There's little concensus at the academic level anyway, at least style-wise--especially among active writers and readers of contemporary fiction. In fact, if you could persuade a dozen academics to compare LotR and DL stylistically, plenty of them would side with DL on aesthetic grounds. The issue isn't at all clear cut.crazypixie said:
Dragonlance: Our LotR?
- Thread starter Reynard
- Start date
qstor
Adventurer
I read LotR when I was 11 and DL when I was about 22. I love each equally. I'm saddened by the stuff that WOTC has been doing the past week. I think it shows they really don't have a love for the history of the game esp since the authors of DL have been a real part of D&D for a long time since the stories in Dragon magazine and the print products at TSR.
I think Hasbro is pulling all stops for Eberron now. What's next a GI Joe rpg????
Renew DL![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
Mike
I think Hasbro is pulling all stops for Eberron now. What's next a GI Joe rpg????
Renew DL
Mike
DragonLancer
Hero
It took me about 15 years to read LotR because I just couldn't stand Tolkien's writing style. He's just too flowery and I'd rather he just got on with it rather than describing the hundreds of flowers. Saying that though, I do appreciate his storytelling and how it has influenced D&D and gaming in general.
For me, the Dragonlance Chronicles and Legends are MY LotR. They are everything I wanted out of an epic fantasy story, and unlike LotR (IMO) they are well written. It was from reading the Chronicles back in 1987 that made me hunt down D&D and start roleplaying.
For me, the Dragonlance Chronicles and Legends are MY LotR. They are everything I wanted out of an epic fantasy story, and unlike LotR (IMO) they are well written. It was from reading the Chronicles back in 1987 that made me hunt down D&D and start roleplaying.
Tinker Gnome
Adventurer
I like Dragonalnce Faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar better than LoTR. Dragonlance beats up LoTR in every single way possible for me. It is just that much better. Oh, and Tinker Gnomes rule your soul! 
pawsplay
Hero
I think a lot of people are confusing "I enjoy this" with well written. Simply because you enjoy a McDonald's burger and do not enjoy the lobster bisque at the Mansion on Turtle Creek does not mean the burger is well prepared and bisque poorly prepared. I did not enjoy The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce, whereas I did enjoy A Difficulty with Dwarves by Craig Shaw Gardner. However, I'm not going to tout the latter's literary merits against the former.
Not everyone is destined to become a sophisticated reader, but I think it's worthwhile to consider the difference between craft and taste.
Not everyone is destined to become a sophisticated reader, but I think it's worthwhile to consider the difference between craft and taste.
Hussar
Legend
I'm going to avoid the whole piddling contest between LOTR and DL. I like them both. Read them both at about the same time and I KNOW that the DL modules informed a lot of my DMing for years to come. I also know that LoTR did not. Make of that what you will.
As for what DL brought to the gaming table - look at cartography for one. Say what you will about DL modules, they are gorgeous. The cartography is head and shoulders above the old blue and white maps that you usually got in modules of the period. Typically, the maps were 3/4 view (something that appears again (before?) in Ravenloft) and color.
You also got some very large poster maps. The poster map of that tower (whose name I forget right now) is bloody beautiful.
Another bonus was the idea that modules could have some extra goodies as well. While you did get hand out pics in some modules, that wasn't the norm. DL modules almost always had something in them to give to the players. A number of the modules also tied into other concepts as well - such as Battlesystems and one module (DL 12?) was actually a board game for playing the War of the Lance as a wargame.
Conceptually, you get some very new ideas as well. The dreamweb in the module with the Green dragon (I'm misremembering numbers) has been attempted and reattempted in a number of other modules. Published at about the same time, you have a similar attempt in Isle of the Ape. I'm actually not sure which came first.
While DL modules are much maligned as railroads (rightfully in my mind), they are the granddaddy of things like the Adventure Paths. Sometimes you gotta do it wrong before you can do it right.
