Two Cool New TTRPG Things In One Week!
Not only did Wizards of the Coast release the D&D SRD 5.2 this week, but Paizo released the new Tech Playtest for Starfinder Second Edition. What a great week!
We all know we’re kind of in a TTRPG golden era right now. New content for so many games is being released regularly, both from major studios and indie creators. And this week, some awesome new stuff came out for two of my favorite games: D&D and Starfinder.
1. The New D&D 5e SRD Is Out!
The SRD (standard reference document) is a free version of the Dungeons & Dragons rules that you can use to make your own content. After the OGL debacle of 2023, WotC published it under a Creative Commons license (CC-BY-4.0), which means you can do whatever you want with it—including copy/pasting it to make your own game off it as a framework.
Most of the time, however, creators like me use it to create adventures and have ready-made assets ready to go. You get classes, subclasses, monsters, etc. It’s what all of the Kobold Press was based on before Tales of the Valiant was released, as well as every third-party Patreon creator you may support, and so on.
The only people who weren’t strictly held to the SRD were DMsGuild creators like me because that’s a different license altogether.
What does the new SRD Mean?
In a nutshell, there are going to be a lot more third-party titles out there using the 2024 rules because, until this release, none of us were allowed to use them if we made something that wasn’t on DMsGuild.
With the release of the new SRD, that ruleset has opened up, along with additional work on the classes and subclasses that we can use. I haven’t had a chance to read all the way through it myself, but I can’t wait to see what’s changed and added to it. I’m a little worried about what might have been removed, which would make you have to pick-and-choose between the 2014 SRD and the new one…but that’s a post for another day.
2. Starfinder 2e Tech Playtest Is Public!
Now this is what I’m really excited about. We’ve been playing Starfinder weekly for a while now, and the second edition is great. One of the biggest omissions in the playtest so far is the lack of tech classes and spaceships.
For a sci-fi game, that’s odd. But there’s a reason: there’s going to be a whole book on tech coming out this summer, and the tech classes and all that stuff are going to be included in it.
As of now, we can test out the Mechanic class (think Artificer but much cooler and much much much more powerful), and the Technomancer (think of that one person one who tells “Hack the Planet!” when they roll initiative, but then they can literally do it.)
One of the guys at my table is playing a Mechanic now, swapping over from Solarian. The class is awesome, and I can’t wait to see more of it. It definitely dominated the battlefield on Tuesday, and I can’t wait to see what else comes from it.
As I get to play with more of the tech playtest goodies, I’ll be sure to let y’all know how it goes?
That’s all for me, friendos. Have you tried the tech playtest for Starfinder 2e yet? Or checked out the new SRD? Let’s hear your thoughts!