Dragonlance Dragonlance "Reimagined".

Micah Sweet · Sep 25, 2022

Hussar said:
Well, no.

That's not how marketing works. You cannot deny the power of name recognition. But, with name recognition does not necessarily come anything more than a passing familiarity with the brand. So, it's very, very powerful to whack an old name onto an idea and then change that idea.

Hell, we're playing a version of "Dungeons and Dragons" that would be completely unrecognizable to someone from 1980. Or 1990 for that matter. The idea that D&D shouldn't be called D&D because it's different just isn't going to fly.

And, let's not forget, that a lot of these ideas change over time. Dragonlance from 1986 compared to Dragonlance in 1996 is a very, very different beast. A whole lot of things got changed in 10 years. And a whole of things got rewritten. The only thing is that now, instead of those changes only being seen by a tiny handful of die hard fans that kept up with it, the new Dragonlance will be seen by an audience that probably dwarfs the size of the original audience.

Which means that there are a lot more things to pay attention to. Writing for the couple of thousand people who were going to see DL back in the day is different now. It just is.

It's kind of like the changes to the Ring of Power series on Amazon. Yuppers, they changed Middle Earth. Very much. But, there's a difference between some Oxford professor writing a book that he could only get published in a vanity press and the billion dollar investment Amazon is doing. Of course there will be changes. That's inevitable. And, that's art. We have a thousand different takes on Shakespeare. A hundred different takes on Sherlock Holmes. I have no idea how many takes on Frankenstein. So, yeah, we're going to get a new take on Dragonlance.

And that's a good thing. Otherwise Dragonlance goes the way of Nimh. Or Thieves World. Or Lankhmar.

New authors bringing in fresh takes and new ideas is a good thing.

I will never subscribe to the oft-repeated principle that new takes are always better takes. Nothing is a direct incline, and I'm very tired of hearing the opposite position being treated as some kind of axiom.

And, while I'm sure its important to many, marketing and what will appeal to the most people and bring in the most money does not matter to me.

Mind of tempest · Sep 25, 2022

Micah Sweet said:
I will never subscribe to the oft-repeated principle that new takes are always better takes. Nothing is a direct incline, and I'm very tired of hearing the opposite position being treated as some kind of axiom.

And, while I'm sure its important to many, marketing and what will appeal to the most people and bring in the most money does not matter to me.

it is fair to believe that a new take is not always better and it is practical to be sceptical but to dismiss it without having seen it is foolish it might have some great parts to it or it might knock it out of the park.
just be open to it but keep hype in check, the latter will be easy for you.

Stormonu · Sep 25, 2022

Micah Sweet said:
I will never subscribe to the oft-repeated principle that new takes are always better takes. Nothing is a direct incline, and I'm very tired of hearing the opposite position being treated as some kind of axiom.

And, while I'm sure its important to many, marketing and what will appeal to the most people and bring in the most money does not matter to me.

I agree that new takes aren't always better (Battlestar Galactica/Caprica & Star Wars sequels, I'm looking at you). Moreso, it's how much change am I willing to put up with?

As for marketing, the only play that comes in for me is that if a publisher or other entity doesn't feel it can make money because the world has moved on, then they aren't likely to bring back the old shell. The big problem (to me) is what changes places like Hollywood think they need to make more often than not is "change for the sake of change" for whatever new entity to put their mark on the product.

For Dragonlance, I've got my fingers crossed. So far, with 5E I haven't run across a product I detest, short of Tasha's. At worst, with the campaign settings they've released I've wished for more content - but I've got heaps of old stuff that hasn't been invalided to draw from for them.

Haplo781 · Sep 25, 2022

Stormonu said:
I agree that new takes aren't always better (Battlestar Galactica/Caprica & Star Wars sequels, I'm looking at you). Moreso, it's how much change am I willing to put up with?

As for marketing, the only play that comes in for me is that if a publisher or other entity doesn't feel it can make money because the world has moved on, then they aren't likely to bring back the old shell. The big problem (to me) is what changes places like Hollywood think they need to make more often than not is "change for the sake of change" for whatever new entity to put their mark on the product.

For Dragonlance, I've got my fingers crossed. So far, with 5E I haven't run across a product I detest, short of Tasha's. At worst, with the campaign settings they've released I've wished for more content - but I've got heaps of old stuff that hasn't been invalided to draw from for them.

