D&D 5E WotC Announces An Impending Announcement: New Setting, Storyline

LuisCarlos17f · Jun 6, 2020

S'mon said:
Tempting!

Occulus, a movie about a cursed mirror? A good story to be set in Ravenloft. Mmmm, maybe the demiplane needs somebody like the narrator of the twilight zone.

I have said several times in previous posts one of the reasons of the return of Ravenloft as complete setting is because is relatively easy to be adapted into action-live productions. The matter is about if some players want to be the monsters and about allowing steampunk technology and the firearms from d20 Past (some DM would use for the hunters against the monster PCs).

Paul Farquhar · Jun 6, 2020

TV has had a whole raft of horror anthology shows recently. Sticking a D&D label on the same old clichés is fine in a tabletop game, but is has been overdone on TV.

LuisCarlos17f · Jun 6, 2020

About a Ravenloft action-live production I see a potential conflict between producers and WotC. Those would like to tell some story set in the XX century or current again, but then it would need a lot of explanations about how the dark powers could taint some regions in other planar planes. Maybe a secret temple hidden in the jungle of a Lovecraftian cult become the battlefield of the pulp-age/WWII/panzerpunk versions of G.I.Joe vs Cobra-La. And the surprise is the bullets can't cause too damage, but if they were rubber bullets used by anti-riot forces or some magic amulet is the equivalent to a bulletproof jacket. (the bullets are painful like a hit by a hammer, but they can't pierce the skin easily). This possible spin-off could allow different styles, for example a zombie-postapocalypse.

QuentinGeorge · Jun 6, 2020

LuisCarlos17f said:
About a Ravenloft action-live production I see a potential conflict between producers and WotC. Those would like to tell some story set in the XX century or current again, but then it would need a lot of explanations about how the dark powers could taint some regions in other planar planes. Maybe a secret temple hidden in the jungle of a Lovecraftian cult become the battlefield of the pulp-age/WWII/panzerpunk versions of G.I.Joe vs Cobra-La. And the surprise is the bullets can't cause too damage, but if they were rubber bullets used by anti-riot forces or some magic amulet is the equivalent to a bulletproof jacket. (the bullets are painful like a hit by a hammer, but they can't pierce the skin easily). This possible spin-off could allow different styles, for example a zombie-postapocalypse.

Please stop posting all these terrible movie ideas.

Paul Farquhar · Jun 6, 2020

QuentinGeorge said:
Please stop posting all these terrible movie ideas.

Ed Wood is spinning in his grave.

QuentinGeorge · Jun 6, 2020

Paul Farquhar said:
Ed Wood is spinning in his grave.

What if Strahd was a zombie. And he was also a super zombie, with laser cannons on his arms. And then Vecna arrived, with laser cannons on his shoulders. It's possible Michael Bay is already developing such a script. And Dreamworks will produce.

Ruin Explorer · Jun 6, 2020

Zaukrie said:
I really don't understand this "hostility" "hate" whatever posts..........do people really think the developers are being hostile to you? It's been a VERY LONG time since there was DS content, even longer on Spelljammer. They may have just decided that is the product they want to put out (maybe not now, maybe not ever)....but I doubt it is open hostility to what has come before.....

You're probably right, but people sometimes feel like there is hostility where it isn't intended, because historically, this kind of hostility hasn't been entirely uncommon in the RPG industry.

You even see it within gamelines. Vampire The Masquerade, for example. 1E and 2E are largely similar in terms of how they present the gothic-punk world, how vampires work, and whether the game is really action, horror, or what. They allowed certain things, games tended to play out more as low-level dark-superhero things than particularly gothic horror. More Forever Knight, Blade or The Vampire Diaries than actual horror like Nosferatu or even really existential horror like The Hunger or whatever. Anne Rice was clearly a primary influence.

Whereas VtM Revised (3E, effectively) was openly hostile to a lot of that. It had different main writers, and they clearly had a very different vision, where they basically wanted to force the game to be very horror-centric, and made lots of changes to the lore and so on that pushed the game hard in that direction (which players proceeded to ignore, but whatever). Justin Achilli was pretty clear that he didn't have any time for the "low-level dark-superhero" mode that was perhaps the most common mode or play, nor Anne Rice-style "sexy" vampires (despite the whole thing coming from that).

Despite my inclinations I will resist the urge to provide more examples, but suffice to say, it happens, and with Chris Perkins "No." response, it's not unreasonable to wonder if there is a bit of hostility there. You don't usually post "No." (notice the period) as the sole response to something unless you intend to convey hostility (nor even say it like that). Especially not if you're experienced social media type, as Perkins is. It's not clear where the hostility is directed - maybe he's just annoyed at being asked a lot, or people guessing, but that is typically something you'd do as a hostile gesture.

(As an aside, I would say that personally I feel like WotC are maybe somewhat hostile towards the idea of bringing back older settings generally, and to a lot of the 2E-era settings specifically, perhaps because they're not WotC IPs originally. Even their FR stuff seems mostly to be because it was so popular as a setting, rather than out of much fondness for it. Hostile is different from being merely averse because you think they wouldn't make money, note.)

