D&D General What the Melf's Guide to Greyhawk Cover Might Look Like

Below is a quick mockup of the potential cover of Melf's Guide to Greyhawk based on the Jeff Easley art revealed at Gary Con, using the current D&D 5.5E trade dress. The fonts aren't quite right, but it gives an approximate look at what the book may look like when it is released.

 

[mamba]

Understand it sounds far fetched, but I think the reality is if they want to grab those like me that have left, they have to make it separate from the 5.5e rule books or the entire effort fails.

that might be true for your case, I just don’t see them doing it. They might be fine leaning into this direction a little to get back people who are easier to win back (however many that might be), but I don’t think they will release a new set of core books for this.

And even if they did, what then? You rejected the 5.5 art in the core books, do you now need a different set of adventure books too? I would assume so, but as far as WotC is concerned, I expect that to be a non-starter

Because if they don't, who would buy it?

pretty much the same people that buy their current books, plus a few people that might not but feel nostalgic

Running an entire ad on Polygon (that's usually what these articles are) makes me think this isn't just an extremely niche product with a limited run.

that was about your hypothetical set of core books, not the Greyhawk one, and if you think having an ad for your core books is expensive, then you really have not thought about the cost of making them in the first place

 

[Jahydin]

My dude, Boomer and Gen X players are a fraction of the players they picked up in the 5E era. They are absolutely not going to trot out a bunch of super-expensive books that might get a few old fogies to buy their books again. It would be a wildly irresponsible move, and they save that for not making starter sets connected to Honor Among Thieves.

Exactly. I think you're underestimating just how many people didn't bite with 5.5e, but that said, it's still another demographic to sell product to again by just releasing a new dedicated line of products with either a slimmed down rule book (only classic material), new starter set, or even online PDF to get them going. I think that's pretty reasonable.

The new set of books would be awesome, and I think they would sell well, but nothing I'm expecting.

All the people who buy all the regular 5E books. The Easley cover is going to be the alternate cover and the main book is going to get a standard 5E cover.

Everything I read seems to point to this being the real cover, are you sure? Luke himself commissioned Easly to do it for him to get Melf exactly right. Be wierd to just have it as an alt.

Dude, no. Polygon's not great, but they label when they have paid content, as does Rascal.

Sorry about that. I've gotten pretty skeptical over the years. I didn't mean it as in they were getting paid, but more so the usual not wanting to rock the boat, so just passing the news across in exchange for early scoops later. I spent a bit of time looking over their past reviews though and that's not the case at all, so apologize and I'm glad they're legiteimly pumped for this.

The fact that some older fans have their feelings hurt that WotC is focused on customers their grandkids' age doesn't somehow mean there's a giant untapped market where WotC is thinking "gosh, if we don't get a bunch of retirees buying our books, we might as well go out of business."

Clearly, they are though. Who else would care about a public apology for what they wrote about Gary in their book, new Dragonlance novels, and new Greyhawk material written about Luke? Sure there's some overlap, but it's pretty clear they want that older demographic buying product part of the family again.

Oh, and as a Millennial myself, we care too for what it's worth.