D&D 5E Do you care about setting "canon"?

[pemerton]

Lore doesn't create a shared experience. Playing the game does that. Lore just helps(many peopl greatly) color the shared experience that the players are creating.

It absolutely helps with the shared experience, just as work you do helps with it.

When [MENTION=3400]billd91[/MENTION] talks about "shared experience" he is meaning shared across groups, not within groups.

If lore is essentially ignorable - eg the MM says blue dragons like desert but every blud dragon actually encountered in play is an exception like the one in RttoEE - then how is that shared experience being created? Your blue dragon was the RttToEE one; my blue dragon was another exception, living in a forest; etc - where is the shared experience built on common lore?

Some aren't that creative. Others don't have the experience yet and don't want to step out onto that limb.

What limb? If it's OK for Monte Cook to ignore the MM and put a blue dragon wherever he wants, what is going to happen to a GM - rookie or otherwise - who does the same thing? What is the (metaphorical) risk of falling of this (metaphorical) limb?

The MM writers do occasionally make those changes, and it throws off some DMs and players who rely lore and who know about the prior lore.

Throws them off how? And how worse than the examples I've given, all of which place monsters in complete disregard of their lore?

D&D is a game, to be played. How does reading something different throw you off, but actually playing a session in which a blue dragon is not in the desert doesn't throw you off? What is the mental process here? I mean, does it become easier to play the dragon-out-of-desert when you know that, typically, it would be in a desert, than if someone had rewritten the MM to delete that particular bit of dragon lore?

 

[JediSoth]

Only until the point at which my campaign starts. After that, what is written is what happens in MY game. That goes even if my campaign takes place in the past, with regards to previously written canon.

Basically, I just use it as history and background, not as a pre-ordained future (if I want to preserve that, I don't write a campaign that should intersect with those events, though if the PCs force things in that direction, I won't stop them).

 

[Maxperson]

When @billd91 talks about "shared experience" he is meaning shared across groups, not within groups.

Okay, but I don't think that's even a thing. My group shares nothing with any other group and vice versa.

If lore is essentially ignorable - eg the MM says blue dragons like desert but every blud dragon actually encountered in play is an exception like the one in RttoEE - then how is that shared experience being created? Your blue dragon was the RttToEE one; my blue dragon was another exception, living in a forest; etc - where is the shared experience built on common lore?

The entire game is essentially ignorable. I routinely alter mechanics or decide that certain creatures simply don't exist in my word due to my dislike of them. However, a blue dragon existing outside of a desert ignores no lore at all. Blue Dragons only typically live in deserts. Similarly, humans don't typically high up on mountains, yet you can still find some that do.

What limb? If it's OK for Monte Cook to ignore the MM and put a blue dragon wherever he wants, what is going to happen to a GM - rookie or otherwise - who does the same thing? What is the (metaphorical) risk of falling of this (metaphorical) limb?

The limb of changing something and doing it badly. It's a big worry of many new DMs.

Throws them off how? And how worse than the examples I've given, all of which place monsters in complete disregard of their lore?

When people expect one thing and are surprised with something different, they are often thrown off. As a lawyer you know that tactic quite well I imagine, or at least you should. I've also already refuted all of your examples except for the mind flayer. None of the rest violate their lore. Ignoring that refutation isn't going to work. Other people here can read and will still see my response.

D&D is a game, to be played. How does reading something different throw you off, but actually playing a session in which a blue dragon is not in the desert doesn't throw you off? What is the mental process here? I mean, does it become easier to play the dragon-out-of-desert when you know that, typically, it would be in a desert, than if someone had rewritten the MM to delete that particular bit of dragon lore?

A blue dragon not in the desert might throw someone off, but it's much less likely that a 1e mind flayer being on the surface. People understand what they word "typically" means and don't expect all blue dragons to be in deserts. They also understand what the word "always" means, and so would have the expectation that no mind flayer will be on the surface.

 

[billd91]

When [MENTION=3400]billd91[/MENTION] talks about "shared experience" he is meaning shared across groups, not within groups.

If lore is essentially ignorable - eg the MM says blue dragons like desert but every blud dragon actually encountered in play is an exception like the one in RttoEE - then how is that shared experience being created? Your blue dragon was the RttToEE one; my blue dragon was another exception, living in a forest; etc - where is the shared experience built on common lore?

Even though people can ignore it, lots of people still use it, still talk about it at meetups and conventions, talk about their old campaigns with their new groups and on message boards. If the lore isn't there, there's no common lore to use.

And, again, you're fixating on one set of specifics - in this case, blue dragon habitat. But there are other bits of lore that I'm sure people use more frequently and consistently like mind flayers generally being underground, drow being matriarchal, storm giants being good, frost giants living in northern or high alpine climates, fire giants lving in and around volcanoes, etc. All of that helps shape the shared experience of D&D.

 

[Ranes]

I have lurked the devil out of this thread for several dozen posts now. If the game is disregarding - or re-inventing, if you like - creature lore with every edition, I can understand how it can lead to frustration among veteran players and be to the detriment of their enjoyment. However, I cannot buy into the idea that a new DM, confronted by a module that pushes back against MM lore, would necessarily be troubled by it. In my experience, DM beginners are much more occupied with the multitude of practical concerns they face regarding their inexperience. Even so, module writers could easily address any apparently contradictory uses of creatures with a single well-considered expository sentence in the encounter description.

