Wizards of the Coast is turning D&D: World of Warcraft into a full tabletop sourcebook, the company said, giving Dungeons & Dragons players rules for running campaigns in Blizzard’s Azeroth setting. The book is scheduled to launch on November 17.
The move makes Dungeons & Dragons the next Wizards property to get the Universes Beyond treatment, a crossover strategy the company has already used in Magic: The Gathering. Wizards is calling the D&D version “D&D Universes Beyond,” which is corporate-speak for putting licensed worlds into the rules engine rather than asking players to squint and homebrew it themselves.
A second crossover is also on the docket: Wizards announced a Dungeons & Dragons collaboration with Star Wars. The company said that project will take place during the Rebellion era of the Star Wars timeline and is expected in 2027. Details beyond that are thin, so anyone looking for class lists, playable species, vehicles, or force mechanics will have to wait.
When does D&D: World of Warcraft come out?
Wizards of the Coast says D&D: World of Warcraft will be released on November 17. The book uses the revised fifth edition Player’s Handbook as its base, so it is built for the current D&D rules rather than a separate roleplaying system.
A sourcebook is the kind of D&D book that adds setting material and game rules for players and dungeon masters. In this case, it is meant to translate World of Warcraft’s classes, species, spells, items, and professions into a tabletop format that can run at a kitchen table instead of on Blizzard’s servers.
According to Wizards, the World of Warcraft book includes rules for playing all 13 World of Warcraft classes in D&D. It also adds new spells, magic items, and professions, which should give players the usual menu of buttons to press, only now mediated by dice and a dungeon master who may or may not tolerate raid-boss behavior.
The book also introduces 11 World of Warcraft-themed player species and six subclasses. Wizards named the Oath of the Ebon Blade and Oath of the Holy for paladins, Demon Hunter Ranger, Shadow Domain and Discipline Domain for clerics, and Path of the Elements Barbarian among the additions.
What is D&D Universes Beyond?
D&D Universes Beyond is Wizards of the Coast’s label for bringing outside franchises into Dungeons & Dragons. The name borrows from Magic: The Gathering’s Universes Beyond line, which began in 2021 and has put outside intellectual property into Wizards’ collectible card game.
That strategy has been lucrative for Magic, according to MTG Picker, though it has not been universally loved by the existing player base. Polygon has reported mixed reactions from Magic fans over the broader push into licensed worlds. That tension is not hard to understand: crossovers can bring new players in, while also making long-running fantasy games feel more like shelf space for every franchise with a licensing department.
For Wizards and parent company Hasbro, the business logic is less mysterious. GamesRadar reported that Hasbro was down $56 million while noting that Magic remained one of the company’s stronger franchises. D&D now appears to be getting a version of the same experiment, starting with Azeroth and followed by a galaxy far, far away.
This story draws on original reporting from The Verge.
