Before I get going, a bit of a rant.

If you’re new to this series here on my blog, I’m talking about Amalgam Dungeons & Dragons. Nothing advanced here, except for the older editions from which some things are derived. Every edition has something to contribute, and this is not an attempt to rekindle any Edition Wars of Internet infamy. My thought exercise with Amalgam D&D is to try to bring together the best from all editions. (It’s just my opinion, y’all.)

Please indulge a short rant here. I think a lot of us OGs tend to react similarly when we see the announcement a new edition of one of our favorite games.We knew this was coming. It was inevitable. 

I'm trying to remain positive about the upcoming changes to the mother of all RPGs. The biggest company in the industry is once again doing a makeover to one of its flagship products to bring in more revenue. I can respect that.

While I get somewhat annoyed at Wizards of the Coast at times, they are doing very well with what they do. We still have an OSR movement for a reason. I seriously doubt that's going away. We "Old Grognards" will still have our old books and reprints with plenty of fun to be had for years to come.

As far as One D&D goes, maybe it will turn out to be pretty cool. Right now it's not worth getting too worked up over. Let's check out the playtest material and see what changes are implemented in the final draft.Anyone "reviewing" it now is just doing Public Relations for WotC. Once the dust settles, then maybe form a lasting opinion.

This will be the last article in this series as Wizards of the Coast has announced the next incarnation of D&D called, “One D&D.” Supposedly their designers don’t see different editions, even though everything before 3rd Ed seems to disappear into a vault unless they think they can make a quick buck on it.

They’re allegedly keeping 5E fully compatible, but then why is this new edition coming exactly? Wasn’t 5E supposed to be the amalgam of prior editions and retrocompatible? Supposedly they listened to the fans, but I think they really only listen to the ones who say what the writers already wanted to hear. (Okay, getting off my soapbox now before I go full vent mode.)

We haven’t discussed one of my favorite topics yet.

Magic Items! Honestly, I think I invented more items I was happy with in Basic and Fourth Ed than anything else. 4E had a well defined action economy, making artifacts easy to pace in terms of recharge times and abilities. Basic was where I started and it has a pretty wide open stage for cool items.

I’d also throw in tidbits of other books. I mean, +6 Holy Avenger. Am I right?

I would love for WotC to do another official series like the Encyclopedia Magica (but they won’t.) For those unfamiliar, it catalogued nearly every official item T$R ever printed through AD&D 2E. I still go through that set of books looking at all the items.

I can create a new magic item any time I’d like. I think the magic item section in the Dungeon Master’s Guide should have an in-depth step-by-step item creation process to determine cost and possibly components for creating powerful artifacts.

I guess we’ll have to wait and see how it goes. I’m not sure what to think of this new official edition coming up. I think I’ll be more excited when it rolls out in 2024. Like prior new editions, I think there will be an adjustment phase. In the meantime, there’s plenty of OSR action to be had.

Thanks for stopping by. Short of squishing some players together into some kind of weird amalgam, I’m not sure what I forgot to cover. I appreciate you. Game on!