D&D General The Purple Dragon Knights are tied to an Amethyst Dragon (confirmed)

[Necropolitan]

Have you ever been to a fusion restaurant? Or do just you pooh-pooh the idea because they're combinations you hadn't thought if before?

It's the restaurant's job to ensure the food is edible and tastes good, it's not on the diner to pretend a bad combination tastes good.

 

[Misanthrope Prime]

But it's also not too much to deny a possible team up either. You could argue all day that an oil-based puree of a nut-like legume and a stabilized mix of milk and an ancient Mesoamerican drink shouldn't go together, but in the end Reese's Cups still exist.

Either they're going to explain it in the text, or - gasp - you can use your imagination to come up with all sorts of interesting ways for the team up to originate.

There's like 500 years of consumer capitalism between Hernan Cortes and Reese's, and if WotC had written 500 years of history with a high level of verisimilitude I might be willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

 

[Charlaquin]

Thanks. I still wouldn't call that MCU style like what we're seeing in the latest Marvel movies or the Loki TV show. Yes, it talks about "parallel worlds" but I still think they're referring to something different. I take it as being that the Material Plane, the Ethereal Plane, the Outer Planes, etc are "parallel worlds". There's no mention of there being multiple parallel versions of Oerth, each with its own take on Mordenkainen and Tenser and Tasha and so on. That's what I mean by MCU-style parallel worlds.

Not in so many worlds. But I do remember there being some hubbub about WotC confirming that, for example, Thaksis is Krynn’s version of Tiamat, not a separate character that shares a lot in common. I think the idea WotC was trying to go for there is that Krynn, Abeir, Athas, etc. are in fact MCU-style parallel versions of each other. The differences between those parallels are just much more significant than the differences between the various Earths in the Marvel and DC universes.

On the other hand, the fact that in Spelljammer they’re treated like different planets within the same cosmos throws a bit of a wrench in that. But the way I see it, Spelljammer kind of plays around with using fantasy logic to make space travel and interdimensional travel be one and the same.

Well, bit but it does stayed that there are endless parallel worlds:

"The Known Planes of Existence, as depicted in APPENDIX IV of the PLAYERS HANDBOOK, offer nearly endless possibilities for AD&D play, although some of these new realms will no longer be fantasy as found in swords & sorcery or myth but verge on that of science fiction, horror, or just about anything else desired. How so? The known planes are a part of the "multiverse". In the Prime Material Plane are countless suns, planets, galaxies, universes. So too there are endless parallel worlds." (DMG 57).

Notably, infinity is weird and people struggle to really understand it. A lot of media that deals with the idea of infinite parallel worlds takes it as a given that if there are infinite worlds, a world for every possible variation must exist. So, for example, if we assume infinite parallel Earths exist, that must mean there’s an Earth where everything is the same, except I misspelled one word in this post. But that isn’t actually how infinity works. Infinity minus one is still infinity. There could easily be infinite parallel worlds without that infinite set including a world like the one I just described.

 

[Misanthrope Prime]

Not in so many worlds. But I do remember there being some hubbub about WotC confirming that, for example, Thaksis is Krynn’s version of Tiamat, not a separate character that shares a lot in common. I think the idea WotC was trying to go for there is that Krynn, Abeir, Athas, etc. are in fact MCU-style parallel versions of each other. The differences between those parallels are just much more significant than the differences between the various Earths in the Marvel and DC universes.

On the other hand, the fact that in Spelljammer they’re treated like different planets within the same cosmos throws a bit of a wrench in that. But the way I see it, Spelljammer kind of plays around with using fantasy logic to make space travel and interdimensional travel be one and the same.


Notably, infinity is weird and people struggle to really understand it. A lot of media that deals with the idea of infinite parallel worlds takes it as a given that if there are infinite worlds, a world for every possible variation must exist. So, for example, if we assume infinite parallel Earths exist, that must mean there’s an Earth where everything is the same, except I misspelled one word in this post. But that isn’t actually how infinity works. Infinity minus one is still infinity. There could easily be infinite parallel worlds without that infinite including a world like the one I just described.

 

[Charlaquin]

Why on earth does that need to be explained?

It doesn’t, but from the perspective of the game’s creators, the idea of there being a diegetic explanation for it is appealing. I think much more appealing than the idea is from the perspective of people actually playing the game. It doesn’t make any difference to me if your campaign and my campaign happen in parallel worlds to each other or not. But I can see how the lead designer (whoever that is now, I forget) might think that having a piece of lore that allows every DM’s campaign to be “canon” simultaneously would seem like something that would be good for the game.

 

[Charlaquin]

Case in point. Hilarious episode, not actually how infinity works.

 

[Charlaquin]

By the way, while we are talking about the multiverse, I wanted to offer this trivia.

I wanted to call it a "fun fact," but it isn't. It's one of those things I wish I could unlearn. And since I can't, I'm going to inflict it on everyone else.

Oerth (the world that Greyhawk is on) ... how do you think it is pronounced?

Go on.

Oerth. How do you pronounce it? Say it out loud to yourself.

If you're like me, you probably pronounce it something like O-erth. (Slight stress on a long O, followed by earth)

But how was it actually pronounced? By Gygax? Do you really want to know?

I'll put it in spoilers, because, trust me, you can't unlearn this.

OY-th, as if you had a strong Brooklyn accent. I'm sorry.

I pronounce it Orth, because something about when two vowels go out walking or whatever.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I pronounce it Orth, because something about when two vowels go out walking or whatever.

There is no wrong pronunciation.

....except Gygax's.

 

[Demetrios1453]

It's the restaurant's job to ensure the food is edible and tastes good, it's not on the diner to pretend a bad combination tastes good.

But you're essentially rejecting it without even tasting the food. Since the books aren't out and all we have are previews, it's like you're standing outside the window looking at the menu and going "Nah, Swiss-Swazi will never work. It ignores the previous food lore of both cultures, and the two are so different I can't see how they could combine. And it can't possibly have any merit since it may have been done only because of the names" and just walking away without actually trying it. You seem so determined to not like it that you're rejecting the possibility that it might be decent, or even good, or even awesome once you've experienced it in full.

The real question is, you seem to be only able to contemplate on how it can only be bad. Can you, just as an experiment, contemplate on how it might turn out to be good?

 

[Misanthrope Prime]

But you're essentially rejecting it without even tasting the food. Since the books aren't out and all we have are previews, it's like you're standing outside the window looking at the menu and going "Nah, Swiss-Swazi will never work. It ignores the previous food lore of both cultures, and the two are so different I can't see how they could combine. And it can't possibly have any merit since it may have been done only because of the names" and just walking away without actually trying it. You seem so determined to not like it that you're rejecting the possibility that it might be decent, or even good, or even awesome once you've experienced it in full.

The real question is, you seem to be only able to contemplate on how it can only be bad. Can you, just as an experiment, contemplate on how it might turn out to be good?

If the story is good they get my $60. If the story is bad, what do I get from wizards of the Coast for being subjected to bad fantasy? As a member of ENWorld we can all agree THAT is the greatest indignity known to man.