D&D 5E Is Paladine Bahamut? Is Takhisis Tiamat? Fizban's Treasury Might Reveal The Answer!

According to WotC's James Wyatt, Fizban's Treasury of Dragons introduces a new cosmology for dragon gods, where the same beings, including Fizban, echo across various D&D campaign settings with alternate versions of themselves (presumably like Paladine/Bahamut, or Takhisis/Tiamat). Also... the various version can merge into one single form.

Takhisis is the five-headed dragon god of evil from the Dragonlance setting. Paladine is the platinum dragon god of good (and also Fizban's alter-ego).

Additionally, the book will contain psychic gem dragons, with stats for all four age categories of the five varieties (traditionally there are Amethyst, Crystal, Emerald, Sapphire, and Topaz), plus Dragonborn characters based on metallic, chromatic, and gem dragons.

D&D 5E - Check out Fizban's Alternate Cover!

WotC's James Wyatt talked to Polygon about Fizban's Treasury of Dragons, which also revealed the alternate cover, which you can only get from hobby stores. https://www.enworld.org/threads/fizbans-treasury-the-dragon-book-now-has-a-description-and-a-feat.681399/

www.enworld.org

D&D 5E - Fizban's Treasury: The Dragon Book Now Has A Description... And A Feat

Courtesy of Amazon, we now have a description for Fizban's Treasury of Dragons, the October D&D hardcover. The book introduces gem dragons, dragon-themed player options, and plenty of draconic lore! This joins September's The Wild Beyond the Witchlight, and November's Strixhaven: Curriculum of...

www.enworld.org

 

[Maxperson]

It seems to reinvent Dragons as minor deities of land and stream, as it were.

If that's the case, I expect a significant power increase and commonality decrease. I'd want a very few powerful dragons for them to be sort of like minor gods that cast shadows of themselves across the planes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yeah my LotR point was mostly just tied to "A good thing can be mad possible by a big corporation, but that doesn't necessarily mean it will be bad in quality."

As for the stuff on Star Wars... I'll just say I disagree. I don't love all three movies of the new trilogy, but I think the first two are definitely a full breadth of quality better than the prequels. I'm a younger person, and watched the prequels when I was a child (and enjoyed them), but now watching them I can only enjoy them with nostalgia glasses on. If I put my critic brain on, they're boring, bland dialogue with overly complicated politics with haphazard and predictable character development. The new movies have plenty of flaws but I can at least watch them and be entertained.

I now believe George Lucas was only able to create the incredible original films with quite a lot of studio interference, forcing him to take a step back as director (thank you Irvin Kershner), include the writing talents of Lawrence Kasdan and others, and allow the film editing talents of Paul Hirsch and Martha Lucas (he got lucky there!). The enforced budgetary concerns if anything kept the films tighter and more tonally consistent.

Rant over, I'm glad Star Wars is in other hands!

I mean even if I agreed with every point, I'd still rather have more Lucas overseen Filoni Star Wars, and eventually see it in the public domain. My enjoyment of TFA and TLJ doesn't change that, nor my strong dislike of Jar Jar Binks or the short and unsatisfying deaths of several characters to make room for more bad dialogue and drawing out Anakin's fall way longer than it needed to be.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yes, absolutely. I think @doctorbadwolf is talking about the default of the settings, not what DMs what to make of a setting for their table. And I agree with that. Different settings with different cosmologies is one of the things that I really like about the various settings. I dislike this tendency I'm seeing to want to homogenize the settings by making sure all of the races are in Dark Sun and such. Let settings be unique.

Exactly. It's really easy to fit all these worlds together in a campaign. It's harder to separate them, IMO, and it makes them less unique from the jump.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

I don't agree with that. I mean, Disney can come out tomorrow and say midichlorians are not canon, and despite hating their existence, I would scoff at the attempt. The creator is the one who knows best what is canon and what is not. The only place where I would accept the owner over the creator is when the owner creates new material to expand what we know.

"Who knows best." Ugh. This type of maximalist thinking stifles quality, whether it's believing that the old creator has final say, or the new one does.

I definitely don't feel this way. It's like when JK Rowling tweets out "Oh, actually before toilets students just pooped on the floor and magicked it away." Just... why?

The original creator is definitely not an indicator of quality writing or "Who knows best," just as a new owner isn't.

 

[Parmandur]

You can't see the connection between using it to talk about the supposed ignorance of a group of people and the superiority complex of ancient Greek and Roman society and the rhetoric used by imperialist throughout history to paint their expansion as good for the people they invade?

No, not in the slightest. That is nearly the polar opposite meaning of anything in the Republic, which is primarily a mockery and deconstruction of those who pretend to power in the Cave.

