Dragonlance Here's That Official Dragonlance Novels Announcement, Featuring Classic Characters & An Old Logo!

We've known about it for a while due to lawsuits and product placeholder pages on Amazon, but Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman have just announced their new Dragonlance series of novels!

It returns 'the most beloved characters from the original novels', as well as a 'new, strong protagonist'. Previous information from the lawsuit about this series indicated that the first book was to be called Dragons of Deceit, and the second Dragons of Fate. The Amazon placeholder page says the release date is 29th July 2021. Of course, any of that information may have changed.

Original (classic) DL logo

Later (Fifth Age) DL logo​

The branding refers to "Classic Dragonlance" and uses the older, original (and my favourite) Dragonlance logo. Whether that in some way distinguishes it from any potential WotC Dragonlance materials remains to be seen. The logo changed in the 1990s, and continued to be used throughout the 3E era.

The news was shared on Twitter and on Tracy Hickman's website.

 PRESS RELEASE

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Wilmington, NC – January 25, 2021 – Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman are pleased to announce a multi-year licensing agreement with Wizards of the Coast to produce a new, three book series of Classic Dragonlance novels.

The new trilogy will return fans to the most beloved characters from the original novels along with introducing a new strong protagonist. The books will be published by Del Rey Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Although a publishing date has not yet been formally set, they anticipate announcing when the first book will be released later this year.

“We couldn’t be happier to be returning to the world we love,” says Margaret Weis. “Dragonlance is what brought Tracy and I together so many years ago. We’re thrilled to be able to do this for existing lovers of Krynn while bringing our beloved characters to a new generation of readers.”

The first Classic Dragonlance novel, Dragons of Autumn Twilight, was written by Weis and Hickman and published in 1984. Since that time, more than 190 novels have been published in the setting. Weis and Hickman have collaborated on numerous series over the last 30 years including projects set within the world of Classic Dragonlance and outside of it. Two notable series are The Death Gate Cycle and The Darksword Series, both published by Penguin Random House.

“We credit the fans of Dragonlance for making this journey possible,” says Tracy Hickman. “We wrote this series out of our thanks to them for this amazing life-long journey…and from our wish that they join us once more on the road to Solace.”

The license for the series was secured by Weis & Hickman in 2018. Their recent dispute with Wizards of the Coast was resolved at the end of 2020, with all parties pleased to have come to agreement on how best to move forward with the trilogy. All are focused on producing the best series possible and will not comment on the past dispute other than to say it has been resolved.

Watch for additional news from Weis and Hickman about Classic Dragonlance and other projects on the horizon in the coming months.

 

[Selvarin]

If whatever they do gets rid of Dragons of Summer Flame, etc., cool. Essentially having all the powers-that-be (including Raistlin) walk into the sunset in order to satisfy the Chaos god or whatever...meh.

I understand Raistlin is dislikeable, in some ways I preferred not knowing the 'why' with regards to The Soulforge and other books. Or perhaps because I'm not used to seeing him with less sneering menace. Sure gave a good clue as to why Raistlin had a bone to pick with Par-Salian. FFS, being given hourglass eyes in order to...well won't go there.

Fact of the matter is that Krynn is a small pond with big fish and big stories. Take away the characters that made it memorable and it's less interesting, keep 'em in and it goes stale. No perfect fix, other than to iron out certain wrinkles and move forward. There's still some room to write and grow.

Just a thought. World of Greyhawk (as a setting) is kind of 'stuck' with essentially two time eras, Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms also has a few starting points, some worse than others. Wonder how War of the Lance would look under 5E? Raistlin still able to cast cantrips (as opposed to being completely drained, as per 1E/2E rules)? Ah, well.

As for game mechanics used to define characters in stat form. Maybe not as useful but fun mental exercise for those of us who can't/don't want to do algebra for kicks.