D&D 5th edition will live on in Project Black Flag, and The Vineyard leads the way

polygon.com:

Dungeons & Dragons publisher Wizards of the Coast has promised that One D&D, the next iteration of the famous tabletop role-playing game, will be backwards compatible with its 5th edition. Trouble is, some folks just don’t believe it — especially after leaked documents showed that the iconic TTRPG could have gone in a very different direction. That’s why third-party publisher Kobold Press has a backup plan to keep the most popular version of D&D alive, and it’s bringing a sizeable group of freelance artists and writers along for the ride.

Project Black Flag is the codename for Kobold’s effort to “update, streamline, and publish a core fantasy RPG based on” the Systems Reference Document 5.1 — the version of D&D governed by the Open Gaming License (OGL). After fan outcry, Wizards recently transitioned that document to the Creative Commons, effectively placing it outside of its own control. While that change in licensing means the existing system should remain open to act as the basis for new works, there’s no guarantee that core 5th edition rulebooks like the Player’s Handbook and the Dungeon Master’s Guide will remain in print.

Eventually, Kobold Press co-founder Wolfgang Baur says, the existing 5th edition books will go away. Project Black Flag could replace them.

“Somebody who’s in high school, a junior in 2024 wants to pick up the game,” Baur said in a recent interview with Polygon. “Where do they go? Well, they could go to One D&D. And a lot of people will. But for everybody who’s been playing and loving 5th edition for coming on a decade here, why not keep [it] alive by putting the core books out in a beautiful new hardcover? That’s Black Flag in a nutshell.”

While that might sound like a wild idea, Kobold Press has