The only official and semi-official things that have been done regarding Dragonlance is including the pantheon in the PHB and having stats for Taladas minotaurs on the website (it was in the nautical-themed Unearthed Arcana from... May, I think?). I think I've seen one of the devs mention that the Orders of High Sorcery are prime candidates for becoming new wizard traditions as well, but no such traditions have actually been done.
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D&D 2E Are all my 2E books worthless now?
- Thread starter SamWolfeIVI
- Start date
The only official and semi-official things that have been done regarding Dragonlance is including the pantheon in the PHB and having stats for Taladas minotaurs on the website (it was in the nautical-themed Unearthed Arcana from... May, I think?). I think I've seen one of the devs mention that the Orders of High Sorcery are prime candidates for becoming new wizard traditions as well, but no such traditions have actually been done.
I'm actually kicking around starting a 5e Dragonlance game for my young nephews. Dragonlance just seems the perfect setting to me for 11 and 9 year old boys who haven't ever played an RPG before.
I'd recommend Dragonlance Nexus 5e Conversions as a starting point. This Google + page might be worth checking out too.
Now, you could convert Dragons of Despair over to 5e (assuming you have a group), or other 2e Dragonlance modules. That should work pretty well I'd think, using the races and classes at the site above.
Easiest way to do monsters is just find something roughly similar in the 5e Monster Manual. Or you can pick a different monster and "reskin" it — keep the numbers and attacks the same, but change the description. Here's a thread talking about this trick. Then just use the lore from the 2e monster book to describe them and how they act.
Or you could do the reverse: pick up the new 5e Hoard of the Dragon Queen module (set in Forgotten Realms) and tweak the flavor and a few names to fit Dragonlance. This won't convert any of the numbers but it will convert a bit of the story elements. The general story seems like it should align pretty well with the Dragonlance setting.
So those are my suggestions. Good luck with finding a group. And remember, you can always invite first-time gamers to play too. Most of my regular group never played D&D til I invited them over and they love it. I started an old-school basic D&D game and converted it over to 5e when the new edition came out.
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Wik
First Post
I recently converted a 2e adventure from Dungeon ("Keep for Sale") to 5th. I probably took more steps than absolutely necessary, but decided to be studious.
1. First, I rolled on the treasure hoards table. I rolled twenty random individual treasures for level 1 monsters, and then rolled up a treasure horde for a low level big monster. I wrote all this down on a scrap piece of paper. I on the spot added about 10% to that, because I was using this list for ALL of the treasure to be given out in this module.
2. I figured out, using the XP tables in the DMG, what the xp budget was for "easy", "medium", and "hard" encounters. Since "keep for sale" is for 1st level characters, and I was running it for 2nd level characters, I expected the monster amounts in the module would about mesh with these XP budgets. I kept in mind the idea that the more monsters you have, the more the monsters' XP should "Scale" (that whole "3-5 monsters are worth twice as much for budget purposes bit), but I didn't follow it religiously.
3. For every encounter in the module, I tried to convert it to that standard. A LOT of monsters in the module were only 25 XP or 50 XP encounters. I kept them in as written. Often, I just used the monster numbers listed in the module, but as a general rule, I had to add more monsters to fit my budget.
4. I created statblocks for any monster that had a name or seemed like it should be more than just a plain jane goblin. In the original module, the goblin was described as being good with a sling (he got +2 to attack rolls with it!). I thought that was lame, and so gave him a special sling with alchemical sling pots. Other monsters got similar conversions.
5. I read the monster descriptions for some of the weirder monsters in the module, both the 2e version and the 5e version. The kenku, for exampe, has changed quite a bit. Stranger still, the module's original writer must have been using a different version of the kenku, because it did things they were unable to do. Anyways, realizing that "modern" kenku are different, I made a few changes to that NPC so that it'd fit.
6. As I did all this, I'd siphon off treasure from my master list, trying to keep the areas where there were "big scores" to still have similar large scores. Generally, this worked out fairly well.
7. Wherever I thought DCs for skill checks were needed, I wrote them in red ink in the margins. Generally, I go with the 10/15/20 rule. 10 is average, 15 is hard, and 20 is very hard. I try to figure out what the original module was intending - with the old 2e standard of ability or proficiency checks, I assume a DC of around 13, and go from there.
