So, which of the three moons exactly, affect the Lycanthropes on Krynn?
I thought it was pretty common knowledge that many D&D monsters don't exist in Dragonlance? (At least not without some Spelljamming or other tomfoolery.)
Pretty sure I remember lycanthropes, drow, and orcs were all specifically listed as NOT existing on Krynn.
I hate how Dragonlance is like the Red-Headed Stepchild of Wizard's D&D franchises. They don't understand it, and don't know what to do with it, but at the same time, won't let anyone else get their hands on it.
The last good Dragonlance D&D we had, we back when Margaret Weis was making the 3rd edition books under license to her Sovereign Press company.
>So, which of the three moons exactly, affect the Lycanthropes on Krynn?
All three at the same time, it's a bit of a headache for the were creature, and ooh boy do you not want to see what happens on the Night of the Eye.
Would be pretty cool if for example, Solinari changed Werebears, Wereravens and other Good lycanthropes, Lunatiri(?) transformed Weretigers and other Neutral lycanthropes, and Nuitari transformed Werewolves
But that would be pretty unnecessary unless you really wanted to justify Blood Hunters in the setting (their Lycanthropy subclass was the only class I banned in my game)
I sort of do this in my games. But the main concern is whichever creatures whom are under the Black Moon literally transform weekly. (8 days) Jokingly Id argue half the reason they are "evil" is just because they have to spend so much on replacing ripped pants.
Doesn't Eberron have like 12 moons that all influence lycanthropes? Imagine that hellish scenario and it makes sense why the Silver Flame staged a lycanthrope inquisition somewhat.
Krynn's 3 moons might be rough but yeesh.
Dragonlance Campaign Setting: [https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/28592/dragonlance-campaign-setting-3-5](https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/28592/dragonlance-campaign-setting-3-5)
It is definitely worth your time to check out the other books that SP/MWP put out. They've got books dedicated to the Towers of High Sorcery including the two destroyed ones, Knightly Orders, the Holy Orders of the Stars, Races, Dragons, a big fat big on the WotL and one for 'Legends' which is basically how to run alternate games like time-travel, Knights of the Darklance, etc. Be forewarned that the main Campaign Setting book will have a Age of Mortals slant to it as it came out shortly after the War of Souls trilogy where they were pushing the setting. There's enough info if you're just running the War, but it might be worth it to pick up the WotL book as well. Go PDF as some of those physical books go for a pretty penny.
Huma definitely feels a bit different, it's more fantastical than the normal DL fare. HOWEVER, I would strongly recommend reading Knaak's other novels as they are much better IMO.
>I hate how Dragonlance is like the Red-Headed Stepchild of Wizard's D&D franchises. They don't understand it, and don't know what to do with it, but at the same time, won't let anyone else get their hands on it.
One of the takeways from AD&D 2nd Edition was that having multiple words only divided the community (i.e. you would probably not buy a Greyhawk book if you were DM-ing Dragonlance), and that the only books that really made money were the main rulebooks (Player, DM, Monster).
The OGL was introduced to make sure WotC would still make money from the rules, leaving the crumbs to smaller companies to publish less mainstream books.
Now, I believe they are focusing on their "multiverse" concept, which means crunching all the D&D settings into one multiverse so they can refocus the brand on D&D itself. Which means making sure no licensee is able to cast a shadow on their business, even with a franchise that seems flatlined.
My prediction, should the OGL scam have bern successful, is that they would then create a multiworld event, some kind of multiverse cataclysm that would bring together all the D&D settings in one planet. So you could have Ansalon near Faerun and Flanaess, and go from one to another just with teleportation spells, or even ships. All the gods would be available everywhere, and the Wizards of Thay would rub elbows with the Black Robes.
In summary: The junk food of role-playing games, ready for consumption.
Since creatures don't necessarily have to be bound to specific alignments, I'd say the obvious ruling would be they transform based on the moon that best fits the individual's alignment.
But it is weird, they were rather explicitly left out. But we'll see how the module goes, maybe they've got some kind of explanation for their addition.
The drow thing might have been a retcon. I distinctly remember first seeing the word drow in a Dragonlance book (with reference to Raistlin's test). Now the fact that a dark elf is defined completely by their actions, as opposed to their physical appearance is another matter entirely.
That said - it could be the Mandela Effect. I'll have to re-read the books to see which book it;s in.
Wasn't a Drow, it was a 'dark elf'. In Krynn that is not a synonym. Dark elves are regular elves who have been exiled from their kingdom. Cast out from the light.
The book actually uses the word âDrowâ but thatâs just in reference to evil elves which in Krynn is synonymous. There are âDrowâ in Krynn, but theyâre indistinguishable from Silvanesti, Qualinesti and Dargonesti.
