Deck of Many Issues fails on the unsuitable time for D&D

The Deck of Many Issues is not like something that has come earlier than within the historical past of Dungeons & Dragons — an elaborate boxed set with a number of elements, all centered on bringing a beloved magical merchandise to life. It’s a singular undertaking thrust right into a yawning portal within the seminal role-playing recreation’s launch calendar; the subsequent tackle fifth version isn’t due out till later this yr. Nevertheless it’s the unsuitable product delivered on the unsuitable time, solid off into hostile waters already churned by company controversy that looms over your complete franchise.

It’s a disgrace, as a result of the ultimate product is definitely fairly cool.

On the middle of The Deck of Many Issues is the deck itself, consisting of 66 gilt-edged, tarot-sized playing cards. Absolutely 22 of these playing cards are consultant of highly effective magical spells first launched to the sport approach again in 1975, a lot of which have game- and campaign-breaking results. Pulling a card from the Deck is a surefire method to trigger absolute chaos in nearly any D&D recreation by gaining ranges, dropping ranges, killing characters, or having needs granted by a djinn. Having an exquisite, bodily representations of these world-shaking spells is a delight.

Photograph: Charlie Corridor/Polygon

Collectively a full or perhaps a smaller, extra curated model of the Deck can be utilized to divine issues on the desk — identical to a standard tarot deck. Gamers can get a studying from a personality in-game, after all, however there are additionally methods to make use of the playing cards to plan out encounters, traps, or small adventures. By dealing a easy three-card or a five-card unfold you may add selection to any state of affairs. With a full nine-card unfold you may even create a complete marketing campaign, one which flashes from the DM’s hand on to the desk because of its elegant gilt-edged design. And it’s that gilt edge, it appears, that has prompted this product the majority of its troubles.

Early on within the life cycle of fifth version D&D, the staff at Wizards of the Coast took pleasure in printing all of its books in the US. However the financial realities of publishing at this scale, and little question the wants of its company house owners at Hasbro, led to adjustments in its manufacturing course of. What adopted was a sequence of three-volume, higher-end, slipcase-covered releases that Wizards started printing not less than partially in China — typically with blended outcomes.

On the similar time, Hasbro launched an environmental initiative meant to cut back the corporate’s carbon footprint. Modifications in packaging have been obvious all throughout its many product strains, from plant-fiber ties on motion figures to plastic-free packaging on decks of Magic: The Gathering’s well-liked Commander playing cards. The greening initiative immediately led to the manufacturing points that delayed the discharge of The Deck of Many Issues, whose paper bands have been partially the reason for a late 2023 recall that halted shipments to prospects of merchandise that have been already sitting within the distribution channel.

“That is all for a great trigger,” govt producer Kyle Brink informed Polygon in October. “Clearly, we wish to cut back plastic waste, and so we use paper packaging. We inspected very carefully every part all through the manufacturing course of to verify every part was going effective with that, and but a few of the issues that we’re seeing listed here are particularly due to a few of the paper packaging that we use.”

The revised Deck of Many Issues makes use of plastic to guard every of its three stacks of twenty-two playing cards throughout cargo, and I’m comfortable to report that the playing cards at the moment are all a uniform measurement – simply as they need to have been the primary time round. The result’s a sublime and hefty stack that sits nobly on the desk and flashes brilliantly because it’s dealt out to gamers. Nonetheless, it arrived properly previous its unique launch date.

Alongside that good-looking deck of playing cards is the Card Reference Information, which stays unchanged from the batch delivered to reviewers final fall. The 80-page, chapbook-sized quantity is the instruction ebook. It accommodates every part it’s good to know to make use of the Deck, together with all of the layouts talked about above. Its massive and easy-to-read sections of textual content make for a lucid and nimble presentation of the playing cards on the desk.

Nevertheless, not like different props that Wizards has launched up to now, the Deck itself lacks robust theming. It’s mainly a generic merchandise, and lots of different reviewers have pointed to this as a significant flaw. I, alternatively, contemplate that to be a optimistic function. As a collector of TTRPG props, together with miniatures and terrain, I contemplate the Deck a treasure within the truest sense of the phrase as a result of it’s one thing I can draw from it doesn’t matter what a part of the huge D&D multiverse my gamers occur to be in. If I had wished a thematic tarot deck I’d have gone out and purchased one. As an alternative, The Deck of Many Issues seeds retail cabinets with a strong instrument that may be instantly accessible to gamers at any level of their journey by means of fifth version, and for that the staff at Wizards needs to be praised.

After all, producing a chunk of content material that has mainstream enchantment isn’t the factor that makes The Deck of Many Issues an experiment. It’s the second, bigger ebook that accompanies it, a 192-page quantity titled The Ebook of Many Issues, the place Wizards actually rolled the cube. In comparison with actually every part else within the fifth version catalog, it’s completely chaotic.

The Ebook of Many Issues is split into 22 chapters, one every for the unique Deck of Many Issues. These chapters’ content material falls into 5 totally different classes: a five-chapter toolkit for DMs, a four-chapter assortment of character creation choices, 4 chapters “impressed by astrological phenomena,” 5 chapters detailing potential journey areas, and 4 chapters detailing “new monsters and two folks liable for the deck’s creation.” It’s a laundry checklist that’s simply as exhausting to sort out right here as it’s to wrap one’s head round in the actual world.

Photograph: Charlie Corridor/Polygon

Packed alongside the concise and efficient Deck and its helpful Card Reference Information, The Ebook of Many Issues might have been a impolite assortment of shavings left over from a decade spent paring down tough concepts in pursuit of extra centered merchandise. As an alternative, all of it feels bespoke, tailor-made to the themes of the Deck and supporting them in numerous methods. However the shotgun blast of recent content material is delivered with far much less grace and readability than one thing like Xanathar’s Information to The whole lot or Tasha’s Cauldron of The whole lot.

I like the Deck for what it’s — a sublime prop, and a instrument for uplifting collaborative storytelling on the desk. Its golden profile will probably be a fixture on my shelf for years to return. In the long run, it’s The Ebook of Many Issues that feels most like an pointless glow-up for what’s in any other case a strong product.

Its presence on this product raises the query: Why does The Ebook of Many Issues even exist in any respect? I feel the reply lies in Hasbro’s high-level need to digitize what has historically been a really tactile recreation. You may’t flip a bodily prop right into a microtransaction, however you may promote digital books on D&D Past. For Wizards’ company overlords, plainly the Deck itself — the perfect a part of this package deal — was nearly an afterthought. All of the extra punishing then that it was The Ebook of Many Issues, The Deck of Many Issues’ least likable bit, that arrived first in the course of the now perfunctory two-week digital pre-release window, a window stretched out into months due to an sudden recall.

The Deck of Many Issues and its Card Reference Information are a must-buy, particularly when you like operating brief, action-packed adventures or letting the fates resolve the place your marketing campaign finally goes. Sadly, with a view to have enjoyable with this glorious object, you’ve bought to pay for The Ebook of Many Issues as properly.

The Deck of Many Issues is presently out there for buy on-line and at pleasant native recreation shops for a instructed retail value of $99.99, and as digital content material on D&D Past. The product was reviewed with a pre-release bodily copy offered by the writer. Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These don’t affect editorial content material, although Vox Media could earn commissions for merchandise bought through affiliate hyperlinks. Yow will discover extra details about Polygon’s ethics coverage right here.