D&D 5E The New D&D Book: Tasha's Cauldron of Everything!

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The new D&D book has been revealed, and it is Tasha's Cauldron of Everything, "a magical mixture of rules options for the world's greatest roleplaying game." The 192-page book is due out November 17th, with standard and alternate covers, and contains more subclasses, spells, character options, group patrons, and rules. Oh, and psionics!

Cover art is by Magali Villeneuve

WHAT WONDERFUL WITCHERY IS THIS?

A magical mixture of rules options for the world's greatest roleplaying game.

The wizard Tasha, whose great works include the spell Tasha’s hideous laughter, has gathered bits and bobs of precious lore during her illustrious career as an adventurer. Her enemies wouldn’t want these treasured secrets scattered across the multiverse, so in defiance, she has collected and codified these tidbits for the enrichment of all.

• EXPANDED SUBCLASSES. Try out subclass options for every Dungeons & Dragons class, including the artificer, which appears in the book.
• MORE CHARACTER OPTIONS. Delve into a collection of new class features and new feats, and customize your character’s origin using straightforward rules for modifying a character’s racial traits.
• INTRODUCING GROUP PATRONS. Whether you're part of the same criminal syndicate or working for an ancient dragon, each group patron option comes with its own perks and types of assignments.
• SPELLS, ARTIFACTS & MAGIC TATTOOS. Discover more spells, as well as magic tattoos, artifacts, and other magic items for your campaign.
• EXPANDED RULES OPTIONS. Try out rules for sidekicks, supernatural environments, natural hazards, and parleying with monsters, and gain guidance on running a session zero.
• A PLETHORA OF PUZZLES. Ready to be dropped into any D&D adventure, puzzles of varied difficulty await your adventurers, complete with traps and guidance on using the puzzles in a campaign.

Full of expanded content for players and Dungeon Masters alike, this book is a great addition to the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master’s Guide. Baked in you'll find more rule options for all the character classes in the Player's Handbook, including more subclass options. Thrown in for good measure is the artificer class, a master of magical invention. And this witch's brew wouldn't be complete without a dash of added artifacts, spellbook options, spells for both player characters and monsters, magical tattoos, group patrons, and other tasty goodies.

Here's the alternate cover:

UPDATE! An online event called D&D Celebration from September 18th-20th will be hosted by Elle Osili-Wood, which is "an epic live event with panels, gameplay, & previews of the book!" See the video in the Tweet below!

Gather your party and join the adventure at  D&D Celebration 2020, an online gaming event open to fans all over the world!

Celebrate the release of  Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden  with a weekend of Icewind Dale–themed virtual play sessions and help us create the biggest virtual tabletop roleplaying game event ever! Fans will also get the chance to preview some content from  Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, the forthcoming book featuring massive rules options, subclasses, and more for the fifth edition of Dungeons & Dragons. Watch featured play sessions with D&D luminaries and learn something new with a slate of panels led by the D&D design team and community.


UPDATE! Check out the Nerdarchy site for some previews.

Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything Has, Well… Everything for 5E D&D

The follow up to 2017’s Xanathar’s Guide to Everything, on Nov. 17, 2020 fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons upcoming Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything must indeed possess powerful …

nerdarchy.com

UPDATE! Other news items around the web about this book:

With D&D's Next Rulebook, Character Creation Will Never Be the Same

Although Dungeons & Dragons’ fifth edition has added as many classes, races, and rules as it has since it first began, for the most part, the way players create characters has stayed the same. You pick a race, that race defines certain things about you, and so on. But the game’s next sourcebook...

io9.gizmodo.com

Tasha's Cauldron of Everything coming in November, brings new ways to personalize your characters

Wizards of the Coast has announced its next D&D book! Entitled Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, this rules expansion follows up Xanathar’s Guide to Everything and will be available on November 17th. Providing both players and DMs with the tools to level up their games, the 192 page tome will be...

gamingtrend.com

Dungeons & Dragons Announces New Book and Fall Event - IGN

The D&D team reveals an online community event in September and a new sourcebook soon to follow.

www.ign.com

D&D's next expansion, Tasha's Cauldron of Everything, adds new subclasses and racial customization

Dungeons & Dragons is getting its biggest rules expansion in three years, courtesy of one powerful witch. In November, Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything will hit shelves, offering D&D players several new subclasses, some exciting new spells, and a new way to create characters that’s fully...

www.syfy.com

 

[Marandahir]

They played D&D in E.T. back in 1982 and it had a cartoon series (my 11yo got it for his birthday, wow, talk about making the exploration part look bad!) starting in 1983. And it was carried i all the book and toy stores in Northern Illinois anyway. Not quite as big as today, but not bad.

I'd argue that most pop culture references to the game though until very recent years have been pointedly making jokes at D&D player's expenses, however.

Part of that could be that it was a fiercely gatekept geeky white boy's game, though. Greatly widened demographics makes the game much more accessible to all Americans and beyond the US.