Cam Banks
Adventurer
To be fair, the production quality we saw in the classic modules arose from that used in the Basic and Expert sets of the day (full of Elmore art) and Tracy Hickman's other works, the Desert of Desolation trilogy (which featured some astounding maps and excellent plot elements - probably my favorite Hickman modules) and I6 Ravenloft. Those predate Dragonlance, but Dragonlance took the lessons from those modules and went to town.
Dragonlance was the first attempt by TSR to create a whole new brand, a world that would extend to novels, calendars, computer games, and of course adventures. It was a titanic success, moreso than many people even remember.
The quip about more people having played through the GDQ series of modules may seem like a no-brainer, but I honestly don't think it's true. I would put money on more D&D players having been through some, if not all, of the DL series than the GDQ series, leaving out any future repackaging, collecting, or revising of the modules (so I don't count later 2nd edition versions of these adventures, etc etc).
Cheers,
Cam
Dragonlance was the first attempt by TSR to create a whole new brand, a world that would extend to novels, calendars, computer games, and of course adventures. It was a titanic success, moreso than many people even remember.
The quip about more people having played through the GDQ series of modules may seem like a no-brainer, but I honestly don't think it's true. I would put money on more D&D players having been through some, if not all, of the DL series than the GDQ series, leaving out any future repackaging, collecting, or revising of the modules (so I don't count later 2nd edition versions of these adventures, etc etc).
Cheers,
Cam
CruelSummerLord
First Post
Regarding the OP's question, I say yes and no at the same time.
Why?
Because it's important to distinguish the DL modules from the DL novels. I'll explain what I mean by each in turn:
The DL modules were, IMO, fantastic. I'm not one of those gamers who really cares all that much about striking out on my own and doing what I want when I want-I'm content to follow the DM's railroad and plotline. The modules were an excellent example of how to create an ongoing plotline, giving different characters the spotlight at different times. Flint could be developed on the trip through Thorbardin, Laurana on Southern Ergoth, Sturm among the Knights, Raistlin after getting the Dragon Orb, etc. It also showed how to blend a matrix campaign with an ongoing sense of time.
The modules integrated the dungeon crawls into the overall plotline, and gave the players a better reason to enter them than to simply stuff their pockets with treasure. The history of the setting was introduced through the gaming and dungeon crawls. There was something for everyone-fights for the fighting players, role-playing for RPers, negotiation and political intrigue for problem-solvers, etc.
Finally, I don't think the railroading would have mattered as much if the gaming group had actually created these characters and had more of an emotional interest in them, since they would have set out the goals themselves of discovering more about the True Gods, reconciling the Solamnic Knights, rescuing the slaves of Pax Tharkas, helping the dwarves, etc. The players would likely have viewed all that as a logical progression of the storyline they and the DM had created up to that point.
Now as for Weis and Hickman's novels...
They were a major letdown for me.
How come?
First of all, Weis and Hickman blatantly favored some cast members (Raistlin, Tanis, Tasslehoff, Laurana, Sturm) and increasingly pushed some of the others (Riverwind, Flint, Tika, Goldmoon) to the background, or never let them do anything meaningful. Riverwind and Goldmoon seemed to just follow Tanis and Raistlin around as they saved the day, and never got a chance to do it themselves, being simply written out and not even getting to go to Neraka. All Flint ever got to do was complain, and suffer a horribly ignoble and pointless death in the third book. For a guy with an 18 Constitution, he sure had a lot of health problems. He never got to prove himself, he never got to "save the day", so to speak.
In the Twins trilogy, Riverwind only shows up to refuse to accompany Crysania, and then promptly disappears. Were it not for other writers telling the stories of Riverwind and Flint, it's likely Weis and Hickman would have left them to languish in obscurity while continuing to develop Tasslehoff, Laurana and Raistlin.
Then there's the fact that the novels left out so many strong points of the modules. Raistlin single-handedly defeats the Silvanesti nightmare and Cyan Bloodbane, there's no voyage to Sanction to free the dragons, no battle with the King of the Deep, no trip through the High Clerist Tower, no Serinda or Kronn, no voyage to the Glitterpalace, no voyage to recover the Hammer, nothing like that.
