D&D 5E 2020 Release Speculation Thread

[Jester David]

You are probably mostly right on here, but I would have bet against three campaign settings in 9 months (4 within a year, including Acquisitions Incorporated). I don't see much. Reason to think the Setting market is saturated, since they've turned the books into XGtE plus Volo's Guide genre booster packs. They can keep popping those suckers out a couple a year.

I don't think they planned on three back-to-back settings either. It was probably planned to be Eberron, reprint adventure, Theros, new adventure. Until chatting with Matthew Mercer and them deciding to work together.

I think the setting market is saturated because most people run homebrew and you only need one or two setting books for the entire life of the edition.
You don't run more than one campaign in a year (if not two), so there's already enough setting lore do do people until 2023. Assuming no repeats.
I have four campaign books for 5e on my shelf (Midgard, Tal'dorei, Eberron, and Ravnica). After I finished my review, I don't think I opened any ever again. Wildemount and Theros would just join them gathering dust.
While I want to run an Eberron game sometime, that's like #4 on the list of planned campaigns. Years away.

I don't know what setting they could even do at this point.
Dragonlance's big story was done in Tyranny of Dragons. Ravenloft had a cameo in Curse of Strahd, and they're unlikely to go back. Greyhawk is divisive and full of some pretty old, racist tropes (and, arguably, doesn't need updating as you can just get PDFs of the books from the '80s and use those: no mechanical updates are required). Ravnica filled Planescape's niche, making Sigil redundant.

Really, the only setting left is Dark Sun. But they need psionics first, which is likely this fall's book. Which could very well work in 2021 as the sole setting of that year. Especially if they include the psion as a new class. Which would encourage non-DS players to buy the game. (Which might be the reason that class seems to be absent from the fall 2020 book.)
They might do what they did with Eberron and have a paid playtest product on the Guild this summer with the final book out next fall. But I think some people feel burned at paying 50% cover price for Early Access and still being required to pay full price for the final book. (I feel salty about that personally.)
If they released a Dark Sun book on the Guild, I think a lot of people would skip it and just wait for the final release.

 

[Parmandur]

I don't think they planned on three back-to-back settings either. It was probably planned to be Eberron, reprint adventure, Theros, new adventure. Until chatting with Matthew Mercer and them deciding to work together.

I think the setting market is saturated because most people run homebrew and you only need one or two setting books for the entire life of the edition.
You don't run more than one campaign in a year (if not two), so there's already enough setting lore do do people until 2023. Assuming no repeats.
I have four campaign books for 5e on my shelf (Midgard, Tal'dorei, Eberron, and Ravnica). After I finished my review, I don't think I opened any ever again. Wildemount and Theros would just join them gathering dust.
While I want to run an Eberron game sometime, that's like #4 on the list of planned campaigns. Years away.

I don't know what setting they could even do at this point.
Dragonlance's big story was done in Tyranny of Dragons. Ravenloft had a cameo in Curse of Strahd, and they're unlikely to go back. Greyhawk is divisive and full of some pretty old, racist tropes (and, arguably, doesn't need updating as you can just get PDFs of the books from the '80s and use those: no mechanical updates are required). Ravnica filled Planescape's niche, making Sigil redundant.

Really, the only setting left is Dark Sun. But they need psionics first, which is likely this fall's book. Which could very well work in 2021 as the sole setting of that year. Especially if they include the psion as a new class. Which would encourage non-DS players to buy the game. (Which might be the reason that class seems to be absent from the fall 2020 book.)
They might do what they did with Eberron and have a paid playtest product on the Guild this summer with the final book out next fall. But I think some people feel burned at paying 50% cover price for Early Access and still being required to pay full price for the final book. (I feel salty about that personally.)
If they released a Dark Sun book on the Guild, I think a lot of people would skip it and just wait for the final release.

I think you answered your own question: Dark Sun, Planescape, Greyhawk (which their first experiment in GoS was a success, per WotC at Gameholecon), Dragonlance and a deeper dive into Ravenloft. Magic does three different Setting based sets a year, so new Magic books are likely.

The new format is very Homebrew friendly, offering thematic boosters to use for other Settings as desired.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

I'm curious to something else; when do y'all think the next Adventure book will be announced?

Last year BG: DiA was announced I believe May 17, during the Descent event. That is in about 3 weeks, but of course there isn't a new event this year, so maybe they're announcing plans have changed.

Do you think they will wait until Theros is out (in June) or sometime between then and now?

 

[Parmandur]

I'm curious to something else; when do y'all think the next Adventure book will be announced?

Last year BG: DiA was announced I believe May 17, during the Descent event. That is in about 3 weeks, but of course there isn't a new event this year, so maybe they're announcing plans have changed.

Do you think they will wait until Theros is out (in June) or sometime between then and now?

They may end up doing some sort of virtual play and announcement event...

 

[GildaLopez]

Que genial e interesante todos estos temas, gracias

 

[darjr]

I’d pay attention to the May Days event.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

They may end up doing some sort of virtual play and announcement event...

They may, I'm surprised nothing has been announced yet though. Maybe they are hoping by the end of May, they can still hold an event, but without the audience (people still play in person from distances but no audience).

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

If you remember, the most of novels published in the last years have been FR. Dragonlance will come back in the next phase, after the first movie of D&D. I guess the plan is to find the right formule for the media productions, blockbuster movies and videogames, and then to dare to use it in the favorite franchises.

* My suggestion is to publish a free webcomic about an human soul whose "vital spark" with his memories (maybe from a d20 Future setting as Star Frontiers or Gamma World) is "absorbed" by a newborn, who becomes a daeva, (the aasimar subrace from 4th Ed Player Handbook II).

Other idea is innocent girl from d20 Modern who is abducted to the demiplane of the dread, Ravenloft, to become the tragic heroine of her favorite gothic-horror soap opera "killer maho-shojo from outer space". Dark Powers sometimes can enjoy a black humor or dark comedy. (this idea was inspired about some Korean manwhas about reincarnations into the past or in a fantasy world).

 

[Prakriti]

I'm curious to something else; when do y'all think the next Adventure book will be announced?

Last year BG: DiA was announced I believe May 17, during the Descent event. That is in about 3 weeks, but of course there isn't a new event this year, so maybe they're announcing plans have changed.

Do you think they will wait until Theros is out (in June) or sometime between then and now?

Two of the previous Q3 adventure paths were announced in May; three were announced in June:

OotA: May 6
STK: June 3
WDH: June 4
ToA: June 2
BGDiA: May 17

Based on that track record, I wouldn't expect to hear anything earlier than May 6.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Two of the previous Q3 adventure paths were announced in May; three were announced in June:

OotA: May 6
STK: June 3
WDH: June 4
ToA: June 2
BGDiA: May 17

Based on that track record, I wouldn't expect to hear anything earlier than May 6.

Sure, but we also get the announcement of the event about a month before the actual event (when the announcement is).

So in 2018, they announced the Stream of Many Eyes, and people could speculate that it was a beholder, perhaps the most famous, Xanathar (and a Waterdeep adventure).

And in 2019, they announced the Descent event a month before, which the art and name pointed to some adventure in the Nine Hells.

So we could get an announcement to an event any day now, that provides more context as to what the adventure book may actually be. Or maybe we won't, because the virus may have disrupted "the best laid plans."