Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
The Debate of "Canon" in D&D 5E
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8436267" data-attributes="member: 6790260"><p>"Canon" as a component of fiction only matters within a confined fictional space. Settings, by definition, are not confined fictional spaces, and thus cannot have canon.</p><p></p><p>A setting <em>can</em> have a philosophy, goal, or purpose: just as fiction is inherently creationist, it is inherently teleological. It <em>serves some purpose</em>. It might be simple ("it's just fun"/Rule of Cool), but often it isn't. Arguments over canon for settings are usually proxies for "this doesn't fit what I see as the purpose of this setting." This runs into two problems: one, purpose is very much in the eye of the beholder, and two, privileging one purpose over others (since most settings serve multiple purposes) without really acknowledging this arbitrary selection.</p><p></p><p>Even when we have explicit authorial intent (which is pretty rare), settings tend to be wild and woolly things. Two people can experience "the same setting" and get very different messages out of it. For example, many fans of Dark Sun were actually <em>happy</em> that 4e Dark Sun rolled back all the events of the Prism Pentad (IIRC, the 4e DSCS takes as its default start time the days <em>just before</em> the Prism Pentad starts), because, even though those books are in some sense demonstrably "within" authorial intent, the specific direction they went conflicted with audience perception of what Dark Sun was about: a place where mere <em>survival</em> is a challenge, so heroism is at best a lofty goal and at worst suicide (and many would append to that "...and thus when you ARE heroic, it really <em>matters</em>.") Having explicit incredible power in the hands of a heroic individual interferes with some of those ideas, and if people came to the setting to explore those ideas, they'll probably get annoyed....yet some will be fine with it and annoyed that the rollback thus disrupts something they were okay with or even liked. Similar arguments pop up about nearly every setting almost any time one undergoes even the smallest changes, because purpose is a really important thing for why people engage with a piece of fiction at all.</p><p></p><p>On the flipside though, as noted, many settings (and, indeed, many works of fiction, where canon would matter!) serve numerous purposes. Changes, even well-established or authorial-intent-based ones, often arise because the author(s)/creator(s) have a different idea of what purposes are <em>most</em> important about a setting. Thus, fans have to deal with the other problem: what happens if the thing they came to the setting for...isn't actually that much of a priority, whether because it never was to begin with, or because the author(s)/creator(s) have changed their minds? For many, the answer is to engage in arguments over canon or the like, because it allows them to give a veneer of objectivity to their personal frustration over a purpose they like not getting catered to (or, worse, being "attacked" in some way).</p><p></p><p>Yet ultimately, there is no such thing as an <em>inherent</em> purpose to any piece of fiction. Those purposes are always chosen by their creators. Audiences can accept, reject, or question. Unfortunately, to those who accept, questioning can look a lot like rejection--and for those who emphatically reject, acceptance is rather difficult to swallow.</p><p></p><p>Edit: [USER=5948]@humble minion[/USER] does actually give some good examples of why changes to a setting can matter....but I don't personally consider them to be arguments about <em>canon</em>, as in, internal self-consistency. The way they've spoken, it's not really about whether there's appropriate justification or rationale, which is a huge primary concern for canon. It's instead two questions: the purpose argument, as I outlined above, and a <em>resources</em> argument that I didn't consider.</p><p></p><p>Purpose matters, and can make (as they term it) "destructive" changes still beneficial, because they contribute to the (audience-expected) purpose of the setting. I'm very pleased that, having seen nothing of their post, our two analyses of the Dark Sun stuff end up in very similar places. I think this pretty solidly demonstrates how setting <em>purpose</em> is often conflated with arguments about canon proper.</p><p></p><p>The other thing that matters is use of resources. Now, properly speaking, nothing prevents anyone from continuing to use older material, other than the need to adapt...which is gonna be a hugely individual thing, since each person will have their own perception of what counts as "too much" work to adapt. (The personal/subjective aspect I mentioned above is similar.) However, with that said, there's nothing <em>wrong</em> with being upset that the resources you have, which you had hoped to make use of, now require a substantial (and likely ongoing) effort to make useful to you. It's perfectly reasonable to be frustrated by that....but that, again, isn't about the <em>canonicity</em> of the events. It's about <em>your IRL resources</em>, and what you can do with them without <em>unwarranted</em> levels of effort. (As humble minion already said, most of their FR material was <em>already</em> "out of date," so it isn't the canonicity failure that is the problem: it's the <em>degree of exclusion</em> that is the problem, the pervasiveness of the "destruction" without a mitigating purpose.)</p><p></p><p>So I feel rather confident that we can say "canon" is not actually the main concern, it's just an argument people often fall into when what they actually have problems with is disagreements over the <em>purpose</em> of a setting, or frustrations over being unable to simply and easily use resources they already possessed.