Having just finished reading issue 351, I must say that I found it a little weak by comparison with the previous 'Campaign Classics' issues.
I think perhaps my issue was to do with the narrowed focus. Previous issues of this sort have tended to present articles that are of general use to someone running a "Dark Sun", "Spelljammer", or other 'classic' campaign. By contrast, this issue seemed more interested in detailing very small areas around the "World Serpent Inn", with a view to fitting the setting into a setting-hopping campaign.
In particular, I was dismayed by a couple of statements in the Dragonlance article. Firstly, "normally no amount of magic allows travel to or from the world". So, I suppose I imagined Krynnspace, not to mention The Wizards Three? Additionally, and more distressing, was the listing of the Kingpriest's alignment as LG. This being the totalitarian ruler of a corrupt nation who backed his actions with secret and thought police, and who declared entire races (ogres, minotaurs and goblins) were to be exterminated en masse. Surely a mistake? (And I'm aware that he's listed as LG in the 1st Edition "Dragonlance Adventures", but it's a mistake there, that could have done with correction, IMO.)
That said, I should state that I thought the Greyhawk and Ravenloft articles were very well done, both of which seemed to deal with areas of wider use within the setting than the others.
I also like the new FR and Eberron article series, although I don't use either of these settings, and found Savage Tidings particularly good this month. Class Acts was, as always, very solid, and Order of the Stick and Nodwick were particularly amusing this month.
I don't want to get into a whole alignment slapdown, but one of my problems with AD&D and the current 3.x brand is a the black-and-white-itude of the alignment system. Good guys can hunt down and kill evil and when you got a paladin evil detector right next to you; heck, you might aswell go door-to-door. ::knock knock knock:: Yes? Evil detector. Oh my, well no one is evil here. Excuse me but your husband, and 12-year-old daughter both register. Klause shoot them. Shoot them both....:: The use of misdirection type spells might lead to some acceptable losses, (see how bad evil people can be?) but on the whole society would be much better off without actual evil folk. Now while I know that minotaurs aren't all bad in Krynn, but goblins defintely fit the Monster Manual stereotype so why not hunt down and kill them all if you are going to use the alignment axis as law? Given all the spell, and class feature support stuff like detect evil has it is more law than the grappling rules. It's not like evil people in the game don't deserve it either, right? Eventually they are going to do something that is going to hurt someone (probably someone innocent). Why because their evil. The system opens itself to some abuse but would'n't abusers turn up as evil eventually? I'm not saying I agree with this interpretation, but it gets used a lot from what I've seen and read to justify PC slaughterfests and occasional U.S. Government military actions that seem contrary to our nation's founding principles, but that's another thread....
On that note the Kingpriest would score a LE alignment in my games. But I'm a romantic at heart,
GGG
Chief Creative Officer, Publisher
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In particular, I was dismayed by a couple of statements in the Dragonlance article. Firstly, "normally no amount of magic allows travel to or from the world". So, I suppose I imagined Krynnspace, not to mention The Wizards Three?
That's the line being parrotted by the folks writing the official Dragonlance stuff for Margaret Weis Productions, one of whom was the author of that piece. Apparently Weis and Hickman never liked the idea of Krynn being a part of the D&D multiverse, so they've decided to just ignore everything else and pretend it never happened.
I think it's unfortunate, but it is the state of play in 2006.
I'm sure it will all change three or four more times in the future.
--Erik
Delericho, you are the DM and if you don't like it, you can change it. If you like the "Krynn is part of a bigger whole" then present it as such. No one's forcing you to use every exactly as written, and if you feel a change would make the game for the better, then do so. :)
I was happy to see Kara-Tur in this issue, it made me quite happy!
you are the DM and if you don't like it, you can change it.
Oh, I know, and if that had been all I had to say, I wouldn't have bothered. I was rather more concerned about the Kingpriest's alignment, which has always struck me as being blatantly wrong.
However, most of all, I was keen to express that I preferred the approach of the previous "Campaign Classics" issues, which I had particularly enjoyed. It wasn't that this was a bad issue, it just didn't quite work for me. It felt like a meal in a restaurant where the starter, dessert and drinks were all excellent, but the main course just didn't live up to expectations.
IMO, obviously.
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I don't have a whole lot of the old Campaign Classics articles to compare to, but I really liked most of the articles in this issue. I think the narrow scope makes the articles immediately useful to DM's, as opposed to something broad which wouldn't be as useful to DM's and players not running those settings. YMMV.
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This month's magazine did have a variety of things, but it didn't give me things that I wanted.
Some of the articles were nice "adventure hooks", particularly Al-Quadim and Kara-Tur. They might be a good feature in Dungeon. A couple pages to describe something that a DM can "wing" as an adventure with some stock encounters from the MM. I think a "2 page adventure kernel" would be interesting in Dungeon.
But I didn't care for it much in Dragon. I actually don't care much for the Campaign Classics Issue. Providing support for past settings is a good idea in principle, but trying to cover this many campaign settings in a single issue is difficult. Trying to balance each article with being general enough that anyone can use it (a good thing) but being specific enough that fans of the setting have something they WANT to have (also a good thing) is not easy.
I complain when the material is too campaign specific to be useful, but I like specific material that is easily modified. The Cities of the Realms is an example of that kind of article. It has enough detail to be interesting, but is really generic enough that I can plop it directly into my own game world. I haven't fully detailed every city, so some of those will certainly work.
My humble suggestion to the powers that be would be to give us a regular "campaign classic" article. 2-3 Forgotten Realms articles each year, 2-3 Greyhawk, and 6-8 articles (total) for the other campaign settings. For example, Ravenloft is a natural fit for the October issue each year.
This allows the articles to be published when there is something good, and allows for the "less popular" settings to still be visited occassionally.
