Nentir Vale Coming to Dungeons and Dragons

Didn't they explained those changes through novels, tho? I have 6 novels that explain from were 4e tieflings came from, and they pretty much state that the Planescape tieflings still exist. Also, some 4e book explain the differences between 4e eladrin and "celestial" eladrin (and both coexist).

So, in many instantes those changes are advancement of the novels' metaplots, not outright retcons just because reasons.

Parmandur said:

Because in the Nentir Vale she is THE god of Death, who had killed the previous god of Death in the Nentir Vale setting, Kelemvor. This is something Mearls called out as specifically awkward for FR compatibility, as Kelemvor is the existing god of Death who is still active in the game.

The idea with the change, making the Raven Queen a sort of Goth Fairy Queen of the Shadowfell means she can be in FR, she can be in Greyhawk, she can show up on any homebrew, without replacing the local god of Death (though she can still be the god of Deatrh in a Dawn War setting).

This has relatively little, probably nothing, to do with Mearls home campaign.

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I have a 3e Forgotten Realms book that says that killing the aspect of a god in X world, doesn't affect that god in Y world. They used this argument to explain why Lolth was alive and well in Toril, even when she was recently killed in Oerth in some adventure.

Why they couldn't use this argument for Nerul also?

Azzy said:

No, that's a bad argument. I see you and raise you eladrin, tieflings, deva (and many other things that were unnecessarily changed). You can have a different setting with different lore, but when the default assumptions of the game as presented in the rulebooks change things so drastically that you have to drastically rechange things just to represent previous settings and lore without turning to setting explosion (as was done with FR), then no—your argument is bollocks.

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Interesting. See, I’d hold up Tieflings as an example of how changes that are initially conceievef as specific to a particular alternate setting can end up leading to changes in other settings (the exact thing I’m worried about happening with this Neo-Vale), and Deva as an example of how that doesn’t always happen.

Nentir Vale Tieflings are awesome. They are very different from Planescape Tieflings. They have some really cool lore surrounding the Turathi-Arkhosian war that ties them intimately to the Nentir Vale setting, and also marks them as very distinct from the original version. One consequence of this, is that this lore makes Nentir Vale Tieflings specifically Devil-related, and gave them a very specific aesthetic, whereas Planescape Tieflings could be connected to any sort of Fiend and varied wildly in appearance. Now, on its own, I would consider this a cool alternate take on Tieflings that works great for this specific setting. But then, even though Nentir Vale was not the default implied setting of 5e, 5e Tieflings are now a core race that all look like Nentir Vale Tieflings and are only connected to devils. This is exactly what I don’t want to happen to Nentir Vale - for the changes that Mearls makes to the setting for his homebrew to end up getting incorporated into the greater D&D collective understanding of the setting.

Fortunately, Deva are a great counter-example. Like Tieflings, they were a setting-specific reinterpretation of a preexisting concept. Unlike Tieflings, this alternate take on Aasimar stayed in Nentir Vale where it belongs. This is what I hope will happen with Mearl’s changes. That they will be largely accepted as an alternate take that worked for his setting, but don’t end up getting folded into the canon version.

Azzy said:

It would be if I was trying to not allow 4e to be upset—which I'm not. I fully hope that, if there is an official 5e presentation of Nentir Vale that it keeps true to its 4e presentation. Because I know how much that doing otherwise sucks. What I am doing, is not letting the BS assertion that edition changes don't effect lore changes go unchallenged. Because they do, and 4e is the biggest example of that.

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Ah, I see. In that case, carry on.

Imaro said:

It was still a change, again you seem to be operating on some definition of "change" that isn't the commonly understood meaning of the word.

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That's why I'm saying that is a "progresive change" vs a "full retcon".

Like yeah, the Forgotten Realms got blown up in 4e, but this did not changed the backstory of the Realms. It was a progresive change because some metaplot. You can argue wheter this plot was bad or good, but that is another beast altogether. The changes in the Realms at least follow a progresive line that acknowledge the existence of the prior lore.

With the Raven Queen, her prior lore is incompatible with her new lore (from goddess of death to a being that disrupts death - something that goes against her godly teachings).

Parmandur said:

Pretty sure it is a coincidence. The Raven Queen being central in Critical Role is probably played a big role in wanting her in a core book release, and a desire to make her compatible with other settings necessitated the changes: MToF Raven Queen plays nicely with GreyHawk, Forgotten Realms, etc. Mearls said as much about the changes in the MToF lead-up.

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I don't find the logic on this, tho.

Why the Raven Queen is incompatible with the other 10 or so gods of death in the PHB?

Zeromaru X said:

That's why I'm saying that is a "progresive change" vs a "full retcon".

Like yeah, the Forgotten Realms got blown up in 4e, but this did not changed the backstory of the Realms. It was a progresive change because some metaplot. You can argue wheter this plot was bad or good, but that is another beast altogether. The changes in the Realms at least follow a progresive line that acknowledge the existence of the prior lore.

With the Raven Queen, her prior lore is incompatible with her new lore (from goddess of death to a being that disrupts death - something that goes against her godly teachings).





I don't find the logic on this, tho.

Why the Raven Queen is incompatible with the other 10 or so gods of death in the PHB?

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They seem to have wanted the RQ to be available in any setting, because of Critical Role's use of her. There are all these gods i nthe PHB, but Hades and Aphophis are not running around Greyhawk or Dragonlance...but the Shadowfell connects to them.

Heck, the schtick they gave the RQ in MToF is "what the RQ did with Vox Machina" even.

