Wizards won't have a booth at GenCon

According to this article over at io9.com, "Wizards will not have a presence on the Gen Con exhibit floor" (the exhibitor's map at the GenCon site confirms this).

Wow. Nothing. I realize they're trying to lay low in order to build excitement for D&D Next, you'd think they'd have something there to, I dunno, hump M:tG or something. This is the 20th anniversary of Magic: The Gathering, for crying out loud. You'd think they'd want to make a splash with that other than just tournaments.

They will be running events, and are an official sponsor of the convention, but no booth.

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Also, please don't forget the Adventures Dark and Deep Bestiary Kickstarter going on right now! 900 monsters, suitable for most OSR-type games, all under one cover. Can you help get us to having an illustration for each and every one?

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New D&D Movie "Far Along in Development"

Well here's something I'd heard rumors about for a while, but nothing concrete until now. Apparently, the next Dungeons & Dragons movie is "far along in development" by Warner Brothers, and has writers and producers already hard at work:

The studio is actually quite far along in the development of the project, as it will use a script by Wrath Of The Titans and Red Riding Hood scribe and Frank Darabont protege David Leslie Johnson. ... Given the heightened interest in sword, sorcery, chivalry and cool creatures within Warner Bros with the HBO series Game Of Thrones and the ongoing Peter Jackson-directed adaptation of JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit, it is expected that the studio will expend the necessary resources to create a world around a well-established brand"

(More at the link)

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Also, please don't forget the Adventures Dark and Deep Bestiary Kickstarter going on right now! 900 monsters, suitable for most OSR-type games, all under one cover. Can you help get us to having an illustration for each and every one?

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TSR Magazines Gone from Internet Archive

As predicted, the online versions of Dragon, Dungeon, and Polyhedron magazines, which had been put up on the Internet Archive website, are now removed. Hope they'll be made available in some other format soon; I'd certainly shell out money for a new disc with pdf copies of the magazines on it.

Curiously, Ares Magazine, the old SPI science-fiction gaming magazine that was picked up by TSR when they bought out SPI, is still available.

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WotC Reprints and the OSR

There has been a bit of discussion of late concerning the impact that Wizards of the Coast's reissue of the old (A)D&D pdfs will have on the OSR. First, JB at B/X Blackrazor asked "Have we won the battle only to lose the war?"

Is the OSR…as a movement to create new, good material in the Old School style (and thus to promote Old School role-playing)…is the OSR dead?

Why shouldn’t I put down the $10 to get original B/X over Labyrinth Lord? Why shouldn’t I take the original Erol Otus artwork over illustrations that are simply supposed to conjure nostalgia in my heart?

Within a day of JB's post, Dan at Goblinoid Games opined:

WotC has added their material back to the ecosphere where it was in the beginning, and I think that will only strengthen the cause for old-school gaming. People have already been converted to the idea that the older versions of the game are just as valid as the recent ones, and WotC's recent business decisions only reinforce that.

Erik Tenkar (one of the most prolific OSR bloggers around today) said:

The OSR isn't going anywhere. Putting the originals back into PDF format isn't going to gut the OSR of "old school players" anymore than DnD Next is. If anything, making the originals available in PDF format is likely to bring us the newly curious...

Dave at Blood of Procopius asks "Do we still need Labyrinth Lord?" and answers his own question:

I would answer that question with an unequivocal YES for two very important reasons:

LL is an established brand with a license that hobbyists like myself and small publishers can easily and legally publish under with full knowledge that whatever we produce can be used by those who want to do the B/X thing with virtually no conversion at all.

More importantly to me, LL has a library of compatible games that are specifically designed to be modular.

And I'm sure there are others out there whose contributions to the discussion I've missed. If I may be permitted to be self-referential, I believe that what I said about the OSR Phase II applies directly to JB's original point:

But while the first phase of the OSR has seen foundational works such as those mentioned above [straight or near clones of earlier games], what we are now seeing in the OSR is a flowering of material that take off in wild new directions. Now that the final holes in the retro-clone coverage have been filled (the basic game-play of (A)D&D 0E, 1E, and now 2E are covered by multiple products), the OSR as a whole seems self-confident enough to break off in new directions.

