D&D 5E Terrain Toolbox comes to 5e

[MatthewJHanson]

Eight years ago I published Terrain Toolbox for D&D 4th edition (which got a great review here on EN World).

Even though most people have moved on to new editions, the book remains popular, so I've updated it to 5th edition and have just launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund the update.

If you're not familiar with older edition, Terrain Toolbox offers advice for using terrain creatively in your encounters and includes 48 sample terrains, like a blood mage's circle, solid clouds, and lightning pillars. Each sample terrain includes cosmetic and rules variations, giving you hundreds of possibilities.

If you get a chance, check out the Kickstarter page and let me know if you have any questions.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

And, we're funded! Thanks to everybody who supported this book so far!

 

[Fenris447]

Is it a safe assumption that print+PDF backers will get the PDFs whenever they're ready?

 

[MatthewJHanson]

Is it a safe assumption that print+PDF backers will get the PDFs whenever they're ready?

Yes, we can only put in one date for the rewards, so we put in the when we estimate delivering the print books.

 

[mcmillan]

For those of us that had picked up the 4e version can you say a bit about if there's any kind of changes we'd see in the new version (beyond obvious adjusting damage/save difficulties)?

 

[Fenris447]

Yes, we can only put in one date for the rewards, so we put in the when we estimate delivering the print books.

I figured as much, but wanted to make sure. Backed! Very much looking forward to this.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

For those of us that had picked up the 4e version can you say a bit about if there's any kind of changes we'd see in the new version (beyond obvious adjusting damage/save difficulties)?

For sure. In addition to saves and DCs, there's also all the other rules changes between editions. Like there were some terrain that referenced healing surges that got turned to dealing straight damage, and there are new rules like advantage and disadvantage that I was able to use for the revision.

There's also some philisophical changes between the editions that caused some rewrites. Everything was a power in 4e, so in that edition I included a lot of terrains that had powers. For 5e a lot of those just got rolled into the description (there's no more movement "powers," though still plenty of terrain the affect movement). There are now what I'm calling "terrain actions" which are are more narrowly defined and pretty much always doing something offensive in this version (like toppling over a wall on somebody).

I figured as much, but wanted to make sure. Backed! Very much looking forward to this.

Great to hear! Thanks!

 

[MatthewJHanson]

For those curious what the what the terrain in the book look like, we've include a preview of lightning pillars in our latest update.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

We've just unlocked one of our biggest stretch goals! Now we'll also be updating Advanced Encounters to D&D 5e!

Alternate Objectives features advice for creating encounters where you need to do more than just kill the bad guys to win. It also includes six sample encounters complete with maps and new monsters, including like protecting a prince, stealing a necklace, and convincing a fallen angel to return to the light.

We've also got a sketch of the new Terrain Toolbox cover:

 

[MatthewJHanson]

We've got just 24 hours left on the Terrain Toolbox Kickstarter campaign! If you've thought about backing, now is the time!