Coherentizing the Timelines of all the D&D Worlds in 5E (and Ed Greenwood's current year)

[Dungeonosophy]

In this article, I lay out some of the issues involved in lining up the timelines of all the D&D worlds, in the context of an upcoming 5E Planescape/Spelljammer meta-setting:

https://sites.google.com/site/dndphilmont/timeline

From a design standpoint, it'd be good to get all of the worlds of the D&D Multiverse lined up with the Forgotten Realms timeline. And then, from here on out, advance all the worlds at the same rate. (At least nominally, off screen.)

I realize some people want no connection or correlation between the D&D worlds, but for those who agree with this standpoint, do you prefer option A or option B?

A) For the worlds which lagged behind Forgotten Realms (such as Mystara and Birthright whose last products were way back in 2nd Edition): advance them the exact number of (hundred+) years necessary to have their own "Spellplague" and "Second Sundering" which happened off screen.

B) Just say that the date of last published product of each world happened just last year. And now, in the blink of an eye, all the worlds are 5E-infused (with Dragonborn and Tieflings) and lined up with Dale Reckoning 1491 (the date of this year's new FR novel releases). (Over on the Sages of the Realms fb group, I just asked about the current FR date, and Ed Greenwood says):

My novel DEATH MASKS takes place in 1491 DR, the Year Of The Scarlet Witch. I don't recall any events beyond that year in either Erin's or Bob's last-so-far Realms novels...so that's where we officially stand. Beyond that, NDAs seal my lips, I'm afraid. ;}

 

[Coroc]

Somehow i got mixed Feelings about that. On one Hand you have a good Point of reference. Otoh your first intent is to shoehorn (which is a a far to weak word for this) Dragonborn and Tieflings into every campaign world along with spellplague sundering and whatnot? Was spellplague and sundering an intergalactic issue?

I mean did Sigil get sundered or Tyr or Greyhawk or Cerilia?

 

[gyor]

Somehow i got mixed Feelings about that. On one Hand you have a good Point of reference. Otoh your first intent is to shoehorn (which is a a far to weak word for this) Dragonborn and Tieflings into every campaign world along with spellplague sundering and whatnot? Was spellplague and sundering an intergalactic issue?

I mean did Sigil get sundered or Tyr or Greyhawk or Cerilia?

The only worlds that would possibly need to be linked to the Forgotten Realms timeline is Greyhawk, Planescape, and maybe Dragonlance.

Greyhawk has recently interacted with FR so much, that it'd be hard to explain the interactions without a time jump, but a Spellplague and Sundering for Greyhawk is unneeded as Evermeet and Mystera do not dwell in Greyhawk.

Given we will have playable Gith, who would more likely see themselves connected to Planescape setting, figuring out how FR cosmology fits with Planescape would be helpful, especially since the Sundering and Spellplague would have effected the Planescape setting at least in parts.

Dragonlance tends to be somewhat close to FR, it has an archwizard who visits Elminister as does Greyhawk obviously.

Nentir Vale is already lined up more or less with FRs timeline.

Spelljammer I have no idea.

Eberron, Birthright, Mystara, don't seem linked to FRs history so because they are isolated, no time jump is needed.

Darksun got a reboot in 4e, plus it's far from FR so I don't know.

 

[Eltab]

Dark Sun is supposed to be in its own private multiverse, so no worries there.

The other worlds would want the chronology(ies) lined up, but there is no reason to import the Spellplague or the Sundering into those worlds.

In the context of Spelljammer, you can create and explain the rise of a group that can "blockade" or put "travel advisories" on various worlds - and make their say-so stick.
That is where the unsupported cosmoses went.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Demetrios1453]

It wasn't necessary before, so why woukd it be necessary now? FR, Greyhawk, and Dragonlance all moved at varying and differing rates through the 2e and 3e years, yet managed to coexist with each other through Planescape and Spelljammer despite that discrepancy. If we need to explain the 100 year jump for FR in relation to the others, just say the Spellplague decoupled the setting from the rest of the Multiverse, and it's only just now reconnected...

 

[Coroc]

In the end it is normally only important for a small scale time schedule, I have not yet played in a campaign which lasted for more than two years or so in game time and for that you can put your reference marker wherever you want or need it for story reasons.

Also this implies that Einsteins laws are not in place, depending on how far those different primes are apart, It requires 0 time travel methods to stay consistent.
A Portal might be such a means but i dunno about spelljamming?

 

[Dungeonosophy]

Somehow i got mixed Feelings about that. On one Hand you have a good Point of reference. Otoh your first intent is to shoehorn (which is a a far to weak word for this) Dragonborn and Tieflings into every campaign world along with spellplague sundering and whatnot? Was spellplague and sundering an intergalactic issue?

I mean did Sigil get sundered or Tyr or Greyhawk or Cerilia?

