Critical Role The New D&D Book Is 'The Explorer's Guide to [Critical Role's] Wildemount!' By Matt Mercer

It looks like Amazon has leaked the title and description of the new D&D book a day early (unless it's all a fake-out by WotC) -- and it's a new D&D setting book called The Explorer's Guide to Wildemount; it's the Critical Role campaign setting, penned by Matt Mercer!

image from Critical Role wiki​

There's no cover image yet, so we're stuck with the "Coming Soon" image.

This book appeared without a title on Amazon last week, and a 'reveal' date of January 9th, which was then later delayed until January 13th. Amazon appears to have jumped the gun a day early.

Here's some information about Wildemount, which is a continent in the same world as Critical Role's other setting, Tal'Dorei. It is described by the official wiki has having "real-world Eastern European influence.... The Dwendalian Empire takes inspiration from 15th century Russia as well as Germanic nations in Central Europe (e.g., Prussia). Xhorhas has a more 13th-century Romanian flair. Outside of Wynandir, on the edges of the Dwendalian Empire, the cultures and peoples of those regions display a distinctly 14th-century Spanish flavor."

HOW DO YOU WANT TO DO THIS?

A war brews on a continent that has withstood more than its fair share of conflict. The Dwendalian Empire and the Kryn Dynasty are carving up the lands around them, and only the greatest heroes would dare stand between them. Somewhere in the far corners of this war-torn landscape are secrets that could end this conflict and usher in a new age of peace—or burn the world to a cinder.

Create a band of heroes and embark on a journey across the continent of Wildemount, the setting for Campaign 2 of the hit Dungeons & Dragons series Critical Role. Within this book, you’ll find new character options, a heroic chronicle to help you craft your character’s backstory, four different starting adventures, and everything a Dungeon Master needs to breathe life into a Wildemount-based D&D campaign…

• Delve through the first Dungeons & Dragons book to let players experience the game as played within the world of Critical Role, the world’s most popular livestreaming D&D show.
• Uncover a trove of options usable in any D&D game, featuring subclasses, spells, magic items, monsters, and more, rooted in the adventures of Exandria—such as Vestiges of Divergence and the possibility manipulating magic of Dunamancy.
• Start a Dungeons & Dragons campaign in any of Wildemount’s regions using a variety of introductory adventures, dozens of regional plot seeds, and the heroic chronicle system—a way to create character backstories rooted in Wildemount.

Explore every corner of Wildemount and discover mysteries revealed for the first time by Critical Role Dungeon Master, Matthew Mercer.

Critical Role's other setting, Tal'Dorei, was published a couple of years ago by Green Ronin. This brings the list of settings in official D&D books to five: Forgotten Realms, Ravnica, Ravenloft, Eberron, and Wildemount.

UPDATE! Barnes & Noble has the cover (but not the title or description).

 

[Juomari Veren]

I'm very torn on this one. Fact of the matter is, all those classic settings people keep pining over are just too played out or not as fun as they think. D&D needs fresh settings every edition to make it work. Sometimes the old ways just don't translate into a new ruleset well enough. Sometimes those settings are best represented in other ways (like how FR just seemingly works better for a lot of what Greyhawk was trying to sell new players, at least in my opinion).

But this is something different. CritRole has brought a problem to the game in the form of people wanting to emulate that so badly in so many different ways and not focusing on making things truly unique. And when you think about it, campaign settings exist partly for that reason - At least insofar as giving you ideas to then mutate into your own thing. But in this day and age, faithfulness to published material, especially those with deep amounts of lore and a backlog of history worth diving into is not only seen as daunting but necessary to be able to best match the intent of the creators.

That's such a stupid philosophy, though. That's part of the reason I've come to love FR as a setting - It's so big and has so much that has, will, and could happen in it that you just can't make a 100% faithful FR game. Things have to be changed. Canon has to be disregarded. You can't not shape it into your own personal niche of the Realms instead of following cookie-cutter story beats.

And in a way, I'm sure Mercer and the CritRole team don't want that of D&D, nor do they want people to feel like their setting is the setting that all games must be like. But their fans eat that stuff up like it's a buffet, and they probably know that this at least more of a money grab to prey upon the insecurities of people who haven't had the luxury of being able to create their own campaign settings and run homebrew games than it isn't. I know, I know - Businesses need to make money, etc. etc. - But I would've been just as happy with seeing Mercer create his own new setting, running a one-shot in it in the near future, and maybe moving over to it for the third campaign he runs for CR after he finishes the current one. And it probably would've sold just as well, if not better because this book is clearly already drawing a divisive opinion so far.

At the end of the day, I'm a consumer whore who's starved for official published D&D content so I'm still gonna buy it, still gonna use it. But I'm definitely gonna gut just about all of the fluff. Sad that I have to do it at all, but not the end of the world for me. I just hope that this doesn't become an increasingly worrying trend of "sell game that sells game" campaign settings like this in the future of releases.

 

[Remathilis]

It is my understanding this is not Taldorei. That was already published by Green Ronin.

Not being a critter myself, you'll have to excuse my ignorance on the setting. I assumed this was one of those Faerun/Toril type things.

