D&D 5E Announcement coming February 6th

[neobolts]

Not until February 6th, so we know what train we are hyping, or if we even want to hype it.

This got me pondering what D&D product announcements might be divisive or controversial within the D&D community, so here are my hype theories...

-Complete Book of Kenders
-Intersectional Feminism of the Demonweb Pits
-D&D 5e Essentials
-Netflix's Bright Official Campaign Setting
-Dungeon Master's Screen Re-Reincarnated

 

[Demetrios1453]

-Complete Book of Kenders

They were working on that, but had to give up. Their notes kept mysteriously disappearing as each interviewee left!



Sent from my [device_name] using EN World mobile app

 

[Parmandur]

So this begs the questions: Where did they go? And what is this weapon?

If it's this amulet, it's either the one Orcus was looking for, which I cannot find what it might be called, or it's something new entirely. There aren't many (see also, any) artifact amulets. If it's something else, then what could it be? That would depend on where they went. If they went to an outer plane, then it could be anything really: an infernal siege engine, a demon ship from the Abyss, or a Marut. They more than likely went somewhere hospitable, though an upper plane seems unlikely, especially with a lack of "weapons" of note that could be brag-worthy. The Latanese tend to be Gondsmen, and he resides on the Outlands, what if they went there and crafted something really freaking nifty?

Or, something more crazy: They ended up in another campaign world. What if they ended up in Eberron and brought back one of their niceties? If it's a "weapon," I'm inclined to believe it's something really special, maybe a warforged juggernaut? My first thought would be a creation forge, but not necessarily a weapon....but, what if it's something big, really big...maybe the theoretical super weapon that may have cause the Mourning?

My thought process really likes that idea.

Just about anything is possible: Perkins has shown a tendency to want to mix classic bits together in new ways, and his vague comments on Twitter indicate that he is very, very happy with what he has for the next AP.

 

[GarrettKP]

My thoughts and reasons on why "Marathon" won't be an adventure path, but what it will be:

Marathon is listed as a 192 (I think) page supplement. The adventures are 256 pages. The page count for Marathon fits more with books like Volo's Guide and Xanathar's Guide.

This season of AL (Tomb/Season 7) will last until September, meaning no other storyline is taking its place before then.

Chris Perkins mentioned that this season of Dice Camera Action has elements from the next book, and Sigil has played a big part in this season.

The UA's at the end of 2017 were all Planar races (Eladrin, Gith, Elf variants, Planescape Teiflings).

An artist who worked on the next books for this year said 1 has "a lot of monsters."

I think Marathon is going to be "Shemeska's Guide to the Planes." It will be just like Volo's Guide: Chapter 1 will detail all of the planes (Material, Astral, Elemental, Upper, Lower, etc), Chapter 2 will be Racial Planar options (those playtested in the UAs), and Chapter 3 will be a Planar Bestiery! So we get details on Sigil and all the planes, Races for PCs and plenty of monsters to play with.

 

[hawkeyefan]

So this begs the questions: Where did they go? And what is this weapon?

If it's this amulet, it's either the one Orcus was looking for, which I cannot find what it might be called, or it's something new entirely. There aren't many (see also, any) artifact amulets. If it's something else, then what could it be? That would depend on where they went. If they went to an outer plane, then it could be anything really: an infernal siege engine, a demon ship from the Abyss, or a Marut. They more than likely went somewhere hospitable, though an upper plane seems unlikely, especially with a lack of "weapons" of note that could be brag-worthy. The Latanese tend to be Gondsmen, and he resides on the Outlands, what if they went there and crafted something really freaking nifty?

Or, something more crazy: They ended up in another campaign world. What if they ended up in Eberron and brought back one of their niceties? If it's a "weapon," I'm inclined to believe it's something really special, maybe a warforged juggernaut? My first thought would be a creation forge, but not necessarily a weapon....but, what if it's something big, really big...maybe the theoretical super weapon that may have cause the Mourning?

My thought process really likes that idea.

