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News Roundup: D&D to Take Over GenCon 2026
The popular TTRPG is expected to have a whole 'tower' of experiences as well as a lengthy schedule of actual plays, discussions and more at the biggest tabletop convention in the US.
Christopher Hutton
July 12, 2026 • Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes
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Howdy Howdy! I hope you all had a lovely week. Lot of news in today’s issue. First up, we have a lot of details about D&D’s presence at GenCon, a significant step up with regard to content. WE also have some minor updates in the TTRPG space, an opportunity to vote for Ennies, the unveiling of RPG Party’s squad and a lot more today!
In This Edition
Dungeons and Dragons Build a Tower at GenCon, Unveil the Future of the Game
Dungeons & Dragons is making a major comeback at Gen Con 2026 with its own separate facility and events.
Wizards of the Coast has taken over the Indiana Repertory Theater and Indiana Rooftop Ballroom to create the D&D Tower, a six-floor building containing adventures and content. The space was previously used by WOTC for press events.
The event will feature a variety of activities to preview upcoming D&D elements and Hasbro’s plans for D&D as a whole.
The standout event will be the D&D Vision Keynote 2027, an event where head of franchise Dan AYoub will appear alongside Theo Solomon to provide “first looks, special guests”, surprises and more. It’s the first chance to “see the future of Dungeons and Dragons before the world hears."
It seems likely that this launch will further expand on the Seasons model, including previews of the upcoming Arcana Unleashed series of supplements and a third unnamed supplement scheduled for release in Q4 2026 during the “Season of Heroes.”
The event will also feature multiple live actual plays, including a session of Dungeon Masters on Saturday and the third edition of Anjali Bhimani’s Puppy Roll and Twenty-Sided Tavern. There will also be APs related to other growing properties, such as the VTM/D&D crossover, Beadle and Grimm’s Faster Purple Worm, Luke Gygax’s Greyhawk and more.
Wizards of the Coast
There are also several talks from D&D-adjacent writers and celebrities. These include:
Join Matt Mercer and Jasmine Bhullar on the craft of Dungeon Mastering
Luke Gygax and D&D Game Director Justice Arman on “how to make the world your own with design and influence from the source material”
Baldur’s Gate 3/Dungeon Masters’ Devora Wilde and Neil Newbon as they discuss The Hero’s Journey
Laura Hickman, Tracy Hickman, and R.A. Salvatore on Snoring on the Shoulders of Giants: The Future of Fantasy
Anjali Bhimani and Ginny Di on “keys to storytelling”
Mayanna Berrin and Jim Zub on character backstory
How to make your turn matter with Christian Navarro and Theo Solomon
D&D's principal game designers, Wes Schneider and James Wyatt, on how to choose or build a campaign setting
Discover How to Be a D&D Game Designer with members of the D&D Game Design Team: Makenzie De Armas, Justice Arman and Wesley Schneider
Details and tickets can be found on their website. It appears to be a separate affair from the GenCon operation as a whole, so the system there may not work as well.
While D&D has remained a constant presence at GenCon, this is arguably the company's biggest initiative in many years. Past appearances included panels, press events, and more, but a diminished overall conference presence.
It appears that WOTC and D&D want to make a very big impression for 5.5e through the Tower. Whether it will be a regular event is to be determined.
Arcana Unleashed:Bigger Spells, and Players vs. Red Wizards of Thay
Wizards of the Coast
Speaking of what’s next for D&D, the next big release will be Arcana Unleashed, a high-magic faction that will add tools for exploring the setting’s magical elements in new ways. This will start with the main book, as well as Deadfall, a level 11-20 campaign where players will face off against the Red Wizards of Thay from the Forgotten Realms and possibly go toe-to-toe with their lord and lich, Szass Tam on his home turf.
The book will hold 8 new subclasses, plenty of new spells, feats, and backgrounds, and more tools for DMs to create variety in the setting.
The book is available for preorder and is expected to be released to the public on September 15.
Other Stories from This Week
Savage Worlds publisher Pinnacle Entertainment Group (PEG for short) has appointed former VP Simon Lucas as its chief operating officer. He will fill the role formerly held by Jodi Black before she passed away due to health complications in 2025.
A short segment of the upcoming War Wizard novel in the Dragonlance series was previewed in Polygon.
A new list of third-party D&D fan books is out.
Daggerheart is testing out a summoner class. It won’t be out in Hope & Fear but it does imply continued experimentation for future properties.
Popular TTRPG reviewer Dave Thaumavore argues that the Mork Borg brand has become a liability after a Korea-flavored hack changed its name.
ElfQuest, Chaosium’s fantasy game based on the popular graphic novels, is officially out.
Talagaard Adventures, Cubicle 7’s first anthology for the Warhammer: The Old World RPG, is expected to hit retailers in 2027. It’s available online in PDF format for those interested.
Goodman Games unveiled The Book of Funnels, its new anthology of adventures that help players to choose what characters they play by starting with 4 level 0s and then seeing who survives.
Bloodborne fans can now use the Steinhardt’s Guide to the Eldritch Hunt ruleset in their D&D Beyond accounts.
The Daggerheart series Age of Umbra: Sallowlands premiered earlier this week.
Chaosium Updates Quickstart After AI Detected
The Call of Cthulhu publisher announced on June 6 that it had to update the Time without Tide quickstart after discovering that Adobe, the software company who produced the tools it used for publishing, “quietly inserted” AI-generated descriptions of the images. The descriptions were both inaccurate and not approved.
