Planescape 5 New D&D Books Coming in 2023 -- Including Planescape!

At today's Wizards Presents event, hosts Jimmy Wong, Ginny Di, and Sydnee Goodman announced the 2023 line-up of D&D books, which featured something old, something new, and an expansion of a fan favorite.

The first of the five books, Keys from the Golden Vault, will arrive in winter 2023. At Tuesday's press preview, Chris Perkins, Game Design Architect for D&D, described it as “Ocean’s Eleven meets D&D” and an anthology of short adventures revolving around heists, which can be dropped into existing campaigns.

In Spring 2023, giants get a sourcebook just like their traditional rivals, the dragons, did in Fizban's Treasury of Dragons. Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants will be a deep dive into hill, frost, fire, cloud, and storm giants, plus much more.

Summer 2023 will have two releases. The Book of Many Things is a collection of creatures, locations, and other player-facing goodies related to that most famous D&D magic item, the Deck of Many Things. Then “Phandelver Campaign” will expand the popular Lost Mine of Phandelver from the D&D Starter Set into a full campaign tinged with cosmic horror.

And then last, but certainly not least, in Fall 2023, WotC revives another classic D&D setting – Planescape. Just like Spelljammer: Adventures in Space, Planescape will be presented as a three-book set containing a setting guide, bestiary, and adventure campaign in a slipcase. Despite the Spelljammer comparison they did not confirm whether it would also contain a DM screen.

More information on these five titles will be released when we get closer to them in date.

 

[Faolyn]

no one even knows what the difference between a spirit vs soul is in the real world.
why even do that it just makes peoples lives worse.

why make dwarves bad at using what they make humans stuff does not randomly stop working for them in the game.

Gygax wanted games to be human-centric, that's why. But he couldn't think of ways to make humans more interesting so he had to put weird restrictions on non-humans.

Why he didn't just make D&D a humans-only system with optional rules for non-human characters, I don't know.

 

[Incenjucar]

Gygax wanted games to be human-centric, that's why. But he couldn't think of ways to make humans more interesting so he had to put weird restrictions on non-humans.

Why he didn't just make D&D a humans-only system with optional rules for non-human characters, I don't know.

I'm guessing that even back then enough people said "but that's boring" and forced his hand.

 

[Demetrios1453]

I'm guessing that even back then enough people said "but that's boring" and forced his hand.

No one I know followed 1e nonhuman level limits. 2e weren't quite as restrictive, and with good ability scores, they weren't anywhere near as restrictive when it came to the levels of most campaigns...

 

[Incenjucar]

No one I know followed 1e nonhuman level limits. 2e weren't quite as restrictive, and with good ability scores, they weren't anywhere near as restrictive when it came to the levels of most campaigns...

It was one of those things where we were the right age to be very adamant about obeying the exact rules.

 

[Micah Sweet]

no one even knows what the difference between a spirit vs soul is in the real world.
why even do that it just makes peoples lives worse.

why make dwarves bad at using what they make humans stuff does not randomly stop working for them in the game.

The old game mechanically encouraged human PCs.

 

[Micah Sweet]

in what way?

The party is always going to have the spotlight, so who ever is in it has greater narrative weight. No humans in the party probably means humans aren't going to be a big deal in the world, unless they're the bad guys.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I didn't mean to imply it was specifically only and exclusively "animal races." I prefer the aesthetic of human centric worlds and I don't like the Mos Eisley cantina feel. I get that people like that, which is why I specifically said I let my players have it. But my preferences are valid and I don't have to justify them to you. In fact, I think it is pretty rude for you to interrogate me about it.

if you want human only world it might be faster to get a game the incentives that or find people who only want to play humans, secondly, the point of mos eisleys cantina is like showing a dragon flying it is to show you're not on earth any more if you wish to avoid non humans kill all non-human sapient entities but that might cut into the monster roster fast.

The old game mechanically encouraged human PCs.

by making things worse for people who do not to play a human, if I made humans objective the worst option to encourage non humans it would be wrong.
sell people on being human or have a setting with only humans, do something right or not at all.

The party is always going to have the spotlight, so who ever is in it has greater narrative weight. No humans in the party probably means humans aren't going to be a big deal in the world, unless they're the bad guys.

maybe humans should not be relevant for this campaign then is that a bad thing?

 

[Micah Sweet]

if you want human only world it might be faster to get a game the incentives that or find people who only want to play humans, secondly, the point of mos eisleys cantina is like showing a dragon flying it is to show you're not on earth any more if you wish to avoid non humans kill all non-human sapient entities but that might cut into the monster roster fast.

by making things worse for people who do not to play a human, if I made humans objective the worst option to encourage non humans it would be wrong.
sell people on being human or have a setting with only humans, do something right or not at all.

maybe humans should not be relevant for this campaign then is that a bad thing?

It can be if the DM wants to have humans matter, but the PCs all want to play different schmorps instead.

 

[Incenjucar]

We already did the sniping at each other for preferences we don't need to get into that again.

Besides as we all know the only valid species limitation is an all-elemental campaign.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

My recollection (through the mists of time) was that WotC was saying 3e was going to be 'fairly compatible' with 2e at a time when the rumour mill was going all a bit screw-loose with 'OMG the MtG company bought D&D and are going to make it into a CCG, you'll have to buy magic items in random boosters and playing a paladin will need a Rare card!'

In that context, a relatively conventional RPG, with D&Ds six ability scores, classes and levels, hit points, vancean magic, three core books etc etc kinda did count as 'fairly compatible,' considering the alternatives that were being rumoured. Yeah, there were certainly some areas that didn't convert well (multiclass PCs being top of the list), but it was still, y'know ... D&D.

You may be right, it's 20+ years ago and it was a fairly short period of rumour before the facts came out, but I think a lot of people took it to mean it would be closer than it was (I definitely remember they "they'll turn it into a CCG!" idiocy lol). Certainly the approach to multiclassing (basically becoming dual-classing) was a huge surprise to me and my group. We didn't expect that level of hard incompatibility. We tried re-making everyone's MC PCs that way but they were all a mess (I suspect that by the end of 3.5E, all the piles of options and PrCs would have done a better job, or just the good old Gestalt character rules lol).

It can be if the DM wants to have humans matter, but the PCs all want to play different schmorps instead.

You'll take my pointy-eared schmorps from my cold, dead hands!

* plot twist * none of them are even elves.