Azeroth is about to become a full Dungeons & Dragons setting, and the designer who helped bring it there wants tables to treat it as a sandbox. James Wyatt, a principal game designer at Wizards of the Coast, spoke with IGN at New York Comic Con about D&D: World of Warcraft, and the interview went up today (October 17th). The gameplay expansion, made with Blizzard Entertainment, is the first release under D&D's new Universes Beyond banner, and it arrives next month (November 17th).
Wyatt described the book the same way he describes most of the sourcebooks he works on. "It is a great big toolbox," he said. "I don't write a lot of adventure products. I do a lot of source books, and really there's that sense of we've got character options, we've got monsters, we've got dungeons you can explore."
Paraphrase Instead Of Translation
The hardest part of any MMO adaptation is the class system, and Wyatt said his approach was to paraphrase instead of translate. He went through each WoW class's abilities and talent trees, then looked for what fifth edition already did well and where new spells, feats, or Battle Master maneuvers could evoke the most iconic parts of each spec. "Evoking the flavor is more important to us than reproducing the mechanics in any way," he explained.
That means the classes are wider than their video game versions. A D&D Paladin is both a healer and a tank whatever subclass and feats you pick, and a Priest can wear more than cloth. Wyatt noted that the lore already bends those rules anyway, saying, "They keep saying Anduin is a priest and there he is in plate armor with his sword."
Check out the official reveal trailer for the book below:
Dungeons Built For Improv
Some longtime tabletop players have worried the book would be all combat and set-piece dungeons. Wyatt said the team aimed for the opposite. Each of the seven dungeons gives the DM a map and the boss encounters, and leaves the rest open, with random encounter tables for groups that want a fight and plenty of room for exploration the MMO cannot offer. He recalled one Blizzard playtest where a new player's Forsaken Warlock decided he could not cast spells properly because he had no lower jaw, sent himself tumbling down the stairs, and then tore off his own arm and threw it at a monster. "That's Dungeons & Dragons in a nutshell," Wyatt said.
The renown rules from the Dungeon Master's Guide stand in for WoW's reputation system, giving characters a stake in the Alliance, the Horde, and the setting's other factions. Wyatt called the system optional and said tables can ignore it if they want. The separate Icecrown Citadel Adventure Map Pack uses its own faster renown track with the Ashen Verdict, which lets parties upgrade their rings and gather pieces of Shadowmourne in a single run through the raid.
Chromie Gives Tables Permission
The book's introduction is written by Chromie, the bronze dragon who looks after the timeways in WoW. Wyatt said her note is a way of telling readers they can ignore canon and build their own timeline. His own home campaign does exactly that, with a party that starts in Silvermoon City after repelling Xal'atath, finds the city ruled by dragons, and gets sent back 20 years by Chromie to fix whatever the Infinite Dragonflight broke.
He would also like to keep going. Wyatt said he might postpone his retirement to work on a second WoW book, and that he is already keeping a list of ideas. The current book covers the story up to the start of Midnight and has almost nothing on Xal'atath, who he said he would have loved to give a stat block.
What Comes In The Book
The expansion includes rules for all 13 WoW classes with 9 new and reworked subclasses and over 40 specializations, 16 species such as the Draenei, Forsaken, Pandaren, Tauren, and Worgen, more than 60 spells, over 25 magic items, 50+ monsters, 30 dungeon boss stat blocks, and over 20 factions. Its seven dungeons are Azjol-Nerub, Blackfathom Deeps, Deadmines, Dire Maul, Onyxia's Lair, Scarlet Monastery, and Shadowfang Keep. Local game stores get early access on November 3rd, and the $29.99 Icecrown Citadel map pack carries parties from level 16 to 20 for a final showdown with the Lich King.
Wizards is not stopping with Azeroth. The publisher has also confirmed that Star Wars is coming to D&D in 2027, alongside a mature-rated return to Dark Sun.
Would you run Azeroth as a full fifth edition campaign setting, or would you rather borrow its classes and monsters for your own homebrew world?
Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.