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

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Those are closely related topics.

the difference would be weather or not the people are interested in the setting

 

[Micah Sweet]

I disagree here are the changes I am hopeful for and expecting:

Kenders wont be written as jerks by defualt
The 3 orders that are color coded and tied to the towers will not have an enforced alignment but an 'often' or 'mostly' alignment at most
any mention of balance between good an evil will be sparing
we will get rad new death dragons.
we willing et stats for Soth
There will be no beliefe of the main 3 knight orders being sexuised

Have they actually described what makes the three orders different from each other, other than color, if alignment isn't a factor?

 

[Micah Sweet]

the difference would be weather or not the people are interested in the setting

But you're not interested in the setting. You want a setting with some of the same things and all of the same proper nouns with a bunch of changes to suit your personal needs.

 

[Velderan]

I disagree here are the changes I am hopeful for and expecting:

Kenders wont be written as jerks by defualt

You and me both.

The 3 orders that are color coded and tied to the towers will not have an enforced alignment but an 'often' or 'mostly' alignment at most

100%, you and I briefly talked about that the other day and I'm insanely curious to see how they handle the whole "you may not end up where you thought you would" bit. Kinda nervous tbh because I don't like things that take away player decision making. We'll see!

any mention of balance between good an evil will be sparing

I think the theme just promotes a constant back and forth that makes conflict eternal essentially. I never had a problem with it, but I certainly can understand your aversion to it.

we will get rad new death dragons.

Curious if there will be much for lore or just "Soth can make them because reasons".

we willing et stats for Soth

Death Knights in 5E were already tough, but surely Soth will have legendary actions so what will those be...?

There will be no beliefe of the main 3 knight orders being sexuised

Literally none of the game material ever mentioned it, so 100% this book won't either. I really can't think of an example in a novel where females being unable to be knights or similar limitations wasn't coming from an antagonist so seemed like it was just used as an easy way to help the reader figure out who the bad guy was.

 

[mamba]

I disagree here are the changes I am hopeful for and expecting:

Kenders wont be written as jerks by defualt
The 3 orders that are color coded and tied to the towers will not have an enforced alignment but an 'often' or 'mostly' alignment at most
any mention of balance between good an evil will be sparing
we will get rad new death dragons.
we willing et stats for Soth
There will be no beliefe of the main 3 knight orders being sexuised

pretty sure those will all be in, no idea about the robe colors but the rest seems pretty obvious

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Have they actually described what makes the three orders different from each other, other than color, if alignment isn't a factor?

one is more ambitious (I think that was said of black) so I am thinking it will be more personality less ethics.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

But you're not interested in the setting. You want a setting with some of the same things and all of the same proper nouns with a bunch of changes to suit your personal needs.

changes that when I started back 3 weeks ago talking about I thought were so minor no one would notice, since it would keep all the big stuff (and in some cases IMO help push the theme)

 

[Velderan]

Have they actually described what makes the three orders different from each other, other than color, if alignment isn't a factor?

Not really, Schneider and Crawford were kinda vague on it. @GMforPowergamers and I took different things from the video, but I can certainly see what they heard that would influence seeing it that way so it'll be interesting to see what it ends up being. To be fair, I think their version is more interesting but I just don't expect WotC to stray too far from the existing material. Where I see they've strayed so far has mostly been to allow 5E mechanics to function if that makes sense.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Not really, Schneider and Crawford were kinda vague on it. @GMforPowergamers and I took different things from the video, but I can certainly see what they heard that would influence seeing it that way so it'll be interesting to see what it ends up being. To be fair, I think their version is more interesting but I just don't expect WotC to stray too far from the existing material. Where I see they've strayed so far has mostly been to allow 5E mechanics to function if that makes sense.

Sure. I'm just saying there has to be a reason for having three orders, and until a few weeks from now it was alignment. What is it now? Seems like an important question.

 

[Faolyn]

Here's a quote from the book from Mishakal I think.

“The gods have not turned away from man—it is man who turned away from the true gods.”

Yeah, I don't get that. From everything I read, people prayed to the gods, the gods stopped answering prayers, the people continued to pray, the gods ignored them, then the people found other gods. I haven't seen anything that said that people found other gods first, before the Cataclysm--which wouldn't even make sense because the books clearly stated that clerics of fake gods couldn't cast spells, since those gods didn't exist. This only makes sense if there was no way to distinguish a priest of a true god from a priest of a fake god: nobody got spells, or everyone did from faith, no matter who they worship.

Now, in a 5e twist, if those clerics of fake gods were actually warlocks, then having people turn from the true gods might actually make some sense. These new gods actually can help their worshipers, and the worshipers don't need to understand that they're actually getting their powers from fiends or fey or other bizarre entities.