Charlaquin said:

Fortunately, Deva are a great counter-example. Like Tieflings, they were a setting-specific reinterpretation of a preexisting concept. Unlike Tieflings, this alternate take on Aasimar stayed in Nentir Vale where it belongs.

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Whereas I view the deva as a missed opportunity, precisely because they didn't completely replace the aasimar. The deva are far, far more interesting, and I was deeply disappointed to find out that they didn't exist* in 5E.

*Yes, there are deva in 5E, but they're the old "lesser cousins to solars" version, not the "playable reincarnating race" version.

(Also, they weren't restricted to Nentir Vale. There were several 4E Forgotten Realms novels with a deva main character.)

Zeromaru X said:

Didn't they explained those changes through novels, tho?

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Who knows? I haven't read any of the D&D novels since I was in my early 20s. I don't care if they "explained" them, they are changes to the bbase D&D lore. And that's enough of a counterpoint to make your initial statement untrue.

I have 6 novels that explain from were 4e tieflings came from, and they pretty much state that the Planescape tieflings still exist.

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Again, what happens in novels can stay in novels. The game is the only thing that matters. And the 4e PHB that introduced the retconned tieflings never mentioned the Planescape tieflings.

Also, some 4e book explain the differences between 4e eladrin and "celestial" eladrin (and both coexist).

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Must have been well after the fact, but 4e never supported the celestial eladrin (and looks like 5e isn't going to, either).

So, in many instantes those changes are advancement of the novels' metaplots, not outright retcons just because reasons.

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More likely those novels that I don't care about just created an in-fiction excuse for the fact that WotC made sweepiung lore changes for reasons (that likely had more to do with creating a clearer IP that couldn't be easily copied by other companies *cough*Paizo*cough*)

Mouseferatu said:

Whereas I view the deva as a missed opportunity, precisely because they didn't completely replace the aasimar. The deva are far, far more interesting, and I was deeply disappointed to find out that they didn't exist* in 5E.

*Yes, there are deva in 5E, but they're the old "lesser cousins to solars" version, not the "playable reincarnating race" version.

(Also, they weren't restricted to Nentir Vale. There were several 4E Forgotten Realms novels with a deva main character.)

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That was a canon inmigrant from the Nentir Vale, that got ported to the Realms during the Abyssal Plague intro story.

Azzy said:

Who knows? I haven't read any of the D&D novels since I was in my early 20s. I don't care if they "explained" them, they are changes to the bbase D&D lore. And that's enough of a counterpoint to make your initial statement untrue.



Again, what happens in novels can stay in novels. The game is the only thing that matters. And the 4e PHB that introduced the retconned tieflings never mentioned the Planescape tieflings.



Must have been well after the fact, but 4e never supported the celestial eladrin (and looks like 5e isn't going to, either).



More likely those novels that I don't care about just created an in-fiction excuse for the fact that WotC made sweepiung lore changes for reasons (that likely had more to do with creating a clearer IP that couldn't be easily copied by other companies *cough*Paizo*cough*)

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In fact, "noble" eladrin are mentioned in the preview books, but never really explored.

In 5e, they are mentioned in Mordenkainen's, but seem to be just a exalted version of the playable eladrin.

As for the tieflings, the Monster Manual is very specific mentioning stuff like Bael Turath. Pretty much, tying this specific version of the tieflings to a setting, not replacing the race on the whole cosmos. The 4e Forgotten Realms guide has its own explanation for its tieflings that doesn't contradict their Planescape lore, and this is one of the earliest 4e books

Zeromaru X said:

In fact, "noble" eladrin are mentioned in the preview books, but never really explored.

In 5e, they are mentioned in Mordenkainen's, but seem to be just a exalted version of the playable eladrin.

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Speaking of the eladrin, in Planescape, they were explicitly tied to the concept of "free good" and the plane of Arborea as much as the "baatezu (devils) are associated with Baator (the Nine Hells) and the tanar'ri (demons) with the Abyss" (Monstrous Compendium Appendix II).
In the 3e Monster Manuals, the eladrin were statted as outsiders with the good and chaotic subtypes; they existed in a tiered existence, as much like the progression of devils into greater forms, and had several alternate forms that was also mentioned in their lore. They are known as champions of good (Monster Manual).

In 4e, they changed all of that, having them explicitly associated with the Feywild and making the now playable race equivalent to high elves. They now had the humanoid type and fey origin. In the 4e Forgotten Realms Player's Guide, the sun and moon elves, originally always elves, were now subgroups of eladrin.

Charlaquin said:

Asmodeus is still a devil in the Forgotten Realms. It is only the Nentir Vale setting that has a god named Asmodeus, so no, it was not a retcon.

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In Forgotten Realms, Asmodeus became a god when he absorbed Azuth, the Faerunian God of Wizardry. Azuth was revived during the Sundering and split from Asmodeus, but Asmodeus kept his godhood when Enlil, the chief Untheric god, gave him the divine spark of his dead son Nanna-Sin. In 5e, he's listed as the God of Indulgence in the SCAG, with the Knowledge, Trickery, and Order domains.

I find all of the changes to the forgotten realms pantheon quite confusing. The book that should explain why Azuth is back, Asmodeus is still a god, Myrkul is also running around and Amaunator and Lathandar are now split was the sword coast adventurers guide but it doesn't really say much at all. For new players this doesn't really matter since, as far as they're concerned these have always been the gods of faerun. As an older player it leaves me wondering what was going on.