D&D 5E Do you care about setting "canon"?

[Corwin]

I'm not arguing entirely against change. Continuity can and should progress. The world should grow and shift and alter naturally. Characters die or retire, kings are overthrown, villains are defeated, etc. That's all good. But that doesn't change canon, that adds to canon.

Good luck convincing some here of this...

The various major upheavals and "game-changing" developments along the timelines/editions of the Forgotten Realms, such as the Spellplague to name just one contentions example, would fit into your definition as well. But to many, some of them were the worst thing ever to happen to their beloved setting. So, as a few here have continued to press upon: "good" changes are "canon enhancing", "bad" changes are "cannon destroying." And *that* is subjective.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Jester David]

Good luck convincing some here of this...

The various major upheavals and "game-changing" developments along the timelines/editions of the Forgotten Realms, such as the Spellplague to name just one contentions example, would fit into your definition as well. But to many, some of them were the worst thing ever to happen to their beloved setting. So, as a few here have continued to press upon: "good" changes are "canon enhancing", "bad" changes are "cannon destroying." And *that* is subjective.

The Spellplague is tricky as it has elements of both.
It was also an example of "blowing up the moon" and massive, sweeping changes, which are a related gripe. There's overlap, but they're different discussions.

Much of the Spellplague was additive canon. The death of Mystra and 100 year time jump. Things didn't change, they advanced. The plot progressed.
Even retcons like Abeir being a twin world was additive. It was a change, but not a single line of past books was really altered. It was an additive change. It added to canon and didn't take away.

Then there were things like grey elves being eladrin from the Feywild... Now, I *like* the idea of faerie elves and the Feywild. A lot. But changing half the elves in the setting and giving them planar teleportation powers is a bit much. Suddenly you had to reconcile every appearance of high/grey elves in 25 years of products with this chanted information. It was unneeded. They could have just added eladrin as something new. Like a Eberron did, nicely integrating the new race. But instead, canon change.

 

[Jester David]

And when fans demand too much, you have to retcon. You have to reboot. You have to reconcile. Different stories happen in different media. Different actors are available. Different writers have different strengths. And what always (and I mean always!) happens is that those things that are good, get accepted, and those things that are bad, get discarded.

Sprawling canon is an excuse for the pre-internet age. There is a wiki for all fandom.

Now, accidents do happen. People are human and it's impossible to avoid continuity mistakes. I don't care about those. Errors happen and I'm not going to fault someone for not being imperfect.
And TV often gets a pass for stuff like actors, sets, offhand lines, etc.

I reserve my ire for purposeful changes. Obvious ones where even a *minimum* amount of research would have revealed the canon. Where someone actively choose to ignore what was written and do their own thing.
When I sit down to watch an episode of Star Trek, I'm not interested in watching someone's sci-fi story set in their own universe. I want to watch Star Trek. If you can't stick to the series bible or read Memory Alpha before writing a script, if you can't tell a story within the constraints of the series, then you're in the wrong damn job. Period.

 

[Shasarak]

So, you agree that addition=change. Cool. We're on the same page then.

I dont even know what you are talking about now, addition = change?

Does the addition of Eladrin to Planescape change the Forgotten Realms? No.

Does the change of Elves in Forgotten Realms to Eladrin change the Forgotten Realms? Yes.

So no, addition does not equal change.

 

[Shasarak]

On the notion of the OA lore.

Isn't it interesting that we can negate one settings lore ((The people in OA are factually wrong about the nature of their universe)) based on another setting's lore, but, apparently, we are not allowed to do the same in reverse. 4e, to use that example, says that people were actually mistaken about the nature of Eladrin. Here's the correct information.

But, that's completely unacceptable...

The people in OA are not factually wrong about their universe, Pemerton is just using his DMs prerogative to change the nature of their universe to something that is different to that in the OAs book.

Which is completely acceptable.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Jester David]

...and yet, you seem to have overlooked a very important thing regarding this so-called golden age of internet-enabled wiki-powered fan smothering.

What has actually happened? Well, let's look at the major nerdfests, shall we?

1. Star Trek! Reboot of canon (Kelvin timeline). Huh, okay.
2. Star Wars! Total annihilation of almost all canon (like Anakin and the baby jedi, so too was Disney and the expanded universe). Hmmm.....
3. Doctor Who! Umm... there is no canon. But hey, about that limit on regenerations .... thank goodness for timey-wimey!
4. James Bond! Rebooted. Blond Bond (and gritty!).
5. Marvel Comics! Rebooted, again, most recently with the "All new, all different" tags. You might be aware of this given the recent provenance.
6. DC Comics! Um, yeah, just rebooted too.
7. DCU! Well, we are just starting the most recent DC Universe, replacing the dreck from as far back as 2012 (Dark Knight Rises) which is part of the Nolan trilogy (2005-2012) which replaced the 1989-97 series, which itself wasn't big on canon.
8. MCU! Fairly consistent canon ... for eight years. Ignoring the other contemporaneous Marvel characters that other studios own the rights to. In addition, Feige has been inconsistent about canon after the current "trilogy" is finished.

...should I keep going? Do you see a trend here? The love of canon and the internet age (what you claim to appreciate) is the exact thing that also requires the constant reboots and retcons (which you claim to hate). Like peanut butter and jelly.

1) Star Trek. They just decoupled the movie and television canons, as those are different studios now. Discovery is going back to the old continuity.
2) The EU was never canon. Fans liked to pretend, but Clone Wars run roughshod over the EU as well.
3) Doctor Who's canon has always been loose. I love canon and continuity, but applying that to Doctor Who leads to madness. It's a big old exception.
4) Bond has canon?
5 & 6) I stopped reading Marvel when it rebooted Spidey to erase every story I owned from canon, and DC after the new 52. (Comic sales have been on a slow decline for decades, so how is constant change working for them?)
7 & 8) Movies having a "canon" is pretty new. A result of long lasting franchises.

Really, apart from a few rare exception franchises, continuity applies to serial storytelling. Novels, television, video games, etc. Tabletop gaming tends to fall under that.
How many TV shows do you have represented above? One: Doctor Who. Which is an exception to most rules. And with new extended franchises, movies are *adding* continuity like never before, even to action moves like the Fast & Furious.

Your evidence is faulty, so I wholly reject your conclusion.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Shasarak]

The Spellplague is tricky as it has elements of both.
It was also an example of "blowing up the moon" and massive, sweeping changes, which are a related gripe. There's overlap, but they're different discussions.

Much of the Spellplague was additive canon. The death of Mystra and 100 year time jump. Things didn't change, they advanced. The plot progressed.
Even retcons like Abeir being a twin world was additive. It was a change, but not a single line of past books was really altered. It was an additive change. It added to canon and didn't take away.

Then there were things like grey elves being eladrin from the Feywild... Now, I *like* the idea of faerie elves and the Feywild. A lot. But changing half the elves in the setting and giving them planar teleportation powers is a bit much. Suddenly you had to reconcile every appearance of high/grey elves in 25 years of products with this chanted information. It was unneeded. They could have just added eladrin as something new. Like a Eberron did, nicely integrating the new race. But instead, canon change.

I would disagree that a 100 year time jump is additive. If you look at a normal human a 100 year jump would mean that not only are you dead, but your children and their children are dead, so all the NPCs that you knew in Waterdeep are all gone.

A much better idea would have been maybe a 10 or 20 year jump which allows you to bring in a new generation without necessarily having to get rid of favourite characters.

The twin world debacle was also subtractive if the bits you liked were the ones crushed under the new lands.