 

[Cadence]

Part of that could be that it was a fiercely gatekept geeky white boy's game, though. Greatly widened demographics makes the game much more accessible to all Americans and beyond the US.

It was certainly mostly boys in the early 80s as far as I remember, but my first two DMs were both women. First game every was DM'd by a babysitter one night, and then the owner of the local comic/book/record/game shop ran a big game - although I think only one of those players was a woman. Didn't run into more female players until a decade later in college.

 

[Maxperson]

They played D&D in E.T. back in 1982 and it had a cartoon series (my 11yo got it for his birthday, wow, talk about making the exploration part look bad!) starting in 1983. And it was carried i all the book and toy stores in Northern Illinois anyway. Not quite as big as today, but not bad.

Yeah, but D&D was still new enough that it couldn't go main stream due to all the other issues stacked against it. Game acceptance in general has been growing steadily to the point where D&D could make that leap in the last decade.

 

[ChaosOS]

Does anyone else think that WotC were learning directly from DM's Guild for this book?

Besides the lineage system and alternate class features (both are relatively popular topics for DMs Guild options), a lot of these subclasses cover archetypes that I've seen in prominent DM's Guild products.

For example, Xanathar's Lost Notes to Everything Else has a "Noble Genie" Warlock Patron, a "Runeguard" Fighter, a "Way of Empathy" Monk, and a sorcerer-type spellcasting Barbarian subclass, among others. The Iron-Man inspired Artificer and the Scribe/Generalist Wizard are extremely common archetypes on the 'Guild too.

For one, I don't think we actually know the author line up on Tasha's yet - maybe WotC is starting to actually hire freelancers off the guild like they originally suggested they would. From the UA we know these are different designs, but it's entirely possible they're not only using the guild as a gauge of what's popular but actually paying designers to do more work.

Alternatively, these are genuinely common ideas that they're cashing in on in an official capacity. It's not like that Xanathar's collab was filled with good novel designs - frankly most of them are below par and a symbol of the failings of 2017-2018 era guild publications. There's much better stuff on it these days.

 

[Parmandur]

Does anyone else think that WotC were learning directly from DM's Guild for this book?

Besides the lineage system and alternate class features (both are relatively popular topics for DMs Guild options), a lot of these subclasses cover archetypes that I've seen in prominent DM's Guild products.

For example, Xanathar's Lost Notes to Everything Else has a "Noble Genie" Warlock Patron, a "Runeguard" Fighter, a "Way of Empathy" Monk, and a sorcerer-type spellcasting Barbarian subclass, among others. The Iron-Man inspired Artificer and the Scribe/Generalist Wizard are extremely common archetypes on the 'Guild too.

Yeah, pretty much the point of the Guild. Same as Dragon/Dungeon back in the day.

 

[Reynard]

I'd argue that most pop culture references to the game though until very recent years have been pointedly making jokes at D&D player's expenses, however.

Part of that could be that it was a fiercely gatekept geeky white boy's game, though. Greatly widened demographics makes the game much more accessible to all Americans and beyond the US.

The people that are in charge of producing entertainment now were kids in the 80s. Chances are, they were the same people putting those sly, sort of mean D&D references in sitcoms 15 years ago. Callbacks and nostalgia in entertainment are just the current generation finally getting to make their own versions of the things they loved when they were kids. It has always been that way.

 

[Ancalagon]

True, but a bit less on the nose, so a bit harder to notice the joke.

Hurrah is used mostly these days in the metaphorical phrase Last Hurrah, which has made it harder for audiences to realise it's about laughter (and thus make the connection to Tasha's Hideous Laughter). It's also more jovial and joyful in usage, and Hideous Laughter is not Joyful.

"Last Laugh" is also metaphorical, but is directly on the point, and Laugh is used commonly in modern colloquial English to mean laughter. It's also usually darker in usage than Last Hurrah, so fits the Hideous Laughter theme a bit better.

Still, good usage. I just prefer Elfcrusher's one.



Wait what! It's 22+5 not 17+5=22?

Elfcrusher's is excellent, but with one little problem - it sounds like it could be an adventure. "Cauldron of Everything" definitely doesn't. So....

 

[OblivionDrive]

I agree with the worries of the Rune Knight.

Too wildly changed? Stars Druid is one. I want it tweaked obviously, but it was solid. Beast barbarian was amazing, hope that just stays (I think some of the higher level stuff was rough, but it was generally solid)

Yeah I only had one or two small issues with the Beast barbarian and I definitely hope that one made it through more or less unscathed.

 

[OblivionDrive]

I don't think I remember the Beast Barbarian...

It was the one that was basically Lycanthropy Lite. Same UA with Way of Mercy, Oath of Watchers and the first pass at the Genie Warlock.

 

[Weiley31]

And because my mind goes strange places when I'm tired...

Player: Hey DM, can I use these Class Variant features from Tasha's?
Me: Seal was never an option.
Player: How about Usher?

It was the animal, but somebody was gonna go that route with it. lmfao!