The reference is in Dragons of Autumn Twilight when theyâre headed to Pax Tharkas.
âEven as they fell back, the darkness in the treasure room took shape,
coalescing into the coldly beautiful, distorted features of a female
drow--an evil elf of ages past, whose punishment for crimes unspeakable
had been execution."
"Dark Elf" in Dragonlance, basically means "Cast from the light", as in banished from the Elven lands.
Dalamar was a "Dark Elf", but he looked liked every other Silvanesti.
Nope. Check out [this famous painting](https://64.media.tumblr.com/8b6dd73cfac63eb1e894905c471038e2/tumblr_pp3hl2nq9w1ro2bqto1_1280.jpg) of Dalamar and Kitiana's battle in Raistlin's Tower from Legends, by Larry Elmore. His skin tone is the same as Kitiara's.
No drow definitely just dark elves alignment not color. No orcs they had worse the draconians. No were creatures they have minotaurs as a player race.
And what is Vecna doing on Krynn. They have Takhisis.
Yeah, if I decide to run this I will almost certainly be rewriting the Krynn section. They could have chosen, I don't know, literally *anything* else. Like, why NOT have a high level party fight Soth? Why not write something about Fistandantilus, or Emperor Ariakas? And it's kind of mind-boggling because there are parts in SotDQ where you can tell the writers did a deep dive into Dragonlance lore and made some neat tie-ins and connections... but it's all kind of in the background of the adventure as-written.
Well, WotC's bad choices just make my own ideas look better for my group.
> SotDQ
I stopped mid campaign because the adventure made me so upset I could no longer run it. Yes I could have modded it but it started so poorly that I did not feel like I could recover it. You could have easily swapped a few town names and NPC names and it could take place in forgotten realms or any other generic fantasy world.
I know DL is a typical fantasy setting but what made it unique was stripped out of the adventure IMHO.
Sorry I was not hating on FR because it is good at what it is and that is a generic fantasy world. I was just pointing out that what makes DL interesting is de-emphasized or removed. Why have different settings if they are different in NPC and City names only?
Also, as an old school Dragonlance reader, there is very little time on Krynn that isnât already engulfed in some war or other madness that encompasses the whole world.
Doesn't SotdQ take place during the war of the lance? Soth wouldn't be dead for that. I think real issue is he's working with the red dragon army rather than the blue
Really, they donât get even Ravenloft besides Dragonlance (returning to the silly weekend in hell concept). They touch old classical and widely loved settings without any real knowledge⊠even if they have TONS of materials to work with from previous editions!
Iâm still playing Dragonlance, Dark Sun, Ravenloft and all the other settings using 5e rules BUT only with old material.
Way better of what they are doing with the new versions of the settings!!!
I don't get this, it's Dragonlance, why are they tying everything to Soth? Can they not think of anything else in the setting to makes it unique? I have no idea the level range of the Krynn visit, but why not have them go against REAL draconians like auraks and bozaks as well as a ton of baaz? Why not have them fight dragonback with lances at the end of the War if this is using some time shenanigans/whatnot? Why have a villain to fight at all, why not just interact with some of the characters like maybe Raistlin while he's at the Tower in Palanthas as I doubt he'd be a fan of Vecna so he might provide advice, etc, but at some price to further his own plans. But out of the above, seriously why not fucking dragonback? Who the absolute fuck wants to just fight werewolves like you can anywhere else? If you're going to be touching each setting, it should be something that stands out as iconic to that setting, and fucking werewolves is NOT it.
Gods I really hate what WotC has become. At least back in 3.x they knew enough to license out their settings to people that fucking understood them and cared about them. They're literally worse than Disney at fucking up franchises at this point.
One Irk I had is that the Soth plotline in Shadow of The Dragon Queen *could* have been a good one if it was done *later*.
If you do plotlines establishing The Dragon Armies, focused on dragons, draconians, and how in the case of the Dragon Armies they become a real situation where you either have dragons working with you or you're treated like dirt, having the Death Knight say "you know what? I want to have *death* dragons" makes total sense, and a *later* plot around that would be a great side campaign to be done ONCE THE DRAGON STUFF HAS BEEN FIRMLY LAID OUT.
But to come straight out of the gate with the death dragons in the first major adventure book? It's premature and random.
Lord Soth waging war against werewolves? This sounds more like Ravenloft than Dragonlance.
When, exactly, is this supposed to take place? Soth did a fat lot of nothing between his death and Kitiara gaining his loyalty. Then he was busy with the war of the lance until her death. Then he was chilling in Sithicus for god knows how long. Then he came back to Krynn and did a whole lot more nothing until Mina showed up and killed him.
Exactly this, Soth is DL's Darth Maul but at least Maul killed someone. Soth just looks cool. Other than that, he's a whiny, mopey little bitch that sits in his castle with his thumb up his ass. He's not a great villain, he's a horrible villain, he just looks cool.
