- [Interviewer] You had a very successful
crossover with "Magic: The Gathering" and
D&D with "Ravnica," which was a really great
book.
- Thank you.
- [Interviewer] You have a new book coming
out.
- Yeah.
- [Interviewer] Tell me about this book, what
is it?
- "Mythic Odysseys Of Theros" is our new book,
bringing the world of Theros to D&D.
So it's awesome because Theros is Magic's
sort of re-imagining of Greek mythology in
a fantasy setting.
So this book is simultaneously an introduction
to the world of Theros and also sort of an
example of how you can take mythological themes
and concepts and work them into a D&D game
through a unique lens.
- [Interviewer] And with Theros the gods are
very much involved, correct?
- Very much, you can see them walking across
the night sky.
So the gods play a pretty big role in the
book, as you might expect.
It's sort of built around questions of piety
and quests for the gods and being a champion
or an opponent of the gods.
The gods have a lot of space dedicated to
them in this book.
- [Interviewer] And what sort of things will
we be seeing?
Will we be seeing new creatures, new subclasses,
things that are related to "Magic: The Gathering"
that are now being moved into the D&D space?
- [James] Yep, all those things.
- [Interviewer] All of those things?
- Yeah, so there's the structure of the book
is almost exactly like the "Ravnica" book.
The last chapter is a bestiary full of monsters
drawn from Magic cards.
We literally do go through every Theros card
printed and look for things.
And the beauty is with Theros, both the Magic
set and D&D through its history have been
drawing on the same source material, so there's
a lot of overlap in creatures.
But there's a section of the bestiary that
talks about here's what Hydros are like in
Theros, you know, they're familiar monsters
in the Monster Manual, but they have their
own unique spin or lore elements attached
to them in Theros that add to their place
in this world.
- [Interviewer] What is the world of Theros?
Can you give me a big overview of what this
world is in "Magic: The Gathering" and now
also in D&D?
How is it different than say "Ravnica?"
- So, Theros is fundamentally Magic's take
on Greek mythology.
It centers around a Pantheon of 15 gods and
their meddling in human affairs.
- [Interviewer] And the adventure kinda takes
you on that kind of like, I expect the adventure
within it.
Are there adventures in it?
- There is a short starter adventure the same
as we did for "Ravnica," and everyone for
that matter, and then a chapter full of adventure
hooks.
I love those tables.
I could kinda make those tables all day.
In fact I did make those tables all day for
weeks on end.
- [Interviewer] What's your favorite thing
about the book?
- There is an omens table.
- [Interviewer] Ooh.
- It is a D100 table with a 100 omens on it,
but they're also broken down by god.
So, you can either roll a D100 and get just
random omen, or you can pick a god and roll
either a D six or a D eight to get an omen
associated with that god.
It's total geeky table nerding.
- [Interviewer] How do those omens work?
- They are purely flavor.
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
- A leaf blows across your path across the
wind.
Nylea's trying to tell you something.
It's meant for inspiration for the DM, but
you can also like, when you're making a character
roll on the omens table and see what omen
appeared when you were born and play with
that idea.
- [Interviewer] So are, where "Ravnica" has
factions, the gods that you associate with
are very much your faction I'm assuming?
- The gods fill a very similar role in terms
of the structure of the book and potentially
in terms of a characters involvement, you
can decide to be a champion of one of the
gods.
You can also not.
Theros in magic terms, our classic marketing
line was "Gods, Heroes, Monsters."
The tension among those three forces in the
world is key.
So, you might be a champion of a god, but
in Theros fiction in the past that hasn't
necessarily worked out well for the champions.
Elspeth, the Planeswalker character in Theros
block was the Sun's Champion, but Helia the
Sun god ended up killing her at the end of
that story.
Because he was jealous of her power and her
knowledge of other planes of existence.
So, it is a interesting relationship between
mortals and god, not necessarily clear cut.
- [Interviewer] What was it like porting over
Theros which, Theros came out, the most recent
expansion for Theros came out couple of months
ago.
- [James] Right.
- [Interviewer] What was it like porting that
over into the D&D world?
- Both Theros and D&D owe a lot to Greek myth
already.
That made the transition very smooth.
Fundamentally the challenge of working on
a book like this or "Ravnica" is, translating
magic world design into D&D world design,
because they are sometimes surprisingly different
beasts.
There was no map of Theros.
I had to go and comb through the fiction for
geographical references and make sure that
I could come up with a map that was coherent
and not contradicting too much of what we
had said before.
Details of culture and society and commerce
and calendar, and the sorts of things that
D&D player care about and Magic really never
has to worry about, unless it's put into fiction
some place.
So, that sort of thing was the biggest, sort
of, conceptual task, but, a significant page
count of the book devoted to the gods is just
flushing out information that we've already
said, devising new myths about the gods, making
up holidays for them.
- [Interviewer] What unique does this bring
to the D&D multi-verse?
- I think for me the most distinctive thing
about it is sort of, showing by doing.
How you take real world mythology and flesh
it out into a fantasy setting.
It's hard sometimes to make the jump between
okay, I've got gods, now what?
In world building, and Theros really is the
whole world built around that.
- [Interviewer] It's an interesting concept
because Greek and Roman mythology is so, whom
the gods are so very hands on, and I can't
think of another D&D setting where that's
true.
Certainly Dragonlance to a little bit degree,
you know, destroying half the world, and,
you know, Fizban wander around and Astinus
supposedly being a god at the same time.
- Right.
- [Interviewer] But with Theros they might
be at the bar.
Right.
- They're a little more elevated than that.
They're very present and very hands on, but
not very human.
- [Interviewer] This has to be a very strange
thing for clerics, right?
- Probably, yeah.
- [Interviewer] When the gods are that present
in Theros, being a cleric in D&D must be kind
of a different game to some degree when it
comes to role playing.
- I think so, for sure.
There is a notion in Theros that not every
mortal can or does regularly communicate with
the gods, the role of the Oracle in Theros
as in ancient Greece is really important.
The flip side I guess is that there are solid
options to make gods super important for any
character, not just clerics.
Blowing out the piety system that's in the
Dungeon Master's Guide and expanding on that.
To make your faith matter, as you're a champion
of any god or just a devoted servant of any
god, very much.
- [Interviewer] So Theros, if you have a hankering
for Greek mythology, and you want some Magic:
The Gathering in your Dungeons and Dragons,
this is the campaign setting for you.
- [Voice Over] The digital version on D&D
Beyond is still launching on June 2nd.
And remember the first 20 fans who pre-order
the hardcover at a Wizards Play Network store
will receive a 50% off code for the digital
version on D&D Beyond.
