D&D 5E Revisited Setting News: Its not the 2023 Classic setting, but rather for 2024

[LuisCarlos17f]

Precisely because it was so popular, it needs a lot of work for the revival because the fandom will be more exacting. What details will be allowed to be retconected? Are there space for new PC races and classes? Any possibility about spin-off? What about the novels, is the metaplot totally rebooted? How would be it affected in a hypotetical event of multiversal crisis? Can Athas to be invaded by aliens from the "Far Realm"? Are possible werevernims in Athas?

Dark Sun will return, but it is not ready enough, and not only because the psionic powers.

Greyhawk is the setting if they want to recover the 3.5 iconic characters to sell comics and other products. FR is more famous thanks videogames, but also there are more troubles about continuity.

Dungeons & Dragons iconic characters - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

* If WotC says there are parallels universes in D&D you can bet the fandom creating an amateur variant of Krynn/Dragonlance, and this could be good to relive the franchise.

 

[Azzy]

So....
2022: Spelljammer (my guess is it will be a modulesetting like Strixhaven)
2022: Dragonlance
2023: Dark Sun
2024: Forgotten Realms revised; with some cleaned-up lore regarding races and such.

I'm inclined to agree with this prognostication. More or less.

 

[Nikosandros]

Now, opening it up on the Guild would be great. All that other stuff, just seems like convenience. Not enough for me to drop $50+ on it.

Fair enough.

 

[teitan]

According to Ray Winninger's Twitter "It's different. Two classic settings next year and a third in 2023, none of which were covered by previous 5E products. We're looking at "revisiting" a setting in 2024."

So I wrong about the 2023 setting being the revisit, it got bumped to 2024, perhaps to line up with the new edition, the same way 3.5e got its own updated FR campaign book from 3e. This would also allow the new book to include info from BG3, the Way of the Drow trilogy (which will be complete by then), the new 5.5e Core Books, the D&D movie, etc..., without spoiling them. I should have considered these factors.

So the 2023 classic setting could Spelljammer, Dragonlance, Mystara, or some other Tier 2 setting.

Calling it now... 2024: GREYHAWK. 50th Anniversary, that's why there is a bump. If not GH then FR and that would be less intelligent of a decision.

 

[teitan]

I farted. That's all. Necrothread notwithstanding.

 

[teitan]

I thought that for 2024 it might be both Greyhawk and the Forgotten Realms, but someone pointed put to me recently WTF would you even put in a Greyhawk Setting book that you don't have yet. Like it's lore hasn't advanced in decades! Not only is there no new races to add to the PHB, but you don't really need all of the PHB, heck the one thing you could use, major Greyhawk Gods are already in the PHB. You can just as easily play Greyhark with the Core Books and old Greyhawk setting books.

Of all the settings there is the LEAST reason to do Greyhawk except it was one of the first settings.

Gruagach elves for one. Scarlet Brotherhood monk, Knights of the Hart, Circle of Eight agent background, Druid circles built around the original druids from 1e. There is a LOT to do with Greyhawk in 5e that hasn't been done and yeah you don't need... Dragonborn. Tiefling's would be fine in Greyhawk. There are Greyhawk specific monsters like the Greyhawk Dragon to name one besides the aforementioned Gruagach elves (Valley Elves). Actual Explanation of the Greyhawk deities and not just a list of names and their domains maybe? sure some of the data is there but the material itself is negligible and barely skeletal. Greyhawk is not the generic fantasy people seem to think it is or want to force it into. It isn't just Forgotten Realms, nor is it Tolkien. It is more Lankhmar but definitely Vance and an ample helping of Burroughs. It's rougher, it's dirtier, it's less heroic. It's more down to earth while simultaneously more Cosmic and Moorecockian.

If anything Forgotten Realms, as much as I love it, is the more generic of the two but that is its nature by design as it was intended as a kitchen sink setting where you can find almost any sort of setting from Canadian wilderness to Conan like Thay and faux ancient Middle East.

Greyhawk isn't this B&W, we're big dang heroes setting, it is shades of grey. It isn't good vs evil, it's Law vs Chaos and fanaticism. Not quite Mork Borgian levels but man, it's a lot darker than people seem to want to give it credit for. Dorakaa alone is the stuff of nightmares and the Pomarj? Unlike Waterdeep is Greyhawk really a city you would want to raise children in? What about the Great Kingdom with Ivid the Undying? This is not a happy place. There is not a Cormyr with shining knights and an Arthurian king. There isn't a peaceful Dalelands that occasionally deals with Zhent spies because Elminster is a busy body. No the great wizards of Greyhawk aren't even plotting for good but to keep both good and evil, law and chaos, from gaining too much ground.

I've seen the excuse people don't want grey, they want B&W and heroes these days except we know now they don't. They want escapes and adventure but not always the good guy. People like having an edge and Greyhawk has an edge. It's a backstabbing thief in an alley and a barbarian warrior laughing as he smashes in your head and Emirikol laughs as he rides off with both their bags of gold.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Gruagach elves for one. Scarlet Brotherhood monk, Knights of the Hart, Circle of Eight agent background, Druid circles built around the original druids from 1e.

These are things that could be done, not things that need to be done. Gruagach don't need to be mechanically different from wood elves - it's a culture; Scarlet Brotherhood doesn't need to be a subclass, it's an organisation, etc.

 

[teitan]

These are things that could be done, not things that need to be done. Gruagach don't need to be mechanically different from wood elves - it's a culture; Scarlet Brotherhood doesn't need to be a subclass, it's an organisation, etc.

Agreed but that wasn't the claim. I was pointing out what could be done. None of it NEEDS to be done outside of the Basic Rules on the WOTC website.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Said with other words, Greyhawk/Oerth is Westeros/Games of Thrones but with more superpowers and monsters.

Maybe the gruagach/wild elves discovered and explores planar gates to special fey domains. This is a little example of possible future retcons.

Greyhawk may be darker than FR but not too grimdark for only mature audences. It is lower fantasy (closer to sword & scocery), and this means super expensive magic items shouldn't be easy to be found.

The canon origin of dragonborns in Greyhawk is different, there were ordinary humans and other humanoids chosen by Bahamut to be their champions (mainly against Tiamat's minions) but they couldn't breed a new generation.

 

[eyeheartawk]

The next question, though, is how much they plan on rebooting the non-Realms settings for 5E... Ravenloft was a pretty extensive overhaul, but that won't necessarily work as well for all three of those. (Also, speaking personally, I'm only interested in updates that the setting's veteran fans are happy with. I want those fans to feel included, not alienated.)

I can agree with that sentiment. Though, Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft doesn't fall into this category. Imagine if they made that level of changes to a really popular setting like FR.