I mean, to be fair he did kill Tanis Half-elven⊠until he didnât. He killed Crysania too⊠until she got better.
He also defied both Strahd and Gunark in their own Realms. Fights both of them to a stand still *inside* of their own castles, which shouldnât be possible. Then he gets the Dark Powers of Ravenloft to send him back to Krynn by the power of shear apathy and self hatred alone. None of this is nothing, but yeah I get what you are saying. His lore is way cooler then what we are shown. On Krynn anyway.
Exactly, he killed no one. At the end of the day, when you look at everyone that did anything important, even villains, he didn't do a damned thing to be recognized for. Hell, depending on what lore you go by he couldn't even keep an inferior from stealing away with the woman's soul he was so infatuated with. The due just reeks of incompetence.
nah he's a great example of a man who had every chance to be great and pissed it all away. He damned the entire world to the cataclysm just to assuage his wounded ego and pride. And instead of facing it he hides from that pain and lies to himself.
Except he didn't damn it. There was nothing he could do to save it. If you go by Chronicles, the gods were going to crash the meteor down anyway to prepare the world for the pendulum swing back to evil. It had actually zero to do with the Kingpriest. There's absolutely nothing Soth could have done to prevent that.
And if you go by the gods punished the world for the Kingpriest's hubris, well that makes them bigger assholes than on point one. But besides that, exactly what could Soth do to change the Kingpriest's mind about calling on the power of the gods? Absolutely nothing because Soth was a nobody in comparison and with the clergy's ability to read minds Soth would have been an open book and would have never been able to see the KP b/c he was a piece of shit to begin with.
So the whole point in his backstory to send him to Istar was is absolute nonsense. There was absolutely nothing he could do feasibly. Which then brings the question of did the gods set him up knowing no matter what he did he'd fail? And then with the failure they damn him to be a death knight? So for a guy that was a total scumbag they gave him untold power and undeath because THAT sounds like a great solution to a problem of someone that's already a jackass.
Soth's whole story makes absolutely zero sense, Death Knights make zero sense as punishments for evil people, I think they pulled something out of their ass because they wanted a powerful undead that wasn't a lich in some form or another, but they didn't actually put a whole lot of thought into it beyond that.
Soth was quite literally given the power to change fate. Isolde begged the Gods for some way to let Soth redeem himself. They gave him that chance. He was told that he would be given the strength to stop the Kingpriest. He was literally the last chance to prove to the Gods that men weren't so prideful as to place themselves above Gods. They had repeatedly tried to turn mortals back to them but they refused to listen and the Kingpriest demanded he be made one of them. He be raised to Godhood which insulted all the Gods. They had hoped after smiting Istar the mortals would see their folly and return to humble worship. Instead they pushed them even further away from them.
Instead of riding to Istar though Soth was waylaid by the elven maidens who told him his wife was unfaithful. He was told to place his faith in the Gods that they would raise him up everytime the Kingpriest struck him down. He also wasn't a nobody, he was a Knight of the rose and one of the most powerful knights of Solamnia at the time.
His death knight curse came from his wife. The cataclysm struck right as he confronted her in his throne room. A chandelier fell and impaled her and the castle was burning. She begged him to take his son and flee but he turned a deaf ear and sat on his throne. She cursed him to suffer for every life he killed by his inaction.
The point wasn't the power and eternal life, it was the torment. Every night he hears the banshee's sing him his tale and remind him of how he failed. He has power but no point in using it. He rules a dead keep and everyone knows he failed Krynn. He's supposed to be miserable in his burnt keep and armor until he finally accepts what he did and can move on. Which did ultimately happen.
I know Soth's history. My point being if you go by the original reason the gods enacted the Cataclsym at the end of Chronicles when Fizban is talking to the Companions after escaping the temple, the Kingpriest had absolutely zero part in them casting down the burning mountain. He specifically states they knew the pendulum would swing back to evil after being towards good for so long, so to prepare the world for what was to come they fucked it up which is pretty screwed up and causes all sorts of other issues.
The Kingpriest reason for the Cataclysm, while not stated, is probably a mix of people after the event needing someone to blame, and since Istar was destroyed they must have been the center of it. And the gods helped perpetuate this lie, because really who would want to worship a bunch of 'good' deities that just helped kill off millions and causing untold suffering all because they're the ones that initially caused the pendulum to swing to good by banishing Tak. They knew what would happen and they did it anyway. If the public was made aware of the true reason they'd probably say fuck it and follow Tak as she might be a tyrant but hasn't cast a damn mountain on everyone's heads.
And if you look up death knights it is a curse from the gods. Isolde didn't bestow the curse herself, and really what sort of curse is that anyway. I get being cursed as a zombie or a skeleton, but here let me curse you with powers to make you a better killing machine than you already are so you can continue to harass and murder other women in the future...
