At the risk of a slightly negative first thread I have to ask where has D&D gone?

It's been what three years an all we have are the three core books, a gazetteer and some realms specific monster manual (don't have yet).

Where is the settings support? The sourcebooks?

I wa thinking of returning to the DM armchair and looking for inspiration but nothing but tumbleweed.

People keep saying you can use your old edition material but that being the case I may as well just run basic or 2e.

I'm genuinely bewildered by WotC's plan, are they winding D&D down? It looks like there might be a handful of interesting 3rd party support but is it really worth investing in this edition if the owners aren't? Or should I stick with Mythras, my rebound RPG after 3e burned me out?

Some genuine questions in that mope

WotC is in the business of making money.
The existing material has to sell well before more products are released.
It is not like the old days when TSR was basically "the only game in town" if you wanted D20.
While there is demand, there may not be Enough demand.
=

Crawford has talked about how they want to avoid adding too much splat to the game and so unbalance or even break it the way the cleric, druid and endlessly buffed wizards did 3e (my examples not his). By avoiding this they are sparing us a new edition to clean up the overburdened mess in 3-4 years. They also want to keep the game accessible for new players.

Your summary of their releases leaves out 5 book length adventures, two of which (Out of the Abyss and Curse of Strahd) are excellent. And Volo's Guide to Monsters is not a 'realms specific monster manual.' It is all useable in any setting and includes some monster PC options.

As Greentongue says the RPG market is not huge. Better to release a few high quality books that sell well rather than a mountain of uneven material that leads to buyer burn out. Surveys show that homebrew and FR are massively dominant with only a very small number playing in GH, Dark Sun, etc. So while I love a number of those settings publishing for them is not very attractive financially.

And in terms of settings and adventures the OSR and DM's Guild is producing enough new good material to keep anyone satisfied.

'Is it worth investing in this edition if the owner's aren't?' They are focused on keeping D&D alive by attracting new players, bring back some old players and not strip mining their market. 5e is a very fine edition, my favorite since BECMI.

If you want to play or DM it will be a lot easier to find or form a group with 5e than any other edition. So if you actually enjoy playing as opposed to reading supplements and arguing about RPGs on the net, yes it is worth investing in.

Quote from: HorusArisen;950610At the risk of a slightly negative first thread I have to ask where has D&D gone?

It's been what three years an all we have are the three core books, a gazetteer and some realms specific monster manual (don't have yet).

Where is the settings support? The sourcebooks?

I wa thinking of returning to the DM armchair and looking for inspiration but nothing but tumbleweed.

People keep saying you can use your old edition material but that being the case I may as well just run basic or 2e.

I'm genuinely bewildered by WotC's plan, are they winding D&D down? It looks like there might be a handful of interesting 3rd party support but is it really worth investing in this edition if the owners aren't? Or should I stick with Mythras, my rebound RPG after 3e burned me out?

Some genuine questions in that mope

Are you talking about 5e? If so the plan is to produce far more GM facing books then Player facing books. It seems to working fine. New/Mid/Old School types seem to buy the books and I flat know a lot of people actually play the game regularly.

Just to be clear I'm talking specifically about 5e.

I'm not talking the 12 products a month of TSR or 3e days but something would be nice. I did leave out the adventures since they're not worth mentioning in this regard. They're all heavy FR and you can't enjoy reading an adventure the way I enjoyed reading the Rjurik Highlands.

The OSR stuff is nice but since again I'm on about 5e not really relevant.

YMMV but I like shiny new toys

I don't need tons of splat material to run games. The only 5E products I have are the core books and the DM screen. I have been running a Mystara campaign since 2014 without much of a problem. I have enough original B/X material to play with for years on end. I enjoy the fact that the current edition can be played & enjoyed without a constant barrage of "must have" supplements. It remains easy for interested newcomers to get into the game with just a PHB and some dice. If I happen to crave new abilities, classes, spells, etc. then we just make them up. I may end up picking up the Volos guide out of curiosity but the game doesn't come to a screeching halt without an avalanche of new splat.

Also, considering that all prior editions of D&D are available there has never been more to choose from in terms of supplemental material than now.

Quote from: HorusArisen;950617...They're all heavy FR and you can't enjoy reading an adventure the way I enjoyed reading the Rjurik Highlands.

