For years, financial and corporate barriers have kept people from experiencing the magic of Dungeons & Dragons. But today, that changes. Free5e, the first fully free, open-source alternative to D&D 5e, is now live on Kickstarter.
What Is Free5e?
Free5e is a complete, fully compatible TTRPG system based on the 5e rules, built for accessibility, community, and creative freedom. It includes three core books—the Player’s Guide, GM Handbook, and Free Range Monsters—all available for free download and licensed under Creative Commons (CC-BY). That means you can play, modify, publish, and even sell Free5e content—without restrictions.
Why Free5e?
TTRPGs should be for everyone. Free5e removes the financial paywalls and corporate control that have locked too many players out of the game. With print-at-cost books, accessible formats, and no licensing fees, Free5e ensures that everyone—players, Game Masters, teachers, libraries, and publishers—has the freedom to use and expand on the game as they see fit.
Key Features of Free5e:
Completely free, forever – No paywalls, no subscriptions, no corporate restrictions.
Compatible with D&D 5e – Play with your existing adventures, monsters, and modules.
Fully open-source (CC-BY licensed) – Modify, translate, publish, and sell your own content.
Disability representation – Three different systems for including disabled characters.
Designed for accessibility – Dyslexia-friendly PDFs, digital braille, audio, markdown, and more.
Affordable print options – Hardcover and softcover books available at or near cost.
A massive bestiary – Over 500 monsters, plus templates to create thousands more.
We’re funding Free5e through Kickstarter to cover professional editing, layout, and all-new, human-made artwork—all of which will also be released under Creative Commons for anyone to use. Backers will get exclusive rewards, including printable GM tools, engraved wooden accessories, and collectible metal art.
Join the Free5e Revolution
Help us change the TTRPG industry forever. Download Free5e today, share it with your friends, and support the Kickstarter to help make this vision a reality. Let’s set 5e free—forever.
Free5e Kickstarter Launch Update – New Launch Date: March 25
March 25, 2025
Update: March 17, 2025: Due to unexpected prototype material shipping delays, we need to push this back another week.
We’ve got a slight change of plans regarding the launch of our Kickstarter campaign for Free5e! Instead of launching on March 4, we’re pushing back the date to March 25.
Why the delay?
We’re waiting on some key supplies that are essential for fulfilling our backer rewards. We want to ensure that everything is perfectly in place before we open the campaign. This includes running test production so that we can be confident in the quality of the products we’re offering. By getting actual samples in hand before the campaign starts, we’ll be able to show our backers exactly what you’re getting.
We will make every reward in-house after the campaign, and we will personally check every item for quality before it gets delivered. We want to be 100% confident that the rewards we send out are the high-quality, lasting keepsakes you deserve.
We’re all about making these rewards something special—a reminder of when the hobby started to change for the better and that you helped make it happen. Free5e isn’t just a game; it’s a movement toward accessibility and inclusion for every player, and we want our backers to feel proud of supporting this vision for years to come.
We know you’re as excited as we are, and we’re committed to delivering rewards that reflect the importance of this project. Thank you for your patience and understanding. We’re making sure these rewards are something you’ll cherish for generations to come.
In 2024, Wyrmworks Publishing took bold strides to make tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs) more accessible, inclusive, and impactful than ever. We helped you make lives better through TTRPGs, and together, we’re making a difference. Here’s what we achieved this year:
Breaking New Ground in Braille TTRPG Accessibility
We converted all our published titles to digital braille, and thanks to our encouragement and assistance, DriveThruRPG now has 13 braille titles available from us and other publishers. What began with zero braille publishers in 2023 now includes six.
Virtual Tabletops (VTT) and Adventure Publishing
Wyrmworks Publishing expanded into Virtual Tabletop (VTT) gaming with new titles for Foundry:
Therapeutic Applications: Multiple therapists reported incorporating our content into their gaming groups, demonstrating the real-world mental health impact of inclusive TTRPG design.
Lair Pages: We added 38 new entries to our online compendium, bringing the total to 1739 resources.
