D&D General WotC: Novels & Non-5E Lore Are Officially Not Canon

At a media press briefing last week, WotC's Jeremey Crawford clarified what is and is not canon for D&D.

"For many years, we in the Dungeons & Dragons RPG studio have considered things like D&D novels, D&D video games, D&D comic books, as wonderful expressions of D&D storytelling and D&D lore, but they are not canonical for the D&D roleplaying game."

"If you’re looking for what’s official in the D&D roleplaying game, it’s what appears in the products for the roleplaying game. Basically, our stance is that if it has not appeared in a book since 2014, we don’t consider it canonical for the games."

2014 is the year that D&D 5th Edition launched.

He goes on to say that WotC takes inspiration from past lore and sometimes adds them into official lore.

Over the past five decades of D&D, there have been hundreds of novels, more than five editions of the game, about a hundred video games, and various other items such as comic books, and more. None of this is canon. Crawford explains that this is because they "don’t want DMs to feel that in order to run the game, they need to read a certain set of novels."

He cites the Dragonlance adventures, specifically.

 

[Dire Bare]

Crawford was speaking of his own confusion as an adolescent, and helping people avoid similar mistakes and pain.

I was in middle school when Dragonlance first dropped, a friend gave me the novels . . . and I was in love for the first time! But, when I looked at the series of adventures, I was intimidated and decided no way in hell will I be DMing that! I regret that decision, with hindsight, I could have handled it . . . but the combo of the novels and game being a part of the total package was very intimidating to young me.

 

[Dire Bare]

That's not correct. Darkwalker on Moonshae was published in May 1987, the Forgotten Realms Campaign Set in July 1987.

The first Realms boxed set may have come after the first novel, but . . . the Realms had been published for years in the pages of Dragon Magazine prior to the novels.

Interesting. Although I believe "Waterdeep" was published sometime in the 1970s.

No. Heh. Greenwood was certainly writing his very detailed fantasy setting in the 70s (60s I think), but the boxed set mentioned was the first non-magazine game product published for the setting.

I'm fascinated that it was that late. So somehow they jammed in a huge number of 1E FR supplements before Forgotten Realms Adventures for 2E in 1990, and FRA's context was that it was updating, a really new, recent, and popular setting for the new edition.

The reason why the Realms began it's publication history as it did, in my firm opinion, is Dragonlance. WotC had such success with then novels/game combo, they decided to follow the model the Realms and all settings of that era. Before Dragonlance, having settings act as light background and examples in adventures, with support articles in Dragon, was the way to go. Post-Dragonlance, we needed novels, the beginning of serious canon, and "campaign setting" boxed sets/hardcovers.

 

[Echohawk]

I'm fascinated that it was that late. So somehow they jammed in a huge number of 1E FR supplements before Forgotten Realms Adventures for 2E in 1990, and FRA's context was that it was updating, a really new, recent, and popular setting for the new edition.

There were a fair number of Forgotten Realms branded game products in the 32 months between the Campaign Set and Forgotten Realms Adventures, yes:

Forgotten Realms Campaign Set (July 1987)
1. N5: Under Illefarn
2. FR1: Waterdeep and the North
3. FR2: Moonshae
4. FR3: Empires of the Sands
5. I14: Swords of the Iron Legion
6. FR4: The Magister
7. H4: Throne of Bloodstone
8. City System
9. FRC1: Ruins of Adventure
10. FR5: The Savage Frontier
11. Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms
12. FR6: Dreams of the Red Wizards
13. OA5: Mad Monkey vs. the Dragon Claw
14. REF5: Lords of Darkness
15. FR7: Hall of Heroes
16. FRC2: Curse of the Azure Bonds
17. FRE1: Shadowdale
18. FR8: Cities of Mystery
19. FRE2: Tantras
20. LC1: Gateway to Ravens Bluff, the Living City
21. FRE3: Waterdeep
22. TM4: The City of Waterdeep Trail Map
23. MC3: Monstrous Compendium Volume Three: Forgotten Realms Appendix
24. FR9: The Bloodstone Lands
25. OA7: Test of the Samurai
26. TM5: Kara-Tur Trail Map
27. FR10: Old Empires
Forgotten Realms Adventures (March 1990)

To be fair through, the 2nd Edition logo was already on products from FR7 onwards.

 

[Faolyn]

For you maybe, for others it's one of the if not the reasons for chosing a setting.

My interested in Eberron died the moment I learned that it's a "dead" setting that will never move, never resolve the current issues in favor or progress and new issues, etc.

Even though the specific reason for this is so the DM and players can resolve those issues and create progress the that reflect their own game?

