D&D General Joe Manganiello: Compares Early 5E to BG 3 . How Important is Lore?

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

It's mostly enforcement. If they don't enforce blatant cip infringement, they can lose it. But if they fight lawsuits but produce outdated or poor product, they would lose their standing in the industry and be usurped.

Especially if a lot of gaming can't be trademarked or copyrighted.

So a major game leader and publisher can't really afford to sit around and do nothing with their main IPs.

You can never lose copyright (until it expires) no matter what, you can sit on it for as long as you want. You can potentially lose trademark rights if you let people use your trademark to refer to something other than your product. If gamers start calling every RPG "Dungeons & Dragons" then WotC will lose the D&D trademark.

An important thing to remember is that there is no such thing as "IP". There are 3 distinct legal constructs - copyright, trademarks, and patents - that get lumped together and called "Intellectual Property", but this is just a shorthand and legally they are unrelated.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Also the timing seems bad. I just did not biy anything becaue I wait for 5e2024. And if it is really that compatible, I think I buy planescape at least.

 

[Remathilis]

Mostly just respect tge old lore vs blowing it up imho. You run a high risk of alienating the old fans and not getting news ones either (and the old fans are actively dumping on your product to new ones).

One man's respect is another man's betrayal.

Greyhawk is one of the oldest "kitchen sink" settings in existence, and there are fans who howl at the thought of sorcerers, dragonborn, and tiefling PCs. (and they get real side-eyed at those short folk casting arcane spells). To them, it doesn't matter if they introduced a lore rationale for the change or not, its not "Gar-weeze vurshion" and therefore will never be accepted.

The issue ends up a chicken-or-egg scenario: should a setting book support D&D (as it is for the edition the book is being written for) or should D&D change to accommodate the setting. A lot of people here would vote the latter and I'm sure would be happy if a 5e Greyhawk book came out with rule changes like dwarves can't be wizards and dragonborn is verboten, but that's because they still think of Greyhawk as a setting that was created with AD&D (or OD&D) ideas in mind. Whereas a player who came into the game even as early as 3e would not get the logic of banning magic from dwarves or no dragonborn because to them, Greyhawk (being the default 3e world) had those elements by virtue of the core rules. Whose version of Greyhawk is more true? Which deserves publication?

Ultimately, Greyhawk (and all other D&D settings) should serve the D&D game, not vice versa. They are supplements to the D&D game and they should absoluetely be interpreted under the current zeitgeist of the game as it is currently published. Yes, that means things will change. Greyhawk isn't frozen in amber, its not defined by its lack of dragonborn and dwarven wizards. If a setting is designed in such a way it cannot be reinterpreted, then that setting gets left behind (sorry Dark Sun and Birthright fans). Evolve or die. Fit the meta or be left in the dust.

 

[Remathilis]

Not the edition itself. It's openness and ease.

If D&D said dwarves could only be fighters and elves fighters and rogues because that's the lore and culture of 10+ D&D settings, new fans would doing the Abe Simpson in the brothel.

Walk in, remove hat, turn around, put on hat, walk out.

Exactly.

The notion that a setting designed for an edition 40 years ago should remain unchanged and unchallenged despite the game having radically changed. Greyhawk and Dragonlance and such should be held to lore elements designed to accomidate rules that are decades out of date.

 

[Micah Sweet]

One man's respect is another man's betrayal.

Greyhawk is one of the oldest "kitchen sink" settings in existence, and there are fans who howl at the thought of sorcerers, dragonborn, and tiefling PCs. (and they get real side-eyed at those short folk casting arcane spells). To them, it doesn't matter if they introduced a lore rationale for the change or not, its not "Gar-weeze vurshion" and therefore will never be accepted.

The issue ends up a chicken-or-egg scenario: should a setting book support D&D (as it is for the edition the book is being written for) or should D&D change to accommodate the setting. A lot of people here would vote the latter and I'm sure would be happy if a 5e Greyhawk book came out with rule changes like dwarves can't be wizards and dragonborn is verboten, but that's because they still think of Greyhawk as a setting that was created with AD&D (or OD&D) ideas in mind. Whereas a player who came into the game even as early as 3e would not get the logic of banning magic from dwarves or no dragonborn because to them, Greyhawk (being the default 3e world) had those elements by virtue of the core rules. Whose version of Greyhawk is more true? Which deserves publication?

