D&D 5E Iggwilv/Tasha To Join Volo, Xanathar, and Mordenkainen? [UPDATED!]

Is WotC teasing a new announcement? There have been a few D&D books named after famous personalities from the game's extensive lore - Vole's Guide to Monsters, Xanathar's Guide to Everything, Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. It looks possible that the next such personality might be Tasha of Tasha's Hideous Laughter fame -- which was an adventuring alias of the Greyhawk villain Iggwilv.

UPDATE -- A page has appeared on Amazon entitled Dungeons & Dragons November Title (Announced August 24). It's a hardcover, $49.95, November 17th release date.

On their Discord channel, WotC posted a short audio clip; it features some female-sounding voices laughing, and it is titled "Feather and Tart". It also has a metadata info which says August 24th, 2020, which is Monday. But in addition to that, a WoTC staff member on Reddit's avatar was changed to an image of Iggwilv.

Iggwilv was an evil magic-user, a villain created by Gary Gygax. When adventuring with the Company of Seven, she used the alias Tasha. The lore has it that the witch Baba Yaga adopted her as a child and named her Natasha, and she soon became Natasha the Dark (Baba Yaga also adopted Elena the Fair).

Iggwilv has two forms, one old and one young. You can read more about the character on Wikipedia.


What does seem clear is that WotC is teasing an impending announcement! I assume that the announcement they are teasing will be the announcement of an upcoming announcement, or I'll be disappointed.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I misspoke a bit, Iggwilv's Demonicon wasn't a book release, but rather a series of magazine articles in Dragon Magazine. Not sure of the era/edition.

The Demonicon of Iggwilv was printed as a large pull out section in S4 The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth, so it was a book, of sorts. 1st Edition.


NB, the new book is called the Kittenomicon of Tasha.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

It really was not. Dragon Mag isn't official. And that article was just acknowledging a prior article called her that. Which isn't lore man, it's just acknowledging someone called her that in a prior Dragon magazine.

Let me know when it ends up in a setting book. Or even an official adventure. Until it does, it's just dragon magazine extra content which just plain isn't official stuff. Often, it's just like UA stuff is now - testing ideas out.

The 4e Dragon and Dungeon Magazine article content is official lore. It is official canon for the edition it supports. It was not in any way treated as less than canon during publication.

It’s an entirely different sort of things from other eras of the magazines.

 

[Todd Roybark]

But deciding what constitutes 'Official Canon' in that department by drawing arbitrary lines to exclude stuff that doesn't fit your interpretation doesn't seem like it's real logically defensible.

From a practical and historical perspective all Canon decisions are arbitrary.
The Nag Hammadi texts are out of the Bible, the Book of Matthew is in.
The reasons for why this is, comes down to arbitrary preference and interpretation...even if depending on your view it is Divinely inspired arbitrary preference.

An officially released publication by the owners of the IP is apocryphal. Yep. Sure. Ahhh

Apocryphal at it's root essentially means obscure. Exp. to the Ruins of Castle Greyhawk seems to me to be a fairly obscure title.

WotC essentially had ceded Greyhawk to Paizo Dragon. The fact that the holders of the IP, hired what became their main RPG competition for 4e D&D to write one of the last products for 3e...I think is a pretty good indicator, that WotC was just out for the last dollars it could get from 3e and frankly did not care about Greyhawk at all.

Quentin, I have to ask...do you ever have a happy post? You seem snarky, a lot.

that has 2 editions worth of history and consistency?

Dude, the 3.5 product came out in 2007. The 4e Dragon article was in 2008 (?).....we are not talking about some decades long tradition....it is, in the scope of D&D history, a footnote.

I don't care about Canon, I run my games and I make whatever changes I wish....but Iggwiliv=Tasha adds no Story value to Iggwiliv.

Indeed it obscures the story of how Tasha's Hideous Laughter spell actually got it's name.
The real story behind the spell name is sweet and touching.
Obscuring it is a shame.

Iggwiliv is probably a Warlock in 5e, and doesn't even have Tasha's Hideous Laughter on her spell list.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

There is no canon.

But if WotC in 2020 decide to go with Iggwilv = Tasha for purposes of fluffing a book, that's up to them. You don't have to use it in your game.

 

[Todd Roybark]

It's only a weird subset of greyhawk fans who are mad at Mona for invalidating deeply held Canon

Sorry, this generalization is incorrect.
I know Iggwiliv from Tsojcanth. I like the vague details about her in that module. It leaves room for the imagination, and space for DMs to create.

I frankly don't care about any D&D "Canon"...it is a TTRPG not a soap opera or comic book.
I don't follow FR or Greyhawk histories...my games are not subject to novels and so forth.
The Time of Troubles in the FR taught me the lesson of decoupling the home game, from novelizations.

Reboots, (in part) happen when the history of a product impedes being able to be creative with the material. The history restrains what you can do.

I would argue that the Iggwiliv referenced in the Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth, being a Legendary Name with scant details gives DMs more creative freedom to create the villain they want or need...then the more tightly scripted Iggwiliv is person X and Person Y and Person Z who invented Jiffy Pop.

 

[Matrix Sorcica]

I'm mostly surprised WotC has actually managed to have a release not spoilered by Amazon, blogs, hype-millers, "mistakes" and what not.

 

[Quartz]

In one of the Greyhawk modules you got to explore Castle Greyhawk and you could find the body of Tasha, who was replaced by Iggwilv. (And free Robilar who was replaced by Bilarro.) Did anyone who played the module resurrect Tasha?

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Iggwilv is too evil and linked with infernal powers for a no-fiendish codex compedium.

What about an updated version of the lost cavers of Tsojcanth?

* The "retcons" (and others things like Mandela effects or false memories) is by fault of chronomancers altering the space-time continium and some wizards who tried to open a portal to the akashic realm/ideaverse (a demiplane as a "snow globe", a copy of the remembered past, created by the collective memory, but not how it happened really). One of the example of this crazy alterations were some characters from the module Castle Grayhawk, as Prof. Why, Indiana Gnomes, the amazin driderman, or the inedible bulk. Although anytimes they weren't accidents, but somebody who wanted to cause chaos to have fun.

 

[dave2008]

I'm mostly surprised WotC has actually managed to have a release not spoilered by Amazon, blogs, hype-millers, "mistakes" and what not.

Its not Monday yet!

 

[dave2008]

Iggwilv is too evil and linked with infernal powers for a no-fiendish codex compedium.

Is she though? Is she massively more evil than Xanthar? She is a crucial help to the PCs in Savage Tides after all. I'm not saying she isn't evil, but I don't think that would WotC from using here name to sell a book that is not a fiendish codex.