D&D 5E Adventure Designer Felice Kuan Talks Radiant Citadel!

Todd Kenreck interviewed Felice Kuan, the creator of the Buried Dynasty adventure from the Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel adventure compilation book due in July.




It looks like the three main East Asian-inspired settings all have a link connecting them, 3 dragon siblings that founded the different civilizations that these adventures take place in, making them slightly interconnected.

She also discusses how the adventures/settings faithfully translate their cultures to a D&D book while also taking a critical look at some aspects of the cultures.

The adventure is a unique dungeon crawl that involves the party exploring newly uncovered ruins of an ancient dynasty and trying to recover something from the past that could benefit the current dynasty and the nation's future.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

As a personal note, I think it's interesting how common a "trio of dragons" is becoming in D&D now. Fizban's Treasury of Dragons proposes the Elegy of the First World, a poetic myth in which Bahamut, Tiamat, and Sardior created the world that existed before the D&D Multiverse. In Eberron, the Progenitor Dragon Myth proposes that Eberron, Khyber, and Sardior were giant dragons that's bodies formed the main features of the World of Eberron (Eberron to the Planet, Khyber to the Underdark, and Siberys to the planet's rings). And now there's this (new?) trio of dragons that formed these Asian-inspired cultures for this new book.

 

[Malmuria]

As a personal note, I think it's interesting how common a "trio of dragons" is becoming in D&D now. Fizban's Treasury of Dragons proposes the Elegy of the First World, a poetic myth in which Bahamut, Tiamat, and Sardior created the world that existed before the D&D Multiverse. In Eberron, the Progenitor Dragon Myth proposes that Eberron, Khyber, and Sardior were giant dragons that's bodies formed the main features of the World of Eberron (Eberron to the Planet, Khyber to the Underdark, and Siberys to the planet's rings). And now there's this (new?) trio of dragons that formed these Asian-inspired cultures for this new book.

You mean, like a Rule-of-Three??

PLANESCAPE CONFIRMED

 

[Blue Orange]

You mean, like a Rule-of-Three??

PLANESCAPE CONFIRMED

More like the importance of the Trinity. 3, 4, 7, and 12 are our magic numbers on this side of the Urals.

Five or eight would be more appropriate (at least for fantasy China)...but then they'd have to invent two new cultures from scratch. And 4 would be a really bad choice unless they're going for a darker tone.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Todd Kenreck interviewed Felice Kuan, the creator of the Buried Dynasty adventure from the Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel adventure compilation book due in July.




It looks like the three main East Asian-inspired settings all have a link connecting them, 3 dragon siblings that founded the different civilizations that these adventures take place in, making them slightly interconnected.

She also discusses how the adventures/settings faithfully translate their cultures to a D&D book while also taking a critical look at some aspects of the cultures.

The adventure is a unique dungeon crawl that involves the party exploring newly uncovered ruins of an ancient dynasty and trying to recover something from the past that could benefit the current dynasty and the nation's future.

Sounds intriguing!

And "dungeon crawl" sounds like further proof against those decrying "lighter and fluffier"...

 

[Ixal]

Lets see how mentioning the 'not nice' cultural aspects will turn out. But that this is even tried is already a good sign.

I usually tend to roll my eyes when people talk about the faithful representation of a culture because often times everything bad about that culture will still be omitted, no matter how much impact it had on the culture.
Not mainly to not make said culture look bad (but its certainly part of it) but mainly because of D&Ds absolute alignment system so you can't have 'not bad guy' cultures have things like slavery or religious persecution, widespread oppression, ect.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

you can't have 'not bad guy' cultures have things like slavery or religious persecution, widespread oppression, ect.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, but to me, it sounds like you're saying that you would want a culture that has slavery, oppression, and religious persecution to be able to be labeled as "Lawful Good" (or, at least, to not automatically be disqualified from having a good alignment because of the evil things they do).

 

[Ixal]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, but to me, it sounds like you're saying that you would want a culture that has slavery, oppression, and religious persecution to be able to be labeled as "Lawful Good" (or, at least, to not automatically be disqualified from having a good alignment because of the evil things they do).

The idea that entire cultures have an alignment is very restricting and prevents any real world culture like the Korean one mentioned here to be modelled in D&D.

What I want is that when a real world culture is added to D&D as closely as this adventure is supposed to do that it is added with all good and bad sides to keep it faithful and also not automatically be made a "this is the guys you fight" culture because it has bad stuff in it.