Nentir Vale Coming to Dungeons and Dragons

[Ash Mantle]

But that is, as you said, advancement of lore because pf consecuences of certain metaplots.

Yes, the Time of Troubles changed the Realms because some gods died. Logical consecuences of the novels. But, they not changed the Realms into a high-technology setting made by inteligent dinosaurs.

Yeah, quite wild but that is how it feels the changes they did to the Raven Queen in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. And the Nentir Vale setting Mearl's game.

That's still by any definition changing of the lore. Sometimes the changing of lore actually makes the edition change possible and made a way to explain the changing of mechanics from one edition into the next, ie Die, Vecna, Die was the in-game and in-lore explanation for the mechanical change from 2nd into 3rd edition. There was some massive lore changes for several settings as a consequence.

2nd edition Realms was actually on the way to progression of smokepowder being disseminated throughout the Realms, but iirc 3rd edition Realms changed that again.
As another example, we saw the rise of Shar's Shadow Weave in 3rd edition, and we also had 3e mechanics that represented what it meant to be a Shadow Weave practitioner. There was nothing like that in the 2e Realms.

 

[Azzy]

An edition changes rules, not lore.

But then there was 4e. It heralded TONS of lore changes to many of the basic assumptions in D&D lore from monsters to races, etc. That's a big part of why I avoided it.

 

[Imaro]

An edition changes rules, not lore.

Say what now??

Even the Forgotten Realms lore is expanded, perhaps a few retcons to explain why this work that way (magic, for instance) not fully retconned from zero, that was the Raven Queen's case. She was fully changed: her background, her character, even her role was completely retconned.

Ok, it seems like in order to only include examples you want to acknowledge you are narrowly defining change in lore to mean retcon. So her'e s a question, was Asmodeus becoming a god a change in lore? Because before 4e, in every other edition... he was a devil, not a god.

 

[Imaro]

And, well, we don't know if his takes on Erathis, Melora and Torog will be the next ones appearing in an official book, that's true. I guess we'll see when (if) the Vale or some of its elements got published officially.

Honestly if it resonates with the D&D fandom as a whole better... well I think that's exactly what they should do.

 

[Zeromaru X]

But then there was 4e. It heralded TONS of lore changes to many of the basic assumptions in D&D lore from monsters to races, etc. That's a big part of why I avoided it.

Yeah. But, most of the changes of lore in 4e were because they wanted to advance Forgotten Realms' metaplot and make it an universal thing.

They did it better in 5e, though.

Ok, it seems like in order to only include examples you want to acknowledge you are narrowly defining change in lore to mean retcon. So her'e s a question, was Asmodeus becoming a god a change in lore? Because before 4e, in every other edition... he was a devil, not a god.

Yeah. But they gave an explanation for this: they wanted to use Asmodeus more prominently in their metaplots (the full explanation is in Worlds and Monsters, one of 4e pteview books), and also is the evolution of a metaplot: he killed some god and stole his divinity. They didn't changed his whole backstory to say he was a god from the start or something like that, but instead evolved an story they had. Again, whether you consider that story good or bad is another thing.

It was not a change because reasons and without explanation.

 

[Azzy]

Yeah. But,

No.

 

[Imaro]

Yeah. But they gave an explanation for this: they wanted to use Asmodeus more prominently in their metaplots (the full explanation is in Worlds and Monsters, one of 4e pteview books), and also is the evolution of a metaplot: he killed some god and stole his divinity. They didn't changed his whole backstory to say he was a god from the start or something like that, but instead evolved an story they had. Again, whether you consider that story good or bad is another thing.

It was not a change because reasons and without explanation.

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.

So would you be ok if there was some elaborate story for why the changes to the Raven Queen happened? Would that make the change ok with you, because that seems to be your argument for any other change pointed out. If that's the case it doesn't seem like you have a problem with the actual changes to the RQ... but instead you have a problem with the fact that there wasn't an in-depth story to go along with the changes.

EDIT: I'm pretty sure if they ever do a Nentir sourcebook and this version of the RQ is in it... there will be background explaining the differences and how they came to pass. Right now there is no 5e Nentir Vale setting (officially) so why would they take the time to explain /justify the differences with a version of a deity that, at least for now, doesn't exist in 5e?

 

[Parmandur]

He was re-tooling many of the Dawn War gods for his campaign. You can download his take on Erathis, Lolth, Melora and Torog on his Twitter account. He has been working on his Nentir Vale campaign since (at least) the last year.

And suddenly, they changed the lore of the Raven Queen in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. I don't see this as a coincidence.

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.

 

[SkidAce]

MToF Raven Queen plays nicely with GreyHawk, Forgotten Realms, etc. Mearls said as much about the changes in the MToF lead-up.

Why didn't previous Raven Queen work?

 

[Parmandur]

Why didn't previous Raven Queen work?

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.