Why Dungeons & Dragons Isn't Putting Out a Campaign Book in 2025

Wizards of the Coast is not putting out a Dungeons & Dragons campaign book in 2025. Despite adding two more books to its D&D release schedule, there are no plans to release a new full-length campaign book. During a press event at Wizards' headquarters, EN World asked about why the D&D design team had chosen to skip over a campaign book for first time in a decade. "

"This year we have focused on providing, rather than one large adventure, many adventure options because you'll actually see there are more sort of discrete adventure options than we typically do in a year," said Jeremy Crawford, lead rules designer for Dungeons & Dragons. "So you're going to have not only the 10 adventures in Dragon Delves with three possible campaigns, you also have the adventure options in Eberron, you have the adventure options in the Starter Set, and you have a bunch of adventure options in the Forgotten Realms Adventure Guide. So in many ways, we are flooding you with adventure options."

Crawford added that the D&D design team is always experimenting with their releases and that yearly campaign releases didn't always allow players to finish up the previous campaign. "So we're looking at tempos that map to how people actually play," Crawford said. "And we find that often, especially with DMs who like to create their own adventure material, they often have a greater need for sort of micro material that they can swap around. They can build things the way they like. That's what we're doing this year."

Finally, Crawford noted that one of the advantages to continuing Fifth Edition rather than launching a brand new edition meant that players could continue to use existing campaigns. "We have a whole library of epic campaigns that people can play, including last year's Vecna: Eve of Ruin, and those are all playable with the new core books," Crawford said. "And so we've embraced that for 2025, that there's a whole bookshelf of these epic campaigns that people can pick up and play, and we know there are among those campaigns surely one or two that even the most dedicated 5e group hasn't played yet."

However, Crawford noted that the D&D team wasn't moving away from campaigns forever. "For the life of 5th edition, we've never believed in there's like only one way to do it and that's how we do it every year," Crawford said. "Just because there isn't a campaign book this year doesn't mean we're not doing them."

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

WotC’s campaign books tend to be better gazetteers for specific locations than actually good full campaigns. Rime of the Frostmaiden and Descent into Avernus both kind of expect the players to run around a sandbox long enough that they discover the loosely connected overarching plotline. They definitely feel like a freelance team was told to create their own mini adventures of a specific theme that they threw onto a map and added a short plot at the end of the adventure. This sandbox approach can work well when the PCs know they have a specific destination in mind or are gathering MacGuffins to defeat the BBEG (Curse of Strahd), but recent campaign books haven't really done this. I hope in the future they take more time to refine them and provide better guidance for running the campaigns.

 

[Echohawk]

I think many of us would love to roll back the clock and get Dragon and Dungeon magazine back, but it's hard to see the economic model working unless customers are willing to shell out $15-$20 per issue.

The UK D&D Adventurer magazine is £8.99 per issue, or about $11.20. It is certainly nothing like either Dragon or Dungeon in terms of content but presumably has a profitable economic model and doesn't contain adverts.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The UK D&D Adventurer magazine is £8.99 per issue, or about $11.20. It is certainly nothing like either Dragon or Dungeon in terms of content but presumably has a profitable economic model and doesn't contain adverts.

I don't know enough about the UK magazine market to comment.

The magazine apocalypse in the US, though, is widespread and ongoing.

 

[Echohawk]

I don't know enough about the UK magazine market to comment.

The magazine apocalypse in the US, though, is widespread and ongoing.

Me neither. I do note that D&D Adventurer is also available in Italy, so maybe expensive, limited-run, collectable magazines are a British and Italian thing. As a complete aside, I've just noticed that the Italian subscription comes with a D&D mug, which wasn't part of the UK offer. I feel robbed!

 

[Starmaster]

The challenge is that print advertising has cratered due to online advertising, so the cost of that print magazine will have to be borne entirely by the customer, which is why the remaining magazines you see at the grocery store go for about $15 an issue often, unless they are in a category that still has managed to hold onto some advertising revenue somehow.

Perhaps you are correct about the price one would have to pay. Paizo's Pathfire adventure path uses a monthly subscription magazine format, although they don't call it a magazine. These magazines (or gamebooks or modules or whatever you want to call them) cost $30 each today (cheaper by subscription) and they have a pdf option. Yet, despite the price, enough people are paying the $30/month cost to keep the magazine chugging out monthly issues since around 2007 I believe, which was the last year of publication for Dragon and Dungeon magazines. If they can continue to make it work at that price point, I would think WotC could do the same thing with 5e if they really wanted to. I figure there are probably at least as many 5e players as there are Pathfinder players. The Pathfinder adventure path format is different than what Dungeon magazine used to be, but I think the 4-7 5e adventures/issue format would also work.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

The actual adventures in Radiant Citadel don't take place in the Ethereal Plane, but on (apparently) the Prime Material. Most of them would be pretty easy to incorporate into a kitchen sink setting, even if you have to preface the adventure with "after weeks of travel, you arrive in _____."

I did that with Akharin Sangar (Shadow of the Sun). I dropped it into the (little mapped) continent of Market in Exandria. My players traveled there by flying ship across the desert from Ank’Harel.

 

[aco175]

Maybe they plan on doing a campaign world search like before when Eberon won? Maybe they have a build your own campaign series of articles to go with making their own world, but that would just compete against themselves, but I would love to see Ray come back with those old articles on campaign building.

Also, what is Venger from the old cartoon doing? He was some sort of Red Wizard or such? What adventure is he in as some sor of BBEG?

 

[Reynard]

Descent into Avernus both kind of expect the players to run around a sandbox long enough that they discover the loosely connected overarching plotline.

Descent does not have a "loose" plot line. The provided "flowcharts" are literal lines. Avernus is a railroad.

 

[eyeheartawk]

Also, what is Venger from the old cartoon doing? He was some sort of Red Wizard or such? What adventure is he in as some sor of BBEG?

In wrestling parlance, Venger has been booked badly. How are we supposed to buy him as a big bad when he couldn't win against literal children even once out of dozens of tries.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

In wrestling parlance, Venger has been booked badly. How are we supposed to buy him as a big bad when he couldn't win against literal children even once out of dozens of tries.

Dungeon Master fudged the dice rolls.