Finally, there was all the deus ex machina. The good dragons mysteriously appear out of nowhere to suddenly help the heroes-unless you know about what was going on in Sanction, the reader is left wondering why they didn't show up sooner. The Companions are caught red-handed trying to sneak into Neraka, committing a major security breach, and Kitiara shows up at exactly the right moment to bail them out, with no one commenting on how these intruders are suddenly given a free pass. For a god who's not supposed to intervene directly, Fizban pops up a surprising number of times to do exactly that, to spur the Heroes to get on with their business and not-so-subtly guide them.
I know I'm probably going to be pilloried for saying this, but the storyline as offered by the novels simply does not compare to those offered by the modules. I'm left thinking that I could have done a better job by integrating more material from the modules-such as Tanis's party finding Huma's Dragonlance hidden in the ruins near Kendermore, where Cyan Bloodbane hid it, and then bringing it back to Kalamar, where Sturm makes the ultimate sacrifice and recreates the feat of Huma by using his hero's Dragonlance to again drive the Queen of Darkness back through the portal. No, Sturm doesn't die at the High Clerist's Tower, but he gets his big sacrifice all the same.
Flint could have been developed more in Thorbardin. Tasslehoff could save the day when Laurana's party is penetrating Icewall Castle. Raistlin could weave a web of intrigue to play Kitiara and Toede for fools and pit them against each other, all while extracting Berem from their grip. Caramon could have developed a deadly rivalry with Lord Soth. And so on down the line.
I'm sorry, but that's just the way I feel. I think DL would have been better off following the line set by the modules as opposed to that set by the novels.
Why?
Because it's important to distinguish the DL modules from the DL novels. I'll explain what I mean by each in turn:
The DL modules were, IMO, fantastic. I'm not one of those gamers who really cares all that much about striking out on my own and doing what I want when I want-I'm content to follow the DM's railroad and plotline. The modules were an excellent example of how to create an ongoing plotline, giving different characters the spotlight at different times. Flint could be developed on the trip through Thorbardin, Laurana on Southern Ergoth, Sturm among the Knights, Raistlin after getting the Dragon Orb, etc. It also showed how to blend a matrix campaign with an ongoing sense of time.
The modules integrated the dungeon crawls into the overall plotline, and gave the players a better reason to enter them than to simply stuff their pockets with treasure. The history of the setting was introduced through the gaming and dungeon crawls. There was something for everyone-fights for the fighting players, role-playing for RPers, negotiation and political intrigue for problem-solvers, etc.
Finally, I don't think the railroading would have mattered as much if the gaming group had actually created these characters and had more of an emotional interest in them, since they would have set out the goals themselves of discovering more about the True Gods, reconciling the Solamnic Knights, rescuing the slaves of Pax Tharkas, helping the dwarves, etc. The players would likely have viewed all that as a logical progression of the storyline they and the DM had created up to that point.
Now as for Weis and Hickman's novels...
They were a major letdown for me.
How come?
First of all, Weis and Hickman blatantly favored some cast members (Raistlin, Tanis, Tasslehoff, Laurana, Sturm) and increasingly pushed some of the others (Riverwind, Flint, Tika, Goldmoon) to the background, or never let them do anything meaningful. Riverwind and Goldmoon seemed to just follow Tanis and Raistlin around as they saved the day, and never got a chance to do it themselves, being simply written out and not even getting to go to Neraka. All Flint ever got to do was complain, and suffer a horribly ignoble and pointless death in the third book. For a guy with an 18 Constitution, he sure had a lot of health problems. He never got to prove himself, he never got to "save the day", so to speak.
In the Twins trilogy, Riverwind only shows up to refuse to accompany Crysania, and then promptly disappears. Were it not for other writers telling the stories of Riverwind and Flint, it's likely Weis and Hickman would have left them to languish in obscurity while continuing to develop Tasslehoff, Laurana and Raistlin.