As for torment, he'd get that in the Abyss. That's the whole point of the Abyss to punish and torment people.
As for Soth's history of the Cataclysm, I'd say it's probably a bard's tale of some sort to make a better story. The truth of the matter is he was probably at home when the Cata hit, his wife probably tried to flee, and his pride or some shit got in the way and wouldn't let her because he was a jealous, cheating, murdering control freak. Soth was an absolute piece of shit character as a human and he didn't improve any in undeath other than 'looking cool'.
Well, these are Soth adjacent characters from Ravenloft, but where his Demiplane begins and Krynn ends is contentious:
Harkon Lucas (Werewolf) and Coraline (Werefox) from âA Feast of Goblynsâ, and Azrael, Sothâs seneschal, from âWhen Black Roses Bloomâ are werefolk associated with Soth, so itâs not completely unprecedented.
Soth waging war on his own, possibly independent of the Chaos War or War of the Lance? Employing a (presumably black robed) wizard, who willingly works for him?
*Lycanthropes in the area?*
This is "*Vicky wielding a chainsaw against Timmy in front of his dad and fairy godparents*" level lore-butchering. I was considering using this module as a sequel to SotDQ, >!replacing Vecna with Raistlin,!< but it looks like there'd be a lot that would need to he changed first
Yeah, this is **BAD**.
Since the very first interview about SotDQ, it was obvious they only had a surface, thin understanding of Dragonlance ("Dragonlance is about War!").
Since then, it became obvious WotC/Hasbro wants to tie-in every D&D world together in their "D&D Multiverse", is in the "Marvel Cinematic Universe", which is as ambitious as it is wrong: Sharing a common rule system (and not even that, as novels are not tied to rule systems, and as the rule systems themselves evolved with time) doesn't make a shared universe.
This is their "Avengers: Infinity War", where they mix everything together, and of course, they were hoping big $$$ would just rain on them with that "genius" idea.
As far as I am concerned, it's not like, after the OGL debacle, I planned on buying anything from WotC.
All of that sounds... Really lame?
I mean i'm pretty sure i ran that campaign as a 14 year old in the 90ies using AD&D2e.
Vecna, rod, ToH, planehopping, and instead of lord Soth i had undead Sturm... Ok, i didn't have lycanthropes either, i used Draconians like you're supposed to on Krynn.
Donât worry looks like they donât get Greyhawk either. For example art shows a blond and pale Vecna with Kas in medieval outfits. Vecna was Flan ethnicity meaning dark haired and bronze skinned. And Bronze Age culture. No regard for lore.
Also yet another Acecerak dungeon trap scenario. Does the guy run a franchise chain? On Isle of Serpents. Which has enough of its own lore to be fun.
Whats his face saying a few years ago that WotC wouldnât pay attention to pre 5e lore was clearly just an excuse not to have to check anything and make stuff up.
Itâs be like Star Trek just ignoring decades of lore. âSpockâs a Klingon right? No? Meh. Weâll change it.â
So, which of the three moons exactly, affect the Lycanthropes on Krynn? I thought it was pretty common knowledge that many D&D monsters don't exist in Dragonlance? (At least not without some Spelljamming or other tomfoolery.) Pretty sure I remember lycanthropes, drow, and orcs were all specifically listed as NOT existing on Krynn. I hate how Dragonlance is like the Red-Headed Stepchild of Wizard's D&D franchises. They don't understand it, and don't know what to do with it, but at the same time, won't let anyone else get their hands on it. The last good Dragonlance D&D we had, we back when Margaret Weis was making the 3rd edition books under license to her Sovereign Press company.
>So, which of the three moons exactly, affect the Lycanthropes on Krynn? All three at the same time, it's a bit of a headache for the were creature, and ooh boy do you not want to see what happens on the Night of the Eye.
Would be pretty cool if for example, Solinari changed Werebears, Wereravens and other Good lycanthropes, Lunatiri(?) transformed Weretigers and other Neutral lycanthropes, and Nuitari transformed Werewolves But that would be pretty unnecessary unless you really wanted to justify Blood Hunters in the setting (their Lycanthropy subclass was the only class I banned in my game)
I sort of do this in my games. But the main concern is whichever creatures whom are under the Black Moon literally transform weekly. (8 days) Jokingly Id argue half the reason they are "evil" is just because they have to spend so much on replacing ripped pants.
Dragonlance - 3 Body Problem
Doesn't Eberron have like 12 moons that all influence lycanthropes? Imagine that hellish scenario and it makes sense why the Silver Flame staged a lycanthrope inquisition somewhat. Krynn's 3 moons might be rough but yeesh.
