D&D (2024) I think we are on the cusp of a sea change.

[Minigiant]

I would count the mtg books as new settings, and Wildemount too.

I don't. The MTG books are from MYG settings that WOTC already owned. Outside of Strixhaven, it was just converting something they already owned. So it's a new conversion but not a new creation.

And Wildemount is just an official licensing of a celebrity's creation.

WOTC hasn't created a wholely new setting for D&D in over 20 years.

 

[S'mon]

D&D 5e was built primarily on the back of nostalgia, and when its popularity blew up (as did streaming D&D and other TTRPGs) the target audience shifted. The core rulebooks were designed in a completely different style than a more modern audience would prefer

Seems weird that it would be 'completely different style than a more modern audience would prefer', yet the most popular edition of D&D ever? I think 5e both attracted new players and brought back old ones. And the experienced players were important for introducing new players to the game. 5e being both accessible to new players and attractive to old players was important to its initial success.

 

[Minigiant]

Seems weird that it would be 'completely different style than a more modern audience would prefer', yet the most popular edition of D&D ever? I think 5e both attracted new players and brought back old ones. And the experienced players were important for introducing new players to the game. 5e being both accessible to new players and attractive to old players was important to its initial success.

New fans by design tend to be players. Players have less control of the rules and narratives of a table. New players more so and they tend to defer to the ideas of older players and the DMs who tended to be from older audiences.
However once the new players stopped being new and got creative, their desires became more vocalized.

Happened every edition. 5e was just the one with the biggest influx of new players.

 

[JEB]

Just to name a few; Fizban's Treasury of Dragons, Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, and Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden.

Fizban's and Icewind Dale aren't specifically targeting old audiences, anymore than Shang-Chi was specifically targeting fans of the original Shang-Chi comics. It's a reuse of old IP meant to appeal to both old and potential new fans. I'll grant you Fizban's certainly taps much more into the nostalgia well than Icewind Dale, though.

Van Richten's, meanwhile, was clearly targeted more at new audiences, since it rebooted the original setting and thoroughly reworked it. Sure, they wanted (and got) some classic Ravenloft fans on board, but they weren't the main target in that case.

WOTC hasn't created a wholely new setting for D&D in over 20 years.

That's about to change, fortunately! Two brand-new settings in the next few years, or so we've been told.

EDIT: Although, point of order... Eberron came out in 2003 (18 years ago) 2004 (17 years ago). Nentir Vale first appeared in 2008 (13 years ago). Maybe the latter isn't "wholly new" but the prior sure is.

 

[Staffan]

Sure, but there's also the issue that the alignments assigned to the gods in Eberron tend to be much more in-line with what you'd expect from their teachings. Whereas that's not really the case with a lot of settings.

It definitely is a massive help with Eberron that the setting is agnostic on whether they actually exist. It allows religion to be more diverse in that setting too, in terms of how it operates.

One of the particularly cool things about how religion works in Eberron is that it allows for unorthodox interpretations of the gods, which in turn can lead to some interesting sects. The most common interpretation of the gods split them into two pantheons: the Sovereign Host and the Dark Six, who have been cast out of the Host. But you also get things like the Three Faces of War, which worships the three different war gods and recognizes that some situations call for the valiant protection of the weak that's Dol Arrah's purview, and other situations call for the underhanded ambushes that's the Mockery's. Or the Restful Watch which believes that Aureon and the Keeper cooperate to select worthy souls for safe keeping.

WOTC hasn't created a wholely new setting for D&D in over 20 years.

The Eberron campaign setting was released in 2004, and while the primary designer was Keith Baker, a lot of the setting also came from James Wyatt, Bill Slavicsek, and other WOTC designers. Ghostwalk was published in 2003, though it didn't get any support beyond the one book. And of course, 4e had a whole new implied setting of its own, usually referred to Nerath Vale even though that's just a part of it.

 

[Malmuria]

I'm still confused as to what a "sea change" is supposed to look like, barring a completely new edition with a fundamentally different design.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I was thinking more something a bit dark fantasy, like eg Kobold Press's Midgard, not Venger Satanis levels of sleaze.

But how would that attract bunches of people? I don't think there's a particular correlation between being annoyed with 5E's changes and liking "dark fantasy" (also I would question whether Midgard is "dark fantasy". If it is, Earthdawn definitely, and a whole lot of stuff is - arguably Golarion is even, it's about as dark as Midgard). It seems like the people who are "stomping their foot" mad are all mad about stuff like non-all-evil orcs and so on, so you'd have to go a bit further than that.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I often wonder what a D&D campaign world would look like if made with 2021 sensibilities

 

[guachi]

I often wonder what a D&D campaign world would look like if made with 2021 sensibilities

My serious answer is it would probably look like Exandria.

 

[Malmuria]

My serious answer is it would probably look like Exandria.

I don't know a ton about Exandria...seems pretty generic in a lot of ways?