D&D Adds Two New Books to 2025 Slate, Including New Eberron Book

Wizards of the Coast is adding two Dungeons & Dragons books to its 2025 slate, including Eberron: Forge of the Artificer in August and an unnamed mystery book in October. Eberron: Forge of the Artificer will include the revised Artificer class, several new backgrounds and feats, and revised Eberron species, including the “classic” species that previously appeared in Eberron: Rising From the Last War and the new Khoravar species. The design team for Eberron: Forge of the Artificer includes James Wyatt (who worked on the original Eberron line), with original Eberron designer Keith Baker consulting on the new book.

The Forgotten Realms Player's Guide will introduce circle-casting, a new way to cast spells. Full details on the new mechanic was not revealed, but it will involve multiple spellcasters working together to amp up a spell or give it additional effects. One example given was making a spell's effects permanent instead of having a temporary duration.

While no other details were provided for the October mystery book, EN World received a host of new details about the rest of D&D's 2025 slate during a press visit to Wizards of the Coast's new office headquarters last week.

Dragon Delves - July 8, 2025 Release Date

The previously unnamed dragon anthology is called Dragon Delves and will feature 10 short adventures, each of which features a different type of chromatic or metallic dragon. Three campaign options will be provided in the anthology to link together the adventures. Not every adventure pits players against dragons, especially as the adventures range from Level 1 to Level 12. The adventures are described as being relatively short and utilize the prep-style seen in the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide. There's also an art section showcasing dragon art from across 50 years of D&D material.

Dragon Delves also noticably departs from Wizards' in-house style for D&D. Each adventure features art by a different artist, with the artists each providing their own style instead of conforming to the "fantastic realism" typically found in D&D books. Artists in Dragon Delves includes Luke Eidensink, Dominik Mayer, and Ed Kwong, with example pieces seen below.


white dragon ed kwong.jpg

green dragon.jpg

red dragon.jpg


Eberron: Forge of the Artificer - August 19, 2025 Release Date
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Eberron: Forge of the Artificer serves as a "companion" book to Eberron: Rising From The Last War, with looks at different parts of Eberron that wasn't explored in the previous rulebook. The book will include new backgrounds, new bastion options tied to Eberron, and expanded rules for airships. The book also includes some changes/evolutions of Eberron lore. Notably, dragonmarked houses are no longer "species-locked" with characters able to join the houses later in life. Dragonmarks are also being made into feats as opposed to having a separate subsystem.

As a note, lead rules designer Jeremy Crawford specifically noted that the Khoravar are being considered a new species and distinct from half-elves. Crawford noted that this change came from Eberron lore itself and reflects how the existing lore of D&D is influencing the mechanics.

While the book won't include a full campaign, there are three chapters presented as campaign "options" with sample adventures. The three chapters, titled Sharn Inquisitives, Dragonmark Intrigue, and Morgrave Expeditions are organized using the methods explained in the Dungeon Master's Guide and include several sample adventures.

At one point, Eberron: Forge of the Artificer was described as a "Xanathar's Guide to Everything" book, but specific to Eberron. The book will also have a different page count and price point than typical D&D rulebooks, although no further details were given.



Heroes of the Borderland Starter Set - September 16, 2025 Release Date

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Heroes of the Borderlands is a return to the Keep in the Borderlands, although "time has passed" since the original adventure module. The physical starter set will also contain several new innovations designed to make playing D&D easier for beginners. Notably, the starter set includes numerous new components including "tiles" that players mix and match to create new characters. The tile system was described as one of the quickest character creation systems ever for new players, short of giving them a pre-generated character. The Starter Set will also include support for having multiple DMs run the campaign.

Forgotten Realms Player's Guide - November 11, 2025 Release Date

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The Forgotten Realms Player's Guide will feature new backgrounds, feats, and 8 new subclasses. The 8 new subclasses will be revealed today as part of an Unearthed Arcana (found here). Instead of rehashing existing subclasses, at least some of the subclasses are inspired by different parts of the Forgotten Realms. For example, the bard subclass is inspired by the Moonshae Isles, while the genie-themed paladin is focused on Calimsham.
The eight subclasses are:

  • College Of The Moon (Bard)
  • Knowledge Domain (Cleric)
  • Purple Dragon Knight (Fighter)
  • Oath Of The Noble Genies (Paladin)
  • Winter Walker (Ranger)
  • Scion Of The Three (Rogue)
  • Spellfire Sorcery (Sorcerer)
  • Bladesinger (Wizard)

Forgotten Realms Adventure Guide - November 11, 2025 Release Date

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The Forgotten Realms Adventure Guide will contain deep dives on five different parts of the Forgotten Realms, each of which are meant to focus on a "different kind of fantasy." The five areas include the Moonshae Isles, Icewind Dale, the Dalelands, Calimshan, and Baldur's Gate. Each area will have short adventures for DMs to run or help launch a campaign.

