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New D&D core rulebooks for 2024 will introduce the ability for players to create and maintain their own bases – giving them a much-needed place to chill out between adventures.
Dungeon & Dragons’ focus on world-building is a massive part of what makes it one of the best tabletop RPGs out there. Whether you’re exploring an established setting or home-brewing your own, having places like shrines, taverns, and stores don’t just serve a practical purpose but also help to make the space feel more real. D&D players aren’t known for caring about strict realism, but having a world that feels full and lived-in adds essential emotional and narrative weight to any adventure.
So, what if you could not only play in a world that feels lived in but create a little section of that world for yourself? Thanks to changes made in the 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide, player characters no longer have to settle for a bedroll in a forest or a rented bed at an inn but can create fully-fledged home bases. Here, they can rest and relax but also develop key skills and resources to help them along their journey.
If this sounds familiar (and not just because it’s the gameplay loop of every survival-crafter game ever), that’s because we first got a glimpse of D&D’s base building back in 2023 as part of an Unearthed Arcana playtest document. In this doc, bases are referred to as ‘Bastions’ and each Bastion can be customized to fit the individual desires of the adventurer who owns it.
From choosing the floor plan to the furniture, players are encouraged to really make their Bastion their own. As well as decking their space out in character-appropriate finery, players can choose to add a number of facilities dictated by their level. This could include a garden to produce food or medicinal herbs, a laboratory for developing potions and poisons, or even a pub for throwing back drinks and picking up gossip from the locals.
I know that what really caught my eye in the playtest document was all of the different events that can bless (or besiege) your beloved Bastion. While you might only directly interact with your base a couple of times during your campaign, your hirelings can keep the cogs turning while you’re gone. During this period, your Bastion could wind up hosting guests (both friendly and not so friendly), sustaining an attack, or receiving a request for aid from the locals. If you do an especially poor job at managing your homestead, it can even fall, leaving it “quickly vacated, eventually looted, and [maybe] even be burned to the ground”.
At the moment, it’s unclear how much of the rules around base building in the new Dungeon Master’s Guide will differ from those in last year’s playtest. However, I’m hoping that the option to have a greenhouse and a stable sticks around so I can live out my Stardew Valley fantasy at the tabletop.
We’ll get to fully experience this and all the new additions to the 2024 D&D core rulebooks when they release later this year. The 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide will hit shelves November 12, but you can pre-order it right now on D&D Beyond.
Wondering which adventure to play through once the new core rulebooks come out? Check the best D&D books for some inspiration (pun totally intended).
If you’re looking for something else to play while you’re waiting, give one of our best board games picks a try. You’ll also want to keep an eye on Prime Day board game deals to score some savings on your tabletop faves.