We partnered with disabled, neurodivergent, and mentally ill freelancers, ensuring authentic representation in our work.
We also created Crowdplay, a system to run D&D encounters for dozens or hundreds of players at once. Our test involved 100 players across local and virtual platforms at the same time, and we released the system for free.
We developed an accessible character sheet for print and reading disabilities, ensuring no one is left behind.
Creating in Andovir
The world of Andovir continues to grow with new tools for immersive gaming. This year, we developed six languages to model improved cultural accessibility in the game, all available in the Lair.
We also released Stoneharbor, the first AccessPunk city supplement, demonstrating AccessPunk principles.
Collaborations and Charity Work
Sponsored Game Creators: We supported creators in countries unable to run Kickstarter campaigns, empowering voices in the global TTRPG community.
Charity Contributions: We participated in the Rio Grande do Sul Flood Charity Bundle, which raised enough to fund nearly seven improvised shelters.
Strengthening the Hoard and Community
We sent 22 notes of encouragement in our email updates. Thank you to everyone who responded with kind words—your feedback helps silence our inner critic. If you’re not already signed up, join the Dragon’s Hoard for updates and encouragement!
Additionally, I am volunteering to DM for a D&D group of a dozen teens at our local library, inspiring the next generation of TTRPG players.
Encourage Inclusivity and Join Us on Patreon
We couldn’t have achieved this without you, and the work isn’t done. Support us on Patreon to help us continue making lives better through TTRPGs.
Plans for 2025
The view from my front yard in the summer
We haven’t mastered divination magic, so we have lots of plans but don’t always know what life will bring in the coming year. (In 2024, we moved from Minnesota to Leadville, CO. We never imagined that, and it consumed our entire summer and more, but it’s been great for our family.) And thanks to my ADHD, time blindness makes predicting timeframes difficult, but here’s our plan:
Free5e: A Free Open-Source Dungeons and Dragons Alternative. Fully free, Creative Commons D&D core books—accessible, affordable, and open for everyone. Launching March 4 on Kickstarter
Ready-to-Roll: Feyweather Friends: Last Minute, No Prep D&D 5e Adventure $1. Seal the Far Realm breach! No Prep Needed D&D Adventure for 1-2 players level 1-4 with lots of eyeballs, tentacles, and fey magic!
What if we told you that Dungeons & Dragons core books could be free, fully accessible, and open to everyone forever? That’s the mission behind Free5e, a project designed to make D&D not just a hobby but a movement for equity and inclusion.
The TTRPG world has long been gated by affordability and access. People shouldn’t have to decide between playing D&D and paying rent. We aim to knock those gates down and create a future where anyone, anywhere, can join the adventure.
Here’s what makes Free5e a game-changer:
1. Open to Everyone, Everywhere, Forever
Free5e isn’t just about making books free—it’s about breaking barriers. With its Creative Commons license, anyone can:
Translate the books into languages D&D would never reach. Imagine D&D thriving in local languages and cultures, with local printers and creators adapting and selling copies to support their economies. And nobody could take their license away!
Customize the content to fit their culture, community, or gameplay style.
Create copies for families, FLGSs, or local clubs with illustrations, photos, house rules, and other details specific to that group. (Imagine a FLGS creating a localized version the way all those Monopoly clones do!)
Create custom gifts by replacing the photos in one of the books, turning it into a graduation, birthday, or anniversary gift.
Do anything they want with it!
2. Perfect for Schools, Nonprofits, and More
Free5e makes it easy for schools, nonprofits, mentoring programs, and therapeutic settings to:
Provide copies to everyone involved—players, Game Masters, educators, and students.
Adapt the content for specific educational, cultural, or therapeutic needs.
3. Permanently Billionaire-Proof
Once released, Free5e’s core books will belong to everyone, not to a corporation, investors, or self-important billionaires. No matter who buys WotC or what happens to the TTRPG market, Free5e will remain a community resource, free to download, adapt, and share, and nobody can stop it!
What’s Inside?