8. Wandering monster tables got scrapped and replaced with my own - assuming about 75% of the encounters were "easy", 20% were "medium", and 5% were "hard".
anyways, that's my down and dirty basic conversion of the module. It ran very smoothly, and I can't wait to do it again! (though the next module I'm converting is from the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, so who knows when the next 2e one is?)
1. First, I rolled on the treasure hoards table. I rolled twenty random individual treasures for level 1 monsters, and then rolled up a treasure horde for a low level big monster. I wrote all this down on a scrap piece of paper. I on the spot added about 10% to that, because I was using this list for ALL of the treasure to be given out in this module.
2. I figured out, using the XP tables in the DMG, what the xp budget was for "easy", "medium", and "hard" encounters. Since "keep for sale" is for 1st level characters, and I was running it for 2nd level characters, I expected the monster amounts in the module would about mesh with these XP budgets. I kept in mind the idea that the more monsters you have, the more the monsters' XP should "Scale" (that whole "3-5 monsters are worth twice as much for budget purposes bit), but I didn't follow it religiously.
3. For every encounter in the module, I tried to convert it to that standard. A LOT of monsters in the module were only 25 XP or 50 XP encounters. I kept them in as written. Often, I just used the monster numbers listed in the module, but as a general rule, I had to add more monsters to fit my budget.
4. I created statblocks for any monster that had a name or seemed like it should be more than just a plain jane goblin. In the original module, the goblin was described as being good with a sling (he got +2 to attack rolls with it!). I thought that was lame, and so gave him a special sling with alchemical sling pots. Other monsters got similar conversions.
5. I read the monster descriptions for some of the weirder monsters in the module, both the 2e version and the 5e version. The kenku, for exampe, has changed quite a bit. Stranger still, the module's original writer must have been using a different version of the kenku, because it did things they were unable to do. Anyways, realizing that "modern" kenku are different, I made a few changes to that NPC so that it'd fit.
6. As I did all this, I'd siphon off treasure from my master list, trying to keep the areas where there were "big scores" to still have similar large scores. Generally, this worked out fairly well.
7. Wherever I thought DCs for skill checks were needed, I wrote them in red ink in the margins. Generally, I go with the 10/15/20 rule. 10 is average, 15 is hard, and 20 is very hard. I try to figure out what the original module was intending - with the old 2e standard of ability or proficiency checks, I assume a DC of around 13, and go from there.
8. Wandering monster tables got scrapped and replaced with my own - assuming about 75% of the encounters were "easy", 20% were "medium", and 5% were "hard".
anyways, that's my down and dirty basic conversion of the module. It ran very smoothly, and I can't wait to do it again! (though the next module I'm converting is from the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, so who knows when the next 2e one is?)
Sword of Spirit
Legend
That depends on what parts you are trying to convert. Some of this was mentioned already, but here is what we already have for official 5e Dragonlance:
1) The PHB gives you stats for the Krynnish dwarf, elf, and gnome subraces, by name.
2) The PHB mentions that draconians are a special version of the dragonborn race, but they haven't yet given us stats for them.
3) The PHB gives you the 5e info on the Dragonlance pantheon.
4) The PHB references Dragonlance material in a couple other places. In particular, there is a passage from a novel about a Qualinesti city, and Tika Waylan is used as an example in the Personality and Background chapter.
5) The DMG also references Dragonlance in at least one place (and according to 5e, Takhisis is officially the name by which Tiamat is known on Krynn).
6) A free download has the Krynnish minotaur race.
We can expect to have a 5e mechanical conversion at some point, as we already were given a first draft mechanical conversion for the Eberron setting, and Dragonlance is probably next in line. The only things that we really need are:
A) Wizard traditions for Wizards of High Sorcery
B) A paladin oath for Knights of Solomnia, and maybe something for Knights of Takhisis/Neraka
C) Stats for draconians and kender
D) Maybe some Dragonlance specific magic item or monster conversions
Beyond that, all you need is your AD&D material.
That's what you can expect in a 5e conversion: a minimal crunch update to the new ruleset that doesn't mess with the previous lore. (That's kind of perfect for me, as it's all I really need, though I wouldn't mind new campaign setting presentations.)
I believe the 2e settings information is priceless, but converting 2e rules, etc. over to 5E will be worth the effort you are willing to spend to make it happen. It is not a one to one conversion when considering rules as was the case with every new edition that was released.
