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

 

[Veltharis ap Rylix]

Sure, although I don't know if DL as usually presented has enough depth to really support this.

This is the sort of thing I might use Burning Wheel set in Krynn to do!

Which is why my position is that WotC shouldn't be afraid to add depth to Dragonlance, even if it means making changes to canon, but then I'm an outlier in this discussion.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Or perhaps the fact that the idea of collective punishment cannot be squared with modern ideals of personal responsibility could be an in-universe story element that the setting explores, with different characters having different viewpoints on the matter, rather than something you just have to accept as true as part of the baseline price of entry.

That is not buying into the philosophy. When a society functions the way @pemerton suggests, someone with a more individualist view point is really going to stand out, especially as they have to make a point of dissenting or you wouldn't know. Assuming you're not going for comedy (a la Monte Python), the person with the modern views is going to severely confuse the issue and compromise buy-in of the pre-modern premise, which in turn throws the whole story out of whack.

TL;DR: if you don't like stories/settings/worlds with a premodern point of view, don't engage with them. Trying to tear them down by forcing an adherence to a modern standard they have no desire to use to me feels more like giving fans grief about something they enjoy rather than honest discussion.

 

[Faolyn]

But, the Kingpriest wasn't acting alone. The entire population of Istar believed in him so much that he was on the verge of achieving godhood. It's not like it was just the Kingpriest sitting alone in his castle. The entire land was behind him. There was no opposition. There was no one who was stepping up and saying, "Hey, this isn't really a good idea". The entire land, not just the Kingpriest, had abandoned the gods.

I find that ridiculous to the extreme, and clearly done only to make it OK to commit genocide. Which it doesn't.

 

[pemerton]

Which is why my position is that WotC shouldn't be afraid to add depth to Dragonlance, even if it means making changes to canon

I don't care much about canon. But I think WotC will take their lead from MCU and Star Wars and (based on my limited knowledge) the forthcoming D&D film, and emphasise tropes and colour rather than depth.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't care much about canon. But I think WotC will take their lead from MCU and Star Wars and (based on my limited knowledge) the forthcoming D&D film, and emphasise tropes and colour rather than depth.

Agreed. Depth is apparently "outdated" now.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

TL;DR: if you don't like stories/settings/worlds with a premodern point of view, don't engage with them. Trying to tear them down by forcing an adherence to a modern standard they have no desire to use to me feels more like giving fans grief about something they enjoy rather than honest discussion.

If part of the canon says "Genocide is okay", then that part of the canon deserves to be torn down and fans of that specific canon have bad morals.

 

[pemerton]

That is not buying into the philosophy. When a society functions the way @pemerton suggests, someone with a more individualist view point is really going to stand out, especially as they have to make a point of dissenting or you wouldn't know. Assuming you're not going for comedy (a la Monte Python), the person with the modern views is going to severely confuse the issue and compromise buy-in of the pre-modern premise, which in turn throws the whole story out of whack.

TL;DR: if you don't like stories/settings/worlds with a premodern point of view, don't engage with them. Trying to tear them down by forcing an adherence to a modern standard they have no desire to use to me feels more like giving fans grief about something they enjoy rather than honest discussion.

I think this is a bit unfair. I mean, in the real world the transition from pre-modern to modern ideas actually took place via social processes over decades and centuries, and obviously there are people - including in the US - who in some sense have not adopted fully "modern" ways of thinking about the world.

I've run FRPG campaigns that touch on the sort of ideas that @Veltharis ap Rylix has mentioned. Including using D&D settings - GH and OA.

But they do require departures from, or additions to, the work as presented because of the "depth" issue that we are discussing.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If part of the canon says "Genocide is okay", then that part of the canon deserves to be torn down and fans of that specific canon have bad morals.

It is a historical perspective, one that was held by a lot of people in the past, and still believed by some today. You don't have to agree with it personally to engage with it and analyze it on it's own terms.

 

[pemerton]

If part of the canon says "Genocide is okay", then that part of the canon deserves to be torn down and fans of that specific canon have bad morals.

This is silly.

The relationship between aesthetic value and moral value is extremely complicated. But many people take aesthetic pleasure in stories that do not conform to their own political and moral commitments.

I love Excalibur. The central motif of Excalibur is "The King and the land are one." But in real life, although I live in a monarchy, I am not a royalist and certainly don't hold to the sort of view that is central to Excalibur. Similar reactionary political ideas predominate in JRRT's work, which I also love. But I don't build my own political commitments around it. The idea of the "true king" is a fantasy, not a principle that I actually adhere to.

I also love the bit in the Kick Ass film in which the jet pack rider comes up the side of the building and starts shooting all the bad guys, even though that is almost impossible to square with any tenable account of the permissible use of lethal violence.

These works are all fictions, not truths.

 

[Veltharis ap Rylix]

That is not buying into the philosophy. When a society functions the way @pemerton suggests, someone with a more individualist view point is really going to stand out, especially as they have to make a point of dissenting or you wouldn't know. Assuming you're not going for comedy (a la Monte Python), the person with the modern views is going to severely confuse the issue and compromise buy-in of the pre-modern premise, which in turn throws the whole story out of whack.

TL;DR: if you don't like stories/settings/worlds with a premodern point of view, don't engage with them. Trying to tear them down by forcing an adherence to a modern standard they have no desire to use to me feels more like giving fans grief about something they enjoy rather than honest discussion.

I am emphatically not buying into the philosophy. That's the point.

I'm not saying the philosophy can't be present, but I want conflicting views in-universe - people who see the Cataclysm as rightful divine punishment for hubris and those who view it as an unjustified cosmic temper tantrum, debating the matter without necessarily having a clear "correct" answer.