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D&D Puts Dark Vader and Dark Sun on the 2027 Slate

issues ttrpg  2026-08-07

Issue #006 · Week of August 07, 2026

This Week’s Verdict

Gen Con wrapped and the announcement cannon is still smoking: Wizards of the Coast wants your 2027 wallet reserved for Dark Vader and dying deserts. Meanwhile the awards circuit did what it does, and an actual working toy store beat out a slate of nominees for the Diana Jones. A good week for lore, a slow week for anyone waiting on actual errata.

Releases & Announcements

The Gen Con haul is the story. Tribality reports that D&D will cross over into Star Wars in 2027, teased at the D&D Vision Keynote 2027 with a Darth Vader shot and the phrase “Season of Rebellion,” which points at the Galactic Civil War era. Details are thin, as they always are this far out. There is also a licensing wrinkle worth noting: EN World confirms Edge Studios has NOT lost the Star Wars license, so two things can apparently be true at once.

The other big reveal is the return of Dark Sun in February 2027, pitched by Wizards of the Coast as the game’s first setting built for mature audiences, with the expected Athas menu of scarcity, sorcerer-kings, and gladiatorial unpleasantness. Joe Manganiello’s Death Saves: The Blood War setting also got new details at the show, per DnDFanatics.

Elsewhere on the product shelf: Azukail Games put out Guns of Sundara for firearms in the Sundara setting, Story Mode Productions released the Greek folk-horror Erebus Mythos for Shadowdark, and thoughtpunks shipped the modern vampire game Vermillion Vespers. EN World’s RPG Print News roundup covers new supplements for Call of Cthulhu, Traveller, Cyberpunk Red, Shadowrun, Rifts, and MCC RPG, among others.

Rules & Errata

Nothing official this week. The closest thing to rules content is homebrew and analysis: a framework and new feat for cultural language in D&D 5.5e from Stephen Collins, and RPGBOT’s podcast breakdown of the remastered 2014 Ranger at levels 1 through 4. Useful, not canonical. The digest notes the absence and moves on.

The Community

Awards season delivered. The 2026 ENnies winners are posted at EN World, with Chaosium’s RuneQuest inducted into the Hall of Fame. Keith Ammann’s Making Enemies (Spy and Owl) took Gold for Best Writing, a fact its author repeated across roughly five posts this week in case you missed it the first four times. The Diana Jones Award went to the Mischief Toy Store, beating a nominee slate that included the late Rob Weiland, an EN World columnist who passed earlier this year. And in the “wins before shipping” file, EN World notes the newly announced D&D Icons line collected an award without having produced anything yet, which is a bold move even by hobby standards.

Gen Con itself grew to 74,000 attendees, holding its spot as the world’s second largest tabletop gaming convention.

On the discourse front, the OSR crowd stayed busy with the Appendix N jam on Bluesky, and JediSoth’s RPGaDay2026 entry about the Ptolus Brotherhood of Redemption doubled as a cautionary tale: a debate over whether monsters are inherently evil ended a real game in an in-character and out-of-character fight. The eternal lesson that alignment arguments are load-bearing. Also worth a nod, Gnome Stew ran an honest confession about being bad at running published adventures after decades of homebrew, which is more relatable than most people admit.

On the Horizon

Crowdfunding is where the near-term action is. Sly Flourish’s Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster Kickstarter is in its final days, with a free preview available. Nerdronomicon’s The Sorcerer’s Conundrum, a DCC RPG adventure zine tied to Goodman Games, is live on BackerKit with early-backer bonuses. Pelgrane Press is running Merryshire Detective Club on BackerKit. ruckerworks put out a free 12-page core-rules preview for Ashes of Isar, a WWII SOE espionage game.

Previews of note: Monte Cook Games’ Cypher Character Rulebook got a live first look on The Gaming Gang Dispatch, and on the collectible side, ICv2 has a preview of the Magic: The Gathering - The Hobbit Play Booster display.

Resources

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