A video recorded at New York Toy Fair has revealed more details about Dungeons and Dragons upcoming starter set, and it looks to be a simplified, board-game-inspired version of the full RPG. Posted by YouTuber Otakus & Geeks on March 2, the video shows off maps, class boards, monster cards, and DM booklets – just a few of the “hundreds of components” that the demonstrator claims will be inside the boxed set.
D&D starter sets are designed to be a new player’s first foray into the world of tabletop RPGs, so they tend to streamline the full rules for easy onboarding. Heroes of the Borderlands is no exception here.
Instead of character sheets, players use a board representing one of the DnD classes. They’ll add cards to this board to represent their DnD races and DnD 2024 backgrounds, as well as any gear they pick up.
The demonstrator (called Justin, according to the YouTube video description) says that the math has been made much simpler in the starter set, too. Clear calculations with only a handful of steps are printed on cards and boards, so players never need to think too hard about attack or damage rolls. Pointing to the class board, Justin says “we have it all laid out here so we don’t have to do that pesky math that no one likes”.
Things are reportedly easier for DMs, too. Three small booklets, with around 10 pages or so of content, guide the Dungeon Master through the DnD campaign’s three different areas. It seems that the main areas all come with pre-made DnD maps, and monsters have clear cards in a style similar to the players’ equipment cards. According to the video, there are at least 40 hours of content to play through.
Naturally, this is an early prototype of the new starter set, and some content may be subject to change. We can even see ‘TEXT NOT FINAL’ reminders in the DM books being flipped through. The DnD release schedule says Heroes of the Borderlands isn’t due to release until September, so there’s plenty of time for further tweaks to be made.
If you’d like to see more of the new starter set, here’s the teaser trailer recently released by Wizards of the Coast. Be sure to follow Wargamer on Google News for future Dungeons and Dragons updates, too.