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

[Jensaarai]

the vast majority of story decisions and plot developments would be DM fiat anyways...

 

[Dire Bare]

No, the setting lore as established by Ed Greenwood is still canon, it's in his contract.

That video annoyed the heck out of me, although I wonder if Greenwood's comments were taken out of context. Is Greenwood really irritated over these "mistakes", or was he just being nerdy and pointing out the inconsistencies?

Nothing in the video complained about rose to the level of "lazy writing" to me, but rather artistic choices that deviated from existing canon . . . which I could care less about. I certainly want the Forgotten Realms to be mostly consistent, but don't care about rigid adherence to detailed canon at the expense of storytelling and worldbuilding.

I'm cool with the Purple Dragon Knights evolving into a new style of organization . . . international, even multiversal, and partnering with purple dragons! It's a change that can be done well . . . or poorly . . . and I'm happy to wait until the book comes out before I firm up my opinion. If the new PDKs don't work for me . . . that's okay, I just won't use them in my Realms campaigns. No big deal.

If Sammaster has returned . . . yes, it could totally be a "Palapatine Returns" moment . . . but again, it could be done well or done poorly. And easy to ignore if I don't like it. Doesn't bother me that this "breaks canon" or "disrespects" Sammaster's character arc from earlier stories.

I don't doubt Greenwood when he says his contributions to Realms lore are canon, contractually . . . but I don't care. It's not something that seems enforceable to me, and it's been pretty easy for WotC to simply not worry about it and treat Realms canon as flexible. And I'm good with that. Most of the changes WotC has made to the various settings over the decades they've owned the game I'm pretty happy with, and the few I'm not . . . I just ignore without getting all worked up about it. I think WotC's current approach works well and I'm happy with it.

 

[Necropolitan]

the vast majority of story decisions and plot developments would be DM fiat anyways...

"DM fiat" is when something can't be justified beyond the DM saying so.

It's literally just "Because I say so."

 

[Demetrios1453]

"DM fiat" is when something can't be justified beyond the DM saying so.

It's literally just "Because I say so."

But DMs don't exist in-universe. In-universe, a Wish that goes beyond the rules in the PHB can still be cast, just with consequences. In-universe, someone could definitely Wish for Sammaster to return. It might have severe unexpected repercussions, but they could still do it.

But beyond that, what about divine fiat? That does exist in-universe. What's to stop Tiamat, or Null, or some other deity simply willing Sammaster to exist again?

 

[Mecheon]

Make new characters instead of endlessly reviving old ones.

They tried. Go and see the reaction to 4E's time skip to see how well that went.

WOTC has done nothing to inspire confidence that it choosing to bring Sammaster back is anything other than an attempt to profit off name-recognition at the expense of good storytelling.

I don't think anyone is recognising Sammaster for name recognition. Like, let's be honest here, he isn't a famous or popular D&D character. He's a 'literately who?', a glup shitto

 

[Azzy]

They tried. Go and see the reaction to 4E's time skip to see how well that went.


I don't think anyone is recognising Sammaster for name recognition. Like, let's be honest here, he isn't a famous or popular D&D character. He's a 'literately who?', a glup shitto

The name throws me... Master of Sam?

 

[gban007]

As for the deities you mentioned each of them coming back was given the gravitas it required and didn't violate established rules of the setting.

Bane's return was well foreshadowed, Kelemvor had book around his return and Bhaal had adventure for him, but I would need a reminder on Myrkuls return beyond him just suddenly being back at some point.

 

[Mecheon]

The name throws me... Master of Sam?

Some Cult of the Dragon lich or something?

But, yeah, folks bring up Myrkul and he was pretty dang dead after I used his own power to eat his soul and perma-kill him in the Astral Plane during NWN 2 MotB, yet he's apparently still kicking. If Myrkul can walk away from that, Sammaster's fine. He's a lich. "Yeah that wasn't his phylactery/he had a backup" is the easiest out for them

 

[Parmandur]

There's nothing in the rules that would allow Sammaster to come back.

Wish doesn't count since it's a DM fiat spell:


Citing Wish is like claiming that the rulebook doesn't say a dog can't play basketball.

So the DM fiat allowed Sammaster to come back. Open and shut.

 

[taichara]

If Sammaster returning means the Cult Of The Dragon goes back to leaning hard on making dracoliches because they expect dracoliches will rule the ashes of the world in the future apocalypse and they want to be on their good side, instead of being poached by Tiamat, I'm aaallllll for it.