Ultimately, Greyhawk (and all other D&D settings) should serve the D&D game, not vice versa. They are supplements to the D&D game and they should absoluetely be interpreted under the current zeitgeist of the game as it is currently published. Yes, that means things will change. Greyhawk isn't frozen in amber, its not defined by its lack of dragonborn and dwarven wizards. If a setting is designed in such a way it cannot be reinterpreted, then that setting gets left behind (sorry Dark Sun and Birthright fans). Evolve or die. Fit the meta or be left in the dust.

Thanks for making clear all the above was just your opinion and personal preference. Oh wait, you actually didn't do that. Please try not to insist that what you believe is some kind of objective truth.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Exactly.

The notion that a setting designed for an edition 40 years ago should remain unchanged and unchallenged despite the game having radically changed. Greyhawk and Dragonlance and such should be held to lore elements designed to accomidate rules that are decades out of date.

Why shouldn't it? If you want something different out of D&D than classic Greyhawk, that's why there are other settings.

 

[bedir than]

Why shouldn't it? If you want something different out of D&D than classic Greyhawk, that's why there are other settings.

because in the real world things change over time, as does our understanding.

A setting is a world. World's have always changed. They always will change. The stories told within them have always changed upon a new telling (see Canterbury Tales or Arthur or Beowolf). Nothing in life is stagnant.

 

[Remathilis]

Thanks for making clear all the above was just your opinion and personal preference. Oh wait, you actually didn't do that. Please try not to insist that what you believe is some kind of objective truth.

I will when you do.

 

[Zardnaar]

One man's respect is another man's betrayal.

Greyhawk is one of the oldest "kitchen sink" settings in existence, and there are fans who howl at the thought of sorcerers, dragonborn, and tiefling PCs. (and they get real side-eyed at those short folk casting arcane spells). To them, it doesn't matter if they introduced a lore rationale for the change or not, its not "Gar-weeze vurshion" and therefore will never be accepted.

The issue ends up a chicken-or-egg scenario: should a setting book support D&D (as it is for the edition the book is being written for) or should D&D change to accommodate the setting. A lot of people here would vote the latter and I'm sure would be happy if a 5e Greyhawk book came out with rule changes like dwarves can't be wizards and dragonborn is verboten, but that's because they still think of Greyhawk as a setting that was created with AD&D (or OD&D) ideas in mind. Whereas a player who came into the game even as early as 3e would not get the logic of banning magic from dwarves or no dragonborn because to them, Greyhawk (being the default 3e world) had those elements by virtue of the core rules. Whose version of Greyhawk is more true? Which deserves publication?

Ultimately, Greyhawk (and all other D&D settings) should serve the D&D game, not vice versa. They are supplements to the D&D game and they should absoluetely be interpreted under the current zeitgeist of the game as it is currently published. Yes, that means things will change. Greyhawk isn't frozen in amber, its not defined by its lack of dragonborn and dwarven wizards. If a setting is designed in such a way it cannot be reinterpreted, then that setting gets left behind (sorry Dark Sun and Birthright fans). Evolve or die. Fit the meta or be left in the dust.

You're never going to please everyone. Greyhawk still generic D&D it's vibe is a bit darker than say FR.

By respectful I mean look at existing lore and any new changes and try and work with it.

Eg adding Tieflings for example makes sense because of Iuz. There's your way in for adding them organically and be a major race vs far off traveller.

Darksun Genasi should be the new major race.

Adding everything just dilutes things.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

But if you keep those limits in the creation of characters then it will be more difficult to sell new classes created later, for example the psionic manifesters, the incarnum soulmelders or the martial adepts (Tome of Battle: Book of the nine Swords).

The creations by the first generation of players and game designers were very important, but years later the experience teachs us other ways. For example Curse of Strand in 5ed added a lot of new elements there weren't in the 2nd and the 3rd Ed. And why not?

Athasian genasis were canon in 4th, they appeared in an article of Dragon Magazine (#396). They were Embersoul, Magmasoul, Sandsoul and Sunsoul.

* Would you allow elements from 3.5 "Sandstorm" in your Dark Sun game?

Other point is the controversies about canon is useless because after in your game you are totally free to change. Some times even the DMs change intentionally the metaplot to avoid players too warned because they read all in the fandom wiki.