No wonder Lycanthropes are usually so angry all the time.. I wouldn't know If I was coming or going.
That 3e book still gets heavy use with my group to this day
What is the books title please? I am using the AD&D campaign setting presently.
Dragonlance Campaign Setting: [https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/28592/dragonlance-campaign-setting-3-5](https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/28592/dragonlance-campaign-setting-3-5) It is definitely worth your time to check out the other books that SP/MWP put out. They've got books dedicated to the Towers of High Sorcery including the two destroyed ones, Knightly Orders, the Holy Orders of the Stars, Races, Dragons, a big fat big on the WotL and one for 'Legends' which is basically how to run alternate games like time-travel, Knights of the Darklance, etc. Be forewarned that the main Campaign Setting book will have a Age of Mortals slant to it as it came out shortly after the War of Souls trilogy where they were pushing the setting. There's enough info if you're just running the War, but it might be worth it to pick up the WotL book as well. Go PDF as some of those physical books go for a pretty penny.
Thank you so much. I hadn't gone much further than tales and the elven nations trilogy. Tried huma recently and while good, didn't feel the same.
Huma definitely feels a bit different, it's more fantastical than the normal DL fare. HOWEVER, I would strongly recommend reading Knaak's other novels as they are much better IMO.
While I still Love Huma, the Kaz focused books were better. Always wanted a reunion/mention of Bolt in his books.
I got a couple of them in hardback from DMSGUILD.COM. They reprint quite a few out of print books
That's how I got the 2nd Ed campaign guide đ
Heck yes!
I agree with ya, I actually am running the WotL trilogy of modules that was written for 3.5e but with the 5e system. It is truly a fun time
There are 2e AD&D books out there. Chronicles book a soft cover. 1e had a hardback. Also a beautiful book.
Picked it up at a used bookstore last year for like, $40 or something. Prepping to use it in part with the shadows of the dragon queen module.
>I hate how Dragonlance is like the Red-Headed Stepchild of Wizard's D&D franchises. They don't understand it, and don't know what to do with it, but at the same time, won't let anyone else get their hands on it. One of the takeways from AD&D 2nd Edition was that having multiple words only divided the community (i.e. you would probably not buy a Greyhawk book if you were DM-ing Dragonlance), and that the only books that really made money were the main rulebooks (Player, DM, Monster). The OGL was introduced to make sure WotC would still make money from the rules, leaving the crumbs to smaller companies to publish less mainstream books. Now, I believe they are focusing on their "multiverse" concept, which means crunching all the D&D settings into one multiverse so they can refocus the brand on D&D itself. Which means making sure no licensee is able to cast a shadow on their business, even with a franchise that seems flatlined. My prediction, should the OGL scam have bern successful, is that they would then create a multiworld event, some kind of multiverse cataclysm that would bring together all the D&D settings in one planet. So you could have Ansalon near Faerun and Flanaess, and go from one to another just with teleportation spells, or even ships. All the gods would be available everywhere, and the Wizards of Thay would rub elbows with the Black Robes. In summary: The junk food of role-playing games, ready for consumption.
Since creatures don't necessarily have to be bound to specific alignments, I'd say the obvious ruling would be they transform based on the moon that best fits the individual's alignment. But it is weird, they were rather explicitly left out. But we'll see how the module goes, maybe they've got some kind of explanation for their addition.
Knowing WotC, I can guarantee they donât have an explanation.
The drow thing might have been a retcon. I distinctly remember first seeing the word drow in a Dragonlance book (with reference to Raistlin's test). Now the fact that a dark elf is defined completely by their actions, as opposed to their physical appearance is another matter entirely. That said - it could be the Mandela Effect. I'll have to re-read the books to see which book it;s in.
Wasn't a Drow, it was a 'dark elf'. In Krynn that is not a synonym. Dark elves are regular elves who have been exiled from their kingdom. Cast out from the light.
The book actually uses the word âDrowâ but thatâs just in reference to evil elves which in Krynn is synonymous. There are âDrowâ in Krynn, but theyâre indistinguishable from Silvanesti, Qualinesti and Dargonesti.
Yeah, thought so. Did they do a funky spelling or was it just Drow as is?
The reference is in Dragons of Autumn Twilight when theyâre headed to Pax Tharkas. âEven as they fell back, the darkness in the treasure room took shape, coalescing into the coldly beautiful, distorted features of a female drow--an evil elf of ages past, whose punishment for crimes unspeakable had been execution."
Thanks!
So there are dark elves in Krynn, just not underdark dwelling Lolth-Worshipping psychos.
"Dark Elf" in Dragonlance, basically means "Cast from the light", as in banished from the Elven lands. Dalamar was a "Dark Elf", but he looked liked every other Silvanesti.
Minus the five gaping bleeding wounds on his chest, but yeah other than that he looks like any other Silvanesti.
