D&D 5E Whatever "lore" is, it isn't "rules."

[Hussar]

Or if you look at it another way, what is homebrew if it is not the DM colouring in blank spaces?

But, [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION] just told me a few posts back that setting guides presume that groups are going to fill in the details. So, is it a canon game or not if you're following the instructions of the setting guide?

That's not honest, though. The 3e Forgotten Realms campaign book talks about the countless villages, tribes and settlements, as well as the lost places of the ancients with new marvels and such being discovered each year. It also says that it describes in brief the wide and wonderful world. Other campaign guides over the editions are similar.

The PCs with their backgrounds, the towns, NPCs, dungeons and such, those are all provided for in canon, provided the DM is fleshing out the world and not altering what is specifically mentioned. Specific alterations are what constitutes a canon change, not the things you are mentioning above.

So, on this point, the two of you seem to be contradicting each other. Which is it?

To me, I'm thinking that the distinction is largely superfluous. It's virtually impossible to play D&D without home brewing. Perhaps in organized play, I suppose, but, that's a pretty distinct animal. Otherwise, pretty much every campaign played on every table is home-brew to some degree.

Which makes canon distinctions kinda pointless. It's two smurfs arguing about who is more blue.

 

[Shasarak]

But, [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION] just told me a few posts back that setting guides presume that groups are going to fill in the details. So, is it a canon game or not if you're following the instructions of the setting guide?

So are you following the instructions of the setting guide or are you colouring in the blank spaces?

Which makes canon distinctions kinda pointless. It's two smurfs arguing about who is more blue.

Bluey Smurf is more blue if I am following Smurf naming conventions correctly.

 

[Hussar]

So are you following the instructions of the setting guide or are you colouring in the blank spaces?



Bluey Smurf is more blue if I am following Smurf naming conventions correctly.

Yes, exactly. And this becomes even more true in less supported settings. In settings which don't have thousands of pages of canon, we have to presume that the DM is colouring in the blank spaces. The campaign can't move forward if not.

I am rather curious where the line gets drawn though. If adding a town, with dozens, perhaps hundreds of NPC's, isn't a change to the setting, why is adding an invisible moon? Where's the cut off point? Can I add 999 people, but, at 1000 I'm home brewing? Again, to me, the question is nonsensical.

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And I'll note that [MENTION=48965]Imaro[/MENTION] refused to answer my question from before. I'll quote it here since it seems to have gotten lost in the scrum:

[MENTION=48965]Imaro[/MENTION] - I'm seeing something of a contradiction in your points, so, maybe you can clear things up.

You have argued that additions to lore isn't change. That so long as the new stuff doesn't contradict the old stuff, there's no change. Ok, fair enough. You gave the example of replacing the Emperor and Co with Vulcans. We'd all agree this is a change. You are contradicting existing canon and adding something else. Fair enough.

But, here's the problem. You admit that Pemerton is not actually changing anything to Greyhawk by adding WoHS and a third moon. No lore is being contradicted. Therefore, by your definition, he has not changed the setting. He has not changed lore. Addition is not change, by your definition.

Yet, somehow, despite the fact that by your definition he has made no changes, he no longer can claim that his Greyhawk is canon. It is now a home-brew Greyhawk. But, how can that be since he hasn't, by your definition, changed the setting?

You can't have it both ways. Either addition is not change and Pemerton is playing a canon kosher GH game, or addition IS change and most of your other arguments (5e isn't changing lore, it's simply adding) go out the window.

So, which is it? Is Pemerton playing a canon kosher GH game or not?

 

[Shasarak]

Yes, exactly. And this becomes even more true in less supported settings. In settings which don't have thousands of pages of canon, we have to presume that the DM is colouring in the blank spaces. The campaign can't move forward if not.

I am rather curious where the line gets drawn though. If adding a town, with dozens, perhaps hundreds of NPC's, isn't a change to the setting, why is adding an invisible moon? Where's the cut off point? Can I add 999 people, but, at 1000 I'm home brewing? Again, to me, the question is nonsensical.

If you are talking about a game at the table then there is no such beast as a 100% canon game. Personally I dont even know how that is supposed to work.

On the other hand if you were colouring in a blank part of the Forgotten Realms then I would expect as a Player that I could wander out of that part and go to Waterdeep for example. If I instead found Greyhawk City then I would be wondering if this was based in Forgotten Realms or not and then if there were Towers of High Sorcery with three moons affecting magic then I would know this was actually a mash up montage.

 

[Imaro]

And I'll note that [MENTION=48965]Imaro[/MENTION] refused to answer my question from before. I'll quote it here since it seems to have gotten lost in the scrum:

I answered it... with a question of my own

@Hussar... just curious... did you find those posts where I claimed something someone else was doing was badwrongfun? Where I claimed someone in the thread was doing it wrong... or any of the other things you've accused me of during this discussion and then never actually addressed? Because at this point, after the second time you've done it I'm not too keen to just let it go again and start answering your questions... how about you answer the call out for proof of your accusations and then we can continue the conversation? Or admit that in both cases you were mistaken and we can move on from there...

