A new online petition for Hasbro WotC

[oomalex]

Hi everyone, I’d like to share that a few days ago I launched a petition on Change.org asking Hasbro and WotC to bring back the Birthright setting.
I’ve received a lot of negative feedback, some of which I actually agree with.
But the main issue isn’t whether AD&D or 5th Edition is better — it’s about whether we want to see a wonderful setting survive or disappear. A setting that, sadly, cannot rely on fan support alone.
Below you’ll find the details of the petition.

Good morning everyone,
I’m replying to your comments with quite some delay — unfortunately, work and family commitments over the past few days didn’t allow me to answer sooner, or as thoughtfully as I would have liked.

I fully agree with all of you: I also prefer AD&D over the current edition. In fact, tonight I’ll be running the first session of a new campaign I’m DMing, set in Muden, and I’ll rely on my old party because, at almost 53, I find it hard to digest a new rule system that I simply don’t enjoy.

So, why this petition?
Because, truth be told, Birthright is a dead setting. It’s gone. Showing some renewed interest might push the publisher to bring it back to life — to give us new material, new stories, new artwork. That’s the only reason behind this.

Personally, as I mentioned, my group (we’ve been playing together since the Red Box days!) has fully moved on to 5E, and they’re not likely to return to 2.5.

But the question I keep asking myself — and you — is this:
do we really want the Forgotten Realms and other settings to keep thriving, while Aebrynis fades into oblivion?

https://c.org/BsQpwMZKkH

[Sorontar]

I commend you for your objective, but I ask anyone who wants to support this to consider various things that were discussed in the Discord and here previously. There are a number of issues if WOTC/Hasbro were to revive and update Birthright for any future version of D&D.

1. Birthright does not fit into the other D&D campaign settings or the current powerplay rules.
   E.g., low-level magic, few magical items, little planar travel, separate deities, Shadow World is not Feywild and or Shadowfell, blooded PCs and NPCs being the "heroes", not all species or classes being available for PCs, humanoid races having new histories/origin stories and stats.
2. At the realm level, Birthright is largely system independent
   The br.net community has proven this by playing the realm level for various systems. The main system-based changes would need to be how the PCs/NPCs and the blood abilitiies/scores get managed.
3. A lot has been added on Birthright.net for which the community is co-copyright holder according to my understanding of the original agreement.
   This includes realm descriptions, NPCs and rule fixes.
4. The 3/3.5e committee chose to change the D&D system for Birthright, not Birthright for the D&D system.
   The fear is that a new WOTC/Hasbro version of Birthright would not be Birthright, because it would just be an attempt to fit Birthright in with all of the other worlds/settings for the current D&D version.
5. WOTC have previously said no.
   Arjan at various stages asked them.

Sorontar

[oomalex]

I commend you for your objective, but I ask anyone who wants to support this to consider various things that were discussed in the Discord and here previously. There are a number of issues if WOTC/Hasbro were to revive and update Birthright for any future version of D&D.

[....
Arjan at various stages asked them.[/LIST]

Sorontar

Thank you, Sorontar, for your thorough and thoughtful reply.
I don’t use Discord (which is surely a limitation on my part), but I must say that I don’t fully agree with all the points you raised.

I don’t want to go too deep into the difficulties you mentioned — many of which I personally haven’t found to be so limiting. In fact, over the years I’ve adapted several adventures from other settings into Birthright, and even started (though never completed, due to players’ commitments) a campaign set in the Five Peaks, featuring Orog and goblin themes.

What I’m really asking for — as someone who always plays in the Birthright setting, even when running “normal” D&D campaigns without realm management — is simply that this world doesn’t fall into oblivion.

I would like to see new, official material being produced, keeping the setting alive.

If we can show a strong number of supporters through this petition, perhaps someone at an editorial level might take the initiative to publish at least a modern game system for realm management.