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.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

He's specifically over digital products only, FYI.

That is absolutely not correct, I'm afraid. Unless you're somehow not referring to Dan Rawson, in which case I don't know who you mean.

Here's the actual press release, not the slightly misleading articles which paraphrase it as if it was news-news (not meaning ENworld there, ENworld's one is fine):

Hasbro Appoints New Senior Vice President of Dungeons & Dragons

Hasbro, Inc. (NASDAQ: HAS), today announced Dan Rawson has joined Wizards of the Coast in a newly created role as Senior Vice President of Dungeons &a

www.businesswire.com

And the exact relevant quote:

In this new role, he will lead overall Dungeons & Dragons brand growth and profitability across digital, physical, and entertainment.

That is explicit. He is over the whole of D&D, not just digital. It's just his expertise is 100% about digital transformation, i.e. taking people from physical to digital, and taking people from licence-purchase to subscription models, it appears.

 

[Nikosandros]

That's possible, but I suspect it would cause something of an uproar if it was the only digital way.

I think what is more likely is we'll see something like the follow:

[...]

Your idea is also certainly possible and, from my POV, preferable. We'll have to wait and see.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Your idea is also certainly possible and, from my POV, preferable. We'll have to wait and see.

Well, maybe. To be clear I don't think what I'm presenting is genuinely and honestly a "good idea" from the perspective of either players or the longer-term (10-year+) health of D&D as a hobby and particularly as a TTRPG.

I just think it's what they're likely to do, because it's the best way to extract the maximum profit from the situation whilst increasingly converting people to subscription users without causing some kind of uproar.

I think the place what I've described ends up is, basically, over 10 years, D&D is divided essentially into "people who play 1D&D" who use the subscription method, and life-stylers, who mostly use D&D for the pretty books and owlbear plushies and so on, and this thing they maybe played for a couple of years when the kids were 10-12, and who probably watch Critical Role and so on, who buy the physical books and may or may not also subscribe. Then over the 10 years after that, the division becomes starker, with D&D online probably using optional AI tools to DM etc., and essentially trending towards being a kind of weird MMO, and offline basically being not intended to be played, merely to be decorative. And that's assuming there isn't some kind of crash, because if there is, and D&D has moved to a sub-centric model, welp, WotC may just basically maintenance mode D&D, and not in a good way.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

That is absolutely not correct, I'm afraid. Unless you're somehow not referring to Dan Rawson, in which case I don't know who you mean.

Boo, I'm conflating him with a different person, I think. My apologies.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I think the place what I've described ends up is, basically, over 10 years, D&D is divided essentially into "people who play 1D&D" who use the subscription method, and life-stylers, who mostly use D&D for the pretty books and owlbear plushies and so on, and this thing they maybe played for a couple of years when the kids were 10-12, and who probably watch Critical Role and so on, who buy the physical books and may or may not also subscribe. Then over the 10 years after that, the division becomes starker, with D&D online probably using optional AI tools to DM etc., and essentially trending towards being a kind of weird MMO, and offline basically being not intended to be played, merely to be decorative. And that's assuming there isn't some kind of crash, because if there is, and D&D has moved to a sub-centric model, welp, WotC may just basically maintenance mode D&D, and not in a good way.

I don't know about this. I think everyone at WotC and certainly many people at Hasbro know how White Wolf screwed itself over by focusing for much of the 1990s on book buyers rather than game players, to the point that many of their later books were less and less usable and how badly things went when they tried to wrench themselves back on track. They've never recovered and have become a brand in someone else's portfolio as a result.

I do think you're right about lifestyle D&D fans, but I don't think it necessarily follows that they will produce unplayable books. In fact, it's not terribly hard to continue to design for ease at the table, as those good design principles that don't require computer assistance are simply better design and easier to manage and balance. (It doesn't do to go poking around at the math underlying EverQuest, as that can lead to madness and despair.) But more lifestyle products like art books, plush toys, iconic magic items (there's only so many big artifacts in the game, so I'd expect to see more would-be iconic stuff showing up in future products, for possible merchandising opportunities) all seem likely.