The OSR stuff is nice but since again I'm on about 5e not really relevant...

Out of the Abyss and Curse of Strahd are the best adventures yet and far from being 'heavy FR.' CoS doesn't even take place in FR and OotA could be in any world's Underdark.

Converting from any edition besides 4e is so easy it can be done on the fly by a most experienced DMs. The differences between editions is massively overhyped.

Besides which most OSR setting material is system agnostic and so as useable for 5e as for B/X or 1e.

And finally even if one insists on 5e only there are fine adventures on the DM's Guild and several good settings converted to 5e like Scarred Lands, Thule or the upcoming Midgard. Or you can go for the 5e Adventures in Middle Earth although I'd prefer to play TOR in the original system.

The thing is 5e is much more solid about in game rules and not about exceptions like 4e or just crazy power and whatever like 3e. It's a lot like 1e/2e with tiny dashes of 3/4e. And I mean tiny.

The core set is great for what it is. Standard D&D experience and then some, but not too complex, nor innovative.

More recently picked up Volo's Guide. It's decent, but I would have preferred more monsters statted-out, rather than all the lore fluff. That stuff is okay for bathroom reading, but not as useful to me at the table.

Nothing else really holds interest for me, not enough to want to pay full price. Maybe Curse of Strahd. That looks good, but I already have Ravenloft in older editions.

I thought OotA looked cool, but been hearing that it's a bit of a slog?

PotA and SKT look good too, I just don't care about the Forgotten Realms that much.

I guess I've been in the hobby so long that I'm not really looking for "more of the same," rehashes of old stuff. Like TftYP coming out soon. All good adventures back in the day, sure.

I'm looking for stuff that's new, that opens up the game in new ways. 5e continues to go down the safe road. Which is a bit of a shame, because it's actually a robust system. I'd like to see the engine pushed into new genres.

So I look at Pathfinder, which is too complex for me to want to run straight. Thankfully it has Unchained which helps streamline things a bit. But Pathfinder system continues to add some pretty cool and fresh ideas to the game. I was impressed with Ultimate Campaign especially. At first I brushed off Ultimate Intrigue, but it continues to look, well, intriguing. Social rules up the wazoo (do we even really need them?) and... Batman!

Of course the OSR is a great source for innovative ideas (if not mechanics), but it's generally harder to seek out those books.

I also picked up AiME, but haven't gotten to run it yet. I recommend that one for sure.

I have to agree; what I'd really love to see is not necessarily a huge churn out of products, but at least one hardcover book (if not a classic boxed set) devoted to each of the classic campaign settings

Though a self-contained boxed set with all the rules needed to play specifically adapted to each setting is something that could be marketed to Toy and board game shops, even find initial funding with Kickstarters (maybe paired up with CMON for an included set of miniatures).

Quote from: Robyo;950624I thought OotA looked cool, but been hearing that it's a bit of a slog?

Funny I've heard others complain that there aren't enough encounters during travel. I'm not a fan of random enounters and just skip non-eventful travel. As usual it depends on how you play it, I'm never wedded to running it as written.

Quote from: HorusArisen;950617The OSR stuff is nice but since again I'm on about 5e not really relevant.

This is not the OSR but material specifically for 5e with over 1,084 products available. Then over on the DM's Guild there are 3,684 products.

I don't see the basis for your complaint.

Quote from: Tristram Evans;950628I have to agree; what I'd really love to see is not necessarily a huge churn out of products, but at least one hardcover book (if not a classic boxed set) devoted to each of the classic campaign settings

I wish. Planescape, Dark Sun, Spelljammer...only if they let third part publishers get their mitts on the settings.

Quote from: estar;950630This is not the OSR but material specifically for 5e with over 1,084 products available. Then over on the DM's Guild there are 3,684 products.

I don't see the basis for your complaint.

With respect to the people's products on the DMg guild quality is...haphazard at best or just plain tat.

I do like the look of some of the more professional publishing stuff though and if anything that's what will keep my interest. Things like AIME or Midgard which I can run or mine for ideas.

On a side note I remember really enjoying your points of light book.

I remember at the beginning of 5e Mike Mearls saying there would be support for those settings even if just PDF conversion documents...