 

[Ruin Explorer]

There were a fair number of Forgotten Realms branded game products in the 32 months between the Campaign Set and Forgotten Realms Adventures, yes:

Forgotten Realms Campaign Set (July 1987)
1. N5: Under Illefarn
2. FR1: Waterdeep and the North
3. FR2: Moonshae
4. FR3: Empires of the Sands
5. I14: Swords of the Iron Legion
6. FR4: The Magister
7. H4: Throne of Bloodstone
8. City System
9. FRC1: Ruins of Adventure
10. FR5: The Savage Frontier
11. Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms
12. FR6: Dreams of the Red Wizards
13. OA5: Mad Monkey vs. the Dragon Claw
14. REF5: Lords of Darkness
15. FR7: Hall of Heroes
16. FRC2: Curse of the Azure Bonds
17. FRE1: Shadowdale
18. FR8: Cities of Mystery
19. FRE2: Tantras
20. LC1: Gateway to Ravens Bluff, the Living City
21. FRE3: Waterdeep
22. TM4: The City of Waterdeep Trail Map
23. MC3: Monstrous Compendium Volume Three: Forgotten Realms Appendix
24. FR9: The Bloodstone Lands
25. OA7: Test of the Samurai
26. TM5: Kara-Tur Trail Map
27. FR10: Old Empires
Forgotten Realms Adventures (March 1990)

To be fair through, the 2nd Edition logo was already on products from FR7 onwards.

That list was like having a bucket of nostalgia thrown over my head lol damn it!

Not sure whether to thank you or shake a fist at you. I sure own an awful lot of those products even though my first FR purchase was FRA. I still use Lords of Darkness like, probably once a year at least, because those like, underdeveloped, undead-centric adventures are both atmospheric, and incredibly easy to quickly adapt to other fantasy RPGs when I want to run something in a hurry.

 

[Remathilis]

There were a fair number of Forgotten Realms branded game products in the 32 months between the Campaign Set and Forgotten Realms Adventures, yes:

Forgotten Realms Campaign Set (July 1987)
1. N5: Under Illefarn
2. FR1: Waterdeep and the North
3. FR2: Moonshae
4. FR3: Empires of the Sands
5. I14: Swords of the Iron Legion
6. FR4: The Magister
7. H4: Throne of Bloodstone
8. City System
9. FRC1: Ruins of Adventure
10. FR5: The Savage Frontier
11. Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms
12. FR6: Dreams of the Red Wizards
13. OA5: Mad Monkey vs. the Dragon Claw
14. REF5: Lords of Darkness
15. FR7: Hall of Heroes
16. FRC2: Curse of the Azure Bonds
17. FRE1: Shadowdale
18. FR8: Cities of Mystery
19. FRE2: Tantras
20. LC1: Gateway to Ravens Bluff, the Living City
21. FRE3: Waterdeep
22. TM4: The City of Waterdeep Trail Map
23. MC3: Monstrous Compendium Volume Three: Forgotten Realms Appendix
24. FR9: The Bloodstone Lands
25. OA7: Test of the Samurai
26. TM5: Kara-Tur Trail Map
27. FR10: Old Empires
Forgotten Realms Adventures (March 1990)

To be fair through, the 2nd Edition logo was already on products from FR7 onwards.

Even if you cut the OA stuff, that is an intimidating list of stuff for a single setting, and that doesn't include the novels and like. The fact that list just grew exponentially is why I didn't begin to feel comfortable touching the Realms until 5e...

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

As player I don't worry about the canon too much because I love to create homebred smash-up, but as reader or member of audence (action-live or cartoon) the things can be totally different.

Legend of the Five Rings was created to be a living setting, and we know the last edition is practically a reboot.

Maybe even Hasbro itself can't be sure about what will be the canon for the future titles. Let's imagine they notice they can make money with intercompany crossovers but then will need a right explanation about why those no-Hasbro characters appeared in the D&D multiverse. They could need some good reason to explain some change between the original written fiction and the action-live production (because some actor can't work for a time, for example). I suspect the new Ravenloft was designed to allow possible intercompany crossovers, even with characters from franchises set in the current age. Maybe the future setting Witchlight could allow some crossovers.

 

[Echohawk]

The first Realms boxed set may have come after the first novel, but . . . the Realms had been published for years in the pages of Dragon Magazine prior to the novels.

To an extent. Sure, Greenwood was contributing articles to Dragon as far back as the October 1979 (the curst in Dragon's Bestiary) but those early articles are remarkably light in Realmslore. It was only from about 1983 that the editors started letting a bit more of the Realms flavour through, and even then, most of Greenwood's content remained fairly setting neutral until after the Campaign Set was published.

 

[Mirtek]

No it wasn't, it was the setting for Ed Greenwood's home game, and then the setting was published before the first novel (Dalkwalker on Moonshae).

The novels where not written with the intention of advancing some "metaplot". Most of them stand as part of a short series in isolation. The same goes for most of the supplements - something like Frostburn did not advance any metaplot. The only time the novels and supplements did any metaplot was to justify changes between editions. And look how well that turned out!

Maybe it happened occasionally, when one writer picked up an idea from another writer, but there was no grand design, and no one worried about contradictions.

Living settings are a thing. But the FR was never designed to be one of them, and Living Greyhawk was a disaster that many fans don't acknowledge. Currently, WotC have no interest in living settings.

It was. Ed started writing stories set in what became the FR before he played D&D. When he started D&D he used his setting as the background.

Also a lot of novels did drive metaplot during editions. E.g. Return of the Archmages, The Last Mythal, Threat from the Sea, The Hunters Blade, The Cormyr Saga. The only novels written to incorporate edition changes were the Avatar Trilogy and the Sundering.

 

[Alzrius]

It was. Ed started writing stories set in what became the FR before he played D&D. When he started D&D he used his setting as the background.

For more on this, see Ed Greenwood: How the Realms Began here on EN World.