D&D 5E WotC's Nathan Stewart Teases New D&D Setting Book in 2019

Chronos96 said:

I'll admit that I don't know much about Dragonlance. What would you say the hook is? Every time I see Dragonlance mentioned I'm given the impression that it's just a typical fantasy world.

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Extra Cheesiness.

Chronos96 said:

I'll admit that I don't know much about Dragonlance. What would you say the hook is? Every time I see Dragonlance mentioned I'm given the impression that it's just a typical fantasy world.

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More heroic high fantasy.
But, really, the hook is the key story. The famous War if the Lance.

Chronos96 said:

I'll admit that I don't know much about Dragonlance. What would you say the hook is? Every time I see Dragonlance mentioned I'm given the impression that it's just a typical fantasy world.

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Typical in a way that was not typical of D&D pre-1984, nor since outside of Dragonlance. Epic fantasy, rather than heroic fantasy.

It is one of the most popular settings, next to the other biggies that you mention, too.

Yeah, that’s always been its strength, and its weakness. Having an epic struggle against a monolithic foe can be great, but it can also make things difficult – capturing that epic feel without either infringing on the main story or having the main story overshadow the PCs isn’t always an easy task.

Were I to run a Dragonlance campaign these days, I’d set it during the War of the Lance, but in an area of Ansalon that the Heroes of the Lance never went to, creating an entirely new front for the war, with a new Dragon Highlord to fight. Concentrate more on the tone rather than the locales like Xak Tsaroth, Solace, and Palanthas.

Jester David said:

More heroic high fantasy.
But, really, the hook is the key story. The famous War if the Lance.

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Azzy said:

I don't see Planescape or Spelljamer getting full supplements, but instead getting adventures that also act to introduce the setting (much like ToA).

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Agreed.

If I were doing Spelljammer, for instance, I'd probably do something like the Odyssey, Star Trek: Voyager, or the story of Cugel the Clever - give the PCs some strong ties to a home location, suddenly spirit them away to a faraway Sphere, and then base the campaign on their efforts to get home. (You'll need some way to persuade them to use Spelljamming to get home rather than some variant of teleport, but that shouldn't be impossible.)

The bulk of the book would then be a set of adventures in a dozen or so Spheres between them and home, and then a final showdown with whoever it was abducted them in the first place.

If they then open the setting to DM's Guild creators, they can then benefit from huge amounts of material with relatively little outlay.

I agree that Mystara is a pipe-dream for Mystara fans, although I wouldn't be surprised to see a PDF treatment. But a hardcover? Very unlikely.

Greyhawk is also just so dated and idiosyncratic in tone; the folks who want it most and see it as on a similar level as the more recent settings are generally older players who have lost sight of cultural perspective (I am reminded of a 50ish Lyft driver who was telling me and my friend that the late 80s to early 90s was the height of popular music...umm, really?).

That said, I wouldn't be surprised to see a Greyhawk "commemorative edition" at some point. But I just don't see some great Greyhawk--or Mystara--revival to exhume the corpse of 70s-80s era D&D. WotC has created a formula that is working quite well, and I think it is partially because it has a relationship of appreciation and honoring to the older eras of D&D, but without fetishizing or trying to re-live the past.

Dragonlance is interesting, though, because it embodies something 5E has lacked so far: a huge, world-changing story. Well, there have been big stories, but not quite on the level of what Dragonlance is best known for.

That said, I would be surprised if they simply re-did the War of the Lance. I know that is the cultural trend to endlessly re-hash rather than innovate, but I also wouldn't be surprised to see WotC take a different route with a big epic story. Maybe still set in Krynn, or maybe something else. Actually, the Ravnica book gives me hope that they're willing to explore new worlds rather than simply re-do the old.

I also think it likely that we see some kind of world-connecting book at some opint within the next year or two, whether that is Planescape, Spelljammer, Planeswalkers, or a hybrid of all three. Again, they seem to want to turn a new spin on things, so my bet is on a hybrid.

