D&D 5E Xanathar's Guide to Everything -- new mechanical expansion/UA book! -- November 10 with a limited-edition cover by Hydro74

[Zaukrie]

I wonder if there will be a similar section too the monster ecolgies in Volo's. What would Xanathar go on about?

Well. Interesting. That would allow for sections on guilds or churches or whatnot. I had not considered that. I have my doubts, but now I have some hopes too.

 

[gyor]

Then they'd better do some serious changes to Oath of the Edgelord (I mean, Conquest), Oath of defying, uh, oaths (Treachery) and Redemption, because NOBODY liked those as written.

I think the point of Oath of the "Edgelord" as you put it, was to tap into the popularity of Pathfinders Hellknights, they even refer to a subset of the Oath of Conquest Paladins as He'll Knights.

 

[Demetrios1453]

But it still has to be things he would generally know about for him to leave the occasional comment on. Volo (to my limited knowledge) is a researcher, who went out and researched the monsters and their ecologies (or at least that was the hypothetical premise). Xanathar's not going out to research, so it's likely things he would know about based on his life experiences as a beholder and Thieves guild leader.

Well, theives guilds tend to gather lots of information just simply due to what they are. Xanathar, as the head of the organization, should have loads of information at his fingertips... um, eyestalktips. And as adventurers no doubt continually plague him and his organization, a lot of that information would be about them...

I have a feeling the conceit/frame for the book will be Xanathar musing/ranting about adventurers to his goldfish...

 

[CapnZapp]

Let's run the numbers:
All the subclasses to date fill around 35 pages. Downtime is 14 pages, feats are 5, traps are 13, and spells are 5. Battlesystem is 5 pages and encounter building is 4. Revised ranger is 8.
That's less than 100 pages, and we know that not all the subclasses are making it in.

There's a lot of pages of content we know nothing about...

But the remaining page count could be just fluff; Xanathar rambling on, or something similar.

Based on previous books, we should be lucky to get a hundred pages of solid crunch.

I mean, we don't even know if we're getting the Revised Ranger, or any feats. And nothing says we'll get high level spells - we might just get exactly what we've seen in UA, and that means "starter" spells.

(There was one thing you didn't mention: and that is new rules for magic items, whatever that means. I mean, I dare not hope for a 3e-style utility based magic component pricing system...)

There are sooo many things the game is completely ripe for. Instead of repeating all of it, I'm just going to say "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" and refer to those threads.

 

[CapnZapp]

Mmm... has there been new rules for magic items in some Unearthed Arcana? Right now I don't remember any... except for the Runes in the UA about a sample prestige class, which I seriously doubt it has received enough good feedback.

Don't think so. All I can recollect is a mearls-tweet about it.

 

[Rellott]

But the remaining page count could be just fluff; Xanathar rambling on, or something similar.

Based on previous books, we should be lucky to get a hundred pages of solid crunch.

I mean, we don't even know if we're getting the Revised Ranger.

I doubt we'll get "rambling." I'd say think along the lines of Volo's chapters about races' ecology and lairs. Don't know what Xanathar's will be for sure - I've speculated geopolitics in Waterdeep and/or the Sword Coast, as well as the planes/Far Realm.

Based on them farming the Mystic and artificer out to DMs Guild, but not the ranger, I'm hopeful the revised ranger will get released here.

 

[mach1.9pants]

I wonder if there will be a similar section too the monster ecolgies in Volo's. What would Xanathar go on about?

Goldfish, apparently

 

[gyor]

But the remaining page count could be just fluff; Xanathar rambling on, or something similar.

Based on previous books, we should be lucky to get a hundred pages of solid crunch.

I mean, we don't even know if we're getting the Revised Ranger, or any feats. And nothing says we'll get high level spells - we might just get exactly what we've seen in UA, and that means "starter" spells.

(There was one thing you didn't mention: and that is new rules for magic items, whatever that means. I mean, I dare not hope for a 3e-style utility based magic component pricing system...)

There are sooo many things the game is completely ripe for. Instead of repeating all of it, I'm just going to say "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" and refer to those threads.

The starter spells aren't enough for a "host" of new spells, and it'd be weird to only have cantrips and first level spells, so I doubt you are right about that.

I could be wrong, but I think feats will be in the book, they did 3 sets of them, with a similar pattern, that only the weapon feats broke. All the tools, skills, and racial feats gave a +1 to a attribute.

One thing that might be added is how to use the subclasses in a particular setting, like the SCAG had for Bladesingers and Purple Dragon Knights.

 

[gyor]

You know what else might be in it is Mike Mearls inniative system and a replacement for bonus actions that Mike talked about.

 

[GarrettKP]

You know what else might be in it is Mike Mearls inniative system and a replacement for bonus actions that Mike talked about.

That would be too much of an Overhaul. Mearls mentioned that getting rid of Bonus Actions would basically mean re balancing how actions work in general.