WotC Dragonlance: Everything You Need For Shadow of the Dragon Queen

WotC has shared a video explaining the Dragonlance setting, and what to expect when it is released in December.

World at War: Introduces war as a genre of play to fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons.

Dragonlance: Introduces the Dragonlance setting with a focus on the War of the Lance and an overview of what players and DMs need to run adventures during this world spanning conflict.

Heroes of War: Provides character creation rules highlighting core elements of the Dragonlance setting, including the kender race and new backgrounds for the Knight of Solamnia and Mage of High Sorcery magic-users. Also introduces the Lunar Sorcery sorcerer subclass with new spells that bind your character to Krynn's three mystical moons and imbues you with lunar magic.

Villains: Pits heroes against the infamous death knight Lord Soth and his army of draconians.

Notes --

• 224 page hardcover adventure
• D&D's setting for war
• Set in eastern Solamnia
• War is represented by context -- it's not goblins attacking the village, but evil forces; refugees, rumours
• You can play anything from D&D - clerics included, although many classic D&D elements have been forgotten
• Introductory scenarios bring you up to speed on the world so no prior research needed

 

[Fifth Element]

I believe that the current group of writers and freelances employed by WotC are straight-up not as talented as those that worked on D&D under the TSR banner. i.e. WotC 'worldbuilding' is so superficial precisely because they are literally incapable of doing anything better.

Here's an alternate hypothesis: since we have sales data from the TSR era and therefore know that many of their settings sold like naughty word, they know that writing in that way drives sales down because it appeals to too small a subset of players. So maybe assuming incompetence is unfair to the human beings you so easily deride?

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

The old setting book mentioned that characters CAN come from other worlds. So you COULD play an Orc or Drow etc who somehow got transported to Krynn (magical teleport gone wrong?) You would be singular/unique more than likely.

So why ban Orcs if they can come from other worlds?

Poe-TAY-toe, poe-TAH-toe. The Silver Flame is a literal manifesting of divine power. It has a champion that it "speaks" with and faith in it fuels clerical energy. It's not a God like Zeus, but if you want proof of the divine, Eberron is full of it.

There's a big difference between "divine" and "god" in Eberron. Angels are divine. If you worship an angel, you can become a Cleric. But they're not gods. Eberron requires that a true god be omniscient and omnipotent, which the Silver Flame definitely isn't. Keith Baker has even said that if Bahamut or some other god from the Forgotten Realms/Planescape came to Eberron and declared themselves a god, the people of Eberron would reject them and use the fact that he's not omnipotent to prove that he's not a "god".

The definition of a god matters in Eberron.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well there have been several people telling me that WotC is ruining the setting, Dragonlance is only a money grab nostalgia hack, WotC is creatively bankrupt and I’m sure other bits as well.

Does seem to me there are lots of people who want to tell me what I should run at my table.

Even of all of that about WotC and Dragonlance is true, what does any of it have to with your table?

 

[mamba]

So why ban Orcs if they can come from other worlds?

No one is banning Orcs, all that was said is that Orcs are not native to Krynn and someone wondered what that means for Half-Orc players. Somehow this is still going despite this being completely trivial

 

[Micah Sweet]

So why ban Orcs if they can come from other worlds?

There's a big difference between "divine" and "god" in Eberron. Angels are divine. If you worship an angel, you can become a Cleric. But they're not gods. Eberron requires that a true god be omniscient and omnipotent, which the Silver Flame definitely isn't. Keith Baker has even said that if Bahamut or some other god from the Forgotten Realms/Planescape came to Eberron and declared themselves a god, the people of Eberron would reject them and use the fact that he's not omnipotent to prove that he's not a "god".

The definition of a god matters in Eberron.

But it's also different from the definition in virtually every other campaign WotC has ever produced, while not actually affecting the beings in question at all. So it has no more meaning than what the people who believe it give to it.

 

[Maxperson]

Ah, back then, when everyone had a Tarrasque or a couple Balors at the bottom of the dungeon, maybe even an Asmodeus if you were particularly unlucky.

In junior high I did that! Every room with a monster in it and maybe a trap. No rhyme or reason to the dungeons. Ahh, to be young again.

 

[Kai Lord]

Oh man that totally reminds me of the time my buddy in early high school (I'm sure it was freshman year) ran "The Mines of Bloodstone" and early on in the adventure the party was traveling across the countryside in broad daylight until the DM declared that suddenly the ground shook, then opened, then ORCUS THE DEMON LORD clawed his way to the surface, stood before us and roared "I'M FREE!!!!" We were all "holy crap!" and then just as suddenly the DM looked back at the text and said, "oh hold on a second. Oh crap I totally read that wrong. Shoot um okay Orcus actually crawls back down into the ground and the hole seals up. Where are you heading again?"

Needless to say our mouths were on the floor and I don't think we composed a straight answer for quite some time. The most hilarious bit wasn't even that he randomly goofed and had Orcus just appear in front of the party for no reason (in like the first or second session) but that instead of just saying "never mind that didn't happen" no he just rode it out and had Orcus change his mind and go back down into the ground, lol.

 

[Fifth Element]

I have 2 players that 9 times out of 10 play Dragonborn. And one those will ALWAYS play a Beast Master Ranger. Another player always plays the Thief/Rogue. Another most of the time will play a Druid.

It's like the are afraid to break out of their comfort zone.

Or like they prefer to play elfgames the way they prefer to play elfgames, and maybe you should stop judging them for how they prefer to play elfgames. "Afraid" has nothing to do with it.

 

[Fifth Element]

I don't think "say yes" makes players lazy and less creative. In my experience, it has only ever encouraged more creativity. I think that your two players just weren't imaginative.

I agree with your post, but I will say people should stop describing these players who prefer to play certain character types in negative terms. Maybe they just don't value playing different character types all the time? Maybe they just get more out of the game by playing something they know really well? If that's the case, more power to them.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Who said only Goldmoon was called by the deities for a sacred mission? Maybe when Ariakas became Takishis's cleric the other deities also chosen their own clerics, but it had to be secret. Or those chosen ones weren't really clerics but something like warloks.

In my game there are psionic powers (mainly by the order of the seekers) but also primal magic (rangers, druids, shamans..) even after the Cataclysm. And if I want there are crusaders (ki martial maneuvers) among the different knight orders, and "cavaliers".