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

 

[Maxperson]

Really, it's a nothingburger except to point out a campaign with "no clerics/magic healing" effectively neuters a good 70% of the game, and such restrictions (without something to compensate for the loss) tend to cause massive problems over the life of the campaign.

Not really. 120 days can pass really quickly in a war setting.

I wonder, would a 4e game set before the Return of the Gods still allow martial healing? If not, why not?

I would think so, since it's not magical and not really healing. You're just getting fatigue, luck, etc. back.

 

[Remathilis]

Not really. 120 days can pass really quickly in a war setting.

I would think so, since it's not magical and not really healing. You're just getting fatigue, luck, etc. back.

So my way around the "no cleric/no healer" rule would be to play a Warlord. Thanks.

 

[Maxperson]

So my way around the "no cleric/no healer" rule would be to play a Warlord. Thanks.

If it was 4e, sure. There's no warlord in 5e yet. Some day hopefully. Along with my psion.

 

[Veltharis ap Rylix]

No, that's wrong. Is an addition that doesn't run contrary to what came before. A retcon changes something previously established. The races of Eberron, including the "other races." was established in the first book. Dragonborn and Tieflings were not among the "other races."

With all due respect, the "other races" section in the original Eberron campaign setting book was never meant to be a comprehensive list of every other potentially playable race option in the setting. It's primarily just there to note that orcs, goblinoids, gnolls, etc. are races that have a more significant and less inherently antagonistic place in Eberron than they do in other settings.

It says nothing of minotaurs or yuan-ti either, yet each have places in the setting as well.

 

[Remathilis]

If it was 4e, sure. There's no warlord in 5e yet. Some day hopefully. Along with my psion.

The Level Up version is fine enough for me.

 

[Velderan]

So yeah, any DM willing to trash that much of the game is a DM I would run, not walk away from. But that is the same kind of design that keeps me away from any "low magic" setting or classic Dark Sun.

And that's your preference for setting style.

However in general if a DM held a session 0 or w/e to pitch "hey guys, I had this idea I wanted to run" and didn't explain what the design intent was if a player said "well I really wanted to play this class/race that you don't want to allow", that does sound like a pretty crappy DM. Who even does that? If you (not you Remathilis, but you in general) have ever had a DM like that, I'm sorry you had that experience and hopefully you've found players that actually discuss campaign parameters and run things everyone is excited to play because there's just too much material out there to not find something to run that won't cause disagreement.

As someone prepping a DL1-14 campaign, I'm sticking to the traditional race and early class restrictions. My table is fine with it because we talked and I gave them enough info to explain why those are the parameters we're playing in. If they weren't fine with it, I would have not chosen DL1-14 and gasp ran something else more their style instead of running something I'd personally find to be watered down and uninteresting.

 

[Velderan]

I wonder, would a 4e game set before the Return of the Gods still allow a Warlord's martial healing? If not, why not?

I know your question was about 4E, but for my table's 5E game, anything considered divine won't work to start in DL1. So paladin lay on hands would not work. Healing that isn't divine, such as a monk's Wholeness of Body or a Fighter's Second Wind, would work normally since their power isn't described as being granted by a god. We don't have a bard, so I don't need to address the healing magic they get, but likely wouldn't allow those spells at the start. Why? I guess I'd say part of a bard's healing spell is a prayer in the form of song to Branchala so at least it's consistent with the other classes not having their healing spells.

 

[Faolyn]

Okay, but this isn't the argument being made here. The argument being made here is that the design that went into Theros as a MtG setting make

Heh. Yes, actually, it does.

Theros was built with certain setting-rules. It was later turned into a D&D setting, and so it got to keep its original expectations.

Dragonlance was built for D&D

Name a fantasy RPG setting that I can't easily play in with the D&D rules.

I already mentioned one: Discworld. Incompatible flavor, races, magic systems, everything. Does OK with GURPS.

I can't say I've played a lot of different fantasy RPGs besides D&D--when we play non-D&D, we stay away from medieval fantasy. I've always wanted to play games like Troika! and Thirsty Sword Lesbians, and those settings (not that TSL is limited to fantasy) wouldn't work in D&D either.