That led the company to re-release the product.
It’s not the first time TTRPG publishers have had to deal with these sorts of issues. Evil Hat, the publisher of Fate and other TTRPGs, had to update the PDF for its latest release, Umdaar, in June after Adobe injected AI-generated text into the product.
Adobe has embraced a lot of AI in its product design tools. Most notably, it released Firefly, its own generative AI tool that has created gen-AI images in its repositories and trained on them. It has led to some pushback from creatives and designers.
It is likely that we’ll see other TTRPG publishers facing similar issues going forward, particularly as prominent publishing tools embrace AI at an accelerated pace. We merely hope that creators will decide to be public about these problems, rather than fix them quietly.
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If you want to offer your own two cents on tabletop gaming, the Ennies has opened up voting to the public. Fans can participate and offer their input on the top five recipients. The organization asks that you vote only once and not cheat the system. It’s also an opportunity to vote for next year’s judges. The award show has received pushback because its judges in 2026 (and previous years) were predominantly white and male, which has led to several female and POC candidates attempting to step up. We will see if they receive enough nominations to appear next year.
Gamefound’s RPG Party 2026 Unveils its Final Selection of Candidates
RPG Party, the crowdfunding platform Gamefound’s special initiative to help indie game creators launch projects, announced its final picks this week. 23 candidates were selected. They feature solo fantasy games, Daggerheart frameworks, haunted investigations and more. It’s unclear when they will launch the products, although we expect it to occur closer to end of Q3 or even Q4 2026 so designers have the time they need to prepare.
You can see the final selection below.
Q&A with Queercraft About Serving LGBTQ Gaming Needs
Queercraft
Gaming comes in all formats, and it is as much a source of joy as it is a source of identity expression. Gamers want to express who they are at the table, regardless of whether it is a board game, TTRPG, or more.
That’s the pitch behind Queercraft, a tabletop gaming studio from New Jersey. They claim to make products for the LGBT community that reflect their interests, from dice vaults to meeples, through design approaches that reflect the community’s cultural interests. The company primarily serves board gaming needs, though some of its products also overlap with TTRPG interests.
We spoke with one of the owners, Ronald Taylor, about the company's story and what inspired them to start the business.
What’s the origin story of QueerCraft?
Taylor: It came from a series of events that I think all three of us as co-founders — myself, my husband Zhao, and our close friend Tim — experienced: some sort of trauma or disillusionment with corporate America, where we all had worked and where Tim and Zhao still do.
For me in particular, the catalyst to get into this more seriously was being fired from what was, at the time, a dream job — fired for disclosing that I had depression and anxiety
So at that time, we were all looking for a way to make something for ourselves — something we believed in. That’s where we eventually arrived at the idea of QueerCraft. It was born out of necessity, honestly, but also out of a strong shared love of gaming. All of us, even from our youth, remember gaming and game time with family as a good escape from the life around us — school, and sometimes the hardships we faced growing up as gay kids in areas that maybe weren’t as open to it. Spending time playing games, whether video or board, was a really common way for kids like us to just take a breath.
What does it mean to serve the LGBT-focused market?
I think there were two really clear reasons, and we all felt strongly about them. One was very personal. By the time I reached the age I am now, in my early 40s, I was sick and tired of the assumption that everything is heteronormative. Sick and tired of everything — from TV commercials to sitcoms to the music you listen to — where 99% of it is assumed to be heteronormative, or is clearly declared as such. This was one opportunity for us to push through that and give queer visibility the support it really needs.
On the other side, it was strategic. We’ve done a lot of our own research, and there really is no one doing anything close to what we’re doing right now. When you look out there for handmade, high-quality items targeting not just a queer audience but actually designed in ways that express queerness — through the coloring, the sayings we add, the engravings — it’s very clear that we have a point of view, and I don’t see any other companies doing that right now. Certainly not for the queer gaming community.
How would you describe the board gaming and TTRPG community’s relationship with the LGBTQ community?
At face value, if you go into most community game cafés — which are becoming quite popular in metro cities, and even here in Hoboken and Jersey City there are several — the vast majority of the ones we’ve walked into, or connected with online through Instagram and reached out to, embrace the LGBTQ community wholeheartedly. They have queer nights that specifically celebrate the queer community, including drag nights and similar events.
And it’s not just casual observation as you walk around cafés or sit in them — the data backs it up. GLAAD’s 2024 Gaming Report found that 17% of active gamers identify as LGBTQ+, roughly double the share of the general adult population — and the figure is even higher among younger players. But it really is just about looking around and seeing the diversity of players at the table. It kind of makes sense: being part of a TTRPG community is a place where you can feel like you belong. A lot of the LGBTQ community can come from a family or history of not being part of anything familial or comforting, and of really struggling. So being able to sit down at a table with people who don’t care at all about who they’re sitting with — as long as they’re fun, engaging, creative players — is a place to feel more comfortable and relaxed.
On the flip side — I haven’t seen it myself, but the owner of one of the queer-focused gaming cafés we do business with in Bayonne mentioned that some gaming cafés and stores she’s been to in New York and other cities are still pretty much male- and heteronormative-dominated. She’s heard gay slurs screamed out when somebody loses or people calling someone a term that wouldn’t be considered acceptable by today’s standards. So there are these pockets of testosterone still in the community.
That’s all for this week! Feel free to send us tips or emails at [email protected].