D&D 5E New Unearthed Arcana: Heroes of Krynn Revisited

WotC's Jeremy Crawford has announced a new Unearthed Arcana article today with redesigns from the prior Heroes of Krynn UA based on feedback, and in the following video he discusses that feedback and what's in the article:

• New iteration of Kender based on feedback survey, due to mixed response. This time is a back to basics, aiming to capture 1E AD&D fearlessness, curiosity and taunting skills. Delve into their origins from Gnomes in deep history.
• Kender are no longer fey creatures who grab objects from the Feywild
• Tweaked Feats from prior article
• Tweaked Backgrounds from prior article
• Brand new rule giving a list of free Feats for ANY Background
• Free Feat rule for Level 4 for all characters that doesn't take the ASI away, based on a curated list
• Reveals that in the Adventure, healing magic is already back.

Heroes of Krynn Revisited | Unearthed Arcana | Dungeons & Dragons

Explore updated character options from the Dragonlance setting! This playtest document presents revised races, subclasses, backgrounds, and feats.

dnd.wizards.com

 

[Mecheon]

The “good priests” wanted to kill or exile all none humans and justified things like slavery.

Huh, almost like they're actually evil. But, word of writers on this is that is apparently called "Being too Good". Despite being blatently evil.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Dragonlance was always centered on the concept of the balance between good and evil, law and chaos. They were the world where bad guys always wore black, etc. That didn't bother me much because it was kind of meant to be a pulp fantasy world. The stories were focused on what happens if there was too much evil (dragons and dragonlike creatures sweeping the world and causing death and destruction), or if there was too much good (the Gods throwing a fiery meteor and causing death and destruction....yeah, one of the aspects of the world I didn't like very much).

When I run Dragonlance, I don't have a problem easing up on the alignment issues in regards to good/evil. I instead focus on the Order/Chaos axis.

I have always felt that chaos and law is a better approach, though in general I am not a fan of alignment based play. If you are going to have it this is a better approach. It still need table agreement and buy in.

 

[Raunalyn]

You may have read something I haven’t but the scene in Legends is the King Priest simply making demands of the gods.

IE far to much pride. Which they also say was happening to all the races of Krynn. They all started taking the gods for granted and expected to have their whims met.

So once the King Prost made a big show and made his big demand of “Let me run things I can do it better” was the last straw. There was no god enslavement magic.

Soth was supposed to stop him from his last big final demand but was tricked by Tahkesis to return home and slay his wife and kid.

I always found it to be subtle part of the lore that it was Takhisis who was influencing the Kingpriest. During the time of Huma, one of the conditions for removing the Dragonlance from her chest was that she was to leave the world "for as long as the world was whole." I think she manipulated the Kingpriest into making his proclamation, and then suggested the meteor as a way of punishment, knowing that this would "break" the world and thus would provide her means to return and influence the world directly.

 

[DarkCrisis]

Don't forget they also murder anyone who:

A) Doesn't take the test.

or

B) Uses too many spells from the "wrong Moon".

Except when they don't, because they make exceptions for people they like. So yeah they are definitely small-e evil, and probably capital-E Evil in modern D&D terms.

I suspect all this will be retcon'd out of existence for the DL adventure.

Magic is way to powerful to not regulate (as they see it). A lone Mage could nuke a village etc.

Plus The Talent is in the blood (let’s forget sorcerer exist now) and can cause issues for an untrained Mage.

The Wheel of Times Aes Sedai do something similar.

 

[Raunalyn]

Magic is way to powerful to not regulate (as they see it). A lone Mage could nuke a village etc.

Plus The Talent is in the blood (let’s forget sorcerer exist now) and can cause issues for an untrained Mage.

The Wheel of Times Aes Sedai do something similar.

Very true, but I think this was changed after the Summer of Chaos.

 

[DarkCrisis]

Huh, almost like they're actually evil. But, word of writers on this is that is apparently called "Being too Good". Despite being blatently evil.

Just saying, it’s not a fantasy made up thing. People have been “good people” and still looked down on other races “for their good” etc. “We are the stewards and must run their lives to protect them” in the real world.

 

[Remathilis]

Don't forget they also murder anyone who:

A) Doesn't take the test.

or

B) Uses too many spells from the "wrong Moon".

Except when they don't, because they make exceptions for people they like. So yeah they are definitely small-e evil, and probably capital-E Evil in modern D&D terms.

I suspect all this will be retcon'd out of existence for the DL adventure.

Dragonlance, I find in hindsight, had a lot of anti-planar protection rules designed specifically to screw over people who ported over their PCs to Krynn. Non-Krynn clerics didn't get spells unless they converted to a Krynn god, renegade mages were hunted and killed, gold was worthless, etc. I guess it was to discourage players from bringing over beloved (and high level) PCs into Krynn, a practice I found was rather common in days of yore. I don't imagine most of these heavy handed restrictions will survive, if they weren't removed in the 3e book already.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Non-Fey, with an unexplained ability to find something small in their pouches. Leave it up to the player to determine how it gets there and stop sanitizing the game.

sanitization is good. lets keep the game clean and safe please...

Okay that was mostly a joke, but modern players want modern settings and rules... we can only play to nostolgia so long. (It helps that I hate kenders)

 

[bedir than]

I don't like that the two bonus feat options not outlined are Tough and Skilled. That's too narrow of a definition of heroes.
Durable, Prodigy, Tavern Brawler, Keen Mind all fit the tales of soldiers at war too

 

[GMforPowergamers]

No pretty much every forum, site or discord relating to table top games that I am a part of has generally held a low opinion of them.

dude the picture (NSFW) of people editing the kender write up with how much they suck is from like 2003, and back then I had already been to gencon 3 or 4 times, and gencon is FULL of kender bashing