Sure it would. Vancian casting. Clerics. Barbarians. Rogues. All the classes are there, as are multiple forms of magic. Monsters to kill. Quests to be had. All you have to do is run D&D as a comical style game on that world. I can easily run Discworld using D&D rules.

Have--have you actually read any Discworld?

Vancian casting was only used as a joke in the first book where it was mentioned, and then never brought up again. In fact, it's been shown that wizards who care about it can either make spells up on the fly or can effectively "reprogram" magic through cleverness, experimentation, and by using HEX. Wizards rarely actually use magic, primarily because it involves effort that could be better spent on eating. Witches rarely use magic either because they can get what they want through other means. Priests don't have any magic. They're just people in religious office. They don't even have "clerical skills" like mundane healing unless they learned it from another source. The barbarians are barely barbaric; they're mostly just unwashed. The rogues aren't sneaky as they have a legal right to steal (at least in Ankh-Morepork). Even the assassins are only sneaky because it's considered poor form to be clumsy--why did we spend all that money for you to go to assassin school if you're going to be a klutz? Most of the "monsters" are people and because of that, they almost never get killed. There are practically no quests.

A Discworld GM that doesn't understand that and tries to shoehorn the setting into D&D would be terrible.

 

[Maxperson]

Heh. Yes, actually, it does.

Theros was built with certain setting-rules. It was later turned into a D&D setting, and so it got to keep its original expectations.

It didn't. I have the Theros book. There's nothing in there about 5 colors. You can play any D&D race you want. And on and on. It didn't keep the original expectations at all.

Dragonlance was built for D&D

So is this Theros setting.

I already mentioned one: Discworld. Incompatible flavor, races, magic systems, everything.

It's not incompatible at all. I love Discworld and vancian casting, divine casting, all the classses, magic items, etc. fit right in with D&D just fine. All the DM needs to do is come up with silly stories.

Troika! and Thirsty Sword Lesbians, and those settings (not that TSL is limited to fantasy) wouldn't work in D&D either.

If Discworld is an example of a setting you think is incompatible, I will bet you that I could easily run both of those with D&D rules.

Have--have you actually read any Discworld?

Just about every book. I might have missed one or two. There are a lot of them.

Vancian casting was only used as a joke in the first book where it was mentioned, and then never brought up again. In fact, it's been shown that wizards who care about it can either make spells up on the fly or can effectively "reprogram" magic through cleverness, experimentation, and by using HEX. Wizards rarely actually use magic, primarily because it involves effort that could be better spent on eating.

Yes. Effort to MEMORIZE the spell again. It takes a long time ala 1e rules. There's nothing you just mentioned that I couldn't do with D&D.

Witches rarely use magic either because they can get what they want through other means.

But they do use magic, and magic that I could reproduce with D&D rules.

Priests don't have any magic. They're just people in religious office.

Yes they do. Or do you think the magical traps protecting religious sites and objects in temples just spontaneously appears. You should also read Pyramids again. Dios the priest was quite powerful.

The barbarians are barely barbaric; they're mostly just unwashed.

Cohen and the Silver Horde disagree with you.

The rogues aren't sneaky as they have a legal right to steal (at least in Ankh-Morepork). Even the assassins are only sneaky because it's considered poor form to be clumsy--why did we spend all that money for you to go to assassin school if you're going to be a klutz? Most of the "monsters" are people and because of that, they almost never get killed. There are practically no quests.

Yes, they are silly. They also have the skills and exist. D&D works just fine to represent them.

A Discworld GM that doesn't understand that and tries to shoehorn the setting into D&D would be terrible.

It would be amazing, if you were into that sort of game. I'm not into silly RPG play, though I love the books.

 

[Velderan]

Theros was built with certain setting-rules. It was later turned into a D&D setting, and so it got to keep its original expectations.

Dragonlance was built for D&D

Theros and Ravnica both allow you to make whatever you want though, explaining what is typically found there to dissuade you from picking something else. Just like 1E Dragonlance allows you to make a magical freak half-orc, even if orcs aren't naturally there. There's options for DMs to allow players to play what they'd like even if those aren't the standard.