New Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master's Guide Art and Details Revealed

The marketing cycle for the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide is underway. Wizards of the Coast has released the first video and accompanying article previewing the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide. Wizards has already told fans what's actually in the new 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide, so there's not much in terms of actual new details. The video/article revealed that the Bastion system got another look from designers after its initial Unearthed Arcana playtest, that there will be a DM's Toolkit for everything from "alignment to traps," now arranged in alphabetical order, and that there will be 400 "new and improved" magic items.

The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide will also be the home of rules for crafting magic items and a new Greyhawk campaign setting guide, with a focus on showcasing how Greyhawk can be customized or be used as a model for homemade campaign settings. Finally, the Dungeon Master's Guide will contain a lore glossary and a full chapter about D&D cosmology, the latter of which helps to drive home the idea of the D&D multiverse.


While much of this information was already known, the video and article did show off a LOT of new art, some of which can be found below:

 

[mamba]

Yes, for me also it is very clear. The three caracters are discussing with each other and they are unaware of the beholder behind them. The dragonborn and the purple-haired person are looking at each other while the third person is also looking at the dragonborn.

I’d say the purple hair is looking at whatever they are pointing at (not the dragonborn), as does the other person. The dragonborn is looking either at purple hair (with one eye only…) or nothing in particular with his head still turning towards purple hair to see what is going on with them

 

[Parmandur]

I’d say the purple hair is looking at whatever they are pointing at (not the dragonborn), as does the other person. The dragonborn is looking either at purple hair (with one eye only…) or nothing in particular with his head still turning towards purple hair to see what is going on with them

I just cannot see that: the line of sight of both the Halfling and Human are directly at the Dragonborn?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The new art beautifully captures this new D&D, but I just want nothing to do with it.

I got yelled at previously by WotC ride-or-die types for saying this, but this edition of D&D is making some specific choices about what kind of game it most naturally supports and who it thinks its target audience is. (Note that some marketing types may try to walk this back and argue that you can play everything under the sun with this edition, because that's the job of marketers.)

And that's OK!

I know you know this, @Jahydin, but there are so many D&D offshoots and clones now, of nearly every flavor (pure 3E dungeonpunk and 4E-style tactical games are still pretty rare, being the newest old versions), that anyone who feels like this isn't "their" D&D should be able to find a version of the game that is pretty easily.

And judging by online conversations/yelling about the 2024 art (and tonal) direction, this would be an ideal time to try and find groups to play Old School Essentials, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Shadowdark, Mork Borg, Castles & Crusades, or literally dozens of other well-supported OSR or OSR-adjacent games with art and tones that will feel like coming home to people who started with OD&D, 1E, BD&D or 2E. Nearly everything TSR has ever produced is available online nowadays through DriveThruRPG/DMs Guild and more content for each of those rulesets is produced new each year than TSR did in its entire lifetime.

If the 2024 books being aimed at Gen Z and Gen Alpha players frustrates you, there are so many, many amazing games that play like the D&D games you loved (or shhh, sometimes even better) just waiting for you and your like-minded friends to pick them up.

 

[mamba]

I just cannot see that: the line of sight of both the Halfling and Human are directly at the Dragonborn?

we can argue about the human, to me they look over the shoulder of the dragonborn to what the halfling points at, but that is more a matter of what distance they focus on as the dragonborn is in the same general direction, just closer.

There is no way I see the halfling as looking at the dragonborn, the head would be turned much farther to the left. They are looking at what they are pointing at

 

[Parmandur]

we can argue about the human, to me they look over the shoulder of the dragonborn to what the halfling points at, but that is more a matter of what distance they focus on as the dragonborn is in the same general direction, just closer.

There is no way I see the halfling as looking at the dragonborn, the head would be turned much farther to the left. They are looking at what they are pointing at

I mean, I agree she is looking directly at the same thing she is pointing at...the Dragonborn's face. She is pointing at him, looking at him.

 

[mamba]

I mean, I agree she is looking directly at the same thing she is pointing at...the Dragonborn's face. She is pointing at him, looking at him.

with that expression on her face? No, she is pointing towards the top right corner

 

[DarkCrisis]

Monster Manual art is going to be like a Beholder having tea with a Lich while a displacer beast warms itself by a fire. In the background is the Beholders spouse, an Illithid, reading a book and their adopted goblin children playing on a rug nearby.

…. I need to see if AI can draw this for me.

 

[Parmandur]

with that expression on her face? No, she is pointing towards the top right corner

Yes, she is clearly looking at the Dragonborn with tremendous anger and frustration and pointing her finger at his face. Her finger is aimed at him, her eyes are oriented towards him. I cannot see an interpretation that she is looking "off-screen", precisely because her finger and eyes are pointed "on-screen" towards the Dragonborn.

This is a very weird argument, because this seems extremely clear and obvious?

 

[Jahydin]

I got yelled at previously by WotC ride-or-die types for saying this, but this edition of D&D is making some specific choices about what kind of game it most naturally supports and who it thinks its target audience is. (Note that some marketing types may try to walk this back and argue that you can play everything under the sun with this edition, because that's the job of marketers.)

And that's OK!

I know you know this, @Jahydin, but there are so many D&D offshoots and clones now, of nearly every flavor (pure 3E dungeonpunk and 4E-style tactical games are still pretty rare, being the newest old versions), that anyone who feels like this isn't "their" D&D should be able to find a version of the game that is pretty easily.

And judging by online conversations/yelling about the 2024 art (and tonal) direction, this would be an ideal time to try and find groups to play Old School Essentials, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Shadowdark, Mork Borg, Castles & Crusades, or literally dozens of other well-supported OSR or OSR-adjacent games with art and tones that will feel like coming home to people who started with OD&D, 1E, BD&D or 2E. Nearly everything TSR has ever produced is available online nowadays through DriveThruRPG/DMs Guild and more content for each of those rulesets is produced new each year than TSR did in its entire lifetime.

If the 2024 books being aimed at Gen Z and Gen Alpha players frustrates you, there are so many, many amazing games that play like the D&D games you loved (or shhh, sometimes even better) just waiting for you and your like-minded friends to pick them up.

So very true. I've never been happier gaming wise honestly. I was at a Starbucks in San Antonio listening to one of the baristas talk about how much fun they were having playing D&D to a group of excited teens (with the same pink/purple hair I poked fun at above) and I loved every second of that transaction. Far cry from the stinky WotC stores I avoided like the plague back when I was in college! This edition certainly has an audience and I think that's cool. My only beef with WotC ATM is all the petty corporate greed stuff that will absolutely sink them if they don't cut it out.

I own all the games you listed and have enjoyed playing all of them (okay, Mork hasn't hit the table yet, but it was a fun read!). Currently, I'm playing two weekly games of Pathfinder 2E (which shares most of the issues I poked fun of 5.5 for, but somehow does it better? Something to ponder more of why that is...) and really liking Dragonbane (one-shot is def going to happen soon for that one).

Plenty to play while I wait for D&D to swing back to it's roots again.

Edit: About PF2e, now that I thought about it, I think despite having freedom to build the characters you want there is still bounds to keep things grounded; racial ability penalties, for instance, and how ultra "quirky" characters will surely get the party killed fast.

 

[Bacon Bits]

I hadn't had a chance to watch video this when it went up.

Then I noticed the thread was 150 posts complaining about the artwork which tells me they didn't actually talk about the book's content in any way in the video, so I'm not going to bother.

If y'all can't find anything worthwhile to talk about except the art, then there's nothing worth talking about.

The art's fine.