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]

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.

Yep. And then there's the fact that both Theros and Ravnica are settings built for D&D. The inspiration for them came from MtG, but the setting books released for D&D were made for D&D.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

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

This is not a consistent argument. Dragonlance was not "built for D&D" in any way that matters here, it was an adventure series designed for AD&D 1E, which is a completely different RPG to 5E D&D. It's been pretty consistent in how it appeared in AD&D through 1E and 2E, though I'm less familiar with 3E's take. So that's not a meaningful or helpful claim. Theros never required that only certain races live there, that's not how MtG works - it was clearly an artistic choice by the people adapting it to D&D (who were D&D designers, note).

Bear in mind with Theros, as it is an MtG setting, therefore the idea of people from another world being there is not super-shocking, so when Theros is saying these are the only races that live here, others are planar travellers, it's just allowing the DM to potentially allow any race by just saying they're a planeswalker or got brought here by one. But it's giving them options.

That is in stark contrast to the argument you're making re: Discworld which is cogent and makes complete sense.

I agree completely that you can't run Discworld with D&D in any way that makes much sense to Discworld. However, I'm not sure GURPS actually does a much better job, and yeah I do own GURPS Discworld. It's at best "okay". The trouble is GURPS is an RPG with a weirdly specific flavour, and whilst you can technically run this "technically Discworld" game in it, it's like eating a bunch of candy that inexplicably tastes of overcooked steak and cheap whiskey, because everything you play in GURPS tastes of overcooked steak and cheap whiskey.

 

[Faolyn]

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.

So? It still is a setting that wasn't made for D&D and was only later brought over. It doesn't actually matter if the gods or colors are important--I said that before. What matters is that the setting was made for a non-D&D purpose first. Unlike Dragonlance. To quote Wikipedia:

Dragonlance is a shared universe created by Laura and Tracy Hickman, and expanded by Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weis under the direction of TSR, Inc. into a series of fantasy novels. The Hickmans conceived Dragonlance while driving in their car on the way to TSR for a job interview. Tracy Hickman met his future writing partner Margaret Weis at TSR, and they gathered a group of associates to play the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. The adventures during that game inspired a series of gaming modules, a series of novels, licensed products such as board games, and lead miniature figures.

They made Dragonlance for their own AD&D game and then turned it into modules and novels, which were based on their AD&D game.

As opposed to Theros, which came out as a card set in '13 and got made into a D&D game in in '20.

So is this Theros setting.

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.

And that shows me that you may have read Discworld, but you didn't get it. It's not a "silly" setting at all, and it wouldn't work if you tried to make it into game that used D&D as the basis.

There are no silly stories in any of the Discworld books. All of the plots are very serious. They're just written in a humorous way.

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.

And it would be a mess. And yes, I've played in a GURPS Discworld game.

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

Yep. 41 books. Read 'em all, multiple times.

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.

They don't memorize spells, except perhaps in the way that anyone memorizes anything. They don't have to memorize spells and forget them once cast, and they don't have to unprepare spells in order to prepare new ones. They don't have spell slots.

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

Which is why people who are completely new to magic can summon demons, gods, or even Death itself? All you need is a fresh egg and two sticks, after all.

If you were to use D&D magic, you'd have to change so much that it wouldn't be D&D magic again.

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.

He got magic through building a temple in a shape that actually disrupts time. He didn't get magic from the gods.

*

D&D is many things, but it is not a universal system.

 

[Maxperson]

So? It still is a setting that wasn't made for D&D and was only later brought over. It doesn't actually matter if the gods or colors are important--I said that before. What matters is that the setting was made for a non-D&D purpose first. Unlike Dragonlance. To quote Wikipedia:

The setting released for D&D was made FOR D&D. There are now two different, and they are different, Theros settings. One made for MtG and one made for D&D.

And that shows me that you may have read Discworld, but you didn't get it. It's not a "silly" setting at all, and it wouldn't work if you tried to make it into game that used D&D as the basis.

There are no silly stories in any of the Discworld books. All of the plots are very serious. They're just written in a humorous way.

Pratchett was a genius at getting real world issues through in humorous ways. That doesn't mean that the setting itself isn't silly. A world on the backs of 4 elephants on the back of a turtle flying through space says that clear as day.

They don't memorize spells, except perhaps in the way that anyone memorizes anything. They don't have to memorize spells and forget them once cast, and they don't have to unprepare spells in order to prepare new ones. They don't have spell slots.

