Hello everyone, Darryl here with this week’s gaming news! Pathfinder and Starfinder releases for the coming year announced, new Dungeons & Dragons DM screen coming soon, Regé-Jean Page interviewed about the D&D film, price changes coming to DriveThruRPG, and more!
Don’t forget, you can get all the news every week with Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk! This week, Morrus and Peter are joined by Dave Chapman to talk about the Doctor Who RPG and the Awfully Cheerful Engine.
In case you missed it elsewhere on EN World this week:
PaizoCon Online is over and now it’s time to wade through the flurry of new product announcements for Pathfinder and Starfinder. And as usual for PaizoCon, it’s a lot from the prolific publisher with releases stretching out into 2022.
First up for Starfinder, we have the Galaxy Exploration Manual which includes new class options for every Starfinder class, a PC background generator, and new equipment. And of course, plenty of new rules for exploration such as rules for creating worlds to explore from asteroids to satellites to colony ships, details for 12 different environmental biomes, rules for creating and expanding a world’s culture, and GM advice for running sandbox-style campaigns. This 160-page hardcover releases to mass market on June 15 with a retail price of $39.99. We’ve also got later this summer Tech Revolutions, a sourcebook on the galaxy’s most cutting-edge technology from lost alien relics to robotic nanites to cybernetic augmentations and more. This 160 page hardcover is set for release on August 25 with a retail price of $39.99.
For adventures, the new six-part adventure path is Horizons of the Vast.
Pathfinder 2nd Edition has three major sourcebooks due for release. Secrets of Magic adds hundreds of new spells and magic items, the Magus and Summoner classes, and new methods of spellcasting like elementalism, geomancy, shadow magic, rune magic, and more. This 256-page hardcover is scheduled for an August release with a price of $49.99. We also got the first look at the cover art for Guns & Gears at the convention, which adds the Inventor and Sharpshooter classes, a new automaton ancestry, firearms and rules for guns, new archetypes, new gadges and vehicles, siege engines, and more. This 256-page hardcover is scheduled for an October release for $49.99. Finally, there’s Book of the Dead focusing on undead enemies and player characters and information on the undead nation of Geb and the devastated Gravelands. This book is scheduled for a March 2022 release. Three new Lost Omens guides are on the way too, The Mwangi Expanse in July, The Grand Bazaar in October, and Absalom, City of Lost Omens in January 2022.
The next adventure path is Strength of Thousnds focused on the magic academy of Magaambya.
Wizards of the Coast announced a new tool for dungeonmasters, the D&D Dungeonmaster’s Screen Dungeon Kit. As has been their style for a while now, this is more than just a DM’s screen and has several additional products useful to those running games. The boxed set includes 32 punch-out dungeon map cards, a double-sided dry erase sweet with map grid on one side and list of player actions on the other, 18 illustrated punch-out condition cards, and 9 punch-out initiative cards. The dungeon map cards are not to tactical scale, but more are meant for planning a dungeon map or to be randomly shuffled to generate one on the fly as each one has several rooms with a tunnel or hallway leading out to the edge to connect to the others. The condition cards feature an illustration of the condition or a potential cause of it on one side with game information on the other. The initiative cards appear from the promotional images to be the artwork from the included DM’s Screen cut into 9 cards with the numbers 1-9 on them. This boxed set is available for pre-order now for a retail price of $24.99 with a release date of August 17.
Regé-Jean Page sat for an interview with the entertainment magazine Variety to talk about, among other things, the Dungeons & Dragons live action film. He talks about his history with gaming, admitting that beyond a few Dungeons & Dragons podcasts, he’s more “a second-generation ‘Dungeons and Dragonser’” from playing D&D-inspired games.
DriveThruRPG announced an upcoming increase in the cost of premium color print-on-demand books. Back in May, OneBookShelf (the parent company of DriveThruRPG) warned of potential price changes following a shift in printing technology with Lightning Source. At the time, it was expected that the change in printing presses would result in a slight decrease in prices but warned “if the quality of printing drops significantly…we may have to consider more significant changes.” This appears to be the case as the announcement states “As of July 1st […] the price of premium color books will increase dramatically.” The post did not specify how much they will increase by, but provided a link to available POD print books for those wanting to grab titles before the price goes up.