So, to bring this back to JB's original point, I don't think that WotC's re-release of the older games and modules will in any way dampen the creativity or productivity of the self-identified OSR. While acknowledging that the economy is tough and many people don't have as much disposable income as they might have had at the dawn of the OSR a few years ago, the OSR will take these WotC pdfs and use them to grow like green slime on a first-level magic user. Let me tell you why.

Right now, there are four basic types of products that the OSR is putting out; clones, adventures/settings, supplements, and what I'll call originals. Let's see how each one is impacted by the re-releases. I am not going to include the science-fiction, science fantasy, and other genres, but the same principles apply there as well (or will, if and when WotC starts releasing pdfs of Gamma World, Boot Hill, etc.).

First, we have the retro-clones; restatements of the original rules with more or less fidelity to the details. In this category we have products such as OSRIC, Labyrinth Lord, Swords & Wizardry, For Gold & Glory, etc.

At first glance, the re-release of the WotC pdfs may seem to render this category obsolete, and indeed time will tell what the long-term impact on downloads and sales of these titles will be. The obvious rebuttal is that the retro-clones are better written, more organized, and generally more player-friendly than the originals were (although in the case of 2E and the Rules Compendium, this may be less true). Thus, new players who are introduced to these older games by way of the DnDClassics.com site may seek out the clones for sheer utility, in order to get the same experience with more easily-digestible rules. In any event, this category is pretty well not going to see growth (in terms of new products) because we've seen most of the restatements of the original rules already, and more complete restatements simply aren't needed any more. People chomping at the bit to do them and include their own favorite house rules should look to the third category below and simply publish those house rules on their own.

Second, we have adventure modules and settings; either specific scenarios or entire campaign worlds. There are hundreds of these currently available, supporting most of the retro-clones above, plus many more that are deliberately "generic" and which are intended to be usable with just about anything with a healthy dose of (A)D&D in its genome.

From the very dawn of the hobby, when the original rules were still in print, third party publishers were putting out adventure modules and settings. I would argue that the availability of the original rules in pdf format actually increases the market for new adventure modules and settings with which to use those rules. The market for adventures is only a limited one for a very small subset of the customer base; few people are going to be agonizing between buying Temple of Elemental Evil and Anomalous Subsurface Environment. While there may well be a short-term drop in third-party adventures while folks flock to DnDClassics.com to fill in the gaps in their collections, over the long term sales and downloads of the new stuff will pick up again as people get everything they've been looking to get of the old stuff. Everyone who buys the original Holmes rules is a potential LL and S&W customer.

Third, we have supplements; books that have rules that are designed to be used in addition to, or as a replacement for specific, rules in other games. In this category we have things like new monster books (Monsters of Myth, Malevolent and Benign, Teratic Tome) as well as straight-up rules supplements like Realms of Crawling Chaos, A Curious Volume of Forgotten Lore, the Advanced Edition Companion (admittedly something of a hybrid), the B/X Companion, etc.

The products in this category actually should boom because of the new availability of the older titles, and indeed JB mentions in his post quoted above that he's seen an uptick in sales of his B/X Companion since the original B/X Rules were made available. The challenge to the publishers of these products is to get the word out about their existence and compatibility without violating the OGL rule against declaring compatibility. If they can get over that hurdle, they'll prosper. I also happen to think that this category and the one following will see enormous growth in the coming years, and DnDClassics.com will only fuel that growth.

Fourth, we have what I'm calling originals, but the term shouldn't be taken as disparaging in any way to items in other categories. Here we have games that are sufficiently different in terms of mechanics to be considered new games that attempt to recreate an old-school aesthetic. I include here Adventures Dark and Deep, Castles & Crusades, Dragons at Dawn, Adventurer Conqueror King, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Barbarians of Lemuria, etc.