Well, according to option A, a straightforward interpretation of canon is that each D&D world experienced something like the Time of Troubles (1E > 2E), Die Vecna Die!/Apocalypse Stone (2E > 3E), Spellplague (3E > 4E), and the Second Sundering (4E > 5E), but called the events by different names. All those worlds (Abeir-Toril, Oerth, Krynn, Mystara, Aebrynis (Birthright), Athas (Dark Sun)) were an integral part of the 2E Great Wheel cosmology. And Die Vecna Die! explicitly said that the the whole multiversal framework was changing. Presumably the other "edition-change-based cosmological transformative events" affected all of the worlds...we just didn't hear about it, since WotC was no longer publishing books about them.

Greyhawk had its own Time of Troubles, detailed in the Fate of Istus, which provided in-story reasons for changing from 1E to 2E.
Krynn had the Chaos War (1e Krynn to SAGA Krynn) and War of Souls (SAGA Krynn to 3e Krynn)
And Mystara was implicitly affected by the 3.5E changes to the Plane of Nightmare/Plane of Dreams/Far Realm described in Dragon #327 "Winning Races: Diaboli--Bringing Diaboli into 3.5E"

So, yeah, Sigil and Oerth (and all the other D&D worlds) were affected in a big way by the cosmological changes which occurred at the same time as Toril's Spellplague and Second Sundering, but they wouldn't call the events by those names.

Or...according to Option B, the canonical timeline of all the "retired" worlds stopped when the last product was published. And now they just appear through a 5E lense, just one year later. But now its all lined up, and its all 5E. No catastrophes.

Both options could be justified according to canon.

 

[jgsugden]

We don't have to assume that time passes at the same rate in each Crystal Sphere... but it does have advantages. Regardless, I'd only want to do this as an optional method. There are certain inconsistencies between the Spheres that make a shared universe problematic as the events had an interplanar impact in ways that should have influenced the events in other Spheres. They've been addressed a million times (Dark Sun loses their Gods, Krynn deities leaving/returning/leaving, Time of Troubles in FR, etc...)

My honest preference at this point is for us to see an 'Ultimates' (to borrow from Marvel Comics) approach to merge these worlds:

1.) Continue building new products for all of these worlds in their existing nebulous timelines with nebulous connections as one product line. This allows people that do not care about merging these lines together to continue to play....

2.) Introduce an "Ultimate Product Line" that starts with a manual that explains how all the "Ultimate" version of these planes connect ...

3.) ... and Reboot all of the Ultimate Planes so that they start from their core beginnings once again, but with slight tweaks to allow them to tie together via Spelljammer and Sigil.

So, you might see:

Feb 2019 - Manual of the Planes - with chapters on the Outer Planes (Elemental, Abyss, etc...), Transitive Planes (Shadow, Fey), PMP (Spelljamming, Crystal Spheres, One page summaries of various Crystal Spheres (FR, DS, GH, Mystara, Krynn, Eberron, etc...), and a Timeline covering 100 years in each of the Spheres and showing how they connect.

April 2019 - Forgotten Realms Box Set - a 5E update on the original box set with modifications for the 5E rules, to incorporate concepts added to the Realms at later dates (Drizz't, Underdark, etc...), and to align it with the shared Cosmology.

September 2019 - A Hardcover 'War of the Lance' adventure and a Dragonlance Rulebook that gives us the Dragonlance rules, etc... These books would also be retrofit for 5E and aligned to the shared Cosmology.

December 2019 - Dark Sun.

April 2020 - Mystara

August 2020 - Greyhawk

December 2020 - Eberron

This would give us an expansive and coordinated campaign universe that could be the basis for 5E games for a long time to come, allowing players to span the different realms and for the powers that be to manage the game worlds for official gaming in a shared universe.

 

[Dungeonosophy]

It wasn't necessary before, so why woukd it be necessary now? FR, Greyhawk, and Dragonlance all moved at varying and differing rates through the 2e and 3e years, yet managed to coexist with each other through Planescape and Spelljammer despite that discrepancy. If we need to explain the 100 year jump for FR in relation to the others, just say the Spellplague decoupled the setting from the rest of the Multiverse, and it's only just now reconnected...

It'd be like asking: "Al-Qadim, Kara-Tur, Maztica, and Living Jungle had their own timelines in 2E, why would it be necessary to more fully correlate them with Faerun?" Because it makes the world more coherent. WotC has said they're aiming to bring back all of the worlds eventually (a la Curse of Strahd), and that means the "world-hopping" meta-settings (Planescape, Spelljammer, and Chronomancer) will need to address the issue of timelines. Like, what is the default, official year in all of these settings now? And, like, what happened while Oerth and Mystara and Athas and Aebrynis were off-screen all these years?

In my OP, I propose either that:

A) Time flowed off-screen at the same rate as it did in the FR, and that they went through the "edition changes" off screen. So that these worlds need to be advanced 100+ years.
OR
B) The last published product (from an out-of-game perspective) just happened last year (from an in-game perspective).

You say: "FR, Greyhawk, and Dragonlance all moved at varying and differing rates through the 2e and 3e years, yet managed to coexist with each other through Planescape and Spelljammer despite that discrepancy."

That's not entirely true. It's partly true, in that the three timelines have not been *definitively* lined up, and there are various snags and inconsistencies. But there are also a goodly number of official cross-overs which peg their timelines together.