This seems to fit what's been said so far. Additional player material will be based on the major story arcs. The organized play document for Tyranny of Dragons mentions which materials are usable, which I can see meaning that those who do organized play will have an incentive to pick up the adventurer's handbook for each arc. It also means that old material might expire for organized play (and probably fall out of print). Long term, I wouldn't be surprised to see material get reprinted in newer arcs.
I love this approach to new player material. New options are grouped thematically, rather than mechanically. This solves two issues that I have with the traditional approach that features the Book for Fighters, the Book for Wizards, etc:
1. The new options are actually designed to all be used in the same campaign. Sure, you can come up with ways to fit the Samurai, the Swashbucker, and the Amazon into a campaign (sounds like the set-up for a joke), but in my experience the results are generally unsatisfying and undermine my efforts to craft a coherent game world.
2. The balance between classes should remain roughly the same. The Druid in my game won't be stuck having drastically fewer options than the other PCs due to a) the Druid book isn't out yet or b) I've already spent $90 on splatbooks and just didn't feel like spending another $30 to buy Primal Power.
I don't see this as being that much different from the later 4e books like
Heroes of the Feywild or
Heroes of the Elemental Chaos. It's just more tightly focused for the needs of a specific campaign, rather than options build around a more general theme. And I much prefer those books to books like
Martial Power,
The Complete Warrior, and the like. This way, you get to use most of the book, rather than the relevant 10 pages from each of 5 books.
Now, where's the setting material?
We will probably see most of it in these big adventures and their accompanying
Adventurer's Guides, rather than as separate products. Quite likely, some supplemental material to expand the setting beyond the scope of the adventure will show up in the magazines.
In many ways, this is reminiscent of TSR's approach in the early-to-mid 80s.
The world of Krynn was introduced in
DL1 Dragons of Despair. Each module in the series revealed more of the world as the scope of the campaign widened.
DL5 Dragons of Mystery was a 32-page sourcebook that compiled and expanded upon the setting info from the first four adventures. The remaining adventures in the series continued to expand upon the setting as needed.
The Known World (later, Mystara) was introduced in the module
X1 Isle of Dread and the Expert Set with a map and a couple of sentences describing each nation.
B10 Night's Dark Terror was a long adventure set in The Grand Duchy of Karameikos and provided a wealth of information about that region. Several of the X-series modules introduced new lands (X4, X5, X6, X9) and
X10 Red Arrow, Black Shield provided more details on all of the nations on the X1 map.
CM1 Test of the Warlords introduced the land of Norwold, and unexplored and unsettled realm, to complement the rules for PCs building strongholds and ruling dominions.
I would not be at all surprised to see something like a
Blood of the Yakuza story arc with an accompanying Adventurer's Guide and supplemental Dragon articles describing Kozakura, rather than an Oriental Adventures hardcover and a Kara-Tur Campaign Setting.