When asked whether the Forgotten Realms would have any changes, Crawford said that some areas of the Forgotten Realms would have new developments, particularly in areas where Fifth Edition hasn't touched before. Additionally, Baldur's Gate 3 will be referenced in the artwork of the Baldur's Gate section and there would be some other nods to the game in that section as well.
 

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Christian Hoffer

Christian Hoffer

Wow, covering the Moonshaes? That area has been off-limits for development since the book trilogy! Curious to see what this book will actually contain.

Interested to see what they do with the Artificer, though considering how little Bastions changed, I don't expect we'll see any differences from the recent Artificer UA (which is a shame, that class needs some serious further fleshing out). Though the depicted characters look too modern for my vision of a fantasy game. Reminds me of the Arcane anime, based on League of Legends - which, while good isn't the sort of Fantasy I am looking for.

That painting for the Borderlands is confusing, the depiction of the hobgoblins makes it looks like its a PC vs. PC scene, especially with the Elf points the bow at the Tiefling instead of one of hobgoblins! (and it took a moment to even realize those were hobgoblins on the cover...). Though the set has my attention.

The Dragon Delve art doesn't sit well with me, and as much as I love Dragons, I'm not sure I am going to pick the book up.
 

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I disliked it the first time, but I've come around to the idea since. I'm at least open to it this time and assumed a while ago this was probably going to be the model they used.
It’s also easy enough to split the difference and say that 99% of the house is one race but rare exceptions have been known to exist.

If Keith is involved, I’m not super worried. I’ok be more evaluating how much of the book is actually new material, especially compared to Exploring Eberron.
 

I assume the dragonmarks not being "species-locked" means they aren't presented like subraces this time, not a 4e style player entitlement thing. Hopefully this also means that using most of your dragonmark abilities isn't locked out to non-spellcasters. I do wonder how the Mark of Finding will be handled this time.

As for the Eberron specific species, I hope they let Shifters use all the beast forms, there's really no reason to limit them to a single one now.
My guess is they will be feats, with an origin feat to represent least marks and a level 4 feat or feats to represent greater marks or other unique mark abilities.

Add a background to represent house affiliation and your all set.
 

I assume the dragonmarks not being "species-locked" means they aren't presented like subraces this time, not a 4e style player entitlement thing. Hopefully this also means that using most of your dragonmark abilities isn't locked out to non-spellcasters. I do wonder how the Mark of Finding will be handled this time.

As for the Eberron specific species, I hope they let Shifters use all the beast forms, there's really no reason to limit them to a single one now.
I would guess the Mark mechanics will work similar to the free spells/slots certain species get. Dragonmarked might be a feat chain or a universal subspecies.
 


Odds of eberron book containing any new lore/setting stuff or it just being a stripped down version of Rising from the Last War, with maybe more character options?
10%, and only that high because Baker is consulting and thus might come up with something cool. If it's not a stripped-down RftLW for the most part (albeit possibly with some good illustrations), I'll be pretty shocked.

Interesting to see Half-Elves return so soon, even with a silly name.
 

I really like the eclectic art style for Dragon Delves.

However, I'm not enthusiastic about the adventures in this book being done in the style of the ones in the new DMG. Those are perfect examples of the amount of info you actually need to write down if you're just running a homebrew adventure for your group & not writing for publication. But for a PUBLISHED adventure, I want something much more fleshed out than those are.
 



Khoravar, "children of Khorvaire", has been the Eberron term for half-elves for a long time. Sounds like they will differ from the Half-elves of other D&D worlds in some way though.
It sounds like they are getting the full species treatment while they figure out how they are handling species mixing rules. Which is fine, since Eberron half-elves were essentially a unique species rather than humanXelf.

It does seem like orcs are taking up the half-orcs role in House Thraask though.
 

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