Modiphius released a free quickstart adventure for the Dune: Adventures in the Imperium roleplaying game this week. The adventure Wormsign sends the player characters beyond the shield wall to locate a group of smugglers stealing your House’s spice, forcing them to survive the dangers of the deserts of Arrakis. The quickstart includes basic rules needed to play, six pregenerated elite agent characters, and a brief overview of the setting along with the adventure. If the quickstart manages to pique your interest, the Core Rulebook is available now in PDF for $19.99 with the hardcover edition for $59.99 coming to stores soon.
Geek Native noticed that the terms of service for Hero Forge 3D printed miniatures had a few terms included about who owns the rights to the miniatures you create using the site. Specifically, the Terms of Service state that Sky Castle Studios (parent company of Hero Forge), “retains all ownership, rights, title, and interest in the 3D models” and that they may only be used for “personal, noncommercial use”. So right out of the gate for clarification, no this does not mean that Hero Forge “owns” the characters you create minis for, but that they own the design of the miniature itself (the same way that Hasbro doesn’t “own” Star Wars but does own the rights to the designs of action figures they create). Further clarification of the Terms state that the wording isn’t to prevent casual use of the miniatures created such as videos or streams of games using the miniatures or of miniature painting streams. The Terms are meant to prevent unauthorized commercial use of the STL files for 3D printing that can be purchased. For example, you can buy and resell physical miniatures you purchase from Hero Forge or use them in giveaways, but you cannot take the STL file and print your own miniatures to sell. You can find more specific information about the rights involving Hero Forge miniatures used on sites such as Instagram, Twitch, and YouTube in the full article.
Free League and Humble have partnered for the Tales from the Loop and Symbaroum Bundle. The bundle features over $200 worth of digital books including the core rules for the kid adventure Tales from the Loop, the teenage sequel Things from the Flood, and the dark fantasy exploration Symbaroum roleplaying games along with sourcebooks, adventures, and more. This bundle runs until Monday, June 14, and benefits a charity of your choice. Meanwhile, the Pathfinder 2nd Edition bundle is still available featuring over $400 worth of books for Pathfinder 2nd Edition including the Core Rulebook, Gamemastery Guide, Bestiary, the Extinction Curse adventure path, maps, adventures, fiction, and more. This bundle benefits. This bundle benefits Stop AAPI Hate and runs until Thursday, June 10.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enpublishingrpg.com, and you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitch to get notifications when I go live, subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube for videos on gaming history, RPG reviews, and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
Don’t forget, you can get all the news every week with Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk! This week, Morrus and Peter are joined by Dave Chapman to talk about the Doctor Who RPG and the Awfully Cheerful Engine.
In case you missed it elsewhere on EN World this week:
- EN Publishing’s Awfully Cheerful Engine is still going on Kickstarter complete with a new preview of the space opera setting “Beam Me Up” including the character sheets from the demo stream.
- EN5ider #394 has ten new spells to bring a bit more witchiness into 5e, all designed around the flavor the theme of witchcraft spellcasting.
- EN Publishing’s Level Up 5e has two new previews. The Prestige system is a rating for each character that keeps track of how well-known their exploits have become. We also got a new look at the Planetouched heritage covering Tieflings and Aasimar.
- Rob Weiland examines the one box RPG style of Scratchpad Publishing and the games Dusk City Outlaws and Spectaculars.
- Egg Embry interviewed Chris O’Neill on his new dungeon crawl RPG MAZES on Kickstarter now.
- Etsy store BadgersBunker has a series of medieval-themed character sheets for Dungeons & Dragons.
- The seven-plus-hour long finale of The Mighty Nein campaign for Critical Role streamed Thursday night, closing out the second “season” of the live streaming hit.
- Larry Elmore released some previously-unseen early character study images for Dragonlance characters with the quote, “Found these in the flat files drawer”.
