Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

Libertad! posted:

Also as much as I love covering Dragonlance stuff, I'm thinking of reviewing something different after this one finishes if only to give myself some breathing room.

A wise choice, I'm taking a breather before finishing off the DL modules because holy poo poo my brain was hurting after DL10.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Gun Jam
Apr 11, 2015

Libertad! posted:

Also as much as I love covering Dragonlance stuff, I'm thinking of reviewing something different after this one finishes if only to give myself some breathing room.

Sure. What games to examine are you considering?

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

Gun Jam posted:

Sure. What games to examine are you considering?

1. Well I'm considering reviewing SIGMATA, as the last reviewer abandoned it early.

2. Another idea was to do a review of the Ravenloft adventure's evolution through editions: the original AD&D I6, 3.5's Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, and 5th Edition's Curse of Strahd.

3. Al-Qadim setting. It has both an Arabian Adventures and Land of Fate as its two main products, the former covering the more game mechanics side of things and the latter a more bird's eye view of the setting. I've played and read 1st Edition AD&D, but not so much 2nd so I'm thinking of reviewing the latter.

4. 3rd Edition's Book of Vile Darkness, both for its controversy at the time and also Monte Cook's puritan hang-ups and juvenile mindset at the time.

5. The Red Hand of Doom, an incredibly popular adventure for 3rd Edition.

6. This is more something I wouldn't immediately review given that it's more of a backburner for a book I haven't read in like...forever, but the Midnight Campaign Setting by Fantasy Flight Games doesn't look like it's ever gotten the FATAL & Friends treatment.

If I had to rank them based on how I'm feeling right now, I'd be the most game for SIGMATA, Ravenloft, and/or al-Qadim. Ravenloft can be an interesting case study of an iconic adventure's evolution plus the whole Gothic goodness really tickles my fancy. SIGMATA because I figure a thorough rundown of the game's politics can be good to examine. Al-Qadim because it's a pretty neat and innovative setting which despite being in the Forgotten Realms has some new things to contribute besides "D&D but Arabian Nights."

Book of Vile Darkness may end up being a mock or hateview, which I fear may be draining.

Red Hand of Doom is shorter than the others I have lined up, but the plot is rather straightforward so it may be more of an analysis review. "Okay, it's the classic 'fight the invading army, but HOW does it do things right?"

I'll put up a Strawpoll to more accurately judge audience enthusiasm than last time where I tallied up individual posts.

Libertad! fucked around with this message at 23:30 on Jan 20, 2020

Night10194
Feb 13, 2012

We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

I'd be quite interested in seeing SIGMATA finished, or the Book of Vile Darkness. I remember both it and Exalted Deeds being pretty miserable sourcebooks.

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!
I'd personally be curious about Al Qadim as it's one of the settings I never touched much myself. Didn't it also get a videogame or two?

Hostile V
May 31, 2013

Solving all of life's problems through enhanced casting of Occam's Razor. Reward yourself with an imaginary chalice.

An analysis in Sigmata in 2020 would be pretty decent mostly because my whole approach on that was just. More or less from a place of despair? I was band-wagoning the review based on Popular Interest of the time and I was in a transitional place between my old lifestyle and interest groups and an incredibly uncertain constantly-changing future which is why the old review...starts how it does (fun fact: a lot of that? No longer accurate to who I am!). Considering how things have generally shaken out, it could be worth looking at that sack of crap again and addressing something that grabbed a lot of left-wing minds in the time and immediately disappointed them.

And then continues to disappoint them because Sigmata Guy keeps making centrist mistakes in the form of "ill-concieved world-building ideas".

...also I realized I never got around to proper chargen and never realized my stupid idea of statting Admin of DaShareZone out as a cyborg antifascist with 0 Judgment. Such is life.

Hostile V fucked around with this message at 00:30 on Jan 20, 2020

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

PurpleXVI posted:

I'd personally be curious about Al Qadim as it's one of the settings I never touched much myself. Didn't it also get a videogame or two?

It had a computer game in 1994 called Al-Qadim: the Genie's Curse. It was an action RPG, and Slowbeef did a Let's Play of it at one point. He wasn't exactly fond of it.

Global Disorder
Jan 9, 2020

Libertad! posted:

2. Another idea was to do a review of the Ravenloft adventure's evolution through editions: the original AD&D I6, 3.5's Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, and 5th Edition's Curse of Strahd.

There's also a 2nd edition version, House of Strahd.

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

Global Disorder posted:

There's also a 2nd edition version, House of Strahd.

I did not know that. Thanks for pointing it in my direction!