In Dead Gods, Orcus is not looking for an amulet, but rather his wand. The backstory is that Orcus has been killed by the drow goddess Kiaransalee, and is now a vestige of his former self. He goes by the name Tenebrous. Using a secret power known as the Last Word, Tenebrous begins seatching for the Wand of Orcus because it holds a sliver of his power and can restore him to his true form. The Last Word is powerful enough to slay gods, but it is also consuming Tenebrous.

So he targets deities associated with knowledge. He kills several of them, including Maanzecorean, in his quest for the location of the Wand. He also kills and replaces Primus, the god of the Modrons, and unleashes the Modron March earlier than scheduled so the Modrons can hopefully find the Wand.

It’s a great backstory and the two modules use a lot of established lore in very cool ways. I just put my players through them last year as part of our 5E campain, so it’s all fresh on my mind.

 

[Parmandur]

My thoughts and reasons on why "Marathon" won't be an adventure path, but what it will be:

Marathon is listed as a 192 (I think) page supplement. The adventures are 256 pages. The page count for Marathon fits more with books like Volo's Guide and Xanathar's Guide.

This season of AL (Tomb/Season 7) will last until September, meaning no other storyline is taking its place before then.

Chris Perkins mentioned that this season of Dice Camera Action has elements from the next book, and Sigil has played a big part in this season.

The UA's at the end of 2017 were all Planar races (Eladrin, Gith, Elf variants, Planescape Teiflings).

An artist who worked on the next books for this year said 1 has "a lot of monsters."

I think Marathon is going to be "Shemeska's Guide to the Planes." It will be just like Volo's Guide: Chapter 1 will detail all of the planes (Material, Astral, Elemental, Upper, Lower, etc), Chapter 2 will be Racial Planar options (those playtested in the UAs), and Chapter 3 will be a Planar Bestiery! So we get details on Sigil and all the planes, Races for PCs and plenty of monsters to play with.

Your theory is quite plausible, and my guess is also that Marathon is possibly a monster book: we don't know which books are "Supplements" or "Adventures," though, since the source of the information has the already published books catagorizes incorrectly (Out of the Abyss is a supplement, for example). Broadway probably is an adventure, because of the tie-in dice, but Marathon could turn out to be a TftYP 2 for all we know. I still suspect the planar stuff they were testing is actually for Catacomb, but we will see. I could forsee a "Fiend Folio" monster book in May, a planar Adventure in September, and a "Manual of the Planes" in November, including player race and world-rule variants.

 

[GarrettKP]

Your theory is quite plausible, and my guess is also that Marathon is possibly a monster book: we don't know which books are "Supplements" or "Adventures," though, since the source of the information has the already published books catagorizes incorrectly (Out of the Abyss is a supplement, for example). Broadway probably is an adventure, because of the tie-in dice, but Marathon could turn out to be a TftYP 2 for all we know. I still suspect the planar stuff they were testing is actually for Catacomb, but we will see. I could forsee a "Fiend Folio" monster book in May, a planar Adventure in September, and a "Manual of the Planes" in November, including player race and world-rule variants.

The catagorization of Supplement and Advenuter is less important than the Page counts. The page counts tell us that Marathon is in line with Volo's and Xanathar's rather than Tales and Tomb. They also tell us Catacomb and Broadway are adventures, with the possibility of one of them being a Tales 2 type book (Tho I think it is more likely the two adventures are directly connected like Tyranny of Dragons was). Also the same artist that mentioned the Monster heavy book said that one of the adventures was in the Realms, so I doubt Broadway (the main AP this year) will be planar.

 

[Parmandur]

The catagorization of Supplement and Advenuter is less important than the Page counts. The page counts tell us that Marathon is in line with Volo's and Xanathar's rather than Tales and Tomb. They also tell us Catacomb and Broadway are adventures, with the possibility of one of them being a Tales 2 type book (Tho I think it is more likely the two adventures are directly connected like Tyranny of Dragons was). Also the same artist that mentioned the Monster heavy book said that one of the adventures was in the Realms, so I doubt Broadway (the main AP this year) will be planar.

