Nentir Vale Coming to Dungeons and Dragons

[MechaTarrasque]

If MM wants to make more things like the Lolth Patron warlock (which seems to be the source for the MToF's arachnomancer's abilities) and maybe some 4e-style summoning (not to mention converting some 4e monsters to 5e), that would be great. If that stuff makes into print (or the DMs Guild), that is better yet.

Even if it does go into print/DMs Guild, there is no guarantee that the fluff would be exactly the same as in the video series. There is a big difference between playing around with something and making something for production.

 

[Parmandur]

I love the Dawn War Pantheon, but I know what you mean. As a player, it’s great to have a smaller, more concise and manage list of Gods to deal with. As a DM, especially a worldbuilding DM, it feels really awkward that the same set of deities is recognized by everyone, even if they aren’t all necessarily revered by everyone. If you worship the sun, you worship Pelor, end of story, and that can feel a little (for lack of a better term) unrealistic.

That’s one of the things I tried to address in my homebrew approach to the setting. I use the core Dawn War Pantheon as archetypes that the various deities worshipped by different cultures throughout the world tend to fall into.

Having a sort of "objective" polytheism worldwide makes enough sense in D&D terms, but a little more clutter would be nice. Like, maybe Zeus is universally acknowledged as the god of storms and king of Olympus, but there can be a lot of smaller storm gods & demi-gods...

 

[Parmandur]

Prediction: If, IF, they ever do a Nentir Vale product for realsies, they bring in Matt Mercer in a big way since he is running a big ol' PoL Nentir Vale (minus the Vale...) campaign.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I really like 4E's Dawn War mythology, but found the Nentir Vale to be generic and forgettable. None of the awesome backstory made it into the present for the players to directly interact with. I like Mearls' take on the Vale and will definitely tune in.

PS: In fairness, I think Fallcrest is a pretty great starter town.

The Vale itself was a bit...bland, at least at first. Part of the problem was that the interesting stuff was hidden in race, class, and monster, lore.

They basically kept whatever they liked and threw out anything and everything they didn't like.

It was a little like a Marvel Cinematic Universe adaptation of a classic comic story.

TBF, the MCU would be absolutely terrible if they didn't do that.

While I liked the Nentir Vale material, the one part that rang a bit hollow was the concise, controlled pantheon. Greyhawk having two different Sun God's felt more like an actual pantheon: the NV mythos was a bit too logical.

That's fair. I always added in smaller deities, and treated the main pantheon as the objectively most powerful gods, and thus Pelor isn't the only god related to the sun, but he is The God Of The Sun.

 

[Charlaquin]

Prediction: If, IF, they ever do a Nentir Vale product for realsies, they bring in Matt Mercer in a big way since he is running a big ol' PoL Nentir Vale (minus the Vale...) campaign.

You mean Tal’Dore? I’m pretty sure the pantheon is the only thing his setting has in common with PoLand. And there’s also already a published campaign setting book for it.

 

[Parmandur]

You mean Tal’Dore? I’m pretty sure the pantheon is the only thing his setting has in common with PoLand. And there’s also already a published campaign setting book for it.

The stores of Dragonborn and Tieflings, as well, though those are now "generic D&D." The whole Dawn War is central to the mythology, and Mercer uses the World Axis: these seem to be the key things one would want in a NV book. The Exandria book had to be obtuse about the gods, because they are the NV gods. If they release a book about the NV, with Mercer writing the gods, and then market it as a Critical Role tie in...

 

[Charlaquin]

The stores of Dragonborn and Tieflings, as well, though those are now "generic D&D." The whole Dawn War is central to the mythology, and Mercer uses the World Axis: these seem to be the key things one would want in a NV book. The Exandria book had to be obtuse about the gods, because they are the NV gods. If they release a book about the NV, with Mercer writing the gods, and then market it as a Critical Role tie in...

Yeah, that makes sense.

 

[Jester David]

TBF, the MCU would be absolutely terrible if they didn't do that.

The good movie, yes.
I think Iron Man 2 or 3 could have used more Armor Wars and Demon In A Bottle. And Thor 2 really needed more Simonson.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The good movie, yes.
I think Iron Man 2 or 3 could have used more Armor Wars and Demon In A Bottle. And Thor 2 really needed more Simonson.

I’d go the other way, and say that they needed more creativity, and in the case of Thor 2, more characterization of the villain. What a waste of Christopher Eccleston.

 

[Zeromaru X]

While I liked the Nentir Vale material, the one part that rang a bit hollow was the concise, controlled pantheon. Greyhawk having two different Sun God's felt more like an actual pantheon: the NV mythos was a bit too logical.

Well, AFAIK, the pantheon was small because it was intended for starting GMs, so they just picked up the necessary gods.

However, in-universe, the Nentir Vale world used to have more gods. The others were killed, either during the Dawn War or later, in other conflicts. The current pantheon are just the survivors plus a few nrecomers (like Vecna and the Raven Queen). I have a comprehensive list of deities over here.

And that's why I like the Dawn War pantheon and mythos, because its well structured and has a compelling backstory, something that not all D&D pantheons have. I think, only the FR gods have a better developed backstory than the Dawn War gods (and only because the FR gods have more books dedicated to them over many editions).

As for Mike Mearls' changes, I don't like his take on the pantheon, and I don't trust the 5e team approach to Nentir Vale after what they did to the Raven Queen.

However, I do like Mike's take on the environment, as that is something that is hinted in the 4e materials as well.