THIS ARTICLE IS PRESERVED ON THE SITE FOR POSTERITY. MUCH OF THE INFORMATION IS OUTDATED – PLEASE REFER TO THE MOST CURRENT PLAYER’S AND DM’S GUIDES FOR UPDATED GUIDANCE. (edit: 2017-01-23)

As the industry grows, so must we. We’ve talked quite a bit over the last six weeks in our Facebook and G+ groups (not to mention on Twitter!) about the Adventurer League’s decision to move the adventures into the dmsguild.com partner site. There have been a lot of concerns raised – both for and against – in regards to this move, and I’d like to take a brief moment to talk about some of our core commitments in the coming months:

FIRST – The League will absolutely be providing content to our brick-and-mortar retail shops! This content will be available through the same channel as all the previous seasons and will continue to be free of charge. Access to this channel is a bit different this time around, though, as it will be granted by the Local Coordinators and the Regional Coordinators on a more personal basis. If you participated in the Death House release event at your shop, you may already have been given the password to the download site – if you did not participate in the Death House event, please contact your LC in our wiki.

Another exciting bit of information on the retail store topic is that, for the first time since the launch of the AL, stores will have the ability to print the certificates they need for their adventures. While certificates do not prevent people from using the items that they find during their games, they do become a visceral part of the gameplay experience for many people. These certificates represent tangible rewards that they get to leave the table with, and allow the players to trade their items to other players that they might meet at a later date. Certificates will be located in the same place as the adventures (in regards to downloading) and have a couple of requirements:

must be printed in full color

cannot have their dimensions changed from the provided document

must be printed on both sides

must be printed on white, parchment, or linen cardstock (90# or above)

certificates must be assigned at the end of the session in which they were found, and fall under the same rules as other promotional product as distributed by Wizards of the Coast (such as promo cards for Magic: the Gathering).

SECOND – Conventions, we love you too. Your situation is a bit different, though, as the adventure download totals represent the net income for the adventure designers; combining this with the fact that conventions typically get more “bang for the buck” (ie: more runs of a specific adventure than a retail store would normally get), AND that a convention organizer typically needs to source the adventures for all of their DMs has made us realize that we’re not 100% set on a distribution model for conventions *yet*. We are working through some cost models to see just how we can ensure that adventures are made available to convention organizers without scraping too much income off the designer and still keep some cash in your pockets as well. So…. I think “soon” is the term I want to go with on a timeline for resolution, though I realize that this may not be the ideal answer that you are seeking.

We will be providing adventures to the convention folks, we just need to determine a delivery method.

As the D&D Adventurers League moves through the Curse of Strahd storyline and into the epic tales that lie on the distant horizon we’ll be talking more about those distribution models, content management (including editing processes and our commitment to increased quality), and other related topics. At this time we are only looking at providing certificates for the current adventure season.

Until then: may the devil Strahd never find you alone, and your weapons be as keen as your wits.