But why ever use default lore? One of the easiest ways of differentiating your game is to tweak monster lore and characteristics. If I remember correctly - I don't have my books handy - standard issue third edition goblins have the ride ability. In one of my games, they did not. Instead, they were proficient climbers. When I made this change, I did not forewarn my players of it, because goblins were unknown in the part of the world in which the PCs' adventures began. When the PCs did encounter goblins, and players commented they were unlike any goblins with which they were familiar, I reminded them that their characters were not familiar with any kind of goblins.

I can see a problem legitimately arising when a DM has a long-running game* or long-established game setting* like Greyhawk and everyone decides to change rules edition. In these cases, monsters whose lore has changed with the edition may start to seem in some way incongruous when run out of the box. This will be exacerbated in those cases where a change in lore has informed a change in mechanics (and there are many of these; just read Echohawk's series on monsters across editions). These cases might require a DM to retrofit creatures to meet players' valid expectations of capability derived from the previous edition's lore. On top of accommodating other changes to rules and conventions, that can add up to significant and unwelcome extra work for a DM.

* Even then, many veteran posters here seem to run new campaigns every couple of years, so why not just say that next time everything's going to be set in a parallel Greyhawk or whatever? As long as players are given such knowledge of changes to creature lore and ability as their PCs could expect to be familiar with in advance, players have to assess anew the nature of the beings they encounter in the course of play. And the game is refreshed.

 

[Jacob Marley]

And then the value of the lore is . . .?

I mean, if an individual GM is free to place a blue dragon wherever s/he likes; and WotC is free to publish adventures with blue dragons wherever they like; then what work is the lore doing? Eg how is it creating a "shared experience"?

I'm not arguing that lore creates a shared experience, that is [MENTION=3400]billd91[/MENTION]'s argument; he can defend it.

For my purposes, the value of lore is to serve as an inspiration for my game. If I like the lore presented I'll use it; if not, I'm fine with changing lore to suit the needs of my campaign. I am also fine with WotC changing lore to suit the needs of a changing consumer base, or to open up story-telling possibilities. My objection was to using RttToEE as an example of a blue dragon violating established lore as 3.0/3.5 made it clear that environment lore was mutable.

As to what work lore can do if it is readily changeable - When I ran my 3.5 West Marches-style sandbox, I did make use of the environment lore. Blue dragons existed on the random encounter tables for temperate desert hexes. My players knew that by entering a temperate desert hex there was a chance of encountering blue dragons. They also knew that there was a 5-25% chance of roll on a neighboring hex. This meant that if they encountered a blue dragon outside of a temperate desert hex, they would know that there was a temperate desert hex within a handful of hexes from where they were. Finally, they knew that if they found a blue dragon well away from a temperate desert that there was a reason that dragon was there (hidden backstory), and that there was information or adventure hooks to be gained. The lore served to provide a baseline of knowledge to work from.

 

[Shasarak]

I've been told (by billd91) it's to help create a shared experience - except it won't do that if module writers ignore it - and that it's to help new GMs answer questions - except if module writers can just make stuff up, then why can't new GMs?

So why should we stop at where Blue Dragons live? Why should Blue Dragons only have a Lightning breath weapon - that does not seem very realistic - just give them whatever breath weapon you feel like. And why should Blue Dragons even have to look like Dragons? I think Blue Dragons would be even better if they were green coloured and looked like Orcs so that I can have three of them sitting in a 10 by 10 room guarding a pie.

 

[Shasarak]

When [MENTION=3400]billd91[/MENTION] talks about "shared experience" he is meaning shared across groups, not within groups.

In case you missed it, this edition is particularly focused on giving that "shared experience" across groups then ever before. The Designers want you to be able to talk to people from other groups about how you defeated Strahd and whether or not you managed to put down Tiamat. That is the whole point of the slow release of mega adventures.

 

[TwoSix]

So why should we stop at where Blue Dragons live? Why should Blue Dragons only have a Lightning breath weapon - that does not seem very realistic - just give them whatever breath weapon you feel like. And why should Blue Dragons even have to look like Dragons? I think Blue Dragons would be even better if they were green coloured and looked like Orcs so that I can have three of them sitting in a 10 by 10 room guarding a pie.

That's actually a really good question. Why DO we value the implicit setting generated by those snippets of lore in the rules, especially when we know they're casually hacked into pieces by GMs of all sorts? They do have meaning to a lot of people, otherwise games with setting specific options wouldn't so heavily outnumber generic games. But I can't define, psychologically, what's being gained by their inclusion. I think it might be that a fantasy shared is more powerful than a fantasy known only to oneself. It's why people get more attached to Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings than a novel that no one else has read.

 

[Greg K]

So why should we stop at where Blue Dragons live? Why should Blue Dragons only have a Lightning breath weapon - that does not seem very realistic - just give them whatever breath weapon you feel like.

My friends and I have been altering dragon breath weapons and alignment back since first edition. It has never been an issue to us.