forthcoming Cyberpunk 2077 video game from CDProjektRed. The title reportedly has no relation to the video game licensor.
Remember when I mentioned a while back that Hasbro was creating theme parks based on their licensed properties including Magic: The Gathering? They’ve announced the location for the first water park: Malaysia. So that means a road trip is out of the question for me at least.
Humble has a new bundle specifically for those looking to up their writing game with the Write Like a Writer Bundle. The bundle features books on screenwriting, novel writing, non-fiction writing, and more including books specifically for fantasy, science-fiction, comedy, and more plus inspirational books and guides on how to get published. This bundle benefits the National Coalition Against Censorship and First Book and it runs until Wednesday, May 22.
The tournament fighter inspired RPG Fight! is Kickstarting its second edition. Based on classic 2D and 3D fighting games, Fight! brings elements of science fiction and fantasy together with martial arts action inspired by classic video games like Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Tekken, and others. The PDF is available for a $15 pledge, and you can add the at-cost softcover for $20 or hardcover for $30 (with the hardcover available in both black-and-white or color at an increased at-cost price). This Kickstarter is just a couple hundred dollars short of its $11,000 goal at the time of writing but has until Thursday, May 16 to make its goal.
I’m sure you’ve heard of Odyssey of the Dragonlords by now, the 5e setting from former BioWare designers James Ohlen, Jesse Sky, and Drew Karpyshyn. This Greek-inspired epic-scale setting I detailed in a 280-page full-color hardback with new monsters, magic items, NPCs, and a brand new epic path system for player characters. A $25 pledge gets you the PDF version of the campaign setting and player’s guide, while a $60 pledge gets you the campaign setting in hardback and player’s guide in softcover. This Kickstarter is almost to $300,000 so it’s fully funded and has until Thursday, May 16 to unlock the last few stretch goals.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.com, and you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitch to see more of Thela Iwidia, Chiss Jedi Knight in Star Wars: The Old Republic, follow me on Twitter where I’ll be talking more about Shadowrun Sixth Edition and Bad Religion (since they have a new album out), subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube featuring videos on gaming history (such as my recent video on the history of Dragonlance), RPG reviews, and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
Following last week’s announcement of Shadowrun Sixth Edition due out this summer, Catalyst Game Labs has been busy with more announcements including the full product line for the Sixth Edition launch. The Shadowrun Sixth World Beginner Box will be out this June with a retail price of $24.99. If you’re curious what’s in the box, I did an unboxing video for my YouTube channel yesterday. Also due out in June for $34.99 is the Neo-Anarchist Streetpedia, a 128-page reference book for the Sixth World with entries written in-universe on pretty much anything in the setting you might want to learn about, from major NPCs to corporations to gangs to countries to cities and more for anyone who might feel a bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of lore in Shadowrun.
[video=youtube;5__GmIlgZ6A]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5__GmIlgZ6A[/video]
The media and entertainment sourcebook No Future is due in July for $49.99. “But Darryl, didn’t you write about that book a while back?” Yes, there was a digital release on Drive Thru for No Future for Shadowrun Fifth Edition, but a printing delay meant that the physical copy has been updated to Sixth Edition rules and the PDF will receive an update when the physical edition ships. Also, the physical release has a great gimmick in that it’s shipped with a slipcover that adds an Augmented Reality overlay to the cover, so the cover of the book is reality but the slipcover is the digital landscape laid on top of it for most people.
Anyway, Shadowrun Sixth World, the sixth edition core rulebook, will release in August for $49.99 with a limited edition for $99.99 and executive edition for $199.99. Also coming in August and all with a retail price of $19.99 are Rogues Gallery, a deck of cards featuring NPC stats, Dice & Edge Tokens which are dice designed for use in Shadowrun and tokens for use in the new Edge System, and the Prime Runner Miniatures, a set of unpainted miniatures featuring an elf shaman, human decker, ork street samurai, dwarf rigger, and troll weapons specialist. The Gamemaster Screen will be uniquely designed for the system with several card pouches on both sides so it can be customized on the fly with reference charts, NPC or gear cards, and more along with a reputation tracker for different factions in the world. Finally comes the two big plot books, Cutting Black for $49.99 in September which will be a sourcebook following the metaplot events of 2080 and 30 Nights in October for $39.99, an adventure path (usable individually or as a campaign) during a 30-night long blackout in Toronto.
