D&D 5E (2014) Roundup: Check Out These Previews from D&D Celebration

WotC's online D&D streaming event is taking place all weekend, and throughout the process they have released a few previews upcoming books.

From Fizban's Treasury of Dragons:

• Metallic Dragonborn
• Drakewyrm Ranger
• Moonstone Dragons

D&D 5E - Fizban's Treasury Dragons Ranked By Challenge Rating

WotC has been sending out previews of Fizban's Treasury of Dragons, due out next month, to folks on Twitter. Amongst those are art pieces and other items. By Challenge Rating the dragons in the book are: Ancient crystal (19) Ancient topaz (20) Ancient emerald (21) Ancient moonstone (21)...

www.enworld.org

The Wild Beyond the Witchlight: An In-Depth Review

The Wild Beyond the Witchlight isn't just Wizards of the Coast's latest Dungeons & Dragons adventure. It's the first official, full-length adventure from WotC set in the Feywild. While often mentioned, the counterpart to the Shadowfell has gotten much less attention through the editions...

www.enworld.org

From Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos:

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Remember when DnD was sooooo dark??

Like a few months ago, when they released Ravenloft for 5e? Or a year ago when they released a horror adventure for Icewind Dale? Or two years ago when they released Mad Max in Hell? Or when they re-released Curse of Strahd last year?

 

[NaturalZero]

I glad to see the UA metallic dragonborn made the cut. I'm playing the UA chromatic and this leads me to believe they probably made it too.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

I associate old school Hobbit media with little cartoony people with hairy feet. It's weird to claim that Tolkien was grim-dark compared to 5e.
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Remember when DnD was sooooo dark??
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While I agree with the basic point, that Return of the King video cover art is not really representative of the tone of the movie. Yes it's reasonably kid-friendly, a cartoon, and a musical, but it is not a smiley fun time on horses version of the story by any stretch.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Am I the only one who find Harry Potter to be darker then LotRs?

Anyways I watched both the Strixhaven and Fizban Panels.

For Strixhaven there are 5 new spells, one for each college, like Barrowed Knowledge which gives you a skill prof, but these spells are also added to class lists.

They built this relationship system, it doesn't have to be romantic, but they really went whole hog on the social pillar, but there is still combat and stuff.

Everybody, even fighter gets magic.

Strixhaven is much more designed to be self contained then Theros or Ravnica, so it can be dropped into any D&D world like FR or Greyhawk or MtG setting like Theros or Ravnica or it's actual plane.

For Fizban's they have 3 feats tied to main Dragon Families, 15 Lair maps, they mention some of the other monsters like some kind of a Sacrab that looks like a gold coin, champions of the Dragon Gods. One thing they really emphasis is the whole First World thing, but as a mythology, so it's not completely presented as absolute truth. 80+ monsters. Dyson Logos did the Lair maps, so they will be

practical and functional, but not pretty.

All 20 of the Dragon types that get 3-6 page deep dive have a table with one if the things being different from the typical behavior for the Dragon type, so like you can have a Gold Dragon villain.

I add stuff as I remember it
and it occurs to me

a decent social pillar is of use to me.

I glad to see the UA metallic dragonborn made the cut. I'm playing the UA chromatic and this leads me to believe they probably made it too.

I would hope so.

 

[Bird Of Play]

It sounds like you might need to find people who prefer a game more in the style you do; they're not particularly rare from how you've described your tastes. It's a big tent game, not everything is there for everybody.

Allow me to disagree: they seem pretty dang rare to me.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Allow me to disagree: they seem pretty dang rare to me.

maybe you are just looking in the wrong places? I saw adverts for a grimmer darker setting the sold well so someone is buying it.

 

[Ravenbrook]

There was a 2e supplement called College of Wizardry. It's probably darker than what Strixhaven appears to be. Btw, is Strixhaven a girls' school? Just wondering because of the pictures and the names.

 

[Mind of tempest]

There was a 2e supplement called College of Wizardry. It's probably darker than what Strixhaven appears to be. Btw, is Strixhaven a girls' school? Just wondering because of the pictures and the names.

no, it seems mixed just those are the ones listed.

 

[Mecheon]

Makes sense however, since the majority of D&D players in general either choose to play as their favorite anime character or as their idealized waifu/husbando.

So uh, take it you haven't heard of Record of Lodoss War, then?

The anime based on a story which was just a AD&D campaign some guys in Japan played, and directly lead to the creation of Sword World because TSR wouldn't licence D&D in Japan?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Am I the only one who find Harry Potter to be darker then LotRs?

The books get pretty dark, and the evil is less abstract.

In LotR the evil is evil because it says so in it's stat block. In Harry Potter we actually have descriptions of evil people engaging in acts of racism, torture and murder.

In both good triumphs over evil, so neither is truly grimdark.