Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft

 Yes, the new D&D book, coming out May 18th, is Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, a campaign setting book for the classic, gothic-horror-themed setting first introduced in 1983, and then formalized into its own setting in 1990.

With Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide, Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica, Eberron: Rising from the Last War, Mythic Odysseys of Theros, and Explorer's Guide to Wildemount, this makes it the 6th Campaign Setting book to come out for 5th Edition D&D (7th if you count Acquisitions Incorporated).

The announced features are as follows:

The core of the book is the setting, which is the Demiplane of Dread, an extraplanar part of the Shadowfell that is composed of several locked in realms, each ruled by a Darklord who is also its primary prisoner. The realms are bounded by the Mists of Ravenloft, which draw in people (aka adventurers) and trap them there. The Darklords are trapped in an endless loop of failure and frustration, which they take out with monstrous acts toward the people in their domains. Van Richten's will detail 30 such realms, including Barovia, the setting for the Curse of Strahd adventure. Each realm takes on a different classic horror vibe. I don't have the names of all of them (which are weirdly hard to find on various wikis, despite many being long-established) but there's one themed around mad science and flesh golems (aka Frankenstein,) there's an Egyptian-themed one with mummies, and several others that have their own takes on classic horror stories.

One of these realms, Falkovnia, has apparently undergone some changes in this edition. Previously ruled by a figure named Vlad Drakov, clearly a take on Vlad Tsepesh, aka Vlad the Impaler, aka the real-life Vlad Dracula, this realm was mostly devoid of the supernatural (apart from its mystical isolation) in which its tyrant waged endless wars that always ended in defeat. Apparently, that realm has fallen to a full-on zombie apocalypse, and will represent more of that vibe in 5th Edition.

With 30 domains, I'm a little skeptical we'll get Wildemount-level detail on all of them, but as someone who likes to do a lot of homebrew even in established settings, I'm happy to get many ideas to work with.

Most exciting for players are new player options.

These include the new "Gothic Lineages," which take the place of your racial characteristics. You could be an elf or a gith or a tiefling, but these lineages give you a new identity. Assuming it's the same as the three released for playtesting in Unearthed Arcana, these three are the Dhampir, Hexblood, and Reborn.

Dhampir are half-vampires - perhaps your mother was turned when you were in the womb (like Blade!) or a vampire tried to turn you but the process was interfered with, or you bargained with a vampire to gain some aspect of their power. Either way, you gain vampiric attributes while still being able to walk in the daylight and potentially retain a good alignment.

Hexblood are connected to Hags. They might have been taken as a child by a coven or might have some curse on their bloodline, or they could have, again, bargained for this. Hexblood have some Hag-like attributes, as well as this weird sort of bone-like crown around their heads.

Reborn are people who died and then were brought back somehow, in some kind of mix between benign resurrection and necromantic undeath. You could play as a walking corpse - maybe you had previously been under the control of a necromancer or lich (WoW's Forsaken would 100% use this lineage to convert a character to D&D) or you were altered by some sort of horrific plague, or a resurrection went wrong. Alternatively, you might be a construct built from the remains of many different people or creatures. While you are a unique individual, the memories of the component people who make up your body might bleed into your consciousness.

Each of these lineages allows you to have two creature types at once - humanoid and other. Dhampir are Humanoid and Undead. Hexblood are Humanoid and Fey. And Reborn are either Humanoid and Undead or Humanoid and Construct. While some spells, especially healing spells, don't work on Constructs or Undead, the rules for these hybrid creature types is that if either part of you is eligible for the spell, it will work - essentially the "humanoid" part of you can be targeted. But it does also, I think, mean that Cure Wounds and Negative Energy Flood will both heal you if you're humanoid/undead.

Moving on!

The next character option is two subclasses. Again, we got these in Unearthed Arcana, which is the College of Spirits Bard and the Undead Patron Warlock.

The College of Spirits essentially has you use some form of fortune telling - typically something like a Tarot deck, though you could also use a "spirit board" (aka a Ouija board) or some other divination tool. This allows you to expend Bardic Inspiration dice to get various different effects you can then use to aid allies or hinder foes, based on the random roll/draw.

The Undead Patron makes your patron something like a powerful lich, a vampire, some ancient spirit, etc. (The Obzedat Ghost Council from Ravnica seems like they'd be a super-cool collective patron.) You get various ways to empower yourself by embracing undeath, and gradually gain the power to make your body merely a vessel for your powerful spirit. This one, I think, has a ton of potential, given that many of Ravenloft's Darklords are undead - you could derive your power from the very villain you are struggling against.

Finally, there's something called "Dark Gifts." We don't have anything very explicit here, but these seem likely to be a little like Supernatural Gifts found in Theros, but with a very clear trade-off of power and downside. (In fact, I think you might be able to get some of these in the Amber Temple in Curse of Strahd.)

For DMs, one of the most exciting things, in my opinion, is that there will be a chapter on how to build your own homebrew domain. I don't know how this guide will be structured, but having some guidance on what elements to include and how to build tension should be very fun to read.

Next: we're talking horror, and what's more central to horror than its monsters? Like any campaign setting book (except SCAG) there's going to be a bestiary - and I'm super excited for a new influx of undead and aberrations and the like. There will also be some guidance (though this could just mean new stat blocks) for horrific takes on existing monsters. As a pre-established example, there are things like Strahd Zombies, where if you cut off a limb, that limb keeps coming after you (a bit like the variant troll rules.)

I don't recall if this was an official example or a hypothetical one, but someone suggested Goblins with xenomorph-like inner jaws that can reach farther and infect the target, transforming them into one of them.

Ravenloft is apparently the first of three classic settings that will be getting 5th Edition releases in 2021. While I imagine at least one of these will be another standard fantasy world, I'm hoping they really push this otherworldly theme (give me 5th Edition Planescape and/or Spelljammer, please.)