Each Free5e book is packed with expertly curated content from some of the best TTRPG creators:
Player’s Book: Subclasses from KibblesTasty and spells from EN Publishing bring creativity to every character.
Game Master’s Book: Encounter-building tools and tips from Sly Flourish make running games easier than ever. Magic Items from EN Publishing make treasure more exciting.
Monster Book: Encounter guidelines from Forge of Foes and unique monsters from EN Publishing inspire unforgettable adventures.
Accessible to Everyone
Every Free5e book will be available in a range of accessible formats to meet the needs of every player:
Dyslexia-friendly PDFs designed with low-vision readers in mind
ePub files for e-readers
Digital braille for visually impaired players
MP3 Audio for visually impaired players or for listening on the go
Markdown for easy customization
Print-on-demand options with black-and-white artwork to keep print costs low
Source files to easily create new versions
Inclusivity at Its Core
Free5e isn’t just another set of rulebooks—it’s a promise to create a more welcoming TTRPG community. These books include tips and rule options to help Game Masters and players make their games more inclusive, ensuring every adventurer feels welcomed and valued.
Backer Rewards to Remember
Backing Free5e isn’t just about supporting a great project—it’s about getting unique rewards:
Game Accessories: Enhance your sessions with handmade tools for the table.
Commemorative Items: Celebrate your role in this movement with exclusive keepsakes.
These one-of-a-kind rewards, crafted in-house by our team and specifically designed to last for generations, are a thank-you for helping make Free5e a reality. You’ll be able to show them to future generations and explain that, back in your day, not everyone could afford D&D, but that changed because of you!
Change the World with Us!
On March 18, join us on Kickstarter to help fund the editing, layout, and human-made artwork needed to bring Free5e to life. Follow the project now to stay informed, and don’t forget to sign up for The Hoard, our email announcements, to get early access to draft manuscripts for playtesting.
Free5e isn’t just a set of books—it’s a movement. Whether you’re a TTRPG veteran or a newcomer, you can be part of something that makes gaming more inclusive, accessible, and open to the world.
Elevate your Dungeons & Dragons 5E campaigns with a treasure trove of new content! This limited-time bundle on DriveThruRPG brings together exciting titles from multiple publishers. Get incredible value and fresh adventures for your table. For a limited time, you can get this amazing collection at a significant discount.
Total Value: $32.37
Special Bundle Price: $17.77
Savings: $14.60 (45%)
Included Titles:
Maze of Mezeria for 5e by Earl of Fife Games
A thrilling 53-page adventure filled with labyrinthine secrets and survival challenges, best for 1st or 2nd level characters.
Features new adversaries, a fully keyed map, and fatigue mechanics to test your players.
Stoneharbor (Andovir Atlas) by Wyrmworks Publishing
A vibrant port city that integrates accessibility and diverse cultures, perfect for any campaign world.
Includes adventure hooks, new ancestries, backgrounds, and NPCs to enrich your stories.
Cavern Crawl #047 – Vein Vengeance (5e) by Grim Press
A 4th-level adventure featuring new monsters, magic items, and detailed battle maps.
Perfect for a party of four to six players.
Asger Earthsculptor — People of the Vale by T.M. van Dalen RPG
Focuses on a wizard obsessed with earth magic, including a unique encounter and exploration-focused mini-boss battle.
Into the Paper World: Ashcan Edition by Echidna Design
A whimsical and dark setting inspired by forgotten creative works, featuring new monsters, magic items, and adventure hooks.
Siege of the Silver Stag (5e) by Scoundrel Game Labs
A horror survival one-shot where players must withstand waves of zombies while managing NPC interactions.
Don’t Miss Out!
This bundle is an unbeatable way to inject fresh life into your campaigns with diverse adventures and rich settings. Whether you’re exploring the depths of a maze, navigating a bustling port city, or surviving a siege, this collection has something for every D&D 5E fan. Grab it now before it’s gone and bring new excitement to your gaming table!
