D&D General The Purple Dragon Knights are tied to an Amethyst Dragon (confirmed)

[Demetrios1453]

It's a general problem with bringing characters back to life (or unlife in this case since Sammaster is a Lich) after their stories had satisfying conclusions.

Sammaster being brought back is like if the MCU brought Thanos back after Avengers: Endgame.

And Liches who have had their Phylacteries destroyed coming back has never happened in the entire history of the Forgotten Realms. The closest you get is a single Epic Level Lich who created a spell that let him create more than one of them.

And we know that didn't happen with Sammaster because the Rage of Dragons trilogy explicitly said he only had one Phylactery.

There's a first time for everything. And there are, as I said, powerful forces/creatures/deities that might want him back for some reason of their own. If say Tiamat wants him back, she'll find a way.

 

[pukunui]

There's a first time for everything. And there are, as I said, powerful forces/creatures/deities that might want him back for some reason of their own. If say Tiamat wants him back, she'll find a way.

Or, perhaps, forces opposing Tiamat. Perhaps some of the old school CotD remnants found a way to bring back Sammaster to counter Severin's Tiamat-worshipping faction.

 

[pukunui]

Even Marvel has worked out by now, after years of desperate flailing and pouring vast amounts of money down the drain, that multiverse bulldust is 99% of the time utterly toxic to good worldbuilding AND compelling storytelling.

Sadly, I’m not surprised to see WotC mulishly clubbing away at this particular long-deceased equine.

While I don't necessarily disagree with you, I do feel it's worth pointing out that WotC's idea of a multiverse is different to Marvel's.

The MCU's multiverse is more parallel dimensions, where you have multiple versions of Earth and multiple versions of Loki and whatnot.

While WotC has snuck some of that in with the First World and its echoes, with multiple versions of great wyrm dragons, their multiverse is mostly extraplanar and extra-planetary. Toril's not the best example because it has its parallel sister world of Abeir, but when WotC talks about the multiverse, they're not talking about multiple versions of Krynn, some where Takhisis won and some where she didn't, that sort of thing. There aren't any stories about Toril-616 Elminster having to fight his evil twin from Toril-12345, either.

So yeah - I mean, I'm someone who prefers to keep my fantasy worlds separate - I don't really want someone from Krynn traveling to Toril, or someone from Athas showing up on Eberron - but it's still a different kind of multiverse than the one the MCU has.

 

[Remathilis]

Told you all.

 

[Amphytrion]

I'm somewhat surprised that there are people wondering how Sammaster returned. He's an archlich! Coming back is his deal!

Look, I'm sympathetic to all the lore folk out there. I've spent some energy this week arguing on the Purple Dragon Knights thread that they should have respected that more Arthurian/Camelot fantasy rather than smashing them together with Amethyst Dragons for a whole separate fantasy. I think that where possible, WotC should be respectful of the customers who have invested a lot of time in their property, because most of the time it doesn't even take a lot of effort, just good sense and tact.

All that being said, FR is a D&D world, and it is meant to be adventured in. Sammaster is much more valuable to DMs alive/unalived (?) than dead and buried. He's an iconic character! He's a deranged, insane, megalomaniacal villain with grandiose plans to remake the world! He's fun!

Sidenote: his design is the same as Dragon Heir's tie-in from last year, where he got a lot of cool art. The Black Dragon design also previewed its 2025 redesign before we got a chance to see it. Intersting that the design teams collaborated that closely. The art here indicates that he creates flameskulls on the fly, which probably doesn't mean anything, but would be a fun addition to the statblock.

Spoiler: Art

Artist: Wang Jianxi

Artist: Yang Boyu

 

[Remathilis]

While I don't necessarily disagree with you, I do feel it's worth pointing out that WotC's idea of a multiverse is different to Marvel's.

The MCU's multiverse is more parallel dimensions, where you have multiple versions of Earth and multiple versions of Loki and whatnot.

While WotC has snuck some of that in with the First World and its echoes, with multiple versions of great wyrm dragons, their multiverse is mostly extraplanar and extra-planetary. Toril's not the best example because it has its parallel sister world of Abeir, but when WotC talks about the multiverse, they're not talking about multiple versions of Krynn, some where Takhisis won and some where she didn't, that sort of thing. There aren't any stories about Toril-616 Elminster having to fight his evil twin from Toril-12345, either.

So yeah - I mean, I'm someone who prefers to keep my fantasy worlds separate - I don't really want someone from Krynn traveling to Toril, or someone from Athas showing up on Eberron - but it's still a different kind of multiverse than the one the MCU has.

Its a little more nuanced than that.

WotC has used the multiverse to explain that there are multiple versions of Toril or Eberron, but those multiple versions are yours and mine. My version of the Faerun is going to be different than yours, but if I ever take the PC I used in your version and bring him to mine, I can. It's a very metaphysical way of defining it; we're all part of the larger D&D multiverse regardless of what setting we use or if we use the same setting. WotC itself though doesn't seem too interested in exploring those echos though; they are only there to explain why every DMs Faerun is different.