Game designer and blogger Enrique Bertran (better known as NewbieDM) got his hands on a copy of Ghosts of Saltmarsh and did a very long Twitter thread on the upcoming Dungeons & Dragons adventure. Probably the biggest revelation from the thread: This is officially and firmly set in Greyhawk. This makes the fifth setting for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition now, following Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Eberron, and Magic: The Gathering’s Ravnica. There’s also a sidebar with advice on transplanting the adventures to other settings, including Forgotten Realms, Eberron, and…Mystara? That’s interesting… NewbieDM also has previews of some of the new backgrounds like the Smuggler, the new nautical combat rules, ships, random encounter generators for islands, and a lot more including answering some questions about the module. The adventure is due out May 21 and is available for pre-order.
Bethesda Netherlands pulled a promotional download for a tabletop scenario set in the Elder Scrolls world following allegations the adventure was plagiarized from a 2016 Adventure League adventure. Originally posted on May 7 on official social media accounts for Elder Scrolls Online, the download included PDFs of several pre-generated 5e player characters and an adventure to promote the new Elswyer expansion for the MMO. Several similarities between the module and DDAL05-02 The Black Road from the D&D Adventure League program were quickly noticed. Several passages were only barely modified while others copied word-for-word and even a key NPC had the exact same name. Bethesda pulled the downloads as reports began hitting media outlets including EN World and stated that they are “investigating”. This is the second major attempt at marketing off Dungeons & Dragons that has gone poorly for mainstream companies, following Old Spice’s attempt to make a Gentleman class last year that ran afoul of several OGL violations before being adapted to Pathfinder with help from Paizo.
Speaking of Paizo, Hell may have officially frozen over as the Kingmaker 10th anniversary crowdfunding effort includes material for 5th Edition. The crowdfunding campaign is on GameonTabletop.com and is for a Pathfinder 2nd Edition update to the Kingmaker Adventure Path clocking it at a massive 576 page. There are also books available for Pathfinder 1st Edition and a companion guide, but the biggest shock was the Kingmaker Bestiary for 5e. Yes, that 5e. Though Wizards of the Coast tends to refer to it as “the world’s greatest roleplaying game” when not wanting to use the trademark Dungeons & Dragons, but Paizo calls it “the world’s oldest roleplaying game” because they’re still Paizo. The Bestiary will include 140 monsters and NPCs from the adventure path, making it possible to play the adventure in 5e with only a little more modification to things like skill checks. The campaign is unlocking stretch go—err, I mean “level ups” until Wednesday, May 22.
Gen Con has grown rapidly to the point that attending the world’s largest* gaming convention (or second-largest, depending on how you count attendees between it and Essen-Spiel) requires planning a pretty much full year in advance with securing a hotel room becoming almost a roulette (with just as much odds of winning). For those who can’t attend, Gen Con has a brand new program called Pop-Up Gen Con starting with this year’s convention. The initiative in partnership with Alliance Distribution will allow local hobby game stores to have access to pre-release products launched at Gen Con along with demos of new and upcoming products. From the press release:
“We’re excited to bring the Gen Con experience to more tabletop gaming fans than ever before through our new Pop-Up Gen Con program,” said Gen Con President David Hoppe. “Local game stores that combine community space with traditional retail are the heart of the hobby, and we’re proud to be a part of that by connecting with gamers nationwide.”
In partnership with Alliance Game Distributors, the pilot-year program will deliver pre-release copies of new games from major publishers to participating stores, giving Pop-Up Gen Con attendees the opportunity to play and pre-order convention-release games before they hit the market.
“As a leader in the hobby game business, we are excited to be working with the clear leader on the hobby game convention circuit,” said Mike Webb, VP of Marketing for Alliance Game Distributors. “The opportunity to bring a slice of the excitement of Gen Con to Friendly Local Game Stores around the country is a dream come true.”
