Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks recently spoke to investors about the future of Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) and how the success of Magic: The Gathering (MTG) will serve as a blueprint for the next five years. The digital platform D&D Beyond, acquired from Fandom in 2022, will be a key part of the strategy, leveraging “Universes Beyond-style content” and licensed third-party crossovers to drive financial success. This move is aimed at capitalizing on the increasing trend of virtual tabletops and streaming video calls for roleplay. While physical versions of major releases will still be sold, D&D Beyond offers a more lucrative and less material-dependent avenue for profit through crossover licenses. Over the next five years, WotC plans to distribute a more diverse set of content, including user-generated content and major creators’ content. This will likely include crossover material bringing pop culture mainstays such as Marvel, Fortnite, and Final Fantasy into the realm of 5th Edition-compatible stat blocks and encounters. The article notes that while D&D players have long imagined their favorite media stars as tabletop RPG fodder, it is only recently that this has become a profitable exploit, especially as the legal rights to media are owned by a small number of corporations. The details of how Hasbro and WotC will handle adding popular characters to D&D’s rules are not yet known, but it is expected that they will appear alongside official Forgotten Realms adventure campaigns in the digital storefront.
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D&D models its digital future on MTG’s Universes Beyond pop culture crossovers
