Dragonlance Looking for the best Age of Despair Dragonlance campaign setting material

[Sword of Spirit]

I have the 3e campaign setting, but a good amount of it (including the map) has changed due to being set well into the fifth age.

I understand that the only other campaign setting book was Tales of the Lance, which is riddled with inconsistencies and changes to established Dragonlance lore. (I looked up what some of the changes were, and they are non-trivial in both type and number.)

So...since those won't work, is there any other book, or small collection (ie, 2-3 books, not "pretty much everything published before Tales of the Lance"), that would give me the essential functionality of a campaign setting? Ie, I need a good map, descriptions of the various lands, etc, without any major holes.

Thanks for any help!

 

[Ath-kethin]

Good luck. Dragonlance products are defined as much by their inconsistencies as by their story.

The Tales of the Lance boxed set from 1992 is set during the War of the Lance and slightly after, but that again is full of inconsistencies both with Dragonlance canon and game mechanics.

Similarly, the Dragonlance Adventures hardcover from 1988 has a lot of great stuff, and was written by Weis & Hickman themselves, but it still inconsistent in many ways with canon and setting.

My advice would be to take the 3.5 stuff and just work with it. They had a Legends of the Twins book that was pretty good and had some historical info in it too.

Failing all of that, the Taladas boxed set from 1989 or so was excellent. It is set on a different continent and has some interestingly different interpretations of various events throughout Krynnish history, but it's an awesome setting in itself and dodges the "too much backstory to remember and account for" issue.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Rise from your grave!

I'm taking another look at this, still trying to find a way to get the info I need without breaking the bank and spending hundreds of hours of reading and collating.

Is "PG1 Player's Guide to the Dragonlance Campaign" any good for my desire to get a pre-Tales of the Lance view of the setting? It looks like it was printed shortly after Tales of the Lance, which might be a bad sign, but with various authors working on it it's always possible that they took a lighter hand to the lore.

Another one I wonder about is Atlas of the Dragonlance World. It comes from an earlier time so shouldn't have the reboot issues, but I'm not sure how much content it will have. I'm not looking for mechanics--just a basic atlas+timeline that will tell me what the world is like on the ground at any particular place on Ansalon.

 

[GreyLord]

Couldn't help you on those you are requesting information on. I'd reiterate the same stuff said about 2 years ago, Legend of the Twins for the 3e setting and the Dragonlance Adventures may be the best bet after what you have already.

Other than that, there are various novels out there.

If you are just looking for a timeline...here are some internet resources...

https://dragonlance.fandom.com/wiki/Dragonlance_timeline

Or a more specific one to the Age of Despair

http://dlnexus.com/archives/astinus/history/despair.aspx