At Wyrmworks Publishing, our mission is to help you make lives better through tabletop roleplaying games. That mission inherently depends on you — we can’t do this ourselves. We — our team, our patrons, and our subscribers — the Dragon’s Hoard — worked together as a party of thousands of heroes to make lives better last year.
Here’s what we did together in a year (in roughly chronological order):
We released Limitless Heroics – Including Characters with Disabilities, Mental Illness, and Neurodivergence in Fifth Edition, the most comprehensive disability compendium ever created for a tabletop roleplaying game. Thousands of gaming groups, including both home groups and professionals like therapists, schools, specialized education programs, support groups, and a children’s theater have added this and other Wyrmworks Publishing resources to their game spaces to make them more inclusive.
Multiple libraries and game cafes have made Limitless Heroics available thanks to purchasing it themselves or through your donations. I get frequent notes from those who have added it to their game space. We love hearing about the impact it’s having!
Changing the TTRPG Industry
We were the only public voicespeaking to the effect of the OGL debacle on accessibility (that I could find, and I looked). In the short time Hasbro posted its final OGL survey, that page got 27,000 visitors. I hope that some of the readers who subsequently filled out the survey form, including the hundreds who clicked through to the survey from that page, included those accessibility insights in their responses. And I hope that it in some small way added to the influence of so many others who fought for our community. More than that, I hope that it raised representation and accessibility awareness at Hasbro for future designs across their product lines. We’ll never know whether they heard us, but we’ll keep talking about it regardless.
Disability in the Afterlife In 1 Corinthians 15:42-49, Paul briefly ponders what bodies will look like when we awaken in the spiritual realm, saying “there are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one thing, and that of the earthly is another.” Basically, no one knows what our bodies will look like in the world to come, but it is reasonable to assume they will be an “idealized version of ourselves,” whatever that means to the individual. For many people, this likely means an end to their physical and mental disabilities. However, our minds and bodies have a way of shaping our identity – our sense of who we are. For example, one person may feel that their reliance on a prosthetic is a hindrance, another person may feel that their prosthetic is an extension of their own body, and an integral part of their physical identity. As a result, the diversity of human bodies in the afterlife is likely to be diverse as it is in the Physical Realm, with some people choosing to be freed from aspects of their physical form that they did not like, and others choosing to embrace their disability as an eternal part of who they are. This is why some people (like Rodney or Rodriguez) may appear in this adventure with a disability, even though they have already entered the afterlife.
– Heroes of the Heavenly Host, p. 41
We crowdfunded Inclusive Artwork: Fantasy Stock Art with Disability Representation for TTRPGs, the first and largest collection of fantasy stock art ever produced. When TTRPG publishers want to include disability representation in their products, the lack of available stock art to accompany it makes that cost-prohibitive, since commissioning quality art is expensive if you’re going to pay the artists fairly.
We wanted to remove that obstacle while supporting disabled, neurodivergent, and mentally ill artists.
Limitless Champions: Making Disabled Fantasy Heroes a Physical Reality
We crowdfunded Limitless Champions. We created the largest, most diverse collection of disabled fantasy minis ever made. Like stock art, very few miniatures include disability representation, and those available are mostly limited to representation through wheelchairs and canes. We expanded that range significantly, including miniatures and printable STL files, cards, accessible condition markers, and more. If you missed the campaign, you can find the collection in our shop.
We also licensed Limitless Champions characters to Fiona Shade Stories’ Adventure College Student Handbook to help make zir products more inclusive. One of those characters was featured in a recent Actual Play. If you’re interested in using our characters or other content, check out our HAG License or contact us.
In 2024, we will crowdfund Limitless Champions Adventures, a collection of adventures featuring these NPCs. To supplement those adventures, we created Limitless Champions Adventures Bonus Encounters with STLs and animated maps. They were each available free for a week or more, and they’re currently available through our Patreon.
