What's All This About a Revision?
In December, Wizards of the Coast announced that revised versions of the three core rulebooks of Dungeons & Dragons (the Player's Handbook, Dungeon Master's Guide, and Monster Manual) would be published in July, 2003. This announcement sparked an expected amount of debate and discussion, with the prevailing sentiment seeming to fall somewhere between "wait and see" and "it's about time." That's been very heartwarming to those of us involved with these projects.
Having worked as lead developer on the Revised Player's Handbook for over a year, I'm extraordinarily excited by this new book. The work performed by the revision team (including Rich Redman, Skip Williams, David Noonan, Rich Baker, and all the other designers and editors involved along the way) has been truly inspiring. Every time I thought that I had come up with the best idea yet, someone else would take it another step or think of something even cooler. There hasn't been such an amazing team effort 'round here since, well, the birth of Third Edition D&D itself.
What's more, I've been playtesting the rules in my Bloodlines campaign throughout development, and I can't thank my players enough for their patience. I'm sure it seemed like every time we sat down to play, they were relearning some minor rule or spell effect (OK, they were), and that means they had to trust me, the DM, to keep things fair and equitable. Despite the difficulties, the players continued to give useful feedback at every step of the way. I think they'd agree that the revisions we've been testing represent a great stride forward in "D&D tech."
As the FAQ says, this isn't a new edition, nor will the revisions make products from the last three years obsolete or incompatible with the new rules. Nobody's coming to your house to tear up your dog-eared copy of the Monster Manual or Lord of the Iron Fortress, and this isn't going to put any of the fine D20 companies out there out of business. It's a tune-up that represents what we've learned since the first printing of the 3E core rulebooks hit the stands in the summer of 2000 (heck, even since we had to turn the manuscripts over to typesetting that spring!). A lot of playtesting went into Third Edition, to be sure, but that's been dwarfed by the amount of playing that these rules have seen since then. The D&D community has been more active in the last two years than at any time in the last decade or more, and that means that the rules have been poked, prodded, pulled, stretched, warped, and road-tested in ways that the designers and playtesters couldn't possibly have imagined or reproduced.
It's exactly that vast body of experience, that forced evolution, that the development team drew upon in their work on the core rulebooks. Really, we couldn't have asked for a better testing ground, and I think it shows in the revised books.
If you're eager to hear more about the revised core rulebooks, come to Winter Fantasy 2003 in Fort Wayne, Indiana. This gaming convention, held January 23-26, will include a couple of seminars about the upcoming revisions. Mary Elizabeth Allen and Anthony Valterra from the business team will cover the dollars-and-cents side of the issue, and I'll talk about the books from a rules standpoint. Other guests of honor at the con include designer JD Wiker of The Game Mechanics and Skip "Monster Manual" Williams.
Even if you can't get the scoop first-hand, keep your eyes trained on the Wizards of the Coast website for more details, not to mention regular updates in the pages of Dragon, the official magazine of Dungeons & Dragons. Oh, and I'll share more tidbits from time to time on my message boards.
Andy Collins
January 2003