In the pilot year of the Pop-Up Gen Con program, activations will occur at approximately 40 game stores across the United States. In-store experiences will offer space to play pre-release copies of the featured games, and video content will be streamed live from the Indiana Convention Center.
There’s been a lot of big news this week, so I’m going to rush through a few stories that may have fallen through the cracks:
Original Traveller creator Marc Miller is Kickstarting a reprint of Traveller 5th Edition separated into their three iconic core rulebooks.
British creator Zatnikotel posted over one million square feet worth of battlemaps, available in 50x50 sections for a total of 16 interconnected maps, all available for free and ready for use in virtual tabletops.
A preview has been released for the Scarred Lands Creature Collection for 5e. The Creature Collection has a unique place in gaming history as it was one of the first major OGL products released and, because of a staggered core rulebook release for Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition, it was the first “monster manual” released for 3.0e, beating out the official Monster Manual by almost a full month.
Modiphius released a 43-page preview of the new Unity RPG, created by Zansara Studios. This grim fantasy world with hints of magitech came out last year and the core rulebook is currently available on Drive Thru.
WizKids announced a new expansion for HeroClix as part of their licensing deal with WWE. Yes, WWE wrestlers as HeroClix.
Pre-orders are open for the licensed Labyrinth storytelling roleplaying game. The game will include a 280+ core rulebook including random generation of a labyrinth unique for each playthrough and a pair of custom six-sided dice.
Designer Owen K.C. Stephens posted a blog about the design choices made for the Starfinder Beginner Box and how they narrowed down a 500+ page core rules down to a pair of 96-page booklets including examples for starting players. The Starfinder Beginner Box is available now.
The new edition of Cyberpunk has a name and release date. Due out on August 1, 2019, we’ll get Cyberpunk Red, the fourth edition of the Cyberpunk roleplaying game. This new edition will take place in the 2040s era as a stepping-stone between the tabletop game and the forthcoming Cyberpunk 2077 video game from CDProjektRed. The title reportedly has no relation to the video game licensor.
Remember when I mentioned a while back that Hasbro was creating theme parks based on their licensed properties including Magic: The Gathering? They’ve announced the location for the first water park: Malaysia. So that means a road trip is out of the question for me at least.
Humble has a new bundle specifically for those looking to up their writing game with the Write Like a Writer Bundle. The bundle features books on screenwriting, novel writing, non-fiction writing, and more including books specifically for fantasy, science-fiction, comedy, and more plus inspirational books and guides on how to get published. This bundle benefits the National Coalition Against Censorship and First Book and it runs until Wednesday, May 22.
The tournament fighter inspired RPG Fight! is Kickstarting its second edition. Based on classic 2D and 3D fighting games, Fight! brings elements of science fiction and fantasy together with martial arts action inspired by classic video games like Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Tekken, and others. The PDF is available for a $15 pledge, and you can add the at-cost softcover for $20 or hardcover for $30 (with the hardcover available in both black-and-white or color at an increased at-cost price). This Kickstarter is just a couple hundred dollars short of its $11,000 goal at the time of writing but has until Thursday, May 16 to make its goal.
I’m sure you’ve heard of Odyssey of the Dragonlords by now, the 5e setting from former BioWare designers James Ohlen, Jesse Sky, and Drew Karpyshyn. This Greek-inspired epic-scale setting I detailed in a 280-page full-color hardback with new monsters, magic items, NPCs, and a brand new epic path system for player characters. A $25 pledge gets you the PDF version of the campaign setting and player’s guide, while a $60 pledge gets you the campaign setting in hardback and player’s guide in softcover. This Kickstarter is almost to $300,000 so it’s fully funded and has until Thursday, May 16 to unlock the last few stretch goals.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.com, and you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitch to see more of Thela Iwidia, Chiss Jedi Knight in Star Wars: The Old Republic, follow me on Twitter where I’ll be talking more about Shadowrun Sixth Edition and Bad Religion (since they have a new album out), subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube featuring videos on gaming history (such as my recent video on the history of Dragonlance), RPG reviews, and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