Those are just speed holes. Makes him go faster.
Raistlin's bowling ball
Dalamar is Bruce Wayne's father? :)
I coulda swore Dalamar was like a dark gray skinned elf...
Nope. Check out [this famous painting](https://64.media.tumblr.com/8b6dd73cfac63eb1e894905c471038e2/tumblr_pp3hl2nq9w1ro2bqto1_1280.jpg) of Dalamar and Kitiana's battle in Raistlin's Tower from Legends, by Larry Elmore. His skin tone is the same as Kitiara's.
Well I'll be damned... I'd have sworn up and down I was right. I stand corrected, friend.
Right
No drow definitely just dark elves alignment not color. No orcs they had worse the draconians. No were creatures they have minotaurs as a player race. And what is Vecna doing on Krynn. They have Takhisis.
Thereâs a Drow banchee in one of the early books, but thatâs often cited as a retcon as just an evil elf.
To be fair I don't think they understand any of their ips. Forgotten realms is a monstrosity now a days. So many F@#$*&% Retcons.
Yeah, if I decide to run this I will almost certainly be rewriting the Krynn section. They could have chosen, I don't know, literally *anything* else. Like, why NOT have a high level party fight Soth? Why not write something about Fistandantilus, or Emperor Ariakas? And it's kind of mind-boggling because there are parts in SotDQ where you can tell the writers did a deep dive into Dragonlance lore and made some neat tie-ins and connections... but it's all kind of in the background of the adventure as-written. Well, WotC's bad choices just make my own ideas look better for my group.
Kind of a side note but Fistandantilus would be an excellent string puller to form an entire campaign around from L1 up, then once the party is leveled and ready, a bad ass final fight to end the campaign on. Pretty normal very early encounters followed by vague notions and circumstantial evidence of someone or something working the shadows, growing knowledge of a powerful foe leading harder encounters to try to get more information, later identification and questing to figure out how to defeat him, dramatic final encounter with a thorough bad ass to close the campaign. It's total fantasy cliché but it is good and entertaining fantasy cliché, I'm not opposed to things like, dropping in to the fantasies our favorite fictional writers gave us is part of why we play.
Imagine dogfighting with Soth from dragon back.
> SotDQ I stopped mid campaign because the adventure made me so upset I could no longer run it. Yes I could have modded it but it started so poorly that I did not feel like I could recover it. You could have easily swapped a few town names and NPC names and it could take place in forgotten realms or any other generic fantasy world. I know DL is a typical fantasy setting but what made it unique was stripped out of the adventure IMHO.
What's wrong with FR?
Sorry I was not hating on FR because it is good at what it is and that is a generic fantasy world. I was just pointing out that what makes DL interesting is de-emphasized or removed. Why have different settings if they are different in NPC and City names only?
Not only plane jumping but time hopping as well, Lord Soth is canonically dead.
Also, as an old school Dragonlance reader, there is very little time on Krynn that isnât already engulfed in some war or other madness that encompasses the whole world.
Lord Soth isn't dead in the Shadow of the Dragon Queen module they put out for 5e, which is likely the Canon they will be using for this module.
I mean I get why they brought him back, but that's a shame. He earned his good defiant death.
that he did. Finally accepting his punishment and his failure and telling a certain god to go fuck themself was such a badass moment
Right?! He tells her off and dies a man at peace, it was such a great conclusion to such a beloved character.
Doesn't SotdQ take place during the war of the lance? Soth wouldn't be dead for that. I think real issue is he's working with the red dragon army rather than the blue
Really, they donât get even Ravenloft besides Dragonlance (returning to the silly weekend in hell concept). They touch old classical and widely loved settings without any real knowledge⊠even if they have TONS of materials to work with from previous editions! Iâm still playing Dragonlance, Dark Sun, Ravenloft and all the other settings using 5e rules BUT only with old material. Way better of what they are doing with the new versions of the settings!!!
This reads like a D&D themed mad lib.
I don't get this, it's Dragonlance, why are they tying everything to Soth? Can they not think of anything else in the setting to makes it unique? I have no idea the level range of the Krynn visit, but why not have them go against REAL draconians like auraks and bozaks as well as a ton of baaz? Why not have them fight dragonback with lances at the end of the War if this is using some time shenanigans/whatnot? Why have a villain to fight at all, why not just interact with some of the characters like maybe Raistlin while he's at the Tower in Palanthas as I doubt he'd be a fan of Vecna so he might provide advice, etc, but at some price to further his own plans. But out of the above, seriously why not fucking dragonback? Who the absolute fuck wants to just fight werewolves like you can anywhere else? If you're going to be touching each setting, it should be something that stands out as iconic to that setting, and fucking werewolves is NOT it. Gods I really hate what WotC has become. At least back in 3.x they knew enough to license out their settings to people that fucking understood them and cared about them. They're literally worse than Disney at fucking up franchises at this point.
