D&D 5E Tyranny of Dragons: Online Comic #1

[SigmaOne]

This showed up on the Wizards site today. Looks cool!

http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/news/tyranny-dragons-comic1

I really like how they're making the story span the product line with various partners. I'm interest in seeing how it plays out, and how well this approach works.

 

[Johnny Angel]

Yeah, I generally think the big advantage of prepared modules is this shared experience they create. You talk to old gamers, you hear fascinating stories about what happened while they were running through the Keep on the Borderlands, or Pharaoh, or the Salt Marsh Trilogy. And I found the experience with the 3e module series that lead to the epic confrontation with Ashardalon also tied a lot of people's disparate campaigns together. We play a game of Roshomon, telling tales of how differently it went down at our table. If you meet someone who was gaming back then, just ask them about Meepo.

One of the reasons I'm excited about 5e is that WotC is actively promoting this phenomenon of module-as-shared-dream and seeing what can be done about nurturing this communal aspect of the game. I mean, I'm not myself that interested in playing the online game, but the fact that it's meant to be part of the same rising crisis in the Forgotten Realms that many of us will have going on at our tables is an attempt at self-consciously tying everybody's experiences together that I really hope works. Now there's a comic.

I'm not saying this is altogether new. As a HackMaster player, I enjoy a certain amount of synergy with the comics KenzerCo puts out. In former days you could enjoy Curse of the Azure Bonds as a novel, as a computer game or as module. The first module for Dark Sun put the party right in the middle of a scene from one of the Dark Sun novels and gave them their own part to play in the events that unfolded. And as for the community aspect, Paizo may not have invented the notion of an entire campaign codified, but it was a signature of their product line and near as I could tell Rise of the Runelords tied a lot more tables together than good old Rod of Seven Parts.

Now Wizards is trying to get people excited about the new edition by inviting us to be part of a big, emergent event playing out across multiple media and thousands of kitchen tables. They have my attention.

 

[Boarstorm]

So... we've got a member of the Lords' Alliance, the Order of the Gauntlet and (presumably, based on the color of her clothes) the Harpers.

Do we think the party will naturally grow to include the other factions?

 

[SigmaOne]

Yeah, I generally think the big advantage of prepared modules is this shared experience they create. You talk to old gamers, you hear fascinating stories about what happened while they were running through the Keep on the Borderlands, or Pharaoh, or the Salt Marsh Trilogy. And I found the experience with the 3e module series that lead to the epic confrontation with Ashardalon also tied a lot of people's disparate campaigns together. We play a game of Roshomon, telling tales of how differently it went down at our table. If you meet someone who was gaming back then, just ask them about Meepo.

Exactly. For the last month, I've been just loving to read all the many stories of LMoP playthroughs that have come through here and reddit. There have been at least a few every week; and it's just grand to see them, and to compare them to each other and to my own group's campaign.

 

[CrusaderX]

Nice art! I'm looking forward to more.

 

[drjones]

Looks nice. Dragon masks.. is that a little Skyrimish?

 

[Birmy]

I found it a little difficult to read in-browser, but it was a nice little teaser. I was never much into Baldeon's art but it looks pretty good there; the colors help. I hope they eventually put it into print when it's all wrapped up (maybe as added content in one of the IDW paperback collections?).

 

[CrusaderX]

I found it a little difficult to read in-browser, but it was a nice little teaser.

I agree, they need to present it better. I ended up saving the entire image, opening it up in an image viewer, and resizing it to 1000 x 1554, rather than keeping it at 2500 x 3887. Much easier to read that way.