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.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Each setting could use its own range of palettes to make things a bit more cohesive without requiring different artists.

I meant that it makes the game as a whole feel cohesive if every book has a similar art style. If every setting is of a drastically different art style, to me it feels like they're too different.

 

[dave2008]

I think it waters down what makes each setting unique and removes the visual cue for what makes Planescape different from Forgotten Realms from Dragonlance. I looked at the new DL adventure and it looked like Tyranny of Dragons to me. With Halflings looking like Kender since 3e though it’s not saying much! But some settings like Dark Sun part of what defined them was their visual style. If you John Blanche or Karl Kopinski’s Warhammer designs and gave them to Jim Lee or John Byrne, two great artists, you wouldn’t have something that looks like Warhammer anymore. It looks like a totally different world. So why would you have cookie cutter art styles take those Tom Baxa, Brom and Tony D designs and render them in technically beautiful renders that does not demonstrate those worlds? You do a disservice to all the artists involved. The original artists who envisioned are lost and the new artists are judged on the old artists strong visions. You can’t have Rob Liefeld draw Sandman anymore than you can have Sam Kieth draw Youngblood and both books really be true to those characters and stories.

It, of course, depends. I didn't like Tony D's art style back in the day so it essentially made Planescape a no go for me. On the other hand, Brom really made Darksun IMO. Being visually distinct has advantages and disadvantages.

 

[dave2008]

This Deadline article:

Hasbro’s eOne U-Turn: Behind Toymaker’s Decision To Sell Indie Film & TV Studio And What’s Next For IP Slate

Hasbro's plan to sell eOne's film and TV businesses three years after buying them for $4 billion has raised questions internally and on Wall Street.

deadline.com

Summary:

Hasbro was late November's worst performer in that week's S&P 500. Most analysts are pinning the downturn on Hasbro flooding the market with way too many Magic: The Gathering set releases.

Spelljammer: Adventures in Space has also not met sales expectations, and distributors have been left with a lot of unsold inventory from the set. The poor sales of Spelljammer, exacerbated a bit by the Hadozee fiasco, contributed to Ray Winninger's ouster from WotC.

In addition to being a cost-saving move, the Deadline article attributes the move away from an in-house film & TV division with the 2021 death of Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner, who was the main driver of expanding the company beyond toys and games and turning it into a TV and film powerhouse.

Goldner was replaced by Christopher Cocks, who had previously been head of Wizards of the Coast. Cocks doesn’t like the volatile profit margins of film and TV production that are not set like putting a wholesale price on a toy, for example, and could fluctuate.

Weirdly, Cocks DOES want to do in-house video game content, which is actually just as volatile in terms of profit margins as TV and movies.

I wonder what that means for Dragonlance then as Spelljammer is currently outselling it on Amazon.

 

[darjr]

I wonder what that means for Dragonlance then as Spelljammer is currently outselling it on Amazon.

Just the hardback mind. The deluxe kit of Dragonlance is selling well too and isn’t included in those numbers.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

For Planescape I suspect Tony DiTerlizzi will be back though probably only for 1 or 2 new commissioned art pieces instead of all the artwork. He might have stated sometime ago he was doing something for WotC. Dana Knuston who's work was also quite important in the look of Planescape though, probably won't be back.

Sigil I suspect will be both changed "too much" and "not enough" for just about everyone who cares. It's inevitable that's going to happen. Sure they based Sigil off of London in the 1800's but could also pull some inspiration from Modern Day London or other metropoli.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

For Planescape I suspect Tony DiTerlizzi will be back though probably only for 1 or 2 new commissioned art pieces instead of all the artwork. He might have stated sometime ago he was doing something for WotC.

I believe he later said it was MTG cards. He's very communicative on his Facebook page.

Sure they based Sigil off of London in the 1800's but could also pull some inspiration from Modern Day London or other metropoli.

A mayor with inexplicably terrible hair will champion Sigil closing all existing planar gates and promises that it will make the city more successful and wealthy! #Sigxit

 

[Incenjucar]

I meant that it makes the game as a whole feel cohesive if every book has a similar art style. If every setting is of a drastically different art style, to me it feels like they're too different.

Hence why you could use pallettes to keep each setting effectively color coded so that settings could still have a visual identity. If every single book looks exactly the same it's all going to blur together and become more forgettable.

 

[Veltharis ap Rylix]

A mayor with inexplicably terrible hair will champion Sigil closing all existing planar gates and promises that it will make the city more successful and wealthy! #Sigxit

Cirily, is that you?

 

[Kobold Avenger]

I also wouldn't be opposed to Sigil taking some of the visual cues of the depictions Piltover and Zaun from Arcane (mainly because I'm rewatching that series), but I'm sure others would be quite opposed to that idea.

I definitely feel Planescape during it's run in 2e, basically abandoned and ignored David Zeb Cook's guidelines for what isn't in Sigil from the original boxed set.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I also wouldn't be opposed to Sigil taking some of the visual cues of the depictions Piltover and Zaun from Arcane (mainly because I'm rewatching that series), but I'm sure others would be quite opposed to that idea.

I dunno, I think that'd be fine, but I'd want more diversity really. The issue with Piltover/Zaun is that it's a simple 1800s-style rich/poor divide, which isn't really what Sigil is about. There can absolutely be rich/poor areas but it's the not the central conflict of the setting, whereas in Arcane it drives that entire setting, and is at the heart of everything.

(Also re: 1800s London you may wonder if that was also rich/poor - it was a bit, but the truly rich didn't live in London-London at all if they could possibly help it in the 1800s, which Sigil did kind of reflect. They were in the countryside or areas that only came to be considered London as the suburbs appeared in the 1900s)

Sigil I suspect will be both changed "too much" and "not enough" for just about everyone who cares.

I tend to agree.

I suspect they'll try and modernise it without actually understanding it, and end up making it just as ultra-bland as the end of Faction War (Monte Cook)/4E takes on it. I don't think there's anyone currently working at WotC who really "gets" Planescape. I'm not sure there's even anyone senior who has mentioned really loving it. I'm pretty sure Winninger got it, but he's out, unfortunately. It was started under his watch so maybe that'll help.

But equally they won't modernize it enough to make it something new and interesting.

I strongly suspect Dark Sun, which I'd be unsurprised to see come out for 1D&D, will share this fate. Though unlike PS I think DS has some actual fans in senior WotC employees.

I definitely feel Planescape during it's run in 2e, basically abandoned and ignored David Zeb Cook's guidelines for what isn't in Sigil from the original boxed set.

Absolutely.

That's why Planescape has always been kind of a setting on the edge of being ruined, before Monte gave it a swift shove over the edge. It was a very wild, beautiful, singular vision of a setting, that could only have come from someone exceptionally erudite like Zeb Cook.

It seemed like none of the other designers really "got it", or not fully, but it was so strong it mostly worked anyway even as it travelled further and further from what made it such a singular and special setting.