#d&d

[prokopetz]

Doesn't Hasbro have a strong incentive to make a "lite" version of D&D with a pared-down paperback rulebook and sell it as a casual-friendly overpriced starter kit with a bunch of dice, figures, treasure cards, etc.? It could be a strict subset of the normal 5E rules (I guess - not that knowledgeable about TTRPG design). That way they could sell you all the same books. Seems like a slam dunk

Hasbro's present marketing strategy for Dungeons & Dragons is to try to position every D&D group as potential purchasers of every D&D product. Among other things, this is one of the main reasons that every campaign setting other than the Forgotten Realms is being repackaged as a series of tourist destinations for Forgotten Realms based campaigns to visit, and why there's been a strong move away from focused, topical sourcebooks and toward big, messy "book of everything"-style anthologies that consciously avoid focusing too much on any one type of character or campaign. It's also why the core books make a lot of noise about how wonderfully modular the rules are without actually providing any meaningful modularity in practice – if the game was designed to make it easy to pick and choose modular components, they'd risk fracturing the player base into distinct subsets with different preferred sets of modules.

All this in mind, it's fairly easy to see why there's currently no official "light" version of D&D. Under the paradigm of every single D&D group as a potential purchaser of every single D&D product, a version of Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition that was actually, meaningfully simpler than the core product would function in practice as a competing game (what if people decide they like the simpler version better and just play that instead?), and the last thing you want is to compete with yourself. TSR learned that the hard way! With substantive simplification off the table, the only introductory version of Dungeons & Dragons Hasbro can offer is one with exactly the same rules which simply has less content, and tells people to buy the full version if they want more – which is exactly what they're selling in the various starter sets that are presently available.

[official-dnd-posts]

official dnd post

screaming, crying, throwing up, as I force myself to write a story i'm very passionate about and love writing and have no obligation to write except that i want to

[oldschoolfrp]

How to entertain a cat and an iguana, and an imp in a cage. (Denis Beauvais cover for Dragon 104, December 1985). I love when wizards have anachronistic items in their workshops (look on the shelf just to the right of the crystal ball).

[2minutetabletop]

The Endless River Battle Map

Our newly-released map is of a river that loops at its edge! Inspired by a certain movie – can you guess which? ;)

→ Check out how it seamlessly loops here!

[moonloredraws]

Dame Aylin, the woman that you are

Piece I did for that @bg3womenswrongs zine!

[artofshinga]

First art of 2025, since it feels like a brooding-on-a-rooftop kind of vibe so far this year idk

[vaerhare]

Knight in green armor

[honeyed-pines]

Fuck it— D&Ds your SuperBat

[oldschoolfrp]

Knitting a winter blanket with a pattern of creatures that come to life (Dean Morrissey cover for Dragon 57, January 1982)

[vintagerpg]

The Fantastic Planet: A World of Magic and Mystery (1980) is the third in Stewart Cowley’s Galactic Encounters series. You can totally feel the shrugs here — Cowley obviously had a pile of fantasy art that was going to waste and, even though this is still sorta part of the Terran Trade Authority universe, he was like “Eff it, let’s do a weird science fantasy book.” The result doesn’t work at all in terms of the standards of TTA, but this is probably my favorite of all these books because of the sheer audacity of it.

Lot of pictures cross the gutter, and thus don’t make for good copyphotos. But we have an uptick in space barbarians and chaos knights on horseback. Pretty sure Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are in one painting. Another is definitely the cover of the UK edition of Fred Saberhagen’s The Black Mountains (that’s the dog mutant holding the swordsman Chup). Several of these paintings would reappear the next year in Cowley’s horror/fantasy-themed Tourist’s Guide to Transylvania, which shares a similar tonal inconsistency that I enjoy.

I should note that I think these sorts of books were a unique and brief side-effect of the fantasy art book trend started by Gnomes in 1977. I suspect there are lots more (possibly by Cowley under different pseudonyms, like this series and the Transylvania book). I keep finding others, like Tour of the Universe, by Malcolm Edwards and Robert Holdstock (Mythago Wood), which is in a similar vein as TTA (and using art from the same agencies).

[official-dnd-posts]

soooooo beautiful. the colors, the details!

official dnd post

Scribe for @wizardenby !

[skeet-me1]

skeet ulrich in “faster, purple worm! kill! kill!”

give credit if you use/repost!

[cactusnymph]

I commissioned @sadfishkid to draw Motyl and Zezu, two characters @livingchancy and I play in a small game that @chimney-begins put together for us <33 As always it turned out amazing 🥰

[ID: a digital illustration of two D&D characters. Motyl is a white human artificer with long red hair and a tattered white dress. She wears goggles on her head and a leather belt with many pouches and vials on it. Zezu is a yellow goblin barbarian with huge ears and long hair shaved into an undercut and braided. Zezu's chest and arms are wrapped in bandages and they're wearing loose-fitting pants. Zezu lies on their back with their head in Motyl's lap. On their right a campfire burns bright and bathes the scene in warm light. The surrounding swamp is gloomy and grey with a full moon overhead. Zezu talks with a big smile while Motyl's smile is barely visible as she looks up at the sky. End ID]

[theanoninyourinbox]

Emergency Fund Commissions OPEN

$10 commissions open to fund an emergency vet bill

It's open to Warrior Cats, MLP characters, Dungeons and Dragons ocs, Gemsonas, and just about anything else I can draw

Art Examples Below

[mindboogling]

I love making a gag character for D&D, forgetting they’re just a gag character, and then take a step back to look at the original ref