QuentinGeorge · Jun 6, 2020

Ruin Explorer said:
You're probably right, but people sometimes feel like there is hostility where it isn't intended, because historically, this kind of hostility hasn't been entirely uncommon in the RPG industry.

You even see it within gamelines. Vampire The Masquerade, for example. 1E and 2E are largely similar in terms of how they present the gothic-punk world, how vampires work, and whether the game is really action, horror, or what. They allowed certain things, games tended to play out more as low-level dark-superhero things than particularly gothic horror. More Forever Knight, Blade or The Vampire Diaries than actual horror like Nosferatu or even really existential horror like The Hunger or whatever. Anne Rice was clearly a primary influence.

Whereas VtM Revised (3E, effectively) was openly hostile to a lot of that. It had different main writers, and they clearly had a very different vision, where they basically wanted to force the game to be very horror-centric, and made lots of changes to the lore and so on that pushed the game hard in that direction (which players proceeded to ignore, but whatever). Justin Achilli was pretty clear that he didn't have any time for the "low-level dark-superhero" mode that was perhaps the most common mode or play, nor Anne Rice-style "sexy" vampires (despite the whole thing coming from that).

Despite my inclinations I will resist the urge to provide more examples, but suffice to say, it happens, and with Chris Perkins "No." response, it's not unreasonable to wonder if there is a bit of hostility there. You don't usually post "No." (notice the period) as the sole response to something unless you intend to convey hostility (nor even say it like that). Especially not if you're experienced social media type, as Perkins is. It's not clear where the hostility is directed - maybe he's just annoyed at being asked a lot, or people guessing, but that is typically something you'd do as a hostile gesture.

(As an aside, I would say that personally I feel like WotC are maybe somewhat hostile towards the idea of bringing back older settings generally, and to a lot of the 2E-era settings specifically, perhaps because they're not WotC IPs originally. Even their FR stuff seems mostly to be because it was so popular as a setting, rather than out of much fondness for it. Hostile is different from being merely averse because you think they wouldn't make money, note.)

Wouldn't the hostility be weird coming from Chris Perkins? He was hired when it was still TSR.

Xenonnonex · Jun 6, 2020

Ruin Explorer said:
You're probably right, but people sometimes feel like there is hostility where it isn't intended, because historically, this kind of hostility hasn't been entirely uncommon in the RPG industry.

You even see it within gamelines. Vampire The Masquerade, for example. 1E and 2E are largely similar in terms of how they present the gothic-punk world, how vampires work, and whether the game is really action, horror, or what. They allowed certain things, games tended to play out more as low-level dark-superhero things than particularly gothic horror. More Forever Knight, Blade or The Vampire Diaries than actual horror like Nosferatu or even really existential horror like The Hunger or whatever. Anne Rice was clearly a primary influence.

Whereas VtM Revised (3E, effectively) was openly hostile to a lot of that. It had different main writers, and they clearly had a very different vision, where they basically wanted to force the game to be very horror-centric, and made lots of changes to the lore and so on that pushed the game hard in that direction (which players proceeded to ignore, but whatever). Justin Achilli was pretty clear that he didn't have any time for the "low-level dark-superhero" mode that was perhaps the most common mode or play, nor Anne Rice-style "sexy" vampires (despite the whole thing coming from that).

Despite my inclinations I will resist the urge to provide more examples, but suffice to say, it happens, and with Chris Perkins "No." response, it's not unreasonable to wonder if there is a bit of hostility there. You don't usually post "No." (notice the period) as the sole response to something unless you intend to convey hostility (nor even say it like that). Especially not if you're experienced social media type, as Perkins is. It's not clear where the hostility is directed - maybe he's just annoyed at being asked a lot, or people guessing, but that is typically something you'd do as a hostile gesture.

(As an aside, I would say that personally I feel like WotC are maybe somewhat hostile towards the idea of bringing back older settings generally, and to a lot of the 2E-era settings specifically, perhaps because they're not WotC IPs originally. Even their FR stuff seems mostly to be because it was so popular as a setting, rather than out of much fondness for it. Hostile is different from being merely averse because you think they wouldn't make money, note.)

You are reading too much into it.

lkj · Jun 6, 2020

What I think is funny is that Perkins didn't say it wasn't going to be Dark Sun. He was responding to a question that asked, "Did someone say Dark Sun?!" WotC famously keeps things close to the vest and that could easily be interpreted as, "No. We didn't say that. Nothing to see here. Not saying anything actually . . "

And Perkins likes to tease. That's his MO.

All that said, for a variety of other reasons, I don't think it will be Dark Sun. It's possible he's just trying to stop Dark Sun fans from getting their hopes up, as maybe he knows it won't be appearing for awhile. And there's plenty of hints on the Mind Flayer front. But mostly I think they are hoping to surprise us as usual.

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