D&D 5E Announcement Next Week--What Hints For Upcoming D&D Books?

WotC uses Unearthed Arcana to playtest D&D material which often ends up in a later hardcover book. Mages of Strixhaven was in Unearthed Arcana in June 2021, and Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos was published in December 2021. Draconic Options was in Unearthed Arcana in April 2021, and Fizban's Treasury of Dragons came out in October. The same applied to Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, and other books--the lead time appears to typically be somewhere around 6 months. So what have we had recently which might give us an insight into upcoming books?

WotC is holding a press event this coming Friday, with an embargo for March 22nd (which is Tuesday next week), meaning that an announcement is around the corner.

Unearthed Arcana has slowed in the last year or so, but there have been two notable articles:

• August 2021 -- Travelers of the Multiverse. 6 months after this was February, so if the 6-month lead time theory holds true, a multiverse-themed book would be imminent. The amount of speculative chatter about Spelljammer, Planescape, and 'Planejammer' is at a high.
• March 2022 -- Heroes of Krynn. This UA was released last week; six months would put a Dragonlance hardcover roughly about September, around the same time that Weis & Hickman's new Dragonlance novel releases.

So these two appear the most likely--some kind of multiverse book, and a Dragonlance book.

We know that a new starter set--Dragons of Stormwreck Isle--is on its way this year. WotC has spoken about two brand new settings, and two classic settings in 2022 (which fits the theory!)

They also spoke about a 'brand new format' for the 2 classic settings--WotC's Ray Winninger said in June last year that ""Each of these products is pursuing a different format you've never seen before. And neither is "digital only;" these are new print formats."

As I've mentioned on a couple of occasions, there are two more products that revive "classic" settings in production right now.

The manuscript for the first, overseen by [Chris Perkins], is nearly complete. Work on the second, led by [F. Wesley Schneider] with an assist from [Ari Levitch], is just ramping up in earnest. Both are targeting 2022 and formats you've never seen before.

In addition to these two titles, we have two brand new [D&D] settings in early development, as well as a return to a setting we've already covered. (No, these are not M:tG worlds.)

As I mentioned in the dev blog, we develop more material than we publish, so it's possible one or more of these last three won't reach production. But as of right now, they're all looking great.

 

[Faolyn]

I'd buy a new Spelljammer book, as long as they kept the planar stuff out of it.

Spelljammer was about physically traveling between worlds on the same plane, not teleporting between different planes and dimensions, and I feel the settings would be greatly diminished by mixing the two approaches.

Agreed. Plus, part of Spelljammer was resource management because you could easily run out of water, food, and air on your trips. Even if Wildspace remains the same and it's only the phlogiston that gets replaced by the Astral, you lose that urgency. After all, you don't need to eat, breathe, or even age in the Astral. And then--unless it's been changed this edition and I forgot--you immediately catch up in age when you re-enter reality. Which would make any sort of inter-sphere travel kind of annoying.

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

We had a few of those tear then we got reinforcement bits for the punched holes. (Punk band name.) Little stickers you put on both sides of The Punched Holes™ to prevent tears. No idea what they're called.

Yeah, if you had the Monstrous Compendium, these...



... were a great investment.

 

[Faolyn]

We had a few of those tear then we got reinforcement bits for the punched holes. (Punk band name.) Little stickers you put on both sides of The Punched Holes™ to prevent tears. No idea what they're called.

Reinforcements.

I did that too, but that just made the pages thicker so I couldn't have as many in any one particular binder. Sigh.

 

[overgeeked]

Yeah, if you had the Monstrous Compendium, these...

View attachment 153541

... were a great investment.

Yeah. Them.

 

[darjr]

Agreed. Plus, part of Spelljammer was resource management because you could easily run out of water, food, and air on your trips. Even if Wildspace remains the same and it's only the phlogiston that gets replaced by the Astral, you lose that urgency. After all, you don't need to eat, breathe, or even age in the Astral. And then--unless it's been changed this edition and I forgot--you immediately catch up in age when you re-enter reality. Which would make any sort of inter-sphere travel kind of annoying.

Isn’t that only by the Astral Projection spell? It’s not that you catch up it’s that your body stays behind.

If you go Astral another way I dint think that happens.

 

[darjr]

Reinforcements.

I did that too, but that just made the pages thicker so I couldn't have as many in any one particular binder. Sigh.

I cut apart my B/X books to put them in a binder. Used those things.

It was a huge mistake.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

A Coure could be represented by the Fairy PC race, it would be the Shiere (that only showed up in 2e, but got a reference in 4e) that would be the closest to "PC material" in terms of powers. And all they got that made them special was the ability to change shape into balls of lights. If that Astral Elf had the ability to become incorporeal and fly for 1/round per proficiency bonus as a ball of light, then maybe I'd think they'd actually be attempting to emulate the Celestial Eladrin.

Shiere would still be Eldarin noblity, I'm thinking a type of Aborean elf that we haven't seen yet, closer to commoners. I mean this elf race DOES have a sacred light theme to them, its just less shapeshiftingly as they are the still humaniod element of the Aborean Elf race. Compare the 5e PC Eladrin to the 5e Monster (Fey) Eldarin.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Agreed. Plus, part of Spelljammer was resource management because you could easily run out of water, food, and air on your trips. Even if Wildspace remains the same and it's only the phlogiston that gets replaced by the Astral, you lose that urgency. After all, you don't need to eat, breathe, or even age in the Astral. And then--unless it's been changed this edition and I forgot--you immediately catch up in age when you re-enter reality. Which would make any sort of inter-sphere travel kind of annoying.

What in 5e Phlogiston is a more inhospitable region within the Astral Plane. Or Spelljammers can move through both Phlogiston and the Astral Plane, basically a compromise between 2e and 4e Spelljamming.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

for·mat

/ˈfôrˌmat/

noun

noun: format; plural noun: formats

the way in which something is arranged or set out.

"the format of the funeral service"

the shape, size, and presentation of a book or periodical.

"the format is A4 on newsprint"

Similar:

design

style

presentation

appearance

look

form

shape

size

arrangement

plan

scheme

composition

makeup

configuration

structure

setup

the medium in which a sound recording is made available.

"the album is available as a CD as well as on LP and cassette formats"

COMPUTING

a defined structure for the processing, storage, or display of data.

"a data file in binary format"

verb

verb: format; 3rd person present: formats; past tense: formatted; past participle: formatted; gerund or present participle: formatting

(especially in computing) arrange or put into a format.

"how to format a document"

prepare (a storage medium) to receive data.

"you will be able to format a disk"

I think when folks hear a new format they keep thinking anew print medium, but I suspect it's simply a restructuring of the structure of the books and/or box sets.

 

[Parmandur]

Ted from Nerd Immersion going over the known facts: