D&D 5E WotC Explains 'Canon' In More Detail

Recently, WotC's Jeremy Crawford indicated that only the D&D 5th Edition books were canonical for the roleplaying game. In a new blog article, Chris Perkins goes into more detail about how that works, and why.

This boils down to a few points:

• Each edition of D&D has its own canon, as does each video game, novel series, or comic book line.
• The goal is to ensure players don't feel they have to do research of 50 years of canon in order to play.
• It's about remaining consistent.

If you’re not sure what else is canonical in fifth edition, let me give you a quick primer. Strahd von Zarovich canonically sleeps in a coffin (as vampires do), Menzoberranzan is canonically a subterranean drow city under Lolth’s sway (as it has always been), and Zariel is canonically the archduke of Avernus (at least for now). Conversely, anything that transpires during an Acquisitions Incorporated live game is not canonical in fifth edition because we treat it the same as any other home game (even when members of the D&D Studio are involved).

D&D Canon | D&D Studio Blog | Dungeons & Dragons

In this D&D Studio Blog, Chris Perkins describes the D&D Studio's position on canonicity.

dnd.wizards.com

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...

www.enworld.org

 

[Faolyn]

Is there anything that doesn't? Make it your campaign to storm the city of the dead, overthrow Kelemvor and tear down the wall and see what happens next.

By that point the PCs are likely demigods themselves at very least, one of them maybe even the new lord of death, and at that point in a position to talk to Ao.

And since we all know that adventuring parties almost never get this high of a level...

 

[Mirtek]

And since we all know that adventuring parties almost never get this high of a level...

If the characters are not high level enough, they're also not going to stop that ancient dragon over yonder that insinst on eating virgin sacrifices or stop the slavery in Thay or ....

Big injustices on a cosmic scale are rarely overcome by heroes that are not on a cosmic scale themselves

Sure - who want's people who will complain the whole time because they are salty that even in death some "gods" claim them

The evil deities would take and devour them in a heartbeat I guess. If they taste strange they could still serve as planar currency. Anything is better than letting a rival deity with no claim have them, while you could be the deity without claim that gets to have them.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Atheism isn't a religion, is it? Leaving aside relatively subtle questions, like whether (at least some) Buddhists are atheists - whatever the best view in real life, in D&D I think they wouldn't count as such - atheism is the denial of religious assertions, not another religious assertion.

I'm an atheist. You don't need to explain atheism to me, dude. That's why I said "even if their belief system (or lack thereof) is objectively wrong in that setting". Atheism is a lack of a belief system, which I specified and addressed. That doesn't make it any less problematic.

Not only am I not offended by this Wall of the Faithless thing in FR, as I posted I think it's the most interesting thing I've ever heard about FR.

Yes, I saw that. I don't see at all how that negates anything I said. I know you likely don't mean any offense, nor did whomever created the concept of the Wall of the Faithless (was it Ed Greenwood?) but that doesn't prevent it from offending me and others that asked for it to be removed.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

As am I. Putting myself in a magical world, where Gods do exist, where realms exist which they dwell in, which all fall into various Alignments. Well the Wall makes perfect sense.

Thankfully for you, you can dismiss, ignore, or rest easy knowing that it will likely never be canon again.

To be offended that a world where Gods factually exist, and punish nonbelievers...in a fantasy setting?

Nah.

I'm against any real world groups getting any treatments similar to this in fantasy worlds. I'd be against making any real world cultural, ethnic, religious, or other groups have in-game/world punishments (even if they aren't likely to come up), because it's just unnecessary and inherently problematic.

Take Eberron, for example, as a world where the gods may or may not exist. There's no need for a Wall of the Faithless because either the Atheist or the Theist could be correct. FR doesn't even need a Wall of the Faithless. It's unnecessary and won't come into play in 99.99% of FR campaigns.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

And other RL groups are offended by and have protest agains the very existance of magic and multiple deities and by extension the very game itself. You can't please everyone.