Interviews
I love meeting the amazing people using TTRPGs to make lives better on our Gaining Advantage show. (We posted 11 episodes last year.) I also had the honor of being interviewed last year (including here a few from late 2022):
We want to make our resources available to everyone, but poverty prevents a lot of people from accessing many TTRPG resources. So to allow us to both pay our team and make our content as available as possible, we include full previews of our content on the product pages in our store. But that preview isn’t accessible or convenient for many people, so we also partner with you to make Community Copies of some of our products available. Thanks to individual Community Copy purchases, crowdfunding add-ons, and Patreon rewards, you helped us make the following free copies available:
We launched the Dragon’s Lair, a modular database of all of our publications, maps, and lots of exclusive content. It is the most affordable, accessible way to use our content. As of this writing, it has 1,704 entries.
We also launched the Wyrm’s Workshop, an opportunity for you to get your ideas published in our books! This also gave us the opportunity to hire more disabled, neurodivergent, and mentally ill freelancers. And because it costs money to pay those freelancers fairly, we developed a credits system via our Patreon to enable those without the financial means to contribute their ideas to the Wyrm’s Workshop.
And we emailed 49 notes of encouragement to the Dragon’s Hoard. (A big thanks to those of you who expressed your appreciation for the encouragement. That becomes ammunition to fight my inner critic.)
I’ve also had conversations with other publishers and content creators almost every day about accessibility and representation in their products.
What’s coming in 2024?
Here’s a sampling of what we’re already working on
We have at least two, hopefully three Kickstarters coming in 2024. The first two are currently in the playtesting and editing stages:
Leave a comment below or on any of our products or posts.
Send us a note to share how our work has made a difference to you or people you care about.
Finally, a heartfelt thank-you. When we started this, we wondered whether anyone would agree with our intentions and resonate with our work. We wondered whether this ridiculous idea of changing the world by rolling dice and pretending together could change lives and make the world better. Hundreds of people told me it wouldn’t work, and that I should quit before I started.
And the truth is, it couldn’t. Not without you. But here you are. And here’s how far we’ve come. And we’re just getting started. And we’re not going to stop.
DriveThruRPG CCP Partners Prohibit TTRPG Ableism
March 25, 2025
Here at Wyrmworks Publishing, we don’t want the corner on inclusion and accessibility. We want these concepts to become so ubiquitous in the TTRPG industry that our work becomes redundant, at which point, we’ll turn our focus to one of the other countless struggles in our society that keep people from knowing how loved and valued they are.
We have a long way to go, but we’re making steps in the right direction.
In May 2023, I emailed DriveThruRPG to add “ableism” to the nondiscrimination template for their Content Guidelines for Community Content Programs.
What are Community Content Programs?
A Community Content Program (CCP) allows third-party creators (like us) to create supplemental content for existing TTRPGs, like adventures, character expansions, and more, making more resources available for that game without breaking copyright and trademark laws. They often include artwork, style guides, and other resources to help creators make their publications capture the feel of the core game. DMs Guild, which allows the use of Dungeons & Dragons IP, is the most popular, but DriveThruRPG partners with about three dozen other companies to offer similar programs for other games.
So what’s up with the Content Guidelines?
When a publisher sets up a CCP with DriveThruRPG, they include Content Guidelines that tell creators what they can and can’t do with the game content. DriveThruRPG provides new CCP partners with a sample Content Guidelines template, which the partner can use as much or little as they want. Those guidelines usually include a nondiscrimination clause, and many use DriveThruRPG’s template for this as well:
Neither your products nor any promotional material, including blog/social media posts or press releases, may contain racist, homophobic, discriminatory, or other repugnant views; overt political agendas or views; depictions or descriptions of criminal violence against children; rape or other acts of criminal perversion; or other obscene material. We reserve the right to remove any materials that we determine do not conform to our guidelines for this program.
Nobody wants their game to be used to promote nazis. (OK, nobody that DriveThruRPG would be willing to partner with.)
In May 2023, I looked through the guidelines for all of the CCPs, and I noticed that only one company, Onyx Path Publishing, included a reference to specific ableism in their guidelines.
