Dungeons & Dragons Teases New Campaign Settings

Dungeons & Dragons seems to be preparing to explore brand new campaign settings. Last week, EN World had the opportunity to visit Wizards of the Coast headquarters and get new details about D&D's 2025 slate. While much of the focus was on the newly announced Eberron: Forge of the Artificer book or the upcoming pair of Forgotten Realms book, the D&D design team is also looking at expanding their official multiverse to include brand new worlds.

When asked about the decision to return to Eberron in 2025, the D&D design team noted that keeping the Fifth Edition ruleset allowed them to grow the game instead of rehash it. "One of the opportunities that we have by revising the game, as opposed blowing it up and starting over, is we can actually move forward," said Jeremy Crawford, game director . "And I can't wait until we can tell you about 2026 and 2027."

"With Jeremy Crawford taking on the game director role and then Chris Perkins taking on the creative director role is that we were able to really reestablish a world building environment," added Jess Lanzillo, VP of D&D Franchise at Wizards of the Coast. "What does that mean? We can really establish our worlds and settings like the Forgotten Realms and also look to creating new ones again. That's something that we are working on and we don't have anything to really discuss today other than to tell you like we are re-establishing everything that we have and we are going to make some new stuff too."

While Wizards of the Coast has integrated Magic: The Gathering worlds and Critical Role's Exandria as campaign settings for 5th Edition, D&D's last truly new campaign setting was Nentir Vale, a 'points of light' setting that established small bastions of civilization in an otherwise dark world. In 2023, D&D introduced the Radiant Citadel, a new city within the Ethereal Plane that was connected to numerous new civilizations and worlds briefly touched on in anthology books.

 

[Remathilis]

Fans: we're tired of you rehashing old settings. Do something new!
WotC: ok we're going to add some new settings to the stable
Fans: wait! You haven't done obscure setting that was last published 30 years ago yet!

 

[payn]

Fans: we're tired of you rehashing old settings. Do something new!
WotC: ok we're going to add some new settings to the stable
Fans: wait! You haven't done obscure setting that was last published 30 years ago yet!

 

[Mercurius]

You could say the same thing about Spelljammer.

It's really more can they fund the right hook that will fet both new and old fans interested in Birthright.

But why? Towards what end? The only reason they'd do that is if they think it would be a popular product among the current core fan base. I just don't think there are enough "diehard Birthrighters" to make satisfying that group a priority. And if they think people would buy a kingdom building type product, I'm guessing they'd go a different route than Birthright; they'd find a hook that would be more appealing to the current fan-base, like "Fey Realms" or some such. The best Birthright fans can hope for, in my opinion, is that they do a latter product, with Birthright mentioned or briefly spotlighted as a past example. Who knows, maybe an appendix. I could be wrong, but I highly doubt Birthright will be a focus in the foreseeable future.

What I see time and time again is fans of a particular nook or cranny of D&D mythos equating their own interest with some kind of possible universal appeal. What I'm saying is not a critique of, for instance, Birthright - nor of fan interest or loyalty to a particular sub-brand. It is more pointing out that the quality of a past thing, or one's own personal interest in it, has very little to do with how much energy and resources WotC will allocate to it now, in 2025.

 

[pedr]

And to again beat my personal drum for a Birthright pitch, make a Birthright setting that is wholly focused on "High Level Play." Like, character generation is lvl 10+. Having it just be another generic western fantasy setting where people play sovereigns isn't going to be enough.

Maybe it could have a character/group backstory mini-game, with a guide to creating the state of the world and what the characters did as lower-tier adventurers. That could set up the nature of the power the PCs now wield, and the various organisations they may have annoyed in the process of getting it.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I don't think that is a 5E game.

From what we have seen so far, it looks like it pretty much is…

 

[TwoSix]

Fans: we're tired of you rehashing old settings. Do something new!
WotC: ok we're going to add some new settings to the stable
Fans: wait! You haven't done obscure setting that was last published 30 years ago yet!

Some of us are permanently warped by remembering TSR putting out Spelljammer, Maztica, Dark Sun, Al-Qadim, Planescape, and Birthright all in a 7 year period.

 

[Remathilis]

Birthright is probably deader than dead. A setting about domain management, conquest and rulership determined by bloodlines and divine right is absolutely the wrong thing for this moment. I don't want to invoke Morrus's lire, but a setting based around Blood and Soil is not a good idea at this point in history.

 

[mamba]

From what we have seen so far, it looks like it pretty much is…

Not sure what you have seen, I have seen some art and nothing about the rules it uses

 

[TheSword]

I’ve been thinking about Domain play for Birthright and I think it could be a lot simpler than one would think to implement for a few reasons.

- Domain Actions could be repurposed as Down Time activities. Players have the choice to research that Magic item, train in a temple, or expand their guild holdings in a province or two, perhaps agitate a nearby province or conduct diplomacy. Twenty new downtime activities would be relatively easy to introduce without adding too much complexity or new subsystems.

- VTT and other online tools could make the administration of a kingdom a simple click of button. Calculating taxes, totally expenditure dealing with loyalty changes etc. I can definitely see a simple Domain sheet for Foundry or Beyond in the same way we have vehicle sheets and mounts.

- VTT could also make the visual aspect of the game easy - with the province map modifiable, able to click borders to change a provinces loyalty. Some really clever work could be done with this.

- The new origin feats and higher level feats are a natural fit for bloodline powers. An origin option and a two feat options would be plenty to represent the divine right of kings, while still giving a few options.

 

[Mercurius]

Some of us are permanently warped by remembering TSR putting out Spelljammer, Maztica, Dark Sun, Al-Qadim, Planescape, and Birthright all in a 7 year period.

And it was really fun at the time - and I'm glad it happened, because it broadened the breadth and depth of what D&D can be. I love settings and in my perfect world, WotC would churn out half a dozen a year, if only to enjoy visiting a range of different worlds. But I'm also cognizant of the fact that my personal preferences aren't a primary (or secondary, tertiary, etc) consideration for WotC - and I'm fine with that. In fact, it would be weird if they were ;-).

In other words, it is possible to be a cheerful grognard that prefers older stuff, but is open and interested in the new (are Gen Xers grognards now?). So rather than, "Get off my lawn," I'm more like, "What are the kids doing on my lawn? Interesting...Oh wait, it is our lawn."