Then there's the fact that the novels left out so many strong points of the modules. Raistlin single-handedly defeats the Silvanesti nightmare and Cyan Bloodbane, there's no voyage to Sanction to free the dragons, no battle with the King of the Deep, no trip through the High Clerist Tower, no Serinda or Kronn, no voyage to the Glitterpalace, no voyage to recover the Hammer, nothing like that.
Finally, there was all the deus ex machina. The good dragons mysteriously appear out of nowhere to suddenly help the heroes-unless you know about what was going on in Sanction, the reader is left wondering why they didn't show up sooner. The Companions are caught red-handed trying to sneak into Neraka, committing a major security breach, and Kitiara shows up at exactly the right moment to bail them out, with no one commenting on how these intruders are suddenly given a free pass. For a god who's not supposed to intervene directly, Fizban pops up a surprising number of times to do exactly that, to spur the Heroes to get on with their business and not-so-subtly guide them.
I know I'm probably going to be pilloried for saying this, but the storyline as offered by the novels simply does not compare to those offered by the modules. I'm left thinking that I could have done a better job by integrating more material from the modules-such as Tanis's party finding Huma's Dragonlance hidden in the ruins near Kendermore, where Cyan Bloodbane hid it, and then bringing it back to Kalamar, where Sturm makes the ultimate sacrifice and recreates the feat of Huma by using his hero's Dragonlance to again drive the Queen of Darkness back through the portal. No, Sturm doesn't die at the High Clerist's Tower, but he gets his big sacrifice all the same.
Flint could have been developed more in Thorbardin. Tasslehoff could save the day when Laurana's party is penetrating Icewall Castle. Raistlin could weave a web of intrigue to play Kitiara and Toede for fools and pit them against each other, all while extracting Berem from their grip. Caramon could have developed a deadly rivalry with Lord Soth. And so on down the line.
I'm sorry, but that's just the way I feel. I think DL would have been better off following the line set by the modules as opposed to that set by the novels.
Aaron L
Hero
I am 31 years old. I came to gaming in the early 90's through comic books, specifically Chris Claremonts X-Men (still the best things ! have ever read) and the Punisher. It wasn't until just after I found a group of gamers and begged them to let me play that I finally read LotR. I wasn't all that impressed, largely because the dense, arcane, and and Byzantine prose made it almost impossible or me to discern what the hell was going on in the story. It wasn't until after I read supplementary material and bestiaries and the like that I really began too appreciate the world of Midde Earth and the story of LotR. Reading the Silmarillion made me understand what was going on, and I got more out of the paragraph long summary of the whole of the series than I ever did out of reading the books themselves. Then I went back and read LotR and was finally able to appreciate it, but I still can't take all the poerty and songs and still skip them whenever I read the books. LotR made me fall in love with Elves, and I am sill in love with them to this day.
It wasn't for several years that I read the Dragonlance Chronicles, recommended to me by a friend who had come to gaming through them. Since then I had been exposed to Frank Herbert's Dune, Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time, David Eddings Belgariad and Mallorean, and Lovecraft and the general body of Cthulhu Mythos material. so I was excited about reading the legendary Dragonlance Chronicles. But when I finally read it I was left totally unimpressed. It was simplistic, predictable, and juvenile. The only character I found remotely interesting was Raistlin and his relationship with his brother Caramon. ALL of the races I found repugnant. The elves were xenophobic racists, the dwarves were stubborn racist fools causing their own extinction, and the humans were arrogant racists who deserved to be wiped off the planet. Tinker gnomes, kender, and gully dwarves made me so sick to read about, so annoyed and disgusted that I wanted to rip out every page featuring one of them and burn it. The fact that the the "absent minded tinker" replaced the 1st Edition gnomish culture and became a standard for gnomes in D&D and elsewhere since then (even frigging EverQuest and World of Warcraft!) still infuriates me to this day, and I strip it out of the race in every game I run. The way the dwarves treated the gully dwarves reminded me of nothing but Nazis and the way they treated the mentally ill. Every race but the dragons were vile and unsympathetic, and wanted them to unite and wipe the other races off the face of Krynn.
