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.

 

[Retreater]

The TL;DW is that the latest books have all been designed to work with the 2024 version for a couple years now. Anything they put out now will still be usable fully with the changes. The Mosnters of the Multiverse reprints were confirmed by Crawford to match with the new Monster Manual changes.

To quote the holy scripture of Spaceballs: "How could there be a cassette of Spaceballs-the Movie. We're still in the middle of making it.
Basically, how in the world can WotC know that everything published since 2014 will be compatible with the 2024 edition when they haven't even playtested the 2024 edition?

Why MUST there be a distinction? If they are compatible, then it doesn't matter.

Well, if you're coming to my game in 2025, do you want to know if you're using the 2014 Player's Handbook, the 2024 Player's Handbook, or should I make you a list of options in between?
The distinction matters because the rules matter. Already we're seeing significant boosts in Backgrounds and handing out Feats like candy. Do you want a character made with a crappy 2014 background and no Level 1 feat if Mistwell gets a shiny, new 2024 character? No, you don't.
It's. Not. The. Same. Game.

They go out of their way to say everything will be retroactively compatible. Your Xbox comparison is unintentionally a good example here as it. in fact, is entirely retro-compatible, and you can play all your Xbox One and almost all Xbox 360 games on your Xbox Series X.

But not so much the other direction. You can't put an Xbox One disc in an Xbox 360 and expect to play it. Nor can you put an Xbox Series X game in an Original Xbox console. Which is fine, they are different systems.

 

[bedir than]

The focus on primordials (Giants), dragons (Fizbans), and astrals(Planescape), seems ripe for the multiverse to consolidate around a First World / Dawn War narrative.

One D&D launches with the First World makes a lot of sense

 

[Retreater]

Every member of the D&D team called it 5th edition today.

Yes. And they'll end up slipping and calling 2024 "6E" too. That's exactly my point.
The official name isn't 5e, but everyone calls it that anyway.

 

[bedir than]

Yes. And they'll end up slipping and calling 2024 "6E" too. That's exactly my point.
The official name isn't 5e, but everyone calls it that anyway.

It's official. It's literally on the books. It comes out of their mouths in interviews and podcasts.

 

[Mistwell]

Yes, even Wizards slips and calls it 5e on their books. The official stance of the company is that it's just called "D&D" and they don't use "5e" in marketing. This was part of their "evergreen" marketing strategy, because "you don't look at what edition of Monopoly you're playing" as they explained.
So yes, we call it 5e. Sometimes Wizards refers to it as "the fifth edition."
And this is going to be 6e, even if Wizards wants us to call it "D&D One" or "0D&D" or "D&DWillU" or "Larry."

It's not a slip. They've been calling it fifth edition since the release. D&D Next was the playtest-only name. Their official stance has been, for many many years, that it's 5th edition. They abandoned the "evergreen" marketing stuff during the playtest.

Guarantee it's not going to be 6e. The changes are not nearly drastic enough for that. But, we shall revist this topic I am sure.

 

[Tsuga C]

Planescape!!! At last!!!

Praise day at even, a wife when dead, a weapon when tried, a maid when married, ice when ’tis crossed, and ale when ’tis drunk.----Havamal​

The original made such a powerful impression that I think caution is due, lest we find the "updated and improved" version more honestly described as "vandalized and defiled".

 

[teitan]

Hopefully Planescape has actual content.

 

[Faolyn]

I don't understand WotC's announcing the 6E playtest and then promoting what amounts to "dead edition" books.

They know that not everyone is going to be upgrading to 6e.

 

[Blue]

Well, with their One D&D announcement that isn't particularly compatible, all of my 5e purchase plans are now being scrapped.

 

[Reynard]

Yes. And they'll end up slipping and calling 2024 "6E" too. That's exactly my point.
The official name isn't 5e, but everyone calls it that anyway.

This has to be in the top 5 of Weird Takes I Read on EN World.