Here, I think we see another medium for enormous growth, which will be incidentally helped by DnDClassics.com, but which is largely unconnected to it. What impact the reprints will have on this sector is in the general sense of validation of the old school aesthetic that the OSR champions. Whether one believes that this aesthetic is real or a bit of revisionist history, the fact is that it exists and is now a recognized force within the gaming hobby/industry. The mere fact that WotC wants to tap into it by making the old pdfs available once more is proof of that. As more people are introduced to the concepts and conceits of the older editions of the game, they'll be more willing to experiment with games that take those concepts and conceits into new areas with new mechanics, and thus this sector will grow. There is no real direct impact, of course, any more than there is a direct impact between WotC publishing the original Holmes rules and a game like Dogs in the Vineyard. But the indirect impact is certainly there.

So, I think that the republishing of the old classic pdfs will actually be a good thing for the OSR as a whole. There aren't any more retro-clones to create, and the ones that spurred the OSR in the first place are there for those who discover the original games and want something more player-friendly. Adventures and rules supplements will always be in demand, and work equally well for the classic games or their simulacra. New old-school games will benefit from new players being exposed to the older means and modes of play, with some players going from the Holmes rules into something more mechanically, but not aesthetically, experimental such as Barbarians of Lemuria. And, of course, we can only hope that the republication of the AD&D 1st edition rules will lead to an enormous demand for Adventures Dark and Deep. ;-)

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Hasbro Announces 10% Workforce Cut

From the Boston Globe:

Pawtucket, R.I.-based Hasbro, whose brands include Monopoly and Nerf, has about 5,500 employees worldwide. A 10 percent workforce cut would put about 550 people out of work.

While Hasbro said consumer demand was softer than it expected over the holidays, the season was expected to be tough. This was in part because retailers were ordering inventory more cautiously.
...
Spokesman Wayne Charness said that the job cuts will all be this year and will occur globally, with no particular business groups targeted.

He said that the facility consolidations could result in some closures but was not specific about which plants would be affected other than to say no closures were planned in Rhode Island or Massachusetts in 2013. Hasbro has offices in 40 countries worldwide.

So did WotC skip their annual Holiday Massacre layoffs just to have layoffs imposed from above?

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OSR, Phase II

There is, of course, no singular event that one can point to and say, “The OSR started here.” Certainly it was a product of a particular time within the gaming hobby, wherein a number of circumstances combined to make the OSR possible. D&D 3.5 was petering out and 4th edition was received to blasé reviews or outright hostility. The OGL allowed games such as Castles & Crusades (2004) and OSRIC (2006), and later Labyrinth Lord, Swords & Wizardry, MicroliteXX, etc. to come about, and desktop publishing and the increasingly sophisticated abilities of on-demand publishing made it possible for individuals or a handful of people to put out really incredible products for little or no cash up front.

2008 was the year many flagship OSR blogs were founded, such as the Retroroleplaying Blog (founded February 20008); Grognardia (March 2008); The Society of Pole, Torch, and Rope (August 2008); and Bat in the Attic (October 2008); among many, many others too numerous to name. These blogs and message boards such as Dragonsfoot and the Knights and Knaves Alehouse (again, plus many others) fostered a community of deep introspection, analysis, and discussion about just what made older games great, on a mechanical, “player ethos”, and aesthetic level.

However, one thing I've noticed in the last year or so is that the level of philosophical analysis has decreased dramatically both on the blogs and message boards, in favor of an enormous wave of practical application. There are far fewer fundamental questions being discussed and older editions of D&D being evaluated, and many more reviews of new products, analysis of older non-D&D games, organization of face-to-face and virtual events, and the like. This, I think, is the transition between the first phase of the OSR to the second.

That’s not to say, obviously, that nothing of practical use has come out of the OSR in the last four or five years; far from it. But while the first phase of the OSR has seen foundational works such as those mentioned above, what we are now seeing in the OSR is a flowering of material that take off in wild new directions. Now that the final holes in the retro-clone coverage have been filled (the basic game-play of (A)D&D 0E, 1E, and now 2E are covered by multiple products), the OSR as a whole seems self-confident enough to break off in new directions.

