DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: SPELLJAMMER

Time to brush up on your fantasy astrophysics as we hop into a space galleon to discover what’s out there amongst the spheres

Words by Christopher John Eggett

In amatter of weeks, a new version of Spelljammer will be landing on UK players tables – reviving the setting and campaign for Fifth Edition adventurers. We chatted to Wizards of the Coast about the upcoming boxset of books – and what they have in store for us.

BEYOND THE STARS

Dungeons & Dragons in space. That’s the pitch. Leave the world of relatively mundane fantasy and leap into the stars. Jump on a big space boat (the titular spelljammers) and go and enjoy a life of piracy amongst the spheres. The Astral Plane – the Dungeons & Dragons version of space – naturally sets us up for some strange goings on. To enlighten us Chris Lindsay, the product marketing manager responsible for Spelljammer: Adventures in Space and published game designer in his own right (recently in a personal favourite, Candlekeep Mysteries), talks us through why we should be looking to the stars.

“I’m a long-time Dungeon Master with over four decades of experience, and lover of all things new and shiny when it comes to Dungeons & Dragons,” says Lindsay, “Spelljammer is, simply put, Dungeons & Dragons in space. Unlike space in the real world however, it comes with its own set of rules, a rich and observable ecology, and a sense of magic and wonder that everyone has grown to expect from D&D.”

Working on the books is a continuation of Lindsay’s own history with the game and setting. “I most definitely have a history with this setting, having first engaged with it when it was originally released way back in the 1990s,” he tells us, “I DM’d a brief