 

[Lanefan]

But I would say that breaking rules does not necessarily equal fun. In fact I have played in many games where people break the rules so they can have fun that do not make it fun for everyone else - oh so you roll another Critical Hit? Wow, the tenth one out of ten rolls so far tonight, that is so fun!

Big difference between cheating and thinking way outside the box, yet both can be defined as breaking rules. Cheating, however, is no fun - as you say.

Or you could, you know, play RPGs. Because if you are going to 'win' because you are playing the hero of the story and the hero always wins in the end then you may as well just write your FR fan fic and publish it on your blog. That would save the rest of us having to turn up to the "game".

This assumes that a) you're playing a hero, and b) that heroes always win. Neither is necessarily true.

Lan-"I certainly ain't no hero"-efan

 

[Shasarak]

Big difference between cheating and thinking way outside the box, yet both can be defined as breaking rules. Cheating, however, is no fun - as you say.

Thinking outside the box does not break the rules it just throws the decision onto the DM, which is just his job really anyway..

This assumes that a) you're playing a hero, and b) that heroes always win. Neither is necessarily true.

Lan-"I certainly ain't no hero"-efan

I dont know, it is your story so you get to make that call yourself.

Did you have any comment on the comparison of the Wizard in Forgotten Realms vs Dark Sun?

 

[I'm A Banana]

I think it was @I'm A Banana that put forth that particular argument concerning canon and I believe it was along the lines of some of the points I've brought up... Consistent canon facilitates the ease of dropping into a game... it alleviates the necessity for spending time going over the campaign setup and character options allowed... and so on but he can probably speak to the specifics of his argument better than I can.

EDIT: I think part of his argument was that new canon must not only be good it must also be good enough to outweigh the conveniences lost from constantly changing canon.

I'm usually not that clever, but I do agree with that! Change canon, for any reason, and you have already incurred a not-insignificant cost. If you are the iron fisty overlords of D&D and you imagine that you can execute changes to lore because you have a much better idea, you do need to make peace with the fact that not everyone will see the same value in the change that you do, and that by throwing out the old lore you are throwing out something that is valued at some table. Your new lore doesn't just need to be "good," it needs to have a good chance of winning the gamble of having enough players finding it significantly better enough that they put it into use and don't miss the old stuff much.

Which just means that you need to be careful about the lore you want to change as a producer of Official D&D (tm) content. More careful, I think, than WotC has sometimes been (most famously, with the number and degree of changes from 4e, but 3e and 5e aren't free of this problem, it just tends to be a bit more localized).

There's a lot of advantages one can realize from using canon, including ease of communication, common expectations, and the simple expressive fun of using the setting's tropes and conflicts as your own. But, of course, none of it's necessary, and any particular group can do whatever they want.

 

[Maxperson]

By definition, again, that can't be true (something that IIRC, even @Imaro has acknowledged). You can view this in one of two ways-

a. Abstract. Imagine two different campaigns, each running OOTA "by the book." As soon as there is any difference (whether small, one person swings and hits, one person swings and misses) or large (one party kills a name NPC, one party doesn't), the worlds have diverged. They are no longer the same world.

That doesn't stop what I'm saying from being true at all. Let's imagine you and I are both running the FR. You are running a diplomatic game and I'm running a quest for the artifact game. Both of us are running canon as 100% true with no changes at all. Both of us are running perfect canon games, even though both games are going to be wildly different. The portions that we are contributing exist within the canon framework and don't affect it.

Canon doesn't mean that the table games will be identical, only that the tables are running canon.

b. Concrete. A party necessarily interacts and changes the world, from the large (as pointed out, killing Lolth in GDQ) to small (interactions with people mentioned in various campaign guides, wrecking a building, taking the treasure). At some point, the "static" canon of the page has to be altered by the play of the party. If it wasn't the case, why bother playing?

The world can be changed without changing canon, though. As to why you'd bother, I don't know. I enjoy when the players change the canon of the world and leave their mark. You can play a game where that doesn't happen, though.

 

[Maxperson]

So, on this point, the two of you seem to be contradicting each other. Which is it?

You know that he and I are two different people, and that even though we are on the same side, we can disagree with each other, right?

To me, I'm thinking that the distinction is largely superfluous. It's virtually impossible to play D&D without home brewing.

It's actually exceedingly easy. It may not be nearly as much fun as if you put your stamp on the game, but it's hardly onerous to just play by the rules and use the canon lore as it is written.

Otherwise, pretty much every campaign played on every table is home-brew to some degree.

I agree, but they don't do it because it's "virtually impossible" not to. They do it because it's more fun that way.

Which makes canon distinctions kinda pointless. It's two smurfs arguing about who is more blue.

Bluey Smurf of course.