The page counts don't necessarily tells us anything: not all the Adventures have been 256 pages. In fact, of the 8 AP books released so far 3 have not been 256 pages, including TftYP. And while Marathon is the length of XGtE, that doesn't speak to content, same with Broadway and Catacomb.

Broadway will almost certainly be set in Lantan (they won't stop talking about Lantan, ToA both made a big deal of Lantan being nearby but pointedly said nothing about the island, etc.). Lantan itself recently went on a planar walkabout, that the designers have been constantly coy about for years now. Dollars to donuts that Lantan is the gateway to things planar, to tie in with one or both of the other two books for the year.

 

[GarrettKP]

The page counts don't necessarily tells us anything: not all the Adventures have been 256 pages. In fact, of the 8 AP books released so far 3 have not been 256 pages, including TftYP. And while Marathon is the length of XGtE, that doesn't speak to content, same with Broadway and Catacomb.

Broadway will almost certainly be set in Lantan (they won't stop talking about Lantan, ToA both made a big deal of Lantan being nearby but pointedly said nothing about the island, etc.). Lantan itself recently went on a planar walkabout, that the designers have been constantly coy about for years now. Dollars to donuts that Lantan is the gateway to things planar, to tie in with one or both of the other two books for the year.

2 of those APs were Tyranny of Dragons, which is obviously a very specific case as to why they were not the same length as the other APs. The 3rd is Tales, which is 8 pages short of the 256 mark AND is not even considered an AP. Go read the small blurb at the bottom of all the APs release so far. Each call the books Adventures. But Tales is specifically called an Adventure Supplement. It is not an AP, but special supplement to add to Adventures, and one they have professed was made because Perkins was having trouble keeping up with the 2 APs per year modle they were running. So in actuality only 2 of the Adventures did not meet the 256 page count and they were rushed out to meet deadlines and frankly were very messy. Since then every true AP has been 256, meaning it is more than likely that Broadway and Catacomb are APs, as they are listed.

Also Lantan was mentioned by Perkins as having a role to play in a future book, yes. But he never (to my knowledge) said it was in an Adventure. It is more than plausible that Lantan is detailed in my theorized Guide to the Planes talking about places on the material plane that had planar events occur.

It is possible Lantan is Broadway, but even if it is that does nothing to contradict my guess that Marathon is a planar supplement and not an AP. And all the actual details we have support that guess.

 

[Parmandur]

2 of those APs were Tyranny of Dragons, which is obviously a very specific case as to why they were not the same length as the other APs. The 3rd is Tales, which is 8 pages short of the 256 mark AND is not even considered an AP. Go read the small blurb at the bottom of all the APs release so far. Each call the books Adventures. But Tales is specifically called an Adventure Supplement. It is not an AP, but special supplement to add to Adventures, and one they have professed was made because Perkins was having trouble keeping up with the 2 APs per year modle they were running. So in actuality only 2 of the Adventures did not meet the 256 page count and they were rushed out to meet deadlines and frankly were very messy. Since then every true AP has been 256, meaning it is more than likely that Broadway and Catacomb are APs, as they are listed.

Also Lantan was mentioned by Perkins as having a role to play in a future book, yes. But he never (to my knowledge) said it was in an Adventure. It is more than plausible that Lantan is detailed in my theorized Guide to the Planes talking about places on the material plane that had planar events occur.

It is possible Lantan is Broadway, but even if it is that does nothing to contradict my guess that Marathon is a planar supplement and not an AP. And all the actual details we have support that guess.

Just because the APs have been, largely, 256 pages the inverse does not follow: 256 pages is a good size for printing purposes, all it means is that is the most efficient size for the topic being covered.

I think you are right that Marathon is not Adventure material, but I also doubt that Catacomb is an Adventure book: beyond not wanting to break Perkins, they have also cited that most groups were not processing two books of adventure material in a full year. So, I forsee them pulling back on Adventure specific material this year.

As to Broadway being based in Lantan or not, we'll see: but they seriously keep bringing the place up the past few months. Haven't seen any hints towards an alternate location in the FR...?