I care more about Plato than the rest, though I will note that going into a message board where Prequel fans were talking about what Midochlorians and declaring they "suck" as you oh-so eloquently phrased your opinion of the D&D cosmology, would be yucking other peoples yum, and massively condescending. Even if you are right "objectively"!

 

[Parmandur]

If that's the case, I expect a significant power increase and commonality decrease. I'd want a very few powerful dragons for them to be sort of like minor gods that cast shadows of themselves across the planes.

Well, enter the Great Wyrms, which apparently any Dragon can become.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

My desire is for settings to be built to tell their own unique story, not to support a metasetting that will never benefit 99% of games actually run in the real world, but will change the nature of individual settings and thus impact games set in those settings.

As much as I enjoy seeing Arkhan the Cruel in Avernus, that could have been done without making the entire dnd catalogue of published worlds into the same multiverse. It could be done without cheapening what Takhisis and Paladine are, or what the Progenitor Wyrms of Eberron are.

But you can still have all of that. This story changes nothing with the stories you want to tell. Everything is as you want it. This just adds another layer that can be compelling ignored with no consequences. It doesn’t affect your games at all

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Back on topic, here's an article with interesting insights; D&D dragons and gods as Planeswalkers? James Wyatt connects the dots

“There’s an idea of running through this book that every dragon has echoes of itself on other worlds of the Material plane,” Wyatt said, noting that this isn’t a Dragonlance book. “This really is a book about dragons in every D&D world, and not just any D&D world, but every D&D world.

“Dragons have these echoes that link them through some mysterious means to dragon some other worlds. And the idea behind the Great Wyrm is that, at least to some extent, some of their enhanced power comes from combining the power of multiple echoes into a single dragon. So dragons that we know from legends, like Ashardalon, Chronepsis, or Aasterinian, who have been presented as dragon gods in the past sometimes, we’re describing them as these Great Wyrms who have managed to extend their power and influence beyond a single world and combine the power of multiple echoes to become incredibly powerful creatures.”

How does this work? Wyatt explains: “A given dragon in the Forgotten Realms might have an echo on the World of Greyhawk, and develop that sense of dragonsight in order to be able to communicate, in a waking dream sort of way, with their echo in another world, and then eventually, perhaps, combine that power into a single being.”

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Back on topic, here's an article with interesting insights; D&D dragons and gods as Planeswalkers? James Wyatt connects the dots

“There’s an idea of running through this book that every dragon has echoes of itself on other worlds of the Material plane,” Wyatt said, noting that this isn’t a Dragonlance book. “This really is a book about dragons in every D&D world, and not just any D&D world, but every D&D world.

“Dragons have these echoes that link them through some mysterious means to dragon some other worlds. And the idea behind the Great Wyrm is that, at least to some extent, some of their enhanced power comes from combining the power of multiple echoes into a single dragon. So dragons that we know from legends, like Ashardalon, Chronepsis, or Aasterinian, who have been presented as dragon gods in the past sometimes, we’re describing them as these Great Wyrms who have managed to extend their power and influence beyond a single world and combine the power of multiple echoes to become incredibly powerful creatures.”

How does this work? Wyatt explains: “A given dragon in the Forgotten Realms might have an echo on the World of Greyhawk, and develop that sense of dragonsight in order to be able to communicate, in a waking dream sort of way, with their echo in another world, and then eventually, perhaps, combine that power into a single being.”

Also, two classic settings are being released in 2022.

 

[Parmandur]

Back on topic, here's an article with interesting insights; D&D dragons and gods as Planeswalkers? James Wyatt connects the dots

“There’s an idea of running through this book that every dragon has echoes of itself on other worlds of the Material plane,” Wyatt said, noting that this isn’t a Dragonlance book. “This really is a book about dragons in every D&D world, and not just any D&D world, but every D&D world.

“Dragons have these echoes that link them through some mysterious means to dragon some other worlds. And the idea behind the Great Wyrm is that, at least to some extent, some of their enhanced power comes from combining the power of multiple echoes into a single dragon. So dragons that we know from legends, like Ashardalon, Chronepsis, or Aasterinian, who have been presented as dragon gods in the past sometimes, we’re describing them as these Great Wyrms who have managed to extend their power and influence beyond a single world and combine the power of multiple echoes to become incredibly powerful creatures.”

How does this work? Wyatt explains: “A given dragon in the Forgotten Realms might have an echo on the World of Greyhawk, and develop that sense of dragonsight in order to be able to communicate, in a waking dream sort of way, with their echo in another world, and then eventually, perhaps, combine that power into a single being.”

Love it.