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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Professor Murder" data-source="post: 8621968" data-attributes="member: 6991813">So I was reading the excellent post, <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/spelljammer-collector%E2%80%99s-guide-revisited.687977/" target="_blank">D&D General - Spelljammer Collector’s Guide Revisited</a> and got to thinking about what I feel fundamentally hindered Spelljammer from being more popular. Quite simply, classic Spelljammer was a retcon. It radically upended D&D cosmology and history for multiple settings, with really only Dark Sun remaining untouched as far as I can tell. Now, retcons happen. Every new edition of the game recontextualizes the game and it's settings to accommodate new rules and options. Spelljammer came along in 2nd edition, which means that the idea of retcons to basic lore was not yet as reoccurring as it can feel for longtime fans in the current era. The changes it brought were also rather large. You suddenly had interstellar wars between Elves and Orc/Goblinoids that made conflicts on existing gameworld feel very small scale. Now, any DM and gaming group can always take or leave whatever lore that comes along as they see fit, but because these lore elements were so key to Spelljammer as a setting, it would certainly be challenging to use the setting without them. What's more at issue is how official lore is often received by the fanbase. Again, the world is yours to create, but even now, people are very, very keen on how setting are officially constructed, even if they can change them as fits their own game. Spelljammer received a hard press to incorporate it into nearly every existing setting in some capacity. That can really rub people the wrong way. Changing Spelljammer from Space Travel to Planar Travel, which is a simplification but an accurate one, fixes some key problems. 5th ed setting lore is already primed for Spelljammer to have a place. Numerous races in D&D have extraplanar origins. Ships that can travel the Astral Sea can help facilitate existing lore instead of replacing it wholecloth. This is mostly speculation on my part until I get the books in hand. But I am hopeful.</blockquote>

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