We see this with games such as Lamentations of the Flame Princess (2010) that take the D&D game into new directions, but also with “reconstructions” of games that never saw print, such as Dragons at Dawn (2010) which attempts to recreate the game as it was played at Dave Arneson’s table in the very earliest days of the hobby, or my own Adventures Dark and Deep (2013) which attempts to show what direction the game might have taken if Gygax had stayed with TSR in 1985. There are fantasy games that are not based on the D&D rules, but harken to the old-school “feel” such as Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea, The Secret Fire, and Adventurer Conquerer King. We see science fiction games such as Sorcery and Super Science! and Stars Without Number. There are innovative and envelope-pushing settings and adventures such as Carcosa and Vornheim. And more material is being published every day.

Now, of course, we live in a hobby/industry where Wizards of the Coast has seemingly embraced older products in their back catalog, making them available in pdf format or in distribution-chain reprints. Old TSR stalwarts are publishing new and exciting material with their many decades of experience to guide them. So the landscape is once more changing. But in that change I see really good times ahead. The OSR has done its soul-searching, we've figured out what we are and what we like, and we’re settling down to the business of doing it. “Mainstream” gaming has caught up to us, and for a short while at least, we’re driving the bus. Let’s not hesitate to be bold and confident, and take things in exciting new directions.

As Gary Gygax said, “One more thing: don’t spend too much time merely reading. The best part of this work is the play, so play and enjoy!”

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Wizards of the Coasts PDFs Now Available

Well, the rumors and speculation have turned out to be true; Wizards of the Coast has teamed up with Onebookshelf to make pdf's of a bunch of their older products available.

Their items are available both on the main RPGNow.com site as well as the new DNDClassics.com site, which was set up specifically to accommodate the new WotC material.

There seems to be a smattering of items from all versions but 0E, and everything's in pdf format right now, but I'm assuming there will be new things added to the site all the time. There are both books and modules included, and B1 In Search of the Unknown is currently available as a free download to get the ball rolling.

No idea if people who had previously bought access to the pdf's will somehow be granted access, but UPDATE: Apparently if you previously purchased pdf's through OneBookShelf, your previous purchases are honored with the re-release. That's a terrific bit of news. It's a huge step forward for WotC, and they've certainly kept one promise made early on in the 5E development process. I'll be interested to see what new things get added.

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New DnD Next Playtest Packet Available

This one takes us through level 20, and includes a new adventure and monsters to support higher level play.

Download --> HERE <--

Enjoy!

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What would Dungeons & Dragons have looked like if Gary Gygax had been allowed to keep developing it? Please, if you haven't done so already, consider supporting my Kickstarter for the Adventures Dark and Deep Players Manual, going on now through December 19th. I need your help to make it a reality!

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WotC To Publish New AD&D Material, Encourage AD&D Campaigns

I'll confess that I've never been a particular fan of the A1-4 series of modules. I fully understand that they've got an excellent reputation among many of my colleagues in the OSR, but they just never did much for me. I don't particularly dislike them; I just don't gush over them.

That said, I found the following to be of extreme interest (in the advertising blurb for the upcoming hardcover version of the Slavers modules, due from Wizards in June 2013):

Against the Slave Lords is a hardcover collection of four classic Advanced Dungeons & Dragons adventure modules that form a series -- A1: Slave Pits of the Undercity, A2: Secret of the Slavers Stockade, A3: Assault on the Aerie of the Slave Lords, and A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords -- complete with original black-and-white interior art.

Added to the collection is an all-new fifth adventure -- A0: Danger at Darkshelf Quarry -- that you can use to kick off an AD&D campaign that pits a group of adventurers against the evil Slave Lords! Module A0, designed for levels 1-3, sets the stage for events that unfold throughout the remainder of the "A" series.

While it's neat to see another famous old-school work being republished, what struck me was in the second paragraph:

"you can use to kick off an AD&D campaign"

Wizards of the Coast is not only republishing old material, and is not only publishing new material for a version of the game that is ostensibly out of print, but is actively giving encouragement and assistance to DMs who want to start up a campaign using those out of print rules!

The implications of that simple fact are enormous. I think it signals a shift in their corporate attitude away from "the latest version of the rules is the only one we'll even acknowledge". It also demonstrates their lack of confidence in the ability of 4th Edition to carry the flag until 5th Edition is ready for the public (which is now scheduled for 2014). That means they have all of 2013 to play around with previous  editions, and more than that, continue reaching out to the fan bases of those previous editions.

