Next month (something I'm very excited for,) will see the release of Eberron: Rising from the Last War, the official Fifth Edition D&D sourcebook for the Eberron setting. Introduced in (I believe) 3rd Edition in the early 2000s, Eberron is one of the most popular settings, with its pulp/noir tone and modern-but-magical feel. Plus, Warforged, which is only one of four playable races introduced with the setting but by far the most iconic of them.
Fifth Edition has been out for five years, and while certain adventures have been dips of the toe into other settings - Curse of Strahd being the quintessential Ravenloft adventure and Descent into Avernus starting to get us out into the Outer Planes of Planescape - the only other official setting sourcebook is Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica, taking the 14-year-old Magic the Gathering setting and fleshing it out as a D&D one (which yes, is a very "corporate synergy" kind of move, but damn if I don't freaking love Ravnica and its crazy guilds.)
Admittedly, we also got Ghosts of Saltmarsh, which is a series of adventures set in the world of Greyhawk, but I'd hardly say it's a sourcebook, just as I wouldn't say that Curse of Strahd is a full-on Ravenloft sourcebook.
So let's go down the list: what settings do I, the writer of this blog and not a veteran of decades of D&D, know about, and which seem likely candidates for a new sourcebook?
Greyhawk: While this is a classic one - Gary Gygax's own setting - my understanding is that it's still the same medieval fantasy style as the Forgotten Realms, just with a perhaps more cynical tone. While history and maps would be useful, I doubt there's much more to be added in the way of monsters or class options.
Dragonlance: See above, though my understanding is that Dragonlance is a little more on the idealism side rather than the cynicism side. I could be wrong, but again, I think this is one of those settings that's mostly covered by existing stuff.
Dark Sun: Here we go: Dark Sun's Dune-like dystopia would, I think, feel very different than other settings. On top of that, you've got the heavy presence of psionics, which would be a great opportunity to introduce a psionic-based class (though if it's the Mystic, please seriously go back to the drawing board because that thing was utterly insane.)
Planescape: While we've already gotten a little detail on the Outer Planes, there's very little in 5E about the Outlands (the True Neutral plane) and we could certainly see places that aren't the Nine Hells or the Abyss fleshed out a bit with new creatures and people. I love the weirdness of Planescape, though, and the way in which the whole medieval aesthetic kind of flies out the window.
Spelljammer: Again, this is one of my top picks. D&D Star Trek based on medieval notions about how space works? Awesome. Like Planescape, this would be an opportunity to do something radically different from what one usually gets in D&D, and I think players would love it.
Ravenloft: Curse of Strahd remains one of their most popular 5E published adventures (and one I'm hopefully going to start playing next week!) but having a larger sourcebook to help DMs build their own Ravenloft campaigns would be really cool. I think the existence of CoS might put this one on the back burner, but I imagine this would be a popular choice as well.
Something Totally New: 5E has brought more people into D&D than ever before (myself included,) and so perhaps revisiting all these classics is the right move. We did effectively get a new D&D setting with Ravnica, but it would be cool if someone came up with a radically different setting to introduce. Off the top of my head, perhaps something that is to the Feywild like Ravenloft is to the Shadowfell - maybe leaning hard into surrealism and a kind of Alice in Wonderland/Myst aesthetic.
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