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo

Libertad! posted:

1. Well I'm considering reviewing SIGMATA, as the last reviewer abandoned it early.

2. Another idea was to do a review of the Ravenloft adventure's evolution through editions: the original AD&D I6, 3.5's Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, and 5th Edition's Curse of Strahd.

3. Al-Qadim setting. It has both an Arabian Adventures and Land of Fate as its two main products, the former covering the more game mechanics side of things and the latter a more bird's eye view of the setting. I've played and read 1st Edition AD&D, but not so much 2nd so I'm thinking of reviewing the latter.

4. 3rd Edition's Book of Vile Darkness, both for its controversy at the time and also Monte Cook's puritan hang-ups and juvenile mindset at the time.

5. The Red Hand of Doom, an incredibly popular adventure for 3rd Edition.

6. This is more something I would immediately review given that it's more of a backburner for a book I haven't read in like...forever, but the Midnight Campaign Setting by Fantasy Flight Games doesn't look like it's ever gotten the FATAL & Friends treatment.

If I had to rank them based on how I'm feeling right now, I'd be the most game for SIGMATA, Ravenloft, and/or al-Qadim. Ravenloft can be an interesting case study of an iconic adventure's evolution plus the whole Gothic goodness really tickles my fancy. SIGMATA because I figure a thorough rundown of the game's politics can be good to examine. Al-Qadim because it's a pretty neat and innovative setting which despite being in the Forgotten Realms has some new things to contribute besides "D&D but Arabian Nights."

Book of Vile Darkness may end up being a mock or hateview, which I fear may be draining.

Red Hand of Doom is shorter than the others I have lined up, but the plot is rather straightforward so it may be more of an analysis review. "Okay, it's the classic 'fight the invading army, but HOW does it do things right?"

I'll put up a Strawpoll to more accurately judge audience enthusiasm than last time where I tallied up individual posts.

I doubt you have it or could find it, but I'd love to see somebody do a review of Ravenloft's Gothic Earth setting.

Robindaybird
Aug 21, 2007

Neat. Sweet. Petite.

Everyone posted:

I doubt you have it or could find it, but I'd love to see somebody do a review of Ravenloft's Gothic Earth setting.

I actually have that. Not sure if I have the energy to properly review it

Kaza42
Oct 3, 2013

Blood and Souls and all that

hyphz posted:

A very experimental F&F...

Fatal & Friends: Tokyo Coin Laundry

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxFb5FRVGLc

The RPG is just the first game in the book, there are many others further in. The other games use the components a bit better (and support more players), but none of them are any good with the possible exception of the one where you have washers and dryers fight in a battle arena and use the bedsheet as a measuring tool. It's still pretty bad, but is at least bonkers enough to be fun once

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!



Book 1, Chapter 2: Clans of Color

The next three chapters have a similar structure: an overview of each of the true dragon clans, including 6 not part of the original ten, detailing their societies and culture along with a list of famous members of said clan. They’re also quite heavy in pictures, averaging one per dragon type. They’re quite cool and have quite a bit of action going on in them so it pains me to use just a few: 16 pics is a bit much

Based on the prior chapters’ origin myths, the chromatic clans are wrapped up in the history of Takhisis, with each of the clans representing the Dark Queen’s* virtues: wrath for the red dragons, entropy for the blacks, a soldiery discipline for the blues, and greens with silver tongues to manipulate others. The whites got the short end of the stick with feral instinct. The book notes that these tendencies are cultural rather than biological, and while millennia worth of tradition cannot be wiped away so easily the death of Takhisis has allowed for more independence. The white dragons are an exception: Takhisis was using her divine influence to prevent their mental faculties from raising beyond a nigh-animalistic existence, but being gone white dragons are getting smarter!

*another popular name for Takhisis.

Black Dragons are divided into two subgroups: alkaline and acidic dragons. Alkalines tend to have more smooth and have angular features, while acidics are larger and have more pronounced bones which gives them a skeletal look. Both dragons’ biology has an effect on their surrounding environment, turning the water brackish and increasing the ambient humidity into the air. Black dragon culture teaches that all things must come to an end, which makes them less outgoing and willing to take risky gambits than other clans. When Takhisis died some became even more isolated, figuring that if a god can die then so can all of dragonkind. During the War of the Lance black dragons were notable for their poor morale, only fighting under the Dark Queen if they were sufficiently compensated and willing to retreat if the tide of battle began to turn. They weren’t exactly devout followers of her, either, and preferred the company of reptilian humanoid servants to their own kind save when it came to the raising of children.

