Mearls announces end of Legends & Lore & New D&D Columns in 2015!

WotC's Mike Mearls has announced the end of the long-running Legends & Lore column, which was used during D&D Next playtesting to showcase ideas and concepts, and the start of the previously announced series of articles called Unearthed Arcana, "a monthly look at the art of tabletop RPG game design featuring insights into our philosophy, and examples of new and variant material to use at your table."

Additionally, series called Campaign Notebooks and Sage Advice will be launched. Sage Advice follows the old format of years past, and will be manned by Jeremy Crawford as he answers your rules questions. Campaign Notebooks will feature Chris Perkins and others -- "insights into D&D and tips for your games taken directly from the campaigns of Dungeon Masters here at Wizards."

 

[Tormyr]

I for one will definitely be looking forward to these new columns.

 

[Zaukrie]

Monthly? Not very exciting news.

 

[Astrosicebear]

@astrosicebear

I would argue that the official web site doesn't do much for any of those three concerns. Oh, it certainly HELPS, I'm sure, but I'm dubious as to cost (both in money and time)/benefit.

In my mind, it's kind-of like the official website for Frito-Lay. They have to have one because it's expected. But the percentage of people who visit versus the total number of consumers who use the product is infinitesimally small... I presume. That's in no way backed up by any evidence whatsoever.

That said, I would certainly welcome daily content on par with Wizards' M:tG side of things.

D&D isn't a consumable product, its an investment. In order for that investment to pay off for the consumer, content has to be produced in both standard revenue streams (books) and marketing (web).

But yes, why cant D&D site be like MTG site? MTG is always changing, has a tremendous fanbase, and its a game. D&D is a game, and always changes, every session is different, like a MTG match, but the core rules never change, only expand. D&D.com could focus on getting people into Adventure Leagues with game reports, getting more DMs to run AL games, or help DMs DM better with advise articles. Expand the realms with content, keep them alive and changing in a believable ways that build them up and not tear them down.

There is so much potential there. And if they slow roll this content site, with a potential OGL in place in a few months, the 3PP are going to eat them alive at this. If WOTC wants to sit back and be along for the ride, thats fine, but if they want to drive the train, they'd better start shoveling coal.

 

[Queer Venger]

This news has made my week. I cannot wait for UA next year. This is the type of presentation I have been wanting from WotC, thanks for brining back articles and Sage Advice. This is pure WIN!!!

 

[pukunui]

Have they announced an official collected errata/clarifications page yet?

That should take precedence over any of this stuff.

That's what the survey Mike mentions will be for. They've said previously that they're not going to errata anything without first finding out from the public what needs errata.

That being said, errata came up when I asked Jeremy Crawford about math issues with some of the monsters in the MM and he said that they are collecting errata. The survey may end up being a list of specific things with the question being: Do you think this needs errata?

 

[Uller]

Dungeon magazine or something similar is a must. I made huge use of Dungeon with my DDI subscription in my sandboxy campaign. Find three or four level appropriate adventures and provide hooks for them and presto...easy to run on going campaign with lots of variety and players feeling like they are driving the game. Would gladly pay a few dollars per month for regular short published adventures.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

I like the comparison to WOTC's MTG site. I agree, the amount of activity and support there appears to be huge (though, I haven't played MTG for over 20 years). However I can see that with the Sage, Unearthed Arcana, Story Notes and Recorded Event activities there should be something up at least once a week.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

The problem I have with Unearthed Arcana being monthly is that some of that content is stuff I (and others) were waiting for as part of the DMG. It's, naturally, much better to polish it off and put it up in an article than to just ditch it or put an unfinished condensed version in the DMG. So I'm not upset that it had to be cut from the DMG. But, as it now stands, the core rulebooks aren't really finished yet for me. Starting the campaign I planned to do with the 5e DMG material won't be able to happen until I have that material, which, since it didn't make the DMG cut, I can't have until it comes out online.

I'd much rather see Unearthed Arcana start off as a weekly article as they rush out stuff that is basically done and was only cut for reasons of limited page count. Then, once they unload that stuff they can announce that they've gotten the initial backed-up material out and are now switching over to monthly.

 

[Rabbitbait]

My hope is that they put a decent indexing system in immediately. For 4e, I found it very hard to find the specific resources I was looking for, especially when I did not know the name of what I was looking for.

Assuming that they do establish some sort of adventure database, I really hope that they list them by level range, theme, campaign world and style.

 

[DEFCON 1]

During 4E they had stuff up on their website weekly and it's not like it turned that edition into the end-all-and-be-all. So I fail to see how not putting up the same amount of stuff for 5E is somehow going to get WotC left behind.

You can't have it both ways. If having tons of material on the website is the answer to bringing in and retaining all the manner of old and new players... 4E should have been the greatest edition for every player ever. Since it wasn't... I think it's say to say that a bountiful website full of articles isn't the requirement to making 5E into the behemoth of the RPG industry.

Will articles be nice? Absolutely. Will they be the lynchpin upon the success or failure of the edition? Not even close.