Henadic Theologian
Legend
Green Goblin?
D&D 5E (2024) How excited are you for the 2 upcoming Forgotten Realms books?
- Thread starter Maenalis
- Start date
Green Goblin?
Scribe
Legend
Good Game.
Parmandur
Book-Friend, he/him
Not updated too frequently, but:
"All of which brings me to the Forgotten Realms."
"I’m the project lead for the new Forgotten Realms books recently announced on the Wizards YouTube channel. You can see the video here, I’m only in it for about 30 seconds, the upshot is: two new Forgotten Realms books updating and refreshing the setting."
"In the course of this project I had to make some really big creative decisions very early on. And one of those decisions was: what are we gonna do about continuity? Because the Realms has a lot of continuity from multiple sources. There’s decades of TSR and Wizards material, of course, but Ed Greenwood has been working on the setting since he was a kid and he’s still going today. Fans and third party creators have added countless pages to the Realms."
"Some of this continuity is pretty clunky. When Wizards created the third, fourth, and fifth editions of D&D, they felt obliged to explain how the rule changes manifested in the fantasy world. This obligation was created by continuity. To take one example, the Symbul was a wizard in 1st and 2nd edition D&D. But when 3rd edition introduced sorcerers, she became a sorcerer and, retroactively, she’s always been a sorcerer. Well, until she died (or did she?)."
"Wizards designers introduced setting elements like the Spellplague, the Sundering, and the Second Sundering to make the Forgotten Realms fit each successive edition. And this may come as a shock, but blowing your world up can make fans of that world really grouchy."
"But the simple fact is that 95% of D&D fans have never played a version of D&D other than 5th edition. They know nothing about the Realms outside of what they’ve (maybe) read in the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide and in adventures like Rime of the Frostmaiden or Tomb of Annihlation. Most “Realmslore” is completely lost on them and, importantly, we should not require them to learn it! I know the OGs out there have fond memories of Elminster, but if an average player of D&D knows Elminster at all, it’s as a) Mystra’s messenger in Baldur’s Gate 3 or b) Simon’s great grandfather in Honor Among Thieves. Astarion is far, far more recognized by our fans today than Elminster."
"So now here I am, looking at fifty years of Forgotten Realms continuity, and I have to ask, “What do I keep? What do I lose? Who do I piss off?” And the answer is: the Spellplague is the mullet of the Forgotten Realms. Sure, yes, there are elements of the Realms that I find kind of dumb, weird, or even offensive. And some of these things, the offensive things, I’m gonna change. But if we don’t need to change it? I’m just not gonna talk about it. Was there a Spellplague? A Sundering? A Second Sundering? Sure. I guess. They might even get a few words each in a sidebar. But really I’m just not talking about them. They’re still out there. And if you are running a 40 year long Realms campaign where the Spellplague was absolutely key, a critical part of continuity, you can keep doing that. We’re not saying the Spellplague didn’t happen. But the vast majority of our players don’t know about the Spellplague, don’t care about it, and are not gonna notice when I don’t talk about it. They’re gonna be way too busy running brand new adventures in an exciting world filled with fresh new faces and new, world-shaking, challenges to overcome."
"So once again, I guess we’re all business in the front, and party in the back, my friends. Party in the back."
Hexmage-EN
Legend
That excerpt really doesn't give me much of an idea what to expect. Is it that there will be retcons with no in-setting explanation given at all?
Amphytrion
Explorer
My interpretation from the article is that Trondo will be avoiding retcons by simply omitting parts of lore he does not care for. That’s the proverbial mullet of the title. So it’s essentially Schrodinger’s retcon: the Second Sundering won’t be mentioned, and the reader can decide if it happened or not. This is probably the best possible scenario.
He does mention that he will be changing things he finds offensive, so I believe there will be some retcons, especially for Calimsham. Which I’m alright with, as long as the retcon isn’t “and now Calimsham is ruled by the great, competent, beautiful and wise NPC, who works hard to solve all the problems of the land”. Give me a place full of issues.
He does mention that he will be changing things he finds offensive, so I believe there will be some retcons, especially for Calimsham. Which I’m alright with, as long as the retcon isn’t “and now Calimsham is ruled by the great, competent, beautiful and wise NPC, who works hard to solve all the problems of the land”. Give me a place full of issues.
mamba
Legend
sounds like it, since for 95%+ this is their first FR book, they just say what currently is and do not spend time on how it was and how it got here
Parmandur
Book-Friend, he/him
I mean, I think it gives a pretty solid idea of what to expect: avoiding 2E-3E-4E style Realms Shaking Events, while leaving room for tables to use whichever past ones they care to keep.
Hexmage-EN
Legend
Yeah, which also means they could fit in more unexplained retcons like the Purple Dragon Knights being associated with amethyst dragons. I'm honestly a bit surprised by how explicit that blog post was in saying that they're prioritizing the current fanbase of D&D in general over longtime Forgotten Realms diehards.
FitzTheRuke
Legend
Yeah, there maybe could have been some kind of "looking forward to it, but I wouldn't say, excitedly, exactly. Just, yeah, I'll read it."
Parmandur
Book-Friend, he/him
You might want to read the first part of the blog post which I did not directly quote for context, because he is saying the opposite: he is intentionally working to make sure fans of older versions are not invalidated, even if the overwhelming majority of people playing D&D started with 5E and won't have any stake in obscure lore from the Bush administration. It is worth noting yhst he didn't pull the 95% number out of thin air: the overwhelming majority of D&D players started with 5E, so the customer for this product is newer players not invested into older stuff.
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