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="EzekielRaiden, post: 8436267, member: 6790260"] "Canon" as a component of fiction only matters within a confined fictional space. Settings, by definition, are not confined fictional spaces, and thus cannot have canon. A setting [I]can[/I] have a philosophy, goal, or purpose: just as fiction is inherently creationist, it is inherently teleological. It [I]serves some purpose[/I]. It might be simple ("it's just fun"/Rule of Cool), but often it isn't. Arguments over canon for settings are usually proxies for "this doesn't fit what I see as the purpose of this setting." This runs into two problems: one, purpose is very much in the eye of the beholder, and two, privileging one purpose over others (since most settings serve multiple purposes) without really acknowledging this arbitrary selection. Even when we have explicit authorial intent (which is pretty rare), settings tend to be wild and woolly things. Two people can experience "the same setting" and get very different messages out of it. For example, many fans of Dark Sun were actually [I]happy[/I] that 4e Dark Sun rolled back all the events of the Prism Pentad (IIRC, the 4e DSCS takes as its default start time the days [I]just before[/I] the Prism Pentad starts), because, even though those books are in some sense demonstrably "within" authorial intent, the specific direction they went conflicted with audience perception of what Dark Sun was about: a place where mere [I]survival[/I] is a challenge, so heroism is at best a lofty goal and at worst suicide (and many would append to that "...and thus when you ARE heroic, it really [I]matters[/I].") Having explicit incredible power in the hands of a heroic individual interferes with some of those ideas, and if people came to the setting to explore those ideas, they'll probably get annoyed....yet some will be fine with it and annoyed that the rollback thus disrupts something they were okay with or even liked. Similar arguments pop up about nearly every setting almost any time one undergoes even the smallest changes, because purpose is a really important thing for why people engage with a piece of fiction at all. On the flipside though, as noted, many settings (and, indeed, many works of fiction, where canon would matter!) serve numerous purposes. Changes, even well-established or authorial-intent-based ones, often arise because the author(s)/creator(s) have a different idea of what purposes are [I]most[/I] important about a setting. Thus, fans have to deal with the other problem: what happens if the thing they came to the setting for...isn't actually that much of a priority, whether because it never was to begin with, or because the author(s)/creator(s) have changed their minds? For many, the answer is to engage in arguments over canon or the like, because it allows them to give a veneer of objectivity to their personal frustration over a purpose they like not getting catered to (or, worse, being "attacked" in some way). Yet ultimately, there is no such thing as an [I]inherent[/I] purpose to any piece of fiction. Those purposes are always chosen by their creators. Audiences can accept, reject, or question. Unfortunately, to those who accept, questioning can look a lot like rejection--and for those who emphatically reject, acceptance is rather difficult to swallow. Edit: [USER=5948]@humble minion[/USER] does actually give some good examples of why changes to a setting can matter....but I don't personally consider them to be arguments about [I]canon[/I], as in, internal self-consistency. The way they've spoken, it's not really about whether there's appropriate justification or rationale, which is a huge primary concern for canon. It's instead two questions: the purpose argument, as I outlined above, and a [I]resources[/I] argument that I didn't consider. Purpose matters, and can make (as they term it) "destructive" changes still beneficial, because they contribute to the (audience-expected) purpose of the setting. I'm very pleased that, having seen nothing of their post, our two analyses of the Dark Sun stuff end up in very similar places. I think this pretty solidly demonstrates how setting [I]purpose[/I] is often conflated with arguments about canon proper. The other thing that matters is use of resources. Now, properly speaking, nothing prevents anyone from continuing to use older material, other than the need to adapt...which is gonna be a hugely individual thing, since each person will have their own perception of what counts as "too much" work to adapt. (The personal/subjective aspect I mentioned above is similar.) However, with that said, there's nothing [I]wrong[/I] with being upset that the resources you have, which you had hoped to make use of, now require a substantial (and likely ongoing) effort to make useful to you. It's perfectly reasonable to be frustrated by that....but that, again, isn't about the [I]canonicity[/I] of the events. It's about [I]your IRL resources[/I], and what you can do with them without [I]unwarranted[/I] levels of effort. (As humble minion already said, most of their FR material was [I]already[/I] "out of date," so it isn't the canonicity failure that is the problem: it's the [I]degree of exclusion[/I] that is the problem, the pervasiveness of the "destruction" without a mitigating purpose.) So I feel rather confident that we can say "canon" is not actually the main concern, it's just an argument people often fall into when what they actually have problems with is disagreements over the [I]purpose[/I] of a setting, or frustrations over being unable to simply and easily use resources they already possessed. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
The Debate of "Canon" in D&D 5E
Top