D&D 5E So, did Pendleton Ward help with TFYP?

[Benji]

So, minor question. Before Tales From The Yawning Portal was announced, people at Wizards let slip that he was involved in consultation with the 'next' adventure path. But when Tales was announced, almost no mention of any collaboration was stated. Now there's something odd going on here because if he was involved 1) Why not mention it? It won't hurt sales and may (May, I dunno) get a few extra books of selves 2) Why consult with him on this at all? To have him just help with a straight re-boot of older properties seems a waste given what he could have contributed - Whether you liked adventure time or not, it's hard to question it's inventiveness.

If he did contribute to this, what the hell did he do? Was he just like 'Yeah, I liked these ones the best'. Not something you think they'd announce. I'm guessing AP's got swtiched or something but I wondered if there had been any kind of word on it.

 

[happyhermit]

I don't remember them saying he worked on "the next" adventure, IIRC it was "an upcoming adventure" or something to that effect.

 

[Lanliss]

If they said "next adventure path" would TfTYP even qualify? It does not seem like a "path", just a bunch of one shots.

 

[Benji]

I don't remember them saying he worked on "the next" adventure, IIRC it was "an upcoming adventure" or something to that effect.

If they said "next adventure path" would TfTYP even qualify? It does not seem like a "path", just a bunch of one shots.

Those are both an interesting thoughts/distinctions. Upon re-checking a source or two and the word used is 'Story'. So yeah,it's likely both of you are correct and I have misinterpreted. Mind you, I'm pretty sure it was an easy mistake to make. We should really have some specific terms that mean certain things. Stuff like that would help build a community and prevent confusion by vagueness. 'Story', 'Season', 'Path', 'Campaign', 'Adventure' and 'Module' are all terms that are getting confused. They mean different things to different people. Sometimes they all mean the same thing, sometimes they are gradients within a thing.

 

[happyhermit]

It is entirely possible that he worked on this one, or their schedule got rearranged though. We still don't know exactly how the adventures are tied together, and I wouldn't doubt they do it with "story" aspects. AFAIK, we have a location, a key NPC, and the other locations involved but we don't know how interconnected they are in this product.

 

[Parmandur]

My read is that they were talking about a fall release, but not letting on to that yet.



Now, what will the AP this year be...? Given Ward's involvement (he is a strange one) and what they have been laying down, here are three speculations:



1.) Feywild extravaganza, involving fey courts and all that jazz: lots of room for wild weirdness, and less copying of earlier products.



2.) Mindflayer-centric storyline, utilizing Gates of Firestorm Peak (mentioned several times in the core books by name), and may Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. I would be thrilled if Spelljammer, the seed about the Mindflayer empire traveling in time from Volos, and stats for Cthulu & Friends were involved.



3.) Serpent Hills AP, Yuan-Ti and Lizardfolk galore: Dwellers of the Forbidden City taken up a notch. Plenty of seeds in that direction between SCAG and Volos.

 

[Parmandur]

Thinking about it, we know for a fact TftYP is not what Ward was involved with: because he was working with Chris Perkins, who is not working on TftYP per his Tweets about the book: we still do not know what Ward was involved with. My bet is on the Feywild.

 

[Rabbitbait]

We should really have some specific terms that mean certain things.

/not serious/ Totally disagree. Let's call every story, season, path, campaign or adventure by a new term. I nominate "level" to cover all of them. Then nobody will get confused ever again. "Hey Ragnor, that was a great level. I've finally gone up a level and I now have 3rd level spells". See, so much easier. /not serious/

 

[SkidAce]

 

[Rabbitbait]

Woah. Look at me unintentionaly plagerising a very old joke.