Dragon magazine is considered official!

[Marius Delphus]

Whether or not it's official (which is to say, whether or not the WOTC "stamp of approval" means anything to an individual DM), it occurs to me the impressive (and growing) bulk of Dragon Magazine material means that, as a practical matter, most campaigns will never be able to implement it all anyway.

But, IMHO, permitting players to pick and choose at will from Dragon Magazine is asking for trouble. With a "tight ship" already in place, it sounds like greymarch's group should have no problem with the DM "certifying" magazine stuff for campaign use and prohibiting anything not thus approved. It's what I'd personally recommend, having myself seen optional and add-on rules get a little out of hand....

Add 2 more cp to the thread total.

 

[Desdichado]

Who cares? I couldn't possibly care less what's official and what's not. Also, spread the word? Huh? Since when has this even been a question? As far as I know, Dragon material has been official ever since the magazine started some 300+ issues ago.

 

[Joshua Randall]

I wrote:

Except that it's widely believed that Customer Service often doesn't know what the hell they're talking about.

Baraendur wrote:

And there's also the widely held belief that certain gamers and message board posters take themselves entirely too seriously.

Y'know, Baraendur, that was uncalled for. I was merely pointing out that over the years, the level of game rules knowledge exhibited by the WotC Customer Service department has been, shall we say, rather suspect. This dates back to the pre-D&D, Magic: the Gathering days.

I don't think I deserved to be called out for taking myself too seriously.

 

[Desdichado]

What'd you expect? It's his e-mail that you're calling spurious. If you didn't want to be called out for taking yourself too seriously, you shouldn't have insulted his answer and his profession.

 

[BVB]

I'm not sure why you care if a rule is official or not. ...

Why do you care if he cares or not?
For that matter, why do I care if you care whether he cares?

 

[Grazzt]

And there's also the widely held belief that certain gamers and message board posters take themselves entirely too seriously.

No way. I can't believe such a thing. Say it isn't so, Darrin.

 

[BVB]

The "official" ruleset for me is the SRD. Everything else is unofficial - if it was playtested and approved by both R&D and Legal, it would be in the SRD. ...

Now there's an image for ya -- a bunch of lawyers playing D&D before they issue a formal decision on whether certain rules and aspects of the game are fodder for the SRD.

"For pain and suffering due to the bard's slanderous comments about my character, I'm asking for an judgment of 3,000 bonus experience points and a random minor magic item. ...
"Touch my dice again, sir, and you'll be slapped with a lawsuit faster than you can say 'Orc and Pie.'"
"I'm serving the beholder with a summons..."
"I'll appeal that monster's attack on the basis that the DM sucks my briefs..."

 

[Grazzt]

Didn't this fight about what's "official" and what's "not official" spring up before? Like, last year or something?

What's the point? I mean, who really cares what is and what isn't official, so long as the players and DM all have fun. If something sucks, don't use it. If its all cool, then use it. Who gives a rip whether its "100%" official (which means next to nothing anymore...at least not what it used to mean back in the days of OD&D/1e/2e)

 

[greymarch]

Here is an example of what I am talking about...

I find a spell in Masters of the Wild, and then I find a rule in Dragon magazine that completely changes what Masters of the Wild says about the spell. Which one do I follow? Which one is right? Both are now part of the official D&D rules-set.

It has always been a big debate among the D&D community regarding how official Dragon magazine is, and how to deal with it. As someone at the official WoTC messageboards said "what...do you expect Paiso publishing to put on their cover 'The unofficial magazine of D&D' of course they put the official magazine of D&D on their cover. They want to sell more issues!"

 

[Joshua Randall]

What'd you expect? It's his e-mail that you're calling spurious. If you didn't want to be called out for taking yourself too seriously, you shouldn't have insulted his answer and his profession.

Well, crap, I can't be expected to keep track of what everyone's real name is. At least us Joshuas aren't afraid to show our faces in public.

I'll now fall back on my earlier comment, that the word "official" is essentially meaningless in this context.

And now I'll shut up.