I love Dragonlance for many reasons, but most of all because it deviated from the vanilla kitchen sink that most published offerings feel the need to support. There are no regular halflings. There are no orcs to be found. Minotaur as a playable race. The knights of Solamnia. Etc. Etc.

Yes, there's an issue of living in the shadow of the Heroes of the War of the Lance (the same issue found within Middle Earth), but it's a rich world. I'd love to see it come back a few hundred years into the future past all of those events to clear space for the heroes of a DM's campaign...the players.

If it were presented and treated the way settings are currently in 5e, then Dragonlance would be a fairly typical fantasy setting with a does of "Our [blank] are different" tropes, a much stronger focus on the dragons than most settings, and some fairly setting specific subclasses.

The thing that really made Dragonlance different, Beloved by it's fans, Hated by it's detractors (besides Kender), was that every time Weis & Hickman wrote a book, the events of the book are fully canon and change the setting.

You're playing post Chronicles, and you're a cleric. Oh, a new set of books came out, "The Gods are gone again, you lose your magic." Oh, well, huh, that's uh, dang.

Giant Dragon razes the entire elf wood, all the green elves are dead.

Etc.

These things make the setting dynamic, but can also be upsetting for players.

Anyway, I really don't feel like WotC/Hasbro would be into maintaining a line like that at this point, so a 5e Dragonlance would end up being static. In which case, Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, and Greyhawk are all similar in the sense of being traditional Fantasy settings. I'd love to have a good setting book for all of them, but they lack what I would call a "Strong Hook".

Eberron - Magipunk
Spell Jammer - Space Fantasy
Planescape - Planar reality jumping
Dark Sun - Harsh dying world fantasy
Forgotten Realms - The only setting we actually support in organized play
Greyhawk - Forgotten Realms Alpha (Not supported)
Dragonlance - Forgotten Realms but with realm events (Not Supported)

Given the popularity of Curse of Strahd, the continued popularity of Dragonlance, the popularity of Tales from the Yawning Portal, and the willingness of WOtC as of DotMM to have a 320 page adventure...

I think a full re-do of the original Dragonlance Campaign, with Hickman's input, is very, very possible. Followed with a setting book, that is all the Dragonlance fans would need: world info, and the chance to make the War of the Lance their own.

TiwazTyrsfist said:

If it were presented and treated the way settings are currently in 5e, then Dragonlance would be a fairly typical fantasy setting with a does of "Our [blank] are different" tropes, a much stronger focus on the dragons than most settings, and some fairly setting specific subclasses.

The thing that really made Dragonlance different, Beloved by it's fans, Hated by it's detractors (besides Kender), was that every time Weis & Hickman wrote a book, the events of the book are fully canon and change the setting.

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Sorta, the setting would get changed for the sake of changes to the TRPG (see SAGA) and then Weiss & Hickman would be called in to write these changes into the fiction cannon. It's the standard "Rule changes? Need to blow up the setting!" that TSR started (and WotC continued) with the other settings like Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk

You're playing post Chronicles, and you're a cleric. Oh, a new set of books came out, "The Gods are gone again, you lose your magic." Oh, well, huh, that's uh, dang.

Giant Dragon razes the entire elf wood, all the green elves are dead.

Etc.

These things make the setting dynamic, but can also be upsetting for players.

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Ideally, WotC should just hit the "reset button" on the setting and allow the setting to be played as it was intended.

Anyway, I really don't feel like WotC/Hasbro would be into maintaining a line like that at this point, so a 5e Dragonlance would end up being static. In which case, Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, and Greyhawk are all similar in the sense of being traditional Fantasy settings. I'd love to have a good setting book for all of them, but they lack what I would call a "Strong Hook".

Eberron - Magipunk
Spell Jammer - Space Fantasy
Planescape - Planar reality jumping
Dark Sun - Harsh dying world fantasy
Forgotten Realms - The only setting we actually support in organized play
Greyhawk - Forgotten Realms Alpha (Not supported)
Dragonlance - Forgotten Realms but with realm events (Not Supported)

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In the DMG, it defines Dragonlance as "epic fantasy" and Greyhawk as "sword and sorcery" as opposed to the Forgotten Realms "heroic fantasy" for what it's worth.