 

[DEFCON 1]

This would also explain why Deborah Ann Woll and Marisha Ray were working on projects (adventures) for WotC. Mercer was probably a lead designer on the book, and they got 4 people intimately familiar with the setting to write the adventures.

With WotC going in with Penny Arcade on an official Acq Inc book, it only makes sense they go in with the other major 5E group as well on a product.

As far as whether I pick it up... I picked up the Tal'Dorei book to support CR although I haven't used anything in it. If I get this one it'll probably be whether there is any player stuff in it I actually want. The need to "support" CR is no longer really necessary anymore. They're doing quite fine on their own. LOL.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

I'm very torn on this one. Fact of the matter is, all those classic settings people keep pining over are just too played out or not as fun as they think. D&D needs fresh settings every edition to make it work. Sometimes the old ways just don't translate into a new ruleset well enough. Sometimes those settings are best represented in other ways (like how FR just seemingly works better for a lot of what Greyhawk was trying to sell new players, at least in my opinion).

But this is something different. CritRole has brought a problem to the game in the form of people wanting to emulate that so badly in so many different ways and not focusing on making things truly unique. And when you think about it, campaign settings exist partly for that reason - At least insofar as giving you ideas to then mutate into your own thing. But in this day and age, faithfulness to published material, especially those with deep amounts of lore and a backlog of history worth diving into is not only seen as daunting but necessary to be able to best match the intent of the creators.

That's such a stupid philosophy, though. That's part of the reason I've come to love FR as a setting - It's so big and has so much that has, will, and could happen in it that you just can't make a 100% faithful FR game. Things have to be changed. Canon has to be disregarded. You can't not shape it into your own personal niche of the Realms instead of following cookie-cutter story beats.

And in a way, I'm sure Mercer and the CritRole team don't want that of D&D, nor do they want people to feel like their setting is the setting that all games must be like. But their fans eat that stuff up like it's a buffet, and they probably know that this at least more of a money grab to prey upon the insecurities of people who haven't had the luxury of being able to create their own campaign settings and run homebrew games than it isn't. I know, I know - Businesses need to make money, etc. etc. - But I would've been just as happy with seeing Mercer create his own new setting, running a one-shot in it in the near future, and maybe moving over to it for the third campaign he runs for CR after he finishes the current one. And it probably would've sold just as well, if not better because this book is clearly already drawing a divisive opinion so far.

At the end of the day, I'm a consumer whore who's starved for official published D&D content so I'm still gonna buy it, still gonna use it. But I'm definitely gonna gut just about all of the fluff. Sad that I have to do it at all, but not the end of the world for me. I just hope that this doesn't become an increasingly worrying trend of "sell game that sells game" campaign settings like this in the future of releases.

I'm someone who didn't really love CR, though I have a few players that do. When they started, they totally wanted to emulate that play; then they realized that this just isn't fun, that you have to make your own stories.

That's my experience, that CR is a doorway to D&D, but people aren't great at emulating it.

 

[Weiley31]

Wouldn't it be funny if all the UA PHB classes were introduced in this book?

 

[TwoSix]

Hmm...I'm assuming that Tal'Dorei and Wildemount share a pantheon. (I'm not a CR watcher, but one of the games I play is set in Tal'dorei, so I've read the book.) Since the Tal'dorei pantheon is essentially the 4e pantheon with the names filed off, I wonder if the Wildemount book will actually use the real names, since the IP would be open to them.

 

[dave2008]

Not being a critter myself, you'll have to excuse my ignorance on the setting. I assumed this was one of those Faerun/Toril type things.

I'm not either, just going off of what people say on these forums. It is evidently a different continent on the same world. So different culture and politics I guess?

 

[Juomari Veren]

I'm someone who didn't really love CR, though I have a few players that do. When they started, they totally wanted to emulate that play; then they realized that this just isn't fun, that you have to make your own stories.

That's my experience, that CR is a doorway to D&D, but people aren't great at emulating it.

That's good to hear. A shame not all players or DMs will end up being that way. I just wish Matt and them would've acknowledged that when planning this product out.

Wouldn't it be funny if all the UA PHB classes were introduced in this book?

I'm sure most of them will be, at least the non-psionic ones. I don't mind that bit, because you can remove the rules from their campaign setting and re-skin them, though I'm not too excited about having to buy the book for the polished versions of them. It's like buying a meal with no substitutions and only eating half of it because you didn't know what hollandaise sauce is.

 

[Reynard]

I'm someone who didn't really love CR, though I have a few players that do. When they started, they totally wanted to emulate that play; then they realized that this just isn't fun, that you have to make your own stories.

That's my experience, that CR is a doorway to D&D, but people aren't great at emulating it.

Unless folks stay with the very first group they started D&D with, they always come into D&D via a doorway that colors their idea of how the game is played, and they always eventually find their own way of playing the game. CR isn't any more dangerous to people making D&D their own than their older brother's campaign they used to be aloud to watch as long as they kept their little yap shut.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Yup, Wildemount is the continent to the north-east of Taldorei in the world of Exandria. It has a tiefling/devil worshipping nation, the ruins of the dragonborn empires and its the homeland of the blood hunters and the blood domain clerics. It has a light Witcher + Nentir Vale vibe. Its more Point of Light than Taldorei, which was more a FR analog.