Dragonlance Movie... Opinions?

[Dragonhelm]

Ugh, I have, I'm sorry to say. The bestiary and the War of the Lance supp's are good. Rest is quite poor actually. The age of mortal supp was particularly horrible.

Ouch! Quite the critic, I see. War of the Lance is, IMO, the best Dragonlance RPG book ever. Age of Mortals was an early attempt, and the crew at MWP have improved the quality of their products tremendously since that time.

As for the novels, you mean the ones where people (and an annoying kender) keep getting reserructed all the time making their deaths meaningless?

No, I was talking more like the Minotaur Wars, the Elven Exiles, and so on.

 

[S'mon]

Early promotional material, including some press releases, called it (i.e., the movie that would later be known as "Krull" to fans) "Dungeons & Dragons". The "Krull" name was actually adopted later, for reaons that I am unaware of (obviously, the licensing fell through, though I am not privy as to why that happened).

[Edit: So, in short, it was a D&D movie that got a name change midway through production. IMDB still lists "Dungeons & Dragons" as one of its AKA titles, oddly.]

Hmm. Krull doesn't actually have a dragon in it. Pretty good movie though - nearly as good as Deathstalker.

 

[Asmor]

I can only assume that the animation was quirky on purpose. To me it looked like a conscious effort to use the old animation style (refer to the old Star Trek or Planet of the Apes cartoons for other examples) along with the new CGI style. Maybe they were trying to appeal to older fans and younger fans, but clearly from some responses here it backfired. I liked most of it, cheesiness and all. Not spectacular, but as someone else mentioned above, better than the D&D movie.

I think the only reason the cel animation was as poor as it was is because they didn't spend enough on it. Probably they didn't have enough money to get it properly animated, but that's of little consequence.

 

[Piratecat]

I know and quite like the screenplay writer, George Strayton. He had written for Xena, but is a long time gamer (including writing adventures for Goodman Games.) Too bad.

 

[Tewligan]

Ack it was bad. Bad as Benji Saves the Universe Bad.

 

[Sitara]

Ouch! Quite the critic, I see. War of the Lance is, IMO, the best Dragonlance RPG book ever. Age of Mortals was an early attempt, and the crew at MWP have improved the quality of their products tremendously since that time.



No, I was talking more like the Minotaur Wars, the Elven Exiles, and so on.

Dragonhelm, first I'm sorry if I came out as a basher. I understadn you are a fan (maybe invovled with the rpg book sin someway) and i didn't want to hurt any feelings.

However, I will go out and say I am quite bitter at dragonlance and whats been done to it. The OT was good (though book 3 was, frankly not so good), and the Soulforge/Brothers in Arms were excellent. But al books after dragons of summer flame have sucked. That new female introduced in the books (mira I think) and everything about her has also been rather horrible. Characters keep dying and coming back (palin and dalamar and tasslehoff) and it just become monotonus to read. (I gave yup a long time ago, so I have't read the book syou mentioned) ANother annoying this were those huge alien dragons. Apart from their cheese (huge, invincible, eeeevil, etc) Why they should not obey takhsis the dragonQUEEN was beyond me.

The rpg: The main rulesbook (which required the PHB to play) was quite poor as well (in fact i hear they had to reprint the wizard class again, and the wizard class was one of the good things about the book). Also, the rpg books seem to overemphasize magic items far too much, more so than even forgotten realms. I was dissapointed to see Caramon in the War of the Lance supp be in possession of a +1 chain armor at level 6. I don't think he had this in the novels. I will take you word that quality improved (and yes, war of the lance really was good, and the bestiary was drop dead gorgeous)

Anyhow, how are the towers of high sorcery supplement? The legends of the twins? And how are the revised adventures (dragons of autumn, winter and spring)? I was really considering getting them for nostalgia's sake and see how they stack up.

Regards.

 

[Dragonbait]

I would give it 2/10. (keep in mind, I would give the D&D movie 2/10 and the 2nd D&D movie 4/10, so I'm probably very generous)

Some voice acting was okay, some was very bland. I was surprised at the antagonisting attitude of Tasselhoff. The choppy animation was indicitive of lacking a proper amount of in-betweens (I believe that's the term used for the animation cells of movement between things like arm position 1 and 2) and the CGI was poorly thought out and executed. One their own, the dragons looked fine, but when animated and interacting in the environment, they looked like they were standing in front of a flat-screen that displayed the 2-D animated movie. Also, when the army of draconians all movied in unison. That's a sign of lazy animation. There would be varied movement that would not be difficult to recreate with the computer animation (just change the timining of different groups of draconians!). Another thing was that it seemed the female character's heights changed radically between scenes. They seemed to get shorter as the scenes progressed.

 

[Dragonhelm]

Dragonhelm, first I'm sorry if I came out as a basher. I understadn you are a fan (maybe invovled with the rpg book sin someway) and i didn't want to hurt any feelings.

It's all cool. Kinda hard to tell intent over the internet. I am, btw, one of the freelance designers who has worked on the d20 Dragonlance product design.

However, I will go out and say I am quite bitter at dragonlance and whats been done to it. The OT was good (though book 3 was, frankly not so good), and the Soulforge/Brothers in Arms were excellent. But al books after dragons of summer flame have sucked.

There are several people who have felt that way, so you're not alone. In a way, the War of Souls was a way to get back to Dragonlance's roots.

That new female introduced in the books (mira I think) and everything about her has also been rather horrible.

Mina, and she was actually introduced in the Fifth Age products. I like her, but I can understand why many don't. She's been made into a Joan of Arc type of character. Of course, what's happening with her now is really interesting.

ANother annoying this were those huge alien dragons. Apart from their cheese (huge, invincible, eeeevil, etc) Why they should not obey takhsis the dragonQUEEN was beyond me.

Nah nah, hey hey, kiss them goodbye! No longer an issue in the setting. (I didn't like them either. )

The rpg: The main rulesbook (which required the PHB to play) was quite poor as well (in fact i hear they had to reprint the wizard class again, and the wizard class was one of the good things about the book).

The Wizard of High Sorcery prestige class didn't allow for generalist spellcasters, so it was slightly tweaked to allow for that option. Otherwise, it remains unchanged.

There were some other issues with the Dragonlance Campaign Setting. While I think it was a great book, there are some things that could have been done better. We totally revamped the Knights of Solamnia to match the novels better (and get rid of some overpowering and wonky mechanics that WotC mandated). Check out Knightly Orders of Ansalon for that one (co-written by yours truly!).

Anyhow, how are the towers of high sorcery supplement? The legends of the twins? And how are the revised adventures (dragons of autumn, winter and spring)? I was really considering getting them for nostalgia's sake and see how they stack up.

All very good. Towers of High Sorcery was when Margaret Weis Productions really hit their stride with Dragonlance.