That statement just shows that you don't know discworld as well as you think you do. Once cast the wizards of discworld forget the spell and have to memorize it again.

If you were to use D&D magic, you'd have to change so much that it wouldn't be D&D magic again.

Vancian casting is vancian casting. I wouldn't have to change it at all, except to add in epic spells like the one in Rincewind's head.

D&D is many things, but it is not a universal system.

And yet I can run any fantasy RPG setting with it. Any.

 

[Faolyn]

I agree completely that you can't run Discworld with D&D in any way that makes much sense to Discworld. However, I'm not sure GURPS actually does a much better job, and yeah I do own GURPS Discworld. It's at best "okay". The trouble is GURPS is an RPG with a weirdly specific flavour, and whilst you can technically run this "technically Discworld" game in it, it's like eating a bunch of candy that inexplicably tastes of overcooked steak and cheap whiskey, because everything you play in GURPS tastes of overcooked steak and cheap whiskey.

True. GURPS is better than D&D for Discworld, simply because GURPS doesn't require classes, which makes it easier to build the more complicated types of characters that Discworld has. But I'd run a Discworld game in Fate or some other narrative-first type of game.

 

[Older Beholder]

I think the general idea is that modern settings are designed so that they can be used together. They don’t want a setting, be it Dragonlance or whatever that essentially makes all the other D&D books you own useless.

The fact that the recent Spelljammer set had a lot of Dark Sun in it has me currently working on an adventure that combines those two settings. Sure it could be considered a Kitchen sink setting, but it clearly has a different vibe than say Forgotten Realms.

Want to combine Ravenloft with Theros: you can. Wanna make Ravnica a city in Eberron or Sharn a suburb in Ravnica. Easy.

Wanna use the Strixhaven academy and the Dragonlance tower of high sorcery as rival schools of magic in a Forgotten Realms campaign. No problem.

I think there’s a lot of people out there that enjoy that kind of world building.

 

[Faolyn]

The setting released for D&D was made FOR D&D. There are now two different, and they are different, Theros settings. One made for MtG and one made for D&D.

You may want to go tell WotC that.

Pratchett was a genius at getting real world issues through in humorous ways. That doesn't mean that the setting itself isn't silly. A world on the backs of 4 elephants on the back of a turtle flying through space says that clear as day.

His stories were dead serious, with serious consequences. The fact that they take place on a flat world on top of a turtle doesn't change that, and doesn't mean you it's a game for silly stories.

That statement just shows that you don't know discworld as well as you think you do. Once cast they wizards of discworld forget the spell and have to memorize it again.

Nope. That bit of trivia was used once, in the first or second book, and never used again. There are multiple occasions of wizards casting the same spell more than once.

Vancian casting is vancian casting. I wouldn't have to change it at all, except to add in epic spells like the one in Rincewind's head.

And yet I can run any fantasy setting with it. Any.

And many of those fantasy settings will suffer greatly for it.

 

[Faolyn]

This is not a consistent argument. Dragonlance was not "built for D&D" in any way that matters here, it was an adventure series designed for AD&D 1E, which is a completely different RPG to 5E D&D.

It's a different system, to be sure, but it's the same sort of aesthetics.

 

[Faolyn]

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.

I agree. Now, personally, if I were to run any of those settings, I'd say something like "races X, Y, and Z aren't native to the place. If you really must play one of them, talk to me about it and we'll figure out something. Which is why I have a full orc in my "humans-and-mostly-human-only, please." Ravenloft game. With Ravenloft, of course, it's easy--she was pulled in through the Mists. With Dragonlance, Theros, or Ravnica, well, I'd have to say that there from some distant part of the world and somehow managed to get here, and then work with the player to come up with a decent story and culture of origin.

 

[Maxperson]

You may want to go tell WotC that.

Why tell them something that they already know? The D&D Theros setting has things in it that are not in the card setting and vise versa. They are not the same setting.

His stories were dead serious, with serious consequences. The fact that they take place on a flat world on top of a turtle doesn't change that, and doesn't mean you it's a game for silly stories.

No. No they were not dead serious with serious consequences. This is a fact. There were serious real world issues that he was getting across to the readers in a silly, humorous way, but Discworld itself was not serious.

Nope. That bit of trivia was used once, in the first or second book, and never used again. There are multiple occasions of wizards casting the same spell more than once.

And you know that they didn't memorize the spell more than once how?

And many of those fantasy settings will suffer greatly for it.

Not so much.