D&D 5E What would be your ideal 5E yearly product output?

[Mercurius]

This is a riff off of this thread in which @Jester Canuck and I played tug-of-war as to what is the ideal product output for 5E. I thought I'd ask the forum: What do you think the ideal yearly output should be? Please consider and balance two things in your answer:

1. What you'd personally like to see in terms of products.
2. What you think is best for the long-term viability of the game.

Please vote in the poll and then describe specifics in the reply.

EDIT: I just saw [MENTION=7635]Remathilis[/MENTION]' "Static, Evergreen" thread, so it looks like this is being discussed there - but at least vote in the poll, as it will be interesting to see what the forum collectively wants.

 

[jadrax]

I have no real use for story arcs. I wouldn't mind an additional Monster Manual every couple of years. Maybe some worldbooks.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I'd like to see a book a year. But a really meaty book, like a Complete Psionics Guide with notes to adapt past Dark Sun products, not a farmed-out adventure path.

 

[steeldragons]

3-5...So, let's say 4!

Do the 2 adventure "paths" - though I, personally, do not use them. They seem to want to produce their adventures this way. A mistake, I think, but if they were to go tback to the older model of smaller stand-alone or [possibly] loosely connectable "modules" of a certain level range, then they could make this 4 instead of 2...which, then, ups the total count to 6. BUT, let's assume, for now, the adventure paths stay. So 2 per year on those. 1 per 6 months.

In between those, so you have a release of SOMEthing every 3 months for the next...2-3 (I could see up to 5) years...or, maybe if they're very savvy get them ALL out pre-holiday season and coast into summer with only 1 adventure path to worry about...BUT, let's say, for now, in between the adventure paths, so there's something to annouce/release every 3 months, year 'round.

Those "in between" supplements can be...whatever. I don't care. I would probably, ideally, suggest making 1 per year a campaign setting book.

The other being a content/character options style book: be that a Psionics Manual, expanded Spell Tome, a Player Races of the Multiverse Compleat, a "Waterborne/Frostborne/Desertborne Adventures" [with multiple race/class options and optional/expanded rules for running campaigns in XYZ locales, possibly with a minor/small adventure included?]...whatever. Ideally, whatever it is has material that is both for player and DM use in it. So, instead of an Unearthed Arcana book itself, we end up with multiple "mini-UA's" on a variety of topics. But not a Setting specific book.

So you'd get, every 3 months throughout the year, hypothetically: [Jan.] Adventure Path year 1.I, [April] Setting Guide, [July] AP year 1. II, [Oct.] Non-setting guide Player & DM useful manual of some topic...[Jan.] Adventure Path year 2.I, etc etc...

With UA articles presenting bits n' pieces of what they're working on and seeking feedback on same, 1 per month.

Following this model, they could be producing a steady stream of material, covering settings some people are clamoring for and player options other people are clamoring for. And they're still only having to worry about producing 1 bound book, likely not even half the size of the PHB or DMG, every 3 months.

In the immortal words of Trathenigan the Conjurer, "Easy peasy lemon squeezy."

 

[thalmin]

How to vote is the question. I would like to see a monthly short adventure released, to keep a new product out there. Plus the two adventure arcs and a Monster Manual/Campaign Sourcebook per year. I don't want to see a PHBII for at least a couple more years.

The monthly adventures could be 16-48 page SOFTBOUND module-style adventures, something in the $10-20 range. I hate the idea that WotC seems to support just play 1 D&D game at a time. I you want to play with more than 1 group or dm per week, play another game or play the same adventure again. Maybe your will roll differently the second time.

I voted 3-5 items, not counting the monthly adventure because no way do I want to return to the monthly new-rules glut of the past few editions.

 

[steeldragons]

Oh gods, I don't want to see a PHB II EVER! lol.

 

[thalmin]

Oh gods, I don't want to see a PHB II EVER! lol.

Yeah, I guess "a couple years" for me really means 5-10 years.

 

[steeldragons]

Yeah, I guess "a couple years" for me really means 5-10 years.

Still! As soon as you produce a "PHB II" you have a second manual that is, whether implicitly or explicitly, "core" and everything in it is assumed to be part of play/available to any/every game.

I say, thee, NAY! [in the nicest most congenial way. ]

Do. Not. Want.

 

[Staffan]

6-12, of varying sizes. Something like:

1 or 2 campaign adventures like they're doing now.

2-4 smaller adventures that don't take up an entire campaign (32-64 pages).

Alternate between rules expansions into new areas (e.g. psionics) and deeper exploration of old ones (more subclasses, feats, spells, etc. - preferably not focused on a particular splat, but just more stuff for everyone).

One major setting book (on the scale of somewhere between Five Nations and the Eberron Campaign Setting) and one or two smaller ones (~64 pages, covering a city or country, or maybe a particular organization, or something like that). Possibly more if they go for supporting multiple settings, but that would definitely require them to either license them out to someone else, or significantly expand the current designer roster.

A monster book every two years or so, alternating with a "something different" book.

 

[GSHamster]

In the Core game, roughly what WotC is doing now.

But I would love to see the OGL and the wild experimentation and sheer energy that characterized the 3E era.