- M.T. Black continues his retrospective on RPG periodicals of the past with Dragon Reflections #43 covering The Dragon #43 from November 1980.
- Lewis Pulsipher talks about the ever-present problem of tabletop roleplaying games, the seemingly eternal shortage of gamemasters to run games.
- Michael Tresca looks at a non-Sword Coast recipe from Heroes’ Feast: The Official Dungeons & Dragons Cookbook with Kara-Tur Noodles, a stir fry noodle recipe.
- Don’t miss out on the newest RPG crowdfunding projects ending soon with Egg Embry’s RPG Crowdfunding News and keep up with all the new print RPG releases with Charles Dunwoody’s RPG Print News.
PaizoCon Online is over and now it’s time to wade through the flurry of new product announcements for Pathfinder and Starfinder. And as usual for PaizoCon, it’s a lot from the prolific publisher with releases stretching out into 2022.
First up for Starfinder, we have the Galaxy Exploration Manual which includes new class options for every Starfinder class, a PC background generator, and new equipment. And of course, plenty of new rules for exploration such as rules for creating worlds to explore from asteroids to satellites to colony ships, details for 12 different environmental biomes, rules for creating and expanding a world’s culture, and GM advice for running sandbox-style campaigns. This 160-page hardcover releases to mass market on June 15 with a retail price of $39.99. We’ve also got later this summer Tech Revolutions, a sourcebook on the galaxy’s most cutting-edge technology from lost alien relics to robotic nanites to cybernetic augmentations and more. This 160 page hardcover is set for release on August 25 with a retail price of $39.99.
For adventures, the new six-part adventure path is Horizons of the Vast.
The first 64-page adventure Planetfall will be out this July with a retail price of $22.99. For those looking for one-shot adventures, there’s two on their way this summer. Junker’s Delight has the players dealing with the scavengers of a massive junk field in order to return a lost ship, due out this July for $22.99.The Liberation of Locus-1 sends the players to a research station using magic and science to study the celestial phenomenon known as the Locus as they are threatened by pirates, hostile aliens, and the Azlanti Empire, due for release in August for $22.99.
Pathfinder 2nd Edition has three major sourcebooks due for release. Secrets of Magic adds hundreds of new spells and magic items, the Magus and Summoner classes, and new methods of spellcasting like elementalism, geomancy, shadow magic, rune magic, and more. This 256-page hardcover is scheduled for an August release with a price of $49.99. We also got the first look at the cover art for Guns & Gears at the convention, which adds the Inventor and Sharpshooter classes, a new automaton ancestry, firearms and rules for guns, new archetypes, new gadges and vehicles, siege engines, and more. This 256-page hardcover is scheduled for an October release for $49.99. Finally, there’s Book of the Dead focusing on undead enemies and player characters and information on the undead nation of Geb and the devastated Gravelands. This book is scheduled for a March 2022 release. Three new Lost Omens guides are on the way too, The Mwangi Expanse in July, The Grand Bazaar in October, and Absalom, City of Lost Omens in January 2022.
The next adventure path is Strength of Thousnds focused on the magic academy of Magaambya.
The six-part adventure path kicks off with Kindled Magic available in August for $24.99. We also have the name for the next adventure path, Quest for the Frozen Flame but no other information yet, and the 10th anniversary edition of the Kingmaker Adventure Path crowdfunded on GameOnTabletop set for release this year.
Wizards of the Coast announced a new tool for dungeonmasters, the D&D Dungeonmaster’s Screen Dungeon Kit. As has been their style for a while now, this is more than just a DM’s screen and has several additional products useful to those running games. The boxed set includes 32 punch-out dungeon map cards, a double-sided dry erase sweet with map grid on one side and list of player actions on the other, 18 illustrated punch-out condition cards, and 9 punch-out initiative cards. The dungeon map cards are not to tactical scale, but more are meant for planning a dungeon map or to be randomly shuffled to generate one on the fly as each one has several rooms with a tunnel or hallway leading out to the edge to connect to the others. The condition cards feature an illustration of the condition or a potential cause of it on one side with game information on the other. The initiative cards appear from the promotional images to be the artwork from the included DM’s Screen cut into 9 cards with the numbers 1-9 on them. This boxed set is available for pre-order now for a retail price of $24.99 with a release date of August 17.
