D&D 5E D&D Head Talks Future Plans (Sort Of)

WotC has launched a new design blog. The first edition is written by D&D head Ray Winninger, and he talks a little about future plans.

"Later in the year, Chris will return with our big summer adventure, James Wyatt will deliver a substantially improved version of a concept that I initiated myself, and Amanda Hamon will close us out with a project that was jointly conceived by herself and several other studio members. As usual, Jeremy Crawford is working with all of our leads, overseeing mechanical content and rules development.

In addition to these five major products, look for a couple of additional surprises we’ll unveil in the months ahead."

You can read the full blog here:

Who We Are & What We Do | D&D Studio Blog | Dungeons & Dragons

The first of many design blogs, direct from your friends at the Dungeons & Dragons Studio!

dnd.wizards.com

He also mentions that a D&D book takes 12-14 months to make, and half the projects developed don't make it to market. Winninger describes the structure of WotC's 'D&D Studio':

"The D&D Studio itself is organized into four departments: Game Design, Art, Production, and Product Management, each led by a department head. Game Design is responsible for the developing game mechanics and stories. Art establishes the “look and feel” of Dungeons & Dragons by creating visual concepts, directing our freelance illustrators, and creating innovative graphic designs. The Production department manages our project schedules, interfaces with manufacturing experts, and generally handles administrative matters for the studio. The Product Management department interfaces with sales, marketing, and market research. They also own our long-term product roadmap and look after the D&D business."

The studio has five Product Leads: Jeremy Crawford, Amanda Hamon, Chris Perkins, Wes Schneider, and James Wyatt.

 

[Nellisir]

Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkeinen's Time of Foes are already the MM2 & MM3. If this is a Draconomicon, it would be MM4.

Yeah, this is why I specified "straight-up" monster manual. Not a hybrid monster book/ecology book. And I know other people like them; they can speak for themselves. I'm speaking for myself. (I like them fine, btw. I just would like a bulk of more monsters brought into 5e, not just sprinkled through everything.)

 

[Nellisir]

My guess is we will see a second proper Monster Manual if they ever decide to start letting some of the older books go out of print and need a home for the monsters that appeared in them. So far, though, that's not happening. Even assembling all of the PDF-only WotC monsters wouldn't get you very far toward a new volume.

I don't understand your thinking here. There are a bazillion un-updated monsters from older editions, but you think a MM2 will only be reprints of monsters already in 5e?

That would be really disappointing.

 

[Nellisir]

I really don't need WotC to do more monsters. Kobold Press, the Scarred Lands monster book, Iron Kingdoms monster book, and the deep dives by Nord Games, not to mention the stuff on Drivethru and DMsGuild are great. Frankly, other than the common experience, I'm not sure what I need WotC to do at this point.

I've found the DMs Guild stuff to be hit or miss, and the drivethru stuff is sometimes fine but uniformly of lesser quality. The Kobold books are fantastic. Scarred Lands I haven't seen yet. IK I wasn't fond of the first time around.

I recently wrote a Greyhawk Underdark article, and there just wasn't the breadth of creatures from current WotC publications to get beyond the same core critters that have been retread since 1e. I'd have had to update a bunch myself, or go to 3rd party sources which gets really weird legally and inconvenient for the reader. I think it's fair to assume most readers have the big 3 (MM, Mords, & Volos), but how many are really going to have My Dad's Monster Manual (which is awesome, btw) from the DM's Guild?

Anyways, a niche problem but it's my problem and my perspective.

 

[Parmandur]

Yeah, this is why I specified "straight-up" monster manual. Not a hybrid monster book/ecology book. And I know other people like them; they can speak for themselves. I'm speaking for myself. (I like them fine, btw. I just would like a bulk of more monsters brought into 5e, not just sprinkled through everything.)

I mean the Monster Manual is largely ecologies...?

 

[Nellisir]

I mean the Monster Manual is largely ecologies...?

Seriously? OK, Chapters 1-2 of Volo's, and Chapters 1-5 of Mordenkainen's. Ecology. Lore. Exposition. Whatever vocabulary you want to use, if we're nitpicking about that.

Obviously you know Volo's is less than half "bestiary". And before you get pedantic about how it's "all bestiary", that's the actual title of Chapter 3. Bestiary. It's also the actual title of Chapter 6 in Mord's. (Which is slightly more than half the book.)

I LIKE Volo's and Mord's. If and when WotC does a Draconomicon, I'll buy it no problem. Maybe they'll do some kind of Fey/Shadow theme book too; that'd be awesome. But I would ALSO like a book that's 95% "Chapter 1: Bestiary" that doesn't have a theme and is just a giant collection of fun stuff monster things.

 

[Parmandur]

Seriously? OK, Chapters 1-2 of Volo's, and Chapters 1-5 of Mordenkainen's. Ecology. Lore. Exposition. Whatever vocabulary you want to use, if we're nitpicking about that.

Obviously you know Volo's is less than half "bestiary". And before you get pedantic about how it's "all bestiary", that's the actual title of Chapter 3. Bestiary. It's also the actual title of Chapter 6 in Mord's. (Which is slightly more than half the book.)

I LIKE Volo's and Mord's. If and when WotC does a Draconomicon, I'll buy it no problem. Maybe they'll do some kind of Fey/Shadow theme book too; that'd be awesome. But I would ALSO like a book that's 95% "Chapter 1: Bestiary" that doesn't have a theme and is just a giant collection of fun stuff monster things.

What I mean is that the Monster Manual has very, very large amounts of similar fluff text, and art. So they perfected the format a little further.

 

[Nellisir]

What I mean is that the Monster Manual has very, very large amounts of similar fluff text, and art. So they perfected the format a little further.

OK, well, thanks for explaining what I want to me.

 

[Parmandur]

You are welcome!

 

[Eyes of Nine]

OK, well, thanks for explaining what I want to me.

I hear what you are saying @Nellisir . It would be nice to have another book that was a broad selection of just monsters, without more than a page of background information per monster type. Something like Creature Codex.

 

[Mercurius]

I would think it has more to do with the exclusiveness of the setting and less to do about psionics.

Huh?