These are the TTRPGs we’re looking forward to in 2024 (and none of them are D&D)

Last year, the biggest story in tabletop RPGs was Wizards of the Coast’s proposed changes to the Open Gaming License, in which they planned to revoke a long-standing license allowing people to make their own Dungeons and Dragons content. This license had fostered an entire cottage industry of third party developers making content for D&D, building on the game and bringing in new players at no expense to Wizards itself. In the end, Wizards completely abandoned this idea, and the PR backlash pushed the company to make the current D&D rules available via Creative Commons license and leave the OGL intact.

But the damage to Wizards of the Coast in terms of lost trust is still felt keenly a year later — but that could be good for gamers, too. Because today we have a variety of games on the drawing board that will eschew D&D and its license entirely, either using their own mechanics and licenses or using the Creative Commons D&D rules, which Wizards cannot revoke, as a jumping off point for

Indeed, 2024 feels like the year when the shockwaves caused by Wizards of the Coast’s ill-advised OGL debacle settle into actual changes in the tabletop RPG sphere. Let’s take a look at some of the most interesting TTRPGs coming out this year.

Starfinder 2e playtesting, Pathfinder 2e Remaster

If you’re a Pathfinder player, especially if you play the second edition of the game, you may be excited to learn that Starfinder is getting a similar revamp with an upcoming Starfinder second edition, and it’s already got some playtest materials to look over.

Unlike Wizards of the Coast’s recent playtesting for its 50th anniversary edition, the Starfinder Field Test isn’t actively soliciting comment with a player feedback form because it’s intended more as a preview of what’s coming — but of course you can hit the Paizo forums to share your opinions. This version of Starfinder will have its full playtest in August of this year, which fits in well with the ongoing Pathfinder 2e Core Remaster — the Pathfinder 2e Player Core and DM Core books are out, with Monster Core and Player Core 2 coming out this summer.

But where Pathfinder is just releasing updated 2e rulebooks that are compatible with current Pathfinder 2e content,   Starfinder 2e is a completely new edition. Starfinder’s first edition came out nearly a decade ago, and it makes sense to revise it now while Paizo is making changes to bring its books into line with its new Open RPG Creative License (ORC). Paizo will bring  improvements and refinements from Pathfinder 2e, such as Ancestries replacing Species. You can check out the Starfinder Field Tests Paizo has run so far if you’re interested in seeing the direction the actual playtest will take once it’s here in August.

Upcoming TTRPGs to watch (or snap up like a greedy Mimic)

There are always a lot of things on the horizon, and here are just a few new games I’m excited for in 2024:

• Shadowrun Missions Gamemaster’s Guide: Free to download Shadowrun book that’s intended for the Shadowrun Missions campaign, but is very useful for anyone looking to run a Shadowrun campaign. Plus it’s free, which I already mentioned but a free book in this expensive hobby is always good.
• LUMEN RPG system: This is the year for LUMEN, guys, I can feel it. It’s a game with an absolutely easy to learn system and its own SRD. It’s a game system that can take any video game you’ve ever played and translate it into an exciting tabletop RPG, –and one with an expanding roster of games making use of it.
• Pendragon 6th Edition: Greg Stafford was a legend in RPG game design, though sadly he passed away in 2018. The original Pendragon, a fantasy RPG set in mythical Arthurian Britain, was his  brainchild and he had been working on a 6th edition of the game before his death, and now Chaosium is finally releasing his work (and the work of many others) into the wild. You can already pick up the Pendragon Starter Set if you’re interested in seeing how Pendragon differs from other fantasy RPGs.
• Eat The Reich: I don’t know when this game will be out, but it’s a game where you play vampire commandos who want to eat all of the Nazis up to and including Hitler, so yeah, here it is. You know you want this.
• Mythic Bastionland: This is a fast-paced, rules-light prequel game based in the same universe as Chris McDowall’s other games like Into The Odd. It’s an easy to play fantasy world with its own unique idiosyncratic vision and I’m very excited for it.
• Diablo the Roleplaying Game: This game still doesn’t have a release date, but I’m still salivating at the thought of it. (Not literally.)

But this only scratches the surface of this year’s games. If there’s a game you’d like us to talk about that isn’t mentioned above, please let us know — we’re keen to be as inclusive as possible and really feature games that might not otherwise get the attention they deserve. We love all sorts of games here — we’re not throwing away D&D, we all love playing and talking about that too — but it’s a big hobby, and it has the potential to be even bigger.