An official micro-revival of AD&D? Bring it on! And if you should want to play a mountebank or a mystic when you take on the slave lords in Highport, boy have I got a book for you!

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New D&D Next Playtest Packet Available

For those of you who, like me, are following or participating in the open playtest for D&D Next, there's a new playtest packet available for download. The new packet takes the characters to level 10, makes some changes to spells and the rogue class, adds new monsters, and skills, backgrounds, and specialties have been tweaked. The packet also includes a rework of the classic adventure X1: The Isle of Dread.

You can download the latest packet here, and you can find a fuller description of the changes that it contains here.

Enjoy!

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Pathfinder Tops D&D Again

According to the latest estimates released by ICV2.com, Pathfinder was once again the sales leader in the RPG field this summer, beating out the "genre-defining title" Dungeons & Dragons. Rounding out the field are Dark Heresy/Rogue Trader by FFG, Dragon Age, and Dungeon Crawl Classics.

I've got to say that last one surprises me a bit, but I'm pleased as anything that something that is deliberately being aimed at the old-school market is doing so well when stacked up against all the other RPGs that are out there. Even if I don't personally care for it, it's helping my corner of the hobby, and thus I wish it well.

Bear in mind that these are estimates based on a variety of different sources, since most gaming companies don't publish straightforward sales statistics. They're still regarded as pretty much the only source for comparison. 

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Here Come the 2nd Edition Reprints

Looks like May of 2013 will see the return of the original 2nd edition core rulebooks with the same repritn treatment that the 1E books got:

• Dungeon Master's Guide
• Monstrous Compendium
• Player's Handbook

And also a hardcover edition of Against the Slave Lords and S1-S4 which is an innovation in term of reprints, as far as I can tell.

Can the Rules Cyclopedia be far behind?

(h/t to Jason Paul McCartan)

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The Zero-Sum Game of Campaign Settings

As you might infer from the title of my blog, I am a fan of the World of Greyhawk Fantasy Setting. I have spent literally thousands of hours reading, writing, and dreaming about Greyhawk. Technically, I was a fan of the setting even before it was an official setting; most of my homebrew campaigns prior to 1980, when the first Folio was released, featured a Duchy of Aaqa, or an Empire of Lum, or other places whose names were gleaned from the tiny glimpses we read about in the artifacts and relics sections of Eldritch Wizardry and the DMG, and had gods like St. Cuthbert, similarly sourced. At the risk of being called immodest, I am a Greyhawk "superfan".

However, what you might not know is that I'm also a fan of the Forgotten Realms. I am also a fan of Dragonlance. And the Wilderlands of High Fantasy campaign. And have had very enjoyable experiences in Dark Sun and Ravenloft.

For me, enjoyment of a particular campaign setting is not a zero-sum game. That is, I don't have a limited supply of "campaign appreciation points" that must be dolled out between the various campaign settings out there. Sure, I don't have an unlimited amount of time to devote to gaming (not even the many hours I had in my youth, which seems endless now that I look back on it, compared with what I'm able to devote to gaming these days).

Thus, I don't understand the mindset that says, "I'm a Greyhawk fan. Therefore, Forgotten Realms sucks and so does WotC for choosing it as the next setting!"

Now, it's certainly possible to not like a particular setting on its own merits; Planescape annoys me, for example. But I don't have to mention that fact every time that I bring up my love of Greyhawk. Unfortunately, it seems that some folks do. I've seen it in the last 24 hours in various forums, in reaction to the announcement that the Forgotten Realms is going to be the official setting for D&D for the foreseeable future.

Not everybody has to love that announcement (personally, I think it's probably the best choice they could have made, other than perhaps developing an entirely new setting). But I just don't understand the mindset that says that any piece of good news for a setting that's not my primary favorite automatically means I need to trash that setting. Or, as I have also seen, to trash the company that made the decision. Or the rules that are going to be used.

The Realms being the default setting for 5E isn't going to make me any more or less likely to play 5E. That will be based on the rules themselves. Ditto WotC as a company. Stuff they make that I like, I'll buy. Stuff they make that I don't like, I won't buy. Simple.

