Well here we are with day 2 of the belated #RPGaDAY2020. Today’s topic for me to ponder and share my insignificant thoughts about in a rambling poorly written post is…

My mum likes change. Slap a new sticker on a food item in a supermarket and she will buy it. Me I like routine. Although sometimes routines do change! Take breakfast. In the morning I have a mug of coffee (made using a V60 dripper and a speciality coffee from a small independent roaster) and a couple of slices of toasted sourdough bread (my sourdough loaf makes amazing toast). Before I started baking my own bread I used to have a couple of chocolate chip brioche. So I can change. Its just I choose not to most of the time. It’s probably a comfort thing.

At the moment there are changes happening in D&D if you decide to accept them. For some I think there is some resistance and a refusal to accept those changes. Which is fine it’s their choice. They can ignore those changes and continue to play D&D without them, or they can find some other system more to their liking that they can play instead. It’s up to them.

Me? I like the sound of those changes and I’m looking forward to integrating them into my games (once they start back up again).

So what change am I talking about?

Over the past few months the issue of representation and depiction of certain races within D&D has arisen. I’m not going to go into specifics. However there was a Sage Advice produced by WotC to address some of those issues, and future printings of the material affected will have those changes in. Which is a good thing.

However there is more change coming.

Mid November (in the US) and the start of December (everywhere else basically) will see the release Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything. Which like Xanathar’s before it, is an expansion to the rules of D&D.

Tasha’s introduces new rules for customising a characters origins (there is a sneak peak into these in the latest Adventurer’s League Players Guide), new and updated sub classes, Group Patrons (which I want to say are based on,taken from Guilds of Ravnica and Eberron but I may be mistaken), new and updated Spells, plus rules for personalising them. There are magical tattoos, more magic items, expanded rules for sidekicks (first introduced in the D&D Essentials Kit), rules for parleying with monsters, Supernatural regions are introduced, along with natural hazards, plus puzzles.

So in a way Tasha’s is a consolidation of rules from other source books and making them more generic than the settings that they appeared in. Mixed in with a good dose of new stuff.

But these are changes. Especially the customising a characters origins. Which is a massive change. It’s certainly one I will be embarrassing. I love the idea that a player can personalise the character they are playing even more to reflect the origin/back story that they have come up with.

If you look at the AL Players Guide Appendix 1: Customising Your Origin In D&D it says the following for personality:

“The description of a race might suggest various things about the behavior and personality of that people’s archetypal adventurers. You may ignore those suggestions, whether they’re about alignment, moods, interests, or any other personality trait. Your character’s personality and behavior are entirely yours to determine.”

I feel it has always been possible to do this in D&D. But it’s always been a house rule. Something you agree with your DM at the time. This I feel is WotC giving players and DMs permission to do this sort of thing. They are kind of saying you don’t have to do this, but it’s ok if you do. Which some players and DMs may need to give them the confidence to go ahead and do it.

I definitely want to make use of some of the other stuff like the supernatural regions and natural hazards. I can integrate them into my campaign very easily.

For me these changes will help make my D&D sessions a more fun experience for everyone (hopefully), and more inclusive and accessible. That’s a good thing.