How constrained do you feel by D&D "canon"

[sjmiller]

Good lord, if it's not nailed down I have probably changed it. Drow? Not in my campaign. Illithid? Never heard of the word, mindflayers all the way! Extensive polytheism? Nope. The dwarves in my campaign are strongly monotheistic and xenophobic. Skinny, hyperactive, bard worshiping gnomes? Gnomes are short, semi-stout, dwarf-related fans of illusion. There are lots of things I have changed because I find them silly, inappropriate, or tasteless. Following D&D canon has never been a constraint for me.

 

[GSHamster]

Imo, canon creates "shared expectations". If I stick to the canon on what a dwarf is, I just say, "you meet a dwarf", and everyone understands what is going on. For a game which is primarily based around using words to envision something, the fewer words you need to use, the better.

Basically, using canon allows you to pack a lot of meaning into a few words, and spend the rest of your words describing the things that are unique to this particular individual dwarf, rather than things which are unique to your dwarves in general.

Which is not to say that you *need* to use canon for everything. But there is a non-trivial price for deviating from canon, and I prefer to pay that price only for things which I consider absolutely necessary for my "vision".

 

[Samnell]

I use setting canon to the degree that it's useful to me. My Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil game has evolved from "stop the evil cultists from destroying the world" to "because it's the only way to save the cursed halfling's sanity and soul" to "and also revive an ancient dwarven kingdom with the blessing of Moradin and the help of a de-aged, divinely-infused Rerrid Hammersong and a few dozen of his closest relations". and "by the way, the paladin kind of swore to do it and has some political issues with trying to set up a base of permanent operations outside the fiefdom of his liege lord".

In the course of that I've drawn deeply on FR setting information, especially the history of the realm in question (Shanatar, Sondarr specifically). I've put some of that information into the mouth of the Rerrid and used some of it to add a running, open-ended subplot about who should be the kind of this presumptive realm. The party wants it to be Rerrid, but Moradin's been a bit cagey in the communes and dwarven law leans towards the other claimant. Much of that is based on inferences I've drawn from what's in the books, but I've explained some things by swiping real-life historical practices (tanistry; multiple, simultaneous female inheritance of noble titles in some English peerages), swiped some things from message boards (the curse the halfling druid has is based on an idea off Monte's boards), and invented stuff entirely.

I think I've more of used canon as a source of ideas and starting point than been limited by it. I'm presently ignoring a line in a recent FR book that puts a major artifact in the hands of the rival claimant to the dwarven kingdom because per the dwarven inheritance laws I've outlined that would render his prevailing in the power struggle a fait accompli. That's no fun.

I really should make a story hour out of it one of these days. It's a nicely crinkly game and I'm cloyingly proud of it.

 

[Ranger REG]

How constrained do you find yourself in your own campaign world?

Not so much. I do have to maintain certain continuity based on the group's experience in my campaign world. But once it a while I throw a clog just to confuse them (though with valid reasons).

 

[Jemal]

My friends and I have always used rule zero for background/setting stuff. Keep what you like, Make up the rest.

 

[Maggan]

Why do you feel constrained? Is it your own choice, or do you feel your players would expect it?

I don't feel constrained and my players expects me to deliver the best game mastering I can, and it that means canon goes out the window, then so be it.

I think the only game where I play strictly by canon is Call of Cthulhu.

/M

 

[Mr. Wilson]

Depends on the campaign world for me. FR and Eberron are run pretty faithfully to the RPG books only. Homebrewed worlds are open to all kinds of changes, including ditching the Wheel, having sorcerors outlawed (to dangerous in the minds of Wizards), a mostly neutral pantheon, etc, etc.

 

[RFisher]

I have never felt constrained by canon.

In the past, that meant that I often changed a lot of the canon to fit my whims.

These days, however, I've realized that I'd much rather focus more on other bits than the canon rather than spend so much time altering the canon in ways that don't really add much to the game for me in the end. There's plenty of room within the canon.

 

[Shades of Green]

I don't feel much constrained by D&D cannon - D&D is nothing but a toolkit for building your own worlds, your own adventures... I pick and choose whatever elements I see appropriate.

 

[Greg K]

I would feel constrained only if I were running a setting like Greyhawk or FR. Even then, the cannon for Greyhawk and FR that I would stick with would be pre 3e (actually pre 2e for Greyhawk).