I think it would be a better way of visiting these settings. How about everybody else?
Got to say I liked it!
Always do like the Campaign Classics and I felt this issue was rather like a setting "Taster". Just enough to give you the flavor without forcing a huge heavy portion down the throat of some folks who don't like sand, silk, King Priests and Kenders in the the Dungeon.
Of course I like those nuggets. They keep D&D fresh for me.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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That's the line being parrotted by the folks writing the official Dragonlance stuff for Margaret Weis Productions, one of whom was the author of that piece. Apparently Weis and Hickman never liked the idea of Krynn being a part of the D&D multiverse, so they've decided to just ignore everything else and pretend it never happened.
To that I say yay! Dragonlance was always a pain in the butt to integrate with other D&D worlds due to their currency issues, moon magic, and *shudder* kender.
Damn I hate Dragonlance.
Sebastian (who has coins made of oil because it is rare!)
The Campaign Classics issue is one of my favorite things about Dragon these days. I liked the whole World Serpent Inn concept and it was nice to see settings like Kara-Tur and Al Quadim. Still, I really missed seein my favorite settings:
Mystara
Red Steel/Savage Coast
The Hollow World
Blackmoor
Sure, the Isle of Dread article can pass as a Mystara article, but with the STAP going on and no "Mystara" logo anywhere, I felt like something was missing. Hope Dragon will make up for it in the coming months! :)
Håvard
Mystara had some very cool things going on.
A very cool "Mongol" styled nation.
A very cool "Native American" themed nation.
I was never a big fan of the Hallow World but some of the rest of the seeting was very well done.
My thoughts:
The theme as a whole was an excellent idea. The world serpent inn is a good part of classic d&d lore, works as a good theme mechanic for the issue, and was well written.
I found the dark sun article the most dissapointing. The previous two campaign classics had strong dark sun articles, so it had a large shoes to fill. However, it served only as a very rudimentary introduction to the desert aspect of the setting. Whereas previous articles have been useful both to convert dark sun sensibilities to 3.5 rules as well as giving an introduction to the feel and core sensibilities fo the setting. I did, however, greatly appreciate the defiler feat. It was the most elegent fashion of converting defiling magic to 3.5 I've seen.
The planescape article was my favorite. It was well detailed given the ammount of space, and managed to capture the tone and flavor of the setting, while fleshing out a tiny corner of it.
The ecology of the isle of dread issue was well done also. The willingness to depart from the typical format worked well, and as the issue was devoted to the classic lore of d&d past, it was a good fit.
however, tehre was another savage tidings collumn after it. This one carried lots of filler crunch aspects, that, much like I found wormfood useless in AoW, I have no expectation to use when running the STAP. We already had our savage tide article, this should have been cut for another setting, or more room in the other articles.
I really enjoyed the dragonmarks and volo's guide articles, and look forwards to the regular articles to come. however, I only get one issue a year, the issue I look forwards to most, devoted to dead campaign settings. there are eleven other months for the living settings, so leave some more room for the dead.
That's the line being parrotted by the folks writing the official Dragonlance stuff for Margaret Weis Productions, one of whom was the author of that piece. Apparently Weis and Hickman never liked the idea of Krynn being a part of the D&D multiverse, so they've decided to just ignore everything else and pretend it never happened.
Hey now. I'm not remotely parrot-like!
And the Realms did it too! At least Krynn started out not being connected to the Great Wheel. :)
Cheers,
Cam
And the Realms did it too! At least Krynn started out not being connected to the Great Wheel. :)
Well, fair enough. Any chance you could comment on the "Kingpriest is LG" issue? Because it just strikes me as really wrong - he's the head of state of a totalitarian regime, backed by secret police and thought police, with the stated aim of committing genocide.
Thanks.
Well, fair enough. Any chance you could comment on the "Kingpriest is LG" issue? Because it just strikes me as really wrong - he's the head of state of a totalitarian regime, backed by secret police and thought police, with the stated aim of committing genocide.
In the Dragonlance mythology it is possible to be "too good". So the Kingpriest should be LG according to the DL definition of Good, but probably not by any other definition...
H
The Kingpriest was probably the second most difficult stat block I've ever had to write for Sovereign Press, right after the War of the Twins-era Raistlin. We discussed this into the ground; we were going to make him LN, but it soon became clear (especially if you read Chris Pierson's excellent trilogy about him) that he thought he was being good and righteous almost until the moment Paladine told him "no" and dropped the meteor on his head.
Beldinas characterizes that extreme end of Good that the Balance of Krynn warns of - believing so fervently that evil must be eliminated that one's actions become those of a fanatic or a zealot. I think we'd be hard pressed to find him sane, and alignment being what it is, I think you'd be justified in making him something other than LG if that doesn't work for you.
IT should be noted that he bears the Crown of Power, Miceram, which only functioned at the time for good-aligned people. There's a thought that perhaps its corruption into the Crown later worn by Emperor Ariakas in the War of the Lance began when Beldinas took his desire to see good ascendant and became an extremist.
Cheers,
Cam
Well, fair enough. Any chance you could comment on the "Kingpriest is LG" issue? Because it just strikes me as really wrong - he's the head of state of a totalitarian regime, backed by secret police and thought police, with the stated aim of committing genocide.
Cam,
Thanks for taking the time to comment on this. Obviously, I disagree with the placement (I would have put him at LG initially, but quickly slipping to LE as he fell into hubris - and certainly LE by the point described in the magazine), but that's just me.
I haven't read Chris Pierson's trilogy - I'll have to pick that up at some point.
Thanks again.
I usually love these issues, but this one didn't float my boat for some reason. I just couldn't get into any of the articles as much as normal. I can't put my finger on it, so maybe this isn't a useful post, but I've posted great things on other sites about Dragon, but this one just didn't work.