Regé-Jean Page sat for an interview with the entertainment magazine Variety to talk about, among other things, the Dungeons & Dragons live action film. He talks about his history with gaming, admitting that beyond a few Dungeons & Dragons podcasts, he’s more “a second-generation ‘Dungeons and Dragonser’” from playing D&D-inspired games.
Wait, “I play a paladin”. Does he mean in Diablo or in the film? Curious. Depending on how you read the statement, it may be the first hint at information about the protagonist characters. Page also commented on the script, saying the film will be a “huge sigh of relief for Dungeons & Dragons fans everywhere” due to the elevation of genre storytelling in a “post-MCU world”.
DriveThruRPG announced an upcoming increase in the cost of premium color print-on-demand books. Back in May, OneBookShelf (the parent company of DriveThruRPG) warned of potential price changes following a shift in printing technology with Lightning Source. At the time, it was expected that the change in printing presses would result in a slight decrease in prices but warned “if the quality of printing drops significantly…we may have to consider more significant changes.” This appears to be the case as the announcement states “As of July 1st […] the price of premium color books will increase dramatically.” The post did not specify how much they will increase by, but provided a link to available POD print books for those wanting to grab titles before the price goes up.
Modiphius released a free quickstart adventure for the Dune: Adventures in the Imperium roleplaying game this week. The adventure Wormsign sends the player characters beyond the shield wall to locate a group of smugglers stealing your House’s spice, forcing them to survive the dangers of the deserts of Arrakis. The quickstart includes basic rules needed to play, six pregenerated elite agent characters, and a brief overview of the setting along with the adventure. If the quickstart manages to pique your interest, the Core Rulebook is available now in PDF for $19.99 with the hardcover edition for $59.99 coming to stores soon.
Geek Native noticed that the terms of service for Hero Forge 3D printed miniatures had a few terms included about who owns the rights to the miniatures you create using the site. Specifically, the Terms of Service state that Sky Castle Studios (parent company of Hero Forge), “retains all ownership, rights, title, and interest in the 3D models” and that they may only be used for “personal, noncommercial use”. So right out of the gate for clarification, no this does not mean that Hero Forge “owns” the characters you create minis for, but that they own the design of the miniature itself (the same way that Hasbro doesn’t “own” Star Wars but does own the rights to the designs of action figures they create). Further clarification of the Terms state that the wording isn’t to prevent casual use of the miniatures created such as videos or streams of games using the miniatures or of miniature painting streams. The Terms are meant to prevent unauthorized commercial use of the STL files for 3D printing that can be purchased. For example, you can buy and resell physical miniatures you purchase from Hero Forge or use them in giveaways, but you cannot take the STL file and print your own miniatures to sell. You can find more specific information about the rights involving Hero Forge miniatures used on sites such as Instagram, Twitch, and YouTube in the full article.
Free League and Humble have partnered for the Tales from the Loop and Symbaroum Bundle. The bundle features over $200 worth of digital books including the core rules for the kid adventure Tales from the Loop, the teenage sequel Things from the Flood, and the dark fantasy exploration Symbaroum roleplaying games along with sourcebooks, adventures, and more. This bundle runs until Monday, June 14, and benefits a charity of your choice. Meanwhile, the Pathfinder 2nd Edition bundle is still available featuring over $400 worth of books for Pathfinder 2nd Edition including the Core Rulebook, Gamemastery Guide, Bestiary, the Extinction Curse adventure path, maps, adventures, fiction, and more. This bundle benefits. This bundle benefits Stop AAPI Hate and runs until Thursday, June 10.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enpublishingrpg.com, and you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitch to get notifications when I go live, subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube for videos on gaming history, RPG reviews, and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