So, you're saying because some people went too far and wanted to destroy the game (I'm assuming you are referring to the Satanic Panic), neither I nor anyone else in the real world is allowed to ask for something in the game that they find offensive to them and the cultural/religious/ethnic/racial group that they belong to to be removed?

Yeah. Um. Good luck (not) supporting that argument.

By the same measure of this "logic", the Romani people aren't allowed to be offended by the Vistani, Mongolians aren't allowed to be offended by J.R.R. Tolkien's comparison of Orcs to Mongols, and no other group in the real world is allowed to be offended by the presence of their culture in the fantasy world being presented in an "unflattering light" (to say the least).

"Not being able to please anyone" is absolutely no excuse to go out of your way to offend people.

 

[FrozenNorth]

I find the idea of atheists in a setting of gods and heavens, and hell's questionable.

Traditionally, the wall of the Faithless also caught those who refused to worship any god. Faerun being what it is, I can easily imagine people fed up with all of them refusing to worship any.

 

[FrozenNorth]

Someone above said it was easier to remove than to add. It's easier to remove alignment from your monsters than to add it if it's not there.

The claim being made goes a step further: that having the alignment in the monster description and not in the stat block is not acceptable. Like @Faolyn , I fail to see how that is a compomise in any meaningful way.

 

[Maxperson]

Whataboutism has no validity on any level, ever.

Excellent. Had I used it, you'd have a point. It wasn't whataboutism. It was about demonstrating that your ideals would remove all bad stuff from the game if they were applied everywhere they should be.

If people read the lore for Thay and felt uneasy because the description reminded them of real world slavery in a way that felt like the game echoing the rhetoric of slavers and apologists, it would need to be changed.

I agree. Tables should be making these decisions for themselves, not having individuals who are uneasy making it for them. If slavery, murder or unfaithful people being stuck in a wall makes you uneasy, remove them.

The harm might be such that alteration would be insufficient and it would have to be removed instead, but it might well be perfectly fine to simply make Thayan slavery function more like Roman slavery and also be a thing being actively resisted by the few Good factions within Thay, and even some of the more neutral folks, thus marking it as something the setting recognizes as a bad thing.

That's also a good fix for your game.

If Cormyr had chattel slavery but remained otherwise the "Good forest kingdom", it would be a unacceptable.

Why? I mean, it wouldn't make sense, but other than not making sense for the good kingdom to have slaves, why would it be unacceptable?

That literally is their lore before Tasha's. From their 5e inception they had access to cantrips that do exactly that, and have had the shadowblade spell for a long time as well. What's more, turns don't exist. Rounds don't exist. There is no in-fiction difference between stabbing mundanely and then using Booming Blade and stabbing mundanely and then using Booming Blade.

But they couldn't use a cantrip and swing a sword at the same time or within the same few seconds like they can now. The lore has changed. And booming blade is an exception built into booming blade. It doesn't counter what I'm talking about. I'm talking about swinging and hurling a firebolt and the like. That's a significant change to the lore of the class.

 

[Maxperson]

And the other gods just let him have those?

They can't take those who aren't their followers. That way lies war among the gods, which is bad for everyone, including the gods. The domain of death is the appropriate place.

 

[Maxperson]

The Wall and things like the way drow or the Vistani are/used to be presented aren't things the PCs can fix. They're setting elements you're supposed to accept just because they're setting elements, even if they're really toxic. These are things that the writers need to fix.

The Vistani, are the ONE change WotC has made that I agree with. The PCs can change how drow are or how orcs are, but it would be a very high level, very epic adventure to change something like that.

There is zero reason why there needs to be a WotF in the first place, especially when it's far more sensible to say that atheist souls just vanish into oblivion.

There's as much reason to have it as not to have it. It's just a prop for the game and if a table is uncomfortable with it, it should be removed by them. If the table likes it, there's absolutely nothing wrong with them keeping it as is.