D&D (2024) Anyone Else Find It Interesting How Different The Approaches to Setting Books Is Between 5e & 5.5e?

[Henadic Theologian]

This works for me. The longer this lore focus goes on the more likely it is old settings get revisited. Now, the actual quality of the revisits will likely vary considerably and I have no faith they will get it right, personally (see, Ravenloft, Planescape et al). I also have concave interest in more MtG settings.

That all being said, the reason I'm all for it is once they revisit an old setting, even briefly, it becomes available for people to publish it in the DM's Guild. Great stuff available for Greyhawk already. So I guess what I'm saying is, the best thing about WotC coast publishing this stuff is that it lets other people publish stuff that I probably like better.

Weird how the world works sometimes.

Yes unlocking setting for dmsguild is pretty important.

 

[Micah Sweet]

This works for me. The longer this lore focus goes on the more likely it is old settings get revisited. Now, the actual quality of the revisits will likely vary considerably and I have no faith they will get it right, personally (see, Ravenloft, Planescape et al). I also have concave interest in more MtG settings.

That all being said, the reason I'm all for it is once they revisit an old setting, even briefly, it becomes available for people to publish it in the DM's Guild. Great stuff available for Greyhawk already. So I guess what I'm saying is, the best thing about WotC publishing this stuff is that it lets other people publish stuff that I probably like better.

Weird how the world works sometimes.

I have said this many times. The best part about WotC's setting work IMO is that it allows people other than WotC to do setting work on the DMsGuild.

 

[Mercurius]

Haven't read the whole thread, but I think maybe WotC is searching for a way to refresh the IP, and in a forward-thinking way (while they're "ahead" rather than "behind"). I've heard some remark that "D&D" is in need of a bit of a revival, in terms of world/setting/flavor. The core IP is great and "evergreen," but there are only so many times that you can rehash old settings and stories, much of which is rather dated. So at the very least, they need to find new vessels for the IP.

Consider how many fresh and innovative RPGs have come out over the last decade or so. In a way, I'm reminded of D&D in the 90s: you had a flurry of innovation in the late 80s-early 90s alongside the Indie boom. By the late 90s, D&D was anachronistic and decrepit relative to RPG development as a whole.

The comparison only goes so far, of course, as D&D is still thriving, at least in terms of popularity. But the current wave seemed to peak a couple years ago, and regardless of book sales on the 2024 core rulebooks, they'll need some fresh inspiration to revive momentum, imo.

And it may be that they're forward-thinking: how can they revive and fresh while they're doing well, rather than after they've been slumping for a few years?

Finally, I think it is hard to quantify just how important settings are to IP. I once remarked back in the day that one reason that Pathfinder was so strong was Golarion: it gave a central world for all to relate with, if only to illustrate in a living way what Pathfinder was about. WotC doesn't have a singular world; there's the Forgotten Realms, but it is pretty much in stasis. Perhaps they are taking more of a "Worlds of D&D" approach, with multiple ways to interact with multiple worlds. But to do this, they have to churn out some worlds, give living examples of what D&D can be.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

I'm not convinced there is a difference in approach between 5E and 5.5E. It's the same game. And the product plan has been evolving for the last 11 years.

First, I'm surprised at how many setting books were published for 5E. And even more surprised that most of them didn't have adventure support.

Second, I was surprised to Dragonlance get an adventure, but not a setting book. Still scratching my head at that one.

Third, they've been experimenting with format for a while. Spelljammer got 3 books in a slipcase. That's the deluxe treatment for a setting. This year we're going to see an Eberron book that's shorter and slimmer that previous books. It's like a mini-update.

As for Forgotten Realms, there hasn't been a proper campaign setting published in 15 years (4E) and you've got to go back almost 25 years (3E) for a book that fans actually embraced. So maybe it was just time.

 

[Stormonu]

This works for me. The longer this lore focus goes on the more likely it is old settings get revisited. Now, the actual quality of the revisits will likely vary considerably and I have no faith they will get it right, personally (see, Ravenloft, Planescape et al). I also have concave interest in more MtG settings.

That all being said, the reason I'm all for it is once they revisit an old setting, even briefly, it becomes available for people to publish it in the DM's Guild. Great stuff available for Greyhawk already. So I guess what I'm saying is, the best thing about WotC publishing this stuff is that it lets other people publish stuff that I probably like better.

Weird how the world works sometimes.

Out of curiosity, what were the muck-ups with Planescape? The Ravenloft and Dragonlance changes stuck out to me pretty strongly, but my knowledge of Planescape is pretty surface level so beyond rolling The Sign of One faction into the Mind's Eye, what else was changed?

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I agree. Largely selling us the same content we already bought 10 years ago won't work very well.

It's not just that - those books are still in print, and they want to keep selling them without having to do any work to "replace" them. They want to be additive.

I don't think that it's a big direction change for them (maybe a small one, though) - it's just "time".

 

[eyeheartawk]

Out of curiosity, what were the muck-ups with Planescape? The Ravenloft and Dragonlance changes stuck out to me pretty strongly, but my knowledge of Planescape is pretty surface level so beyond rolling The Sign of One faction into the Mind's Eye, what else was changed?

Yeah, fair. It's not "bad" in the way that say, Ravenloft is. It's different and they made some changes that I don't particularly like, but given it's a smaller slipcase release vs 2E's dozen books or whatever that's understandable to an extent.

Here is a list of all the notable differences

Mainly my criticism with the new Plenescape is the issue I have with most of the 5e settings. That is, they are wide as an ocean but deep as a puddle.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Out of curiosity, what were the muck-ups with Planescape? The Ravenloft and Dragonlance changes stuck out to me pretty strongly, but my knowledge of Planescape is pretty surface level so beyond rolling The Sign of One faction into the Mind's Eye, what else was changed?

The product is way too tiny for a setting as big as Planescape, it's completely focused on the Outlands/Sigil with nothing for the rest of the Outer Planes, and the canceled the RW deities that are actually important to the setting. It wasn't all bad, but it was disappointing in the extreme.

Hopefully they will come out with a big Planescape: Manual of the Planes or something like that.

 

[occam]

Out of curiosity, what were the muck-ups with Planescape? The Ravenloft and Dragonlance changes stuck out to me pretty strongly, but my knowledge of Planescape is pretty surface level so beyond rolling The Sign of One faction into the Mind's Eye, what else was changed?

I don't think there was anything significantly wrong with the Planescape set. In terms of setting, it was focused on Sigil and the Outlands, which I think was a reasonable choice given finite page count.

But I think some folks have unfairly compared it to the entirety of the 2e Planescape line, as if any single product could cover that. Compare it, instead, to the original Planescape Campaign Setting, which included:

• "A DM Guide to the Planes" that is arguably equivalent to what we already have in the DMG
• "A Player's Guide to the Planes" and "Sigil and Beyond" (where "Beyond" is really just the Outlands) which is roughly equivalent to the "Sigil and the Outlands" book in PAitM
• A "Monstrous Supplement" with a dozen random planar monsters, vs. the "Morte's Planar Parade" book in PAitM
• No adventure, unlike "Turn of Fortune's Wheel" in PAitM which provides more detail for a few Sigil locations and nearly half the Outlands

Overall, the 2e and 5e Planescape boxed sets are pretty equivalent. And if the 5e Spelljammer boxed set had had the page count of the Planescape set, it probably would've been much better received.