Bro the BSG remake was a masterpiece WTF U smokin

Vaalingrade · Sep 25, 2022

Hussar said:
See, this isn't terribly productive.

Do you think Gully Dwarves are going to make the cut going forward? I certainly don't. So, yuppers, you're 100% right that there are some seriously cringeworthy things in the original stuff. No argument from me. But, since that's not going to be in the reboot, then it's not really something you can point to as a problem with the setting, is it?

As well as the Tower of High Sorcery. You've ignored the fact that the choice is, tightly control wizardry, or watch every wizard die. That's the choice. And, note, the general population is perfectly happy to kill every wizard. And, judging from the Unearthed Arcana stuff, likely that won't make the cut either, so, congratulations, you win.

Sure, I understand the alignment argument, but, I don't get the absolute hostility about it.

No one knows what's going into the new setting yet and this whole thread is about speculation on what's going to be in or out and complaining about it.

Well it was. Then it became about defending some of the stuff some people think are bad in ways that continually and explicitly ignore the issue people are having.

And speaking of, again: murder all the young wizard you want, jsut don't call yourself good no matter how you justify it.

Vaalingrade · Sep 25, 2022

Haplo781 said:
Bro the BSG remake was a masterpiece WTF U smokin

I mean if you love sexy hot robot spines and ISO Standard 2000's nonsensical plot twists because Lost.

Zardnaar · Sep 25, 2022

Faolyn said:
No. Because this isn't the fault of various writers or real-world religions throughout history. This was the fault of Weiss and Hickman for trying to sell us a game where genocide was considered a good act.

Obviously everyone cares, or there wouldn't be so many arguments about Dragonlance's alignment. And not just on this forum--when I was looking up the kingpriest, I found other arguments about it on several other forums.

Also, just because Tolkien did it doesn't mean that it's OK, or that it's OK for Dragonlance to continue it. And Middle-Earth wasn't a D&D setting that used the D&D alignment system (I've never played MERP, but I took a look at its charsheet and didn't see anything like an alignment section.)

I can't imagine why you're baffled. When the game presents a horrible thing as good, why wouldn't people be upset about this?

If the books had said "these gods decided to go against their natural Good alignment by committing this evil act, and this act forevermore tainted their Goodness," then I don't think people would have a problem with it. But instead, the Gods of Good are still considered to be Good--again, even though these gods then abandoned the world for centuries.

I don't think that the gods that sank Atlantis were considered to be Gods of Goodness.

It wasn't genocide as such iirc the evil gods tricked the good ones.

Dragonlance is also good vs evil cosmic scale. From a gods PoV the cataclysm could be like amputating a limb that's infected.

Neonchameleon · Sep 25, 2022

Hussar said:
But not when the adventures were being created and when the books were being written.

As has been pointed out the 9 point alignment was first published in 1977. AD&D has always had nine point alignment since it was first published in 1978/79. And if we actually look at DL1 - Dragons of Despair it was published in 1984 for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons which was, at that point, more than five years old.

Unless you can somehow find evidence that the Dragonlance modules were more than five years old when they were published then Dragonlance was published after Lawful was at least officially separated from Good. The adventures were created and the books were written with nine point alignment being standard.

As for when Dragonlance was initially created and the modules were written, according to you I think it was the mid 1970s. According to Wikipedia:

[Hickman] was unemployed in 1982, and TSR offered him a job based on his submission of several modules.[2] That year, while driving from Utah to Wisconsin to start a job with TSR, Hickman and his wife created the Dragonlance universe concept.

So nine point alignment had been the D&D standard since at least 1978. They didn't even start development on Dragonlance until 1982. It was written at a time nine point alignment was standard and was written to use nine point alignment.

Twiggly the Gnome · Sep 25, 2022

Zardnaar said:
It wasn't genocide as such iirc the evil gods tricked the good ones.

Fifth Element · Sep 25, 2022

Micah Sweet said:
I will never subscribe to the oft-repeated principle that new takes are always better takes.

Good thing that's irrelevant, and I don't think anyone argued that here anyway. But new takes certainly can be better. And there's no chance of them being better if they're not allowed to be tried.