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The Future of Dungeons and Dragons

Today (8/16/2012) at 7:00 PM eastern time, Wizards of the Coast will be live streaming the keynote address from GenCon: "The Future of Dungeons and Dragons." Speculation is that they will not only talking about the DnD Next playtest, but might also divulge which campaign setting(s) will be featured.

Hie thyself to this link to see the future of D&D:

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/GenCon.aspx

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Some Virtual Gaming News from Wizards and Paizo

WotC's VTT

Here's a two-fer on a subject that a lot of gamers are following closely; virtual gaming.

First, from Wizards of the Coast, comes the announcement that they're shutting down the Beta test of their Virtual Table Top:

"I wanted to inform you all about an important decision that Wizards has made regarding the D&D Virtual Table and Virtual Table Beta. While we appreciate the enthusiasm and participation in the Beta phase, we were unable to generate enough support for the tool to launch a full version to the public. Effective July 30, 2012 the D&D Virtual Table Beta will be coming to an end and the VT will be closed.

Over the next three weeks, we encourage you to wrap up your existing campaigns and make sure to gather contact information from your online group members so that you can stay in touch if you like. We realize that because all data generated in the tool is in a proprietary format usable only by the Virtual Table, it is not possible to export your campaigns for use in another tool. You can, however, take screenshots of any notes, maps or adventures that you would like to hang on to or use in your home games.

We would like to thank everyone who participated in the VT Beta and look forward to continuing to support D&D game play through our D&D Insider digital tools and D&D Next."

Paizo's PGS

Certainly a bummer for those who like to (or must) do their gaming online with some sort of automated play aid. The most curious thing is the timing of the announcement, because it comes just two days after Paizo announced that they are coming out with their own online Paizo Game Space at Paizocon:

Paizo Game Space is amazing software that lets you play with the people you know... anywhere in the world. All you need is the internet.

It's a virtual tabletop. Now VTTs aren't new. I'm gonna say "VTT" a lot because "virtual tabletop" is kind of a mouthful.

Virtual tabletops aren't new. There have been literally dozens of them before this. Some of them we like. Some of them we like a lot.

But none of them is exactly what we think a virtual tabletop should be.

We've talked to a lot of people and they all say the same thing:

We love playing on a VTT. We can keep our group together after people move away.

We love playing on a VTT. As Cosmo told me the other day, it lets him game in his underwear without all the catcalling and wolf whistles.

People love playing on a VTT. But they're kind of annoying!

You have to find the software. And download it. Install it. Will it run on a Mac? That's a big one for us at Paizo.

And then you get the fun part. IP addresses and firewalls and port forwarding and all that. Even network administrators don't want to deal with that stuff. That's work! We're here for fun.

So today, Paizo is reinventing the virtual tabletop.

Paizo Game Space runs right in your web browser. There's no software to install! None. Not even a plug-in.

If you can get to paizo.com, you and your friends can play on Paizo Game Space.

(The full text of the script used in the announcement is at the above link, message #22.)

Reading through the whole thing, the PGS definitely sounds like a good thing for thems as uses such fancy thingamabobs.

As far as the timing of the two announcements go, while I can't help but think that the WotC announcement is related to the winding-down of 4th edition, the timing is truly unfortunate. It makes it look like they couldn't hack it, and Paizo is stepping in once again to take over where WotC dropped the ball.

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WotC Reprinting 3.5 Core Rulebooks

To follow up on the 1st edition core rulebooks that WotC is reprinting next month, it is now official that the 3.5 rulebooks will also be reprinted in September.

As with the 1st edition rulebooks, these will be premium, limited edition books.

It should be noted that these were previously up on the Barnes & Noble website, and then withdrawn, almost certainly because they were inadvertently prematurely made live on the B&N site.

Given the sensibilities and strategy around the DnD Next release, this is a very interesting development. Are they trying to reach out to the hordes of 3.5 players who were, shall we say, less than pleased with 4E and left in droves to Pathfinder? I think it's quite likely. Will they succeed in winning back some of the goodwill they lost? That's a bit more problematic.