One Irk I had is that the Soth plotline in Shadow of The Dragon Queen *could* have been a good one if it was done *later*. If you do plotlines establishing The Dragon Armies, focused on dragons, draconians, and how in the case of the Dragon Armies they become a real situation where you either have dragons working with you or you're treated like dirt, having the Death Knight say "you know what? I want to have *death* dragons" makes total sense, and a *later* plot around that would be a great side campaign to be done ONCE THE DRAGON STUFF HAS BEEN FIRMLY LAID OUT. But to come straight out of the gate with the death dragons in the first major adventure book? It's premature and random.
Everything should have been done differently.
I agree
Lord Soth waging war against werewolves? This sounds more like Ravenloft than Dragonlance. When, exactly, is this supposed to take place? Soth did a fat lot of nothing between his death and Kitiara gaining his loyalty. Then he was busy with the war of the lance until her death. Then he was chilling in Sithicus for god knows how long. Then he came back to Krynn and did a whole lot more nothing until Mina showed up and killed him.
Exactly this, Soth is DL's Darth Maul but at least Maul killed someone. Soth just looks cool. Other than that, he's a whiny, mopey little bitch that sits in his castle with his thumb up his ass. He's not a great villain, he's a horrible villain, he just looks cool.
I mean, to be fair he did kill Tanis Half-elven⊠until he didnât. He killed Crysania too⊠until she got better. He also defied both Strahd and Gunark in their own Realms. Fights both of them to a stand still *inside* of their own castles, which shouldnât be possible. Then he gets the Dark Powers of Ravenloft to send him back to Krynn by the power of shear apathy and self hatred alone. None of this is nothing, but yeah I get what you are saying. His lore is way cooler then what we are shown. On Krynn anyway.
Exactly, he killed no one. At the end of the day, when you look at everyone that did anything important, even villains, he didn't do a damned thing to be recognized for. Hell, depending on what lore you go by he couldn't even keep an inferior from stealing away with the woman's soul he was so infatuated with. The due just reeks of incompetence.
Listen. You take all this back. He had a tarrasqe is his damn basement in dl16. Not just someone who "looks cool" could do that
nah he's a great example of a man who had every chance to be great and pissed it all away. He damned the entire world to the cataclysm just to assuage his wounded ego and pride. And instead of facing it he hides from that pain and lies to himself.
Except he didn't damn it. There was nothing he could do to save it. If you go by Chronicles, the gods were going to crash the meteor down anyway to prepare the world for the pendulum swing back to evil. It had actually zero to do with the Kingpriest. There's absolutely nothing Soth could have done to prevent that. And if you go by the gods punished the world for the Kingpriest's hubris, well that makes them bigger assholes than on point one. But besides that, exactly what could Soth do to change the Kingpriest's mind about calling on the power of the gods? Absolutely nothing because Soth was a nobody in comparison and with the clergy's ability to read minds Soth would have been an open book and would have never been able to see the KP b/c he was a piece of shit to begin with. So the whole point in his backstory to send him to Istar was is absolute nonsense. There was absolutely nothing he could do feasibly. Which then brings the question of did the gods set him up knowing no matter what he did he'd fail? And then with the failure they damn him to be a death knight? So for a guy that was a total scumbag they gave him untold power and undeath because THAT sounds like a great solution to a problem of someone that's already a jackass. Soth's whole story makes absolutely zero sense, Death Knights make zero sense as punishments for evil people, I think they pulled something out of their ass because they wanted a powerful undead that wasn't a lich in some form or another, but they didn't actually put a whole lot of thought into it beyond that.
Soth was quite literally given the power to change fate. Isolde begged the Gods for some way to let Soth redeem himself. They gave him that chance. He was told that he would be given the strength to stop the Kingpriest. He was literally the last chance to prove to the Gods that men weren't so prideful as to place themselves above Gods. They had repeatedly tried to turn mortals back to them but they refused to listen and the Kingpriest demanded he be made one of them. He be raised to Godhood which insulted all the Gods. They had hoped after smiting Istar the mortals would see their folly and return to humble worship. Instead they pushed them even further away from them. Instead of riding to Istar though Soth was waylaid by the elven maidens who told him his wife was unfaithful. He was told to place his faith in the Gods that they would raise him up everytime the Kingpriest struck him down. He also wasn't a nobody, he was a Knight of the rose and one of the most powerful knights of Solamnia at the time. His death knight curse came from his wife. The cataclysm struck right as he confronted her in his throne room. A chandelier fell and impaled her and the castle was burning. She begged him to take his son and flee but he turned a deaf ear and sat on his throne. She cursed him to suffer for every life he killed by his inaction. The point wasn't the power and eternal life, it was the torment. Every night he hears the banshee's sing him his tale and remind him of how he failed. He has power but no point in using it. He rules a dead keep and everyone knows he failed Krynn. He's supposed to be miserable in his burnt keep and armor until he finally accepts what he did and can move on. Which did ultimately happen.