The whole story made me wish I had never read it. The modules were even worse, the most horrific railroad of a series of adventures I ever had the misfortune of trying to play through.
The Legends series was much better; better written, better characters portrayals, better everything. I actually still have a copy and read it every so often. But you couldn't pay me to read the Chronicles again.
As for Dragonlance being the LotR of a generation of gamers? I'm afraid I agree with that. Very unfortunately. Now everyone expects gnomes to be tinkers, kender to be allowed as a playable race, no matter what world the game is set on, and minotaurs to be a playable race. I wish the books had never been written to taint fantasy with it's ideas.
Well, there's my take on it. In my present state of mind it probably comes off a lot harsher than I'd normally put it, but it's still truly what I think.
I'm sorry about that for all the people that love Dragonlance.
And Cam Banks, I've always wanted to ask you: just where in central PA do you live, exactly?
It wasn't for several years that I read the Dragonlance Chronicles, recommended to me by a friend who had come to gaming through them. Since then I had been exposed to Frank Herbert's Dune, Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time, David Eddings Belgariad and Mallorean, and Lovecraft and the general body of Cthulhu Mythos material. so I was excited about reading the legendary Dragonlance Chronicles. But when I finally read it I was left totally unimpressed. It was simplistic, predictable, and juvenile. The only character I found remotely interesting was Raistlin and his relationship with his brother Caramon. ALL of the races I found repugnant. The elves were xenophobic racists, the dwarves were stubborn racist fools causing their own extinction, and the humans were arrogant racists who deserved to be wiped off the planet. Tinker gnomes, kender, and gully dwarves made me so sick to read about, so annoyed and disgusted that I wanted to rip out every page featuring one of them and burn it. The fact that the the "absent minded tinker" replaced the 1st Edition gnomish culture and became a standard for gnomes in D&D and elsewhere since then (even frigging EverQuest and World of Warcraft!) still infuriates me to this day, and I strip it out of the race in every game I run. The way the dwarves treated the gully dwarves reminded me of nothing but Nazis and the way they treated the mentally ill. Every race but the dragons were vile and unsympathetic, and wanted them to unite and wipe the other races off the face of Krynn.
The whole story made me wish I had never read it. The modules were even worse, the most horrific railroad of a series of adventures I ever had the misfortune of trying to play through.
The Legends series was much better; better written, better characters portrayals, better everything. I actually still have a copy and read it every so often. But you couldn't pay me to read the Chronicles again.
As for Dragonlance being the LotR of a generation of gamers? I'm afraid I agree with that. Very unfortunately. Now everyone expects gnomes to be tinkers, kender to be allowed as a playable race, no matter what world the game is set on, and minotaurs to be a playable race. I wish the books had never been written to taint fantasy with it's ideas.
Well, there's my take on it. In my present state of mind it probably comes off a lot harsher than I'd normally put it, but it's still truly what I think.
I'm sorry about that for all the people that love Dragonlance.
And Cam Banks, I've always wanted to ask you: just where in central PA do you live, exactly?
Last edited:
Hussar
Legend
After that rant?
(J/K)The railroad aspect of the modules is a fair criticism I think. Then again, I think that also kinda goes with the times, but, I'm not going to go there.
OTOH, there were all sorts of chewy goodness in the modules. DL1 and Xak Tsaroth was a bloody fantastic dungeon crawl. If you lifted the dungeon crawl out of the module and played it as is, it's got some great moments. Also, those two modules on the end, the ones with all the mini modules, had some really fun adventures in there.
Granted, I could never get a group to play through the whole series. I think the farthest we ever got was about the sixth module before giving up.
But, worst modules ever? No, that's not fair. There were much worse modules out there.
Fortunately, it appears that the kender thing has faded away from mind. At least with anyone I play with for a long time.
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