(h/t to commenter G. van der Vegt for pointing this out)

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Wizards Allows DnDNext Playtesting Online

From their (newly revised) FAQ:

Can I run an online game via email, Skype, Google Hangout or a play-by-post forum?

Yes, you may run online games via Skype, Google Hangout or play-by-post forum provided you to do not post or upload any transcripts from your playtest, upload any playtest materials and make sure that all members of your group have signed up to playtest through the official playtest sign up process.

Well, woot! Who's looking for another player in their DnD Next playtest? I'm up for experiencing it from the other side of the screen, for once.

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It's Reprintapalooza at Wizards!

EDIT2: Nope. Not a hoax. It's up on the Wizards of the Coast website. 

EDIT: WotC has apparently confirmed that this, along with the 3.5 reprints, is a hoax.

I just can't keep up with all this. Now they're reprinting the original Dungeon! board game this October. Excellent news, of course, but why can't they just come out and SAY what the heck they're doing!? Why all this dribbling it out in secret!?

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Is "Provolone" D&D Next?

EDIT: Turns out B&N has now taken down "Provolone" and the two 3.5 reprints that were up there yesterday.

I think D&D Next is scheduled to be released on September 18 of this year.

In the comments of my post from last night pointing out the "reprints" of the Players Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide, sharp eyed James Mishler pointed out that the Wizards RPG Team also had something called "Provolone" scheduled for release the same day, which was also available for pre-order:

James thought-- justifiably so, I think-- that this "Provolone" was the Monster Manual, since that would complete the trio of 3.5 core books. But the more I think about it, the more I think the identification of the first two books available for pre-order on September 18 was a mistake by Barnes & Noble. I think they're the D&D Next books.

Because "Provolone" sure sounds like a code-name to me.

It would make a certain amount of sense; it's certainly been the case that online booksellers, especially the massive ones like Amazon and BN.com, have screwed up details of forthcoming gaming products often enough in the past. I think Barnes & Noble put those entries "live" on their website early, by mistake, and the identification of the first two books as 3.5 was also a mistake. I note that none of them appears on the Amazon.com website. That wouldn't make sense if this really was a 3.5 reprint.

If my theory about a B&N screw-up is true, that leaves us with the notion that WotC is rushing to get D&D Next out the door. The official announcement was January 9, 2012. But we know they've been working on the game for at least a year leading up to that (and probably longer); they had a complete (although not polished) game ready for the D&D Experience convention that same month, and we know that the initial playtesters have had a complete game in their hot little hands for about the same amount of time.

It would finally make the timing of the announcement make sense. Remember how a lot of people were wondering three months ago why WotC would announce 5E while 4E was still on the shelves? Surely they knew the announcement would kill 4E's sales; how could they take that for a whole year or more, until 5E was ready to release?

I think a September release date suddenly makes that all make sense. The design of D&D Next is pretty well wrapped up. They're just polishing it at this point. The input from the open playtest will be used to patch up any glaring holes, anything that's broken mechanically that they missed with their in-house and non-disclosure-agreement-burdened testers. Maybe they figure three months or so is enough time to catch and patch any glaring holes. They'd certainly have enormous pre-release buzz at GenCon, and might just have some previews of the books there (or an early convention-only release, if they can swing it).

Could this be why Monte Cook jumped ship? Because corporate was pushing to get the game out this year, before he thought it would be ready?

All this is just speculation, of course, but it does fit the available facts, and makes some moves from January that didn't make any sense suddenly seem not so crazy.

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More WotC Reprints; 3.5 This Time. WTF?

EDIT: Turns out B&N has now taken down "Provolone" and the two 3.5 reprints that were up there yesterday.

Well isn't this interesting? It's certainly been a day for news from Wizards of the Coast.

Remember how the reprints of the core 1E rulebooks caused such a stir, and they were then postponed a bit? Well now it seems that Barnes & Noble has put two of the 3.5 rulebooks up on their website for pre-order, going on sale September 18:

Players Handbook
Dungeon Masters Guide

Maybe Monte Cook disagreed with the corporate decision to re-release 3.5, as he thought it might compete with 5E? That's pure speculation, of course, but there's a lot of oddness coming out of WotC in the last day or so, and no mistake.

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