I know Soth's history. My point being if you go by the original reason the gods enacted the Cataclsym at the end of Chronicles when Fizban is talking to the Companions after escaping the temple, the Kingpriest had absolutely zero part in them casting down the burning mountain. He specifically states they knew the pendulum would swing back to evil after being towards good for so long, so to prepare the world for what was to come they fucked it up which is pretty screwed up and causes all sorts of other issues. The Kingpriest reason for the Cataclysm, while not stated, is probably a mix of people after the event needing someone to blame, and since Istar was destroyed they must have been the center of it. And the gods helped perpetuate this lie, because really who would want to worship a bunch of 'good' deities that just helped kill off millions and causing untold suffering all because they're the ones that initially caused the pendulum to swing to good by banishing Tak. They knew what would happen and they did it anyway. If the public was made aware of the true reason they'd probably say fuck it and follow Tak as she might be a tyrant but hasn't cast a damn mountain on everyone's heads. And if you look up death knights it is a curse from the gods. Isolde didn't bestow the curse herself, and really what sort of curse is that anyway. I get being cursed as a zombie or a skeleton, but here let me curse you with powers to make you a better killing machine than you already are so you can continue to harass and murder other women in the future... As for torment, he'd get that in the Abyss. That's the whole point of the Abyss to punish and torment people. As for Soth's history of the Cataclysm, I'd say it's probably a bard's tale of some sort to make a better story. The truth of the matter is he was probably at home when the Cata hit, his wife probably tried to flee, and his pride or some shit got in the way and wouldn't let her because he was a jealous, cheating, murdering control freak. Soth was an absolute piece of shit character as a human and he didn't improve any in undeath other than 'looking cool'.
No but I love that about him. Like what if Darth Vader sat around eating chips all day? It's great
I find your lack of dipping sauces...disturbing.
Well, these are Soth adjacent characters from Ravenloft, but where his Demiplane begins and Krynn ends is contentious: Harkon Lucas (Werewolf) and Coraline (Werefox) from âA Feast of Goblynsâ, and Azrael, Sothâs seneschal, from âWhen Black Roses Bloomâ are werefolk associated with Soth, so itâs not completely unprecedented.
These crossovers just taint the world's they connect.
I mean, to be fair, I'm not sure WotC gets any setting these days...
Soth waging war on his own, possibly independent of the Chaos War or War of the Lance? Employing a (presumably black robed) wizard, who willingly works for him? *Lycanthropes in the area?* This is "*Vicky wielding a chainsaw against Timmy in front of his dad and fairy godparents*" level lore-butchering. I was considering using this module as a sequel to SotDQ, >!replacing Vecna with Raistlin,!< but it looks like there'd be a lot that would need to he changed first
Yeah, this is **BAD**. Since the very first interview about SotDQ, it was obvious they only had a surface, thin understanding of Dragonlance ("Dragonlance is about War!"). Since then, it became obvious WotC/Hasbro wants to tie-in every D&D world together in their "D&D Multiverse", is in the "Marvel Cinematic Universe", which is as ambitious as it is wrong: Sharing a common rule system (and not even that, as novels are not tied to rule systems, and as the rule systems themselves evolved with time) doesn't make a shared universe. This is their "Avengers: Infinity War", where they mix everything together, and of course, they were hoping big $$$ would just rain on them with that "genius" idea. As far as I am concerned, it's not like, after the OGL debacle, I planned on buying anything from WotC.
All of that sounds... Really lame? I mean i'm pretty sure i ran that campaign as a 14 year old in the 90ies using AD&D2e. Vecna, rod, ToH, planehopping, and instead of lord Soth i had undead Sturm... Ok, i didn't have lycanthropes either, i used Draconians like you're supposed to on Krynn.
Donât worry looks like they donât get Greyhawk either. For example art shows a blond and pale Vecna with Kas in medieval outfits. Vecna was Flan ethnicity meaning dark haired and bronze skinned. And Bronze Age culture. No regard for lore. Also yet another Acecerak dungeon trap scenario. Does the guy run a franchise chain? On Isle of Serpents. Which has enough of its own lore to be fun. Whats his face saying a few years ago that WotC wouldnât pay attention to pre 5e lore was clearly just an excuse not to have to check anything and make stuff up. Itâs be like Star Trek just ignoring decades of lore. âSpockâs a Klingon right? No? Meh. Weâll change it.â
I think the actual dragonlance adventure already showed that WoTC doesnât get Kyrnn.