D&D General WotC: Novels & Non-5E Lore Are Officially Not Canon

At a media press briefing last week, WotC's Jeremey Crawford clarified what is and is not canon for D&D.

"For many years, we in the Dungeons & Dragons RPG studio have considered things like D&D novels, D&D video games, D&D comic books, as wonderful expressions of D&D storytelling and D&D lore, but they are not canonical for the D&D roleplaying game."

"If you’re looking for what’s official in the D&D roleplaying game, it’s what appears in the products for the roleplaying game. Basically, our stance is that if it has not appeared in a book since 2014, we don’t consider it canonical for the games."

2014 is the year that D&D 5th Edition launched.

He goes on to say that WotC takes inspiration from past lore and sometimes adds them into official lore.

Over the past five decades of D&D, there have been hundreds of novels, more than five editions of the game, about a hundred video games, and various other items such as comic books, and more. None of this is canon. Crawford explains that this is because they "don’t want DMs to feel that in order to run the game, they need to read a certain set of novels."

He cites the Dragonlance adventures, specifically.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I don’t understand this. The setting is absolutely existent, and it has never been canon to 5e lore. This changes nothing for PoLand.

Official representation matters. Official removal from official representation, unless and until someone decides otherwise, likewise matters.

It may not matter a lot. But it does matter.

I had a similar response to the "Star Wars Legends" concept.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

All this demonstrates is that you are not reading what others are saying. Something very much is lost, in dismissing anything before 5e as 'not canon'. It boggles the mind how anyone can not see this.

It's "not canon" for the purpose of current and future D&D books. It's not lost, as the books, video games, and other content with previously-canon lore are still existent. You can still use anything you want from those in your games, as can WotC for their future books.

It boggles the mind how anyone could think that it's "ruining the Forgotten Realms [and other settings]" by making the statement that WotC isn't beholden to the lore of past authors.

I mean really, they own it. They own all of that lore. They're bloody well allowed to say "we don't have to use any of that previous stuff, and neither does anyone else" as the owners of those IPs.

 

[Scribe]

I mean really, they own it. They own all of that lore. They're bloody well allowed to say "we don't have to use any of that previous stuff, and neither does anyone else" as the owners of those IPs.

Again, missing the point.

EDIT: Heres a post from a 'suggested thread'.

D&D General - Do you care about lore?

This came up in one of the Ravenloft threads and I am just curious: do you care about official aka "canon" lore for D&D, either the implied setting or a specific campaign world? Does it bother you if that lore is changed with editions? Should a new version of a setting be "required" to not...

www.enworld.org

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Again, missing the point.

And that is . . . ?

 

[Scribe]

And that is . . . ?

That lore, all of it, contradictory, ugly, good, bad, forgettable, forms the total picture of the settings.

To just wave it away, lessens the settings, TO ME.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

That lore, all of it, contradictory, ugly, good, bad, forgettable, forms the total picture of the settings.

But, again, the DM makes the lore. WotC (and TSR before them) just write the stuff. No one is or ever was required to use it as a DM at their table.

To just wave it away, lessens the settings, TO ME.

And I'm sorry that it feels that way, but for reasons that I outlined in this post, I am highly in favor of the change.

And I'm of the opinion that nothing is being "wave[d] away". They're putting it on the shelf. Not in use right now, but by no means never going to be used again. And, you can still use that. The DM makes the setting, not WotC. (Even if you say "but what about describing the setting to players!?", you can still describe the setting in the now non-canon way that it was before. Nothing is stopping that.)

 

[Yaarel]

Official representation matters. Official removal from official representation, unless and until someone decides otherwise, likewise matters.

It may not matter a lot. But it does matter.

I had a similar response to the "Star Wars Legends" concept.

It isnt really "removed", its more like existing in a parallel universe. Maybe parallel timelines.

The 5e core books officially are a canon. (Really, each setting has its own canon.)

5e Eberron definitely has one canon that is official and a different canon that Baker collaborates on for his own games.

New movies and books about 5e Forgotten Realms have their own canon.

4e has its own canon. With grand unification and "everything is core", 4e is probably the only edition that has a comprehensive and consistent canon.

3e settings have their own canon. 3e canon can be quite different from 2e canon.

1e never had a canon. 2e invented a canon, as if "everything in 1e is canon".

 

[Scribe]

But, again, the DM makes the lore. WotC (and TSR before them) just write the stuff. No one is or ever was required to use it as a DM at their table.

Not.The.Point. I've said as much. Multiple times.

Everyone refuses to acknowledge what I'm saying, while cheering that DM's are free. They have always been free.

This is literally just one more example of something being taken away in an 'official' way, where it could have coexisted as it always has, and I'm being told that not only is what I would prefer wrong, but that I am a bad person because of it.

 

[Charlaquin]

Official representation matters. Official removal from official representation, unless and until someone decides otherwise, likewise matters.

It may not matter a lot. But it does matter.

I had a similar response to the "Star Wars Legends" concept.

I get that, even if I don’t really agree, but what I’m getting at is that PoLand was already officially removed from official representation back in 2012 when they decided 5e would be going back to the Great Wheel cosmology. And if there was still any doubt in anyone’s mind, it was put to rest when they re-wrote the Raven Queen. And if there was still any hope it died when Mike Mearls re-wrote the rest of the lore for Heroes of the Vale. And in case any of it somehow managed to survive Todd Kenrick gave it the double-tap when he took over Heroes of the Vale and had the characters get transported to the Forgotten Realms.

 

[Charlaquin]

Not.The.Point. I've said as much. Multiple times.

Everyone refuses to acknowledge what I'm saying, while cheering that DM's are free. They have always been free.

This is literally just one more example of something being taken away in an 'official' way, where it could have coexisted as it always has, and I'm being told that not only is what I would prefer wrong, but that I am a bad person because of it.

What’s being taken away though? It’s not like Salvatore isn’t allowed to write new books, or won’t be allowed to keep them in the same continuity as the previous books, or will be forced to incorporate things in future books he doesn’t want to include. If you acknowledge that DMs have always been free, what do you see this actually changing?