I think we'll likely also see a sun-setting of D&D Online and similar previous generation MMO-related efforts at some point and another attempt with more resources and probably (alas) a free to play model more similar to Fortnite and Overwatch (although hopefully not nearly as aggressive as Diablo Immortal, although I guess it remains to be seen how profitable that works out to be).

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Playing a non-rogue modron would be like playing a Borg drone from Star Trek that is still fully tied into the Borg Collective - there's not much individual will there.

Yeah, it's possible to have a modron (or Borg) in your party as a productive member, but it's going to be a lot easier and probably more satisfying for everyone if they're an NPC exposition machine/plot generator.

 

[Parmandur]

I don't know about this. I think everyone at WotC and certainly many people at Hasbro know how White Wolf screwed itself over by focusing for much of the 1990s on book buyers rather than game players, to the point that many of their later books were less and less usable and how badly things went when they tried to wrench themselves back on track. They've never recovered and have become a brand in someone else's portfolio as a result.

I do think you're right about lifestyle D&D fans, but I don't think it necessarily follows that they will produce unplayable books. In fact, it's not terribly hard to continue to design for ease at the table, as those good design principles that don't require computer assistance are simply better design and easier to manage and balance. (It doesn't do to go poking around at the math underlying EverQuest, as that can lead to madness and despair.) But more lifestyle products like art books, plush toys, iconic magic items (there's only so many big artifacts in the game, so I'd expect to see more would-be iconic stuff showing up in future products, for possible merchandising opportunities) all seem likely.

I think we'll likely also see a sun-setting of D&D Online and similar previous generation MMO-related efforts at some point and another attempt with more resources and probably (alas) a free to play model more similar to Fortnite and Overwatch (although hopefully not nearly as aggressive as Diablo Immortal, although I guess it remains to be seen how profitable that works out to be).

Honestly maintaining D&D as a lifestyle brand is better in my estimation than constant mucking about with the core game mechanics. And I doubt they will ever stop producing a paper version of the game, just more of what we have seen for the past 8 years already pretty much.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Relevant to this discussion: D&D maker Wizards of the Coast and its RPG rivals are starting to look like Apple and Amazon

 

[Nikosandros]

Well, maybe. To be clear I don't think what I'm presenting is genuinely and honestly a "good idea" from the perspective of either players or the longer-term (10-year+) health of D&D as a hobby and particularly as a TTRPG.

I just meant that it looked preferable to the other option, i.e. no possibility of non-subscription digital purchases. I agree in general with all the points you make in this post.

 

[michaeljpastor]

Planescape has (and always had) to do a lot of things

• Player options
• Sigil and the Outlands, including factions
• Manual of the Planes (each plane has a variable number of lairs, each of which is potentially infinite in scope)
• Bestiary
• general rules of navigating the planes and making adventures

The original PS box set had 224 pages of material, and was mostly just about the Sigil and the Outlands and the general vibe of planescape (each outer and inner plane got 1 page). The "Planes of..." box sets expanded on the outer planes, but to be honest rereading them now they take the infinity of the planes and turn them into a handful of locations that are either mundane ("here's what equipment you can buy in this town on hades") or incomprehensibly hostile to PCs with no good adventure hooks. The most successful PS material, IMO, was the sigil-oriented stuff (Uncaged, Guide to the Cage, Factol's Manifesto). And I think PS: Torment worked in part because it mostly stuck to Sigil and it's weirdness.

So, unless this slipcase is going to be monte cook-esque in length and density, the best thing they can do is focus on Sigil.

I think they should focus on the Outlands. Sigil has been done to death, and I found it to be quite boring. Of course, if they're going to give it the short shrift they gave SJ, Sigil is ok I guess.