I contacted DriveThruRPG:
Given that the template words it, “racist, homophobic, discriminatory, or other repugnant views,” after checking every agreement, I found that only Onyx Path’s specifically mentions “ableist.” I note it especially since ableism is so widely accepted in our culture, unlike most other forms of discrimination, and while it’s certainly covered under, “discriminatory” and “repugnant” in my view, not everyone would agree, especially in the TTRPG space, but I’d like to suggest that you consider clarifying and adding “ableist” to that clause in the template for future CCPs and possibly suggest it for current ones.
A mere ninety minutes later, they replied to let me know that they were changing the template and contacting all CCP partners with the suggestion and would update any change requests immediately. (Again, each CCP decides on their own guidelines wording, so this change is 100% optional.) Considering that this is a change to legal documentation, these are weighty decisions, so I was astonished at the speed of the response!
So like Teos Abadía’s recent article about changes in D&D Beyond’s content, this is old news that you didn’t know about. I waited to write this to allow time for companies to make changes so we could celebrate as many as possible.
What changed?
As of this writing six months later, the following CCPs now specifically forbid ableist content (Remember that Onyx Path Publishing included it already):
I have every expectation that the rest consider their existing “other repugnant views” umbrella clause sufficient. If someone reported CCP content to them that discriminated against people based on ability, they would respond accordingly. Some CCP partners not listed here have personally assured me of this.
If you are a CCP owner and change your agreement, let me know, and I’ll be thrilled to add you to the list!
Why is this important?
While our culture has taken great strides to reduce discrimination against marginalized demographics over the past several decades, it’s a slow process. In every case, we still have a long way to go. However, ableism remains the most widely accepted form of discrimination.
To use a mainstream example, we recently watched the Peacock TV show, Baking It, and in the Season 1 Finale, the hosts, Andy Samberg and Maya Rudolph, did a bit called, “Nut Roast,” a parody of celebrity roasts. Here’s an excerpt:
Hey, look who it is, it’s walnut. Hey, walnut, you lumpy son of a nut, you’re the Elephant Man of the nuts. “I am not a good snack!”…
Uh-oh, it’s peanut…Look at him, he’s just sitting there. Somebody get him an epi-pen, I think he’s in shock!
In December 2021, they mocked people with facial differences and with life-threatening allergies in rapid succession. My family cringed, and I searched online for an apology by NBC or anyone from the cast or crew. Nothing. I searched for blog posts or news articles about the obvious ableist jokes. Nothing. Not even a Reddit post or tweet. In two years, nobody on earth with Internet access even noticed and cared enough to mention it until this post. And this is just one example.
We have a long way to go. We’re counting on the gaming community to roll initiative with us. And we deeply appreciate DriveThruRPG and the eight TTRPG producers who quietly but publicly entered this particular fray. They deserve recognition for leading the industry along with many others who have helped raise awareness through other efforts.
Has this changed the TTRPG industry?
Has this changed the content made available via these CCPs? I hope not. I hope that all of those who create CCP content already consciously avoided ableist content. I have friends who create CCP content, and I know that they don’t need a clause in a legal agreement to make sure their products are welcoming and inclusive to all people. I expect that those who changed their agreements did so because they already found ableism repugnant and would not want their brand associated with it.
But I also hope that the inclusion of one extra word causes everyone who sees it to experience a subtle influence. Maybe they subconsciously tweak the language in their projects to avoid microaggressions. Maybe they consider adding a disabled character and discussing it with someone whose lived experience is represented by that character. I regularly encounter compassionate people who don’t realize ableism exists. Sometimes simply learning the word makes them more sensitive to it when they encounter it.
Finally, thank you to our Patrons and everyone who supports our work and raises a sword with us or other TTRPG parties to welcome everyone to the table. Rule systems don’t make this hobby great — you do.
Unlock New Opportunities for Inclusive TTRPG
March 25, 2025
Ever wished you could bring your character to life in exciting new ways? Wyrmworks Publishing is unlocking new possibilities to make your tabletop RPG experience more immersive and inclusive than ever before.