 

[Parmandur]

While I don't necessarily disagree with you, I do feel it's worth pointing out that WotC's idea of a multiverse is different to Marvel's.

The MCU's multiverse is more parallel dimensions, where you have multiple versions of Earth and multiple versions of Loki and whatnot.

While WotC has snuck some of that in with the First World and its echoes, with multiple versions of great wyrm dragons, their multiverse is mostly extraplanar and extra-planetary. Toril's not the best example because it has its parallel sister world of Abeir, but when WotC talks about the multiverse, they're not talking about multiple versions of Krynn, some where Takhisis won and some where she didn't, that sort of thing. There aren't any stories about Toril-616 Elminster having to fight his evil twin from Toril-12345, either.

So yeah - I mean, I'm someone who prefers to keep my fantasy worlds separate - I don't really want someone from Krynn traveling to Toril, or someone from Athas showing up on Eberron - but it's still a different kind of multiverse than the one the MCU has.

Well, they have done both to an extent, and the MCU style multiverse has been a firmly established thing in D&D since the 70s.

 

[Necropolitan]

There's a first time for everything. And there are, as I said, powerful forces/creatures/deities that might want him back for some reason of their own. If say Tiamat wants him back, she'll find a way.

Tiamat doesn't want him back, his vision definitely did not include her.

And if a Lich can be brought back even after their Phylactery was destroyed then it's throwing out decades of lore and making the entire point of finding and destroying their Phylactery pointless.

There's a reason "Somehow Palpatine returned" became a mocking meme.

I'm somewhat surprised that there are people wondering how Sammaster returned. He's an archlich! Coming back is his deal!

No, he was a normal Lich and was destroyed when his Phylactery was destroyed. Liches don't come back if their Phylacteries are destroyed, that's why the way you fight them is destroying their phylactery.

If Liches can come back even after that then what's stopping WOTC from bringing back every other destroyed Lich?

Sammaster is much more valuable to DMs alive/unalived (?) than dead and buried. He's an iconic character! He's a deranged, insane, megalomaniacal villain with grandiose plans to remake the world!

Sammaster's story was over and was concluded in a way that meant bringing him back makes the Rage of Dragons pointless. He started a world-ending draconic apocalypse and was only defeated by a Cleric sacrificing his life to channel divine energy directly into his doomsday device which also contained his Phylactery after numerous characters fought and died to get to it.

It'd be like bringing Thanos back after Avengers: Endgame.

If "value" is all it takes for a character's death to be undone then there are no stakes because WOTC will never permanently kill off those characters while they can still make money off them.

Well, they have done both to an extent, and the MCU style multiverse has been a firmly established thing in D&D since the 70s.

The Prime Material Planes don't interact that way. You can't go from the Forgotten Realms to Greyhawk as easily as you could go from the Forgotten Realms to Hell and barely anyone on either world knows there are other Prime Material worlds. Even Elminster only visits other worlds in noncanon stories because Ed Greenwood knew there was no way to put that cat back in the bag.

There's already a multiverse setting, it's called Planescape and there's a reason D&D made it so it was the only one that had multiple Prime worlds intersecting.

 

[pukunui]

Its a little more nuanced than that.

WotC has used the multiverse to explain that there are multiple versions of Toril or Eberron, but those multiple versions are yours and mine. My version of the Faerun is going to be different than yours, but if I ever take the PC I used in your version and bring him to mine, I can. It's a very metaphysical way of defining it; we're all part of the larger D&D multiverse regardless of what setting we use or if we use the same setting. WotC itself though doesn't seem too interested in exploring those echos though; they are only there to explain why every DMs Faerun is different.

Yeah, I considered mentioning that aspect in my post but I was mainly thinking about official D&D products, none of which ever feature parallel dimension style stuff (other than parts of Abeir and Toril swapping places during the Spellplague). When WotC talks about the multiverse, they mostly mean the various planes of existence and the various campaign setting worlds that exist on different planets on the material plane.

Well, they have done both to an extent, and the MCU style multiverse has been a firmly established thing in D&D since the 70s.

Really? Do you have any examples? I started playing D&D in the 90s and more more familiar with the older D&D novels than I am with the pre-2e game products, but I am not aware of any MCU-style parallel world multiverse stuff in old D&D books.

It'd be like bringing Thanos back after Avengers: Endgame.

I'm not sure Thanos is the best example, since the entire plot of Endgame involves Thanos "coming back" via time travel. But yes, bringing him back again would not be cool.

 

[Necropolitan]

Really? Do you have any examples? I started playing D&D in the 90s and more more familiar with the older D&D novels than I am with the pre-2e game products, but I am not aware of any MCU-style parallel world multiverse stuff in old D&D books.

There is in Planescape, where there being multiple Prime worlds is part of the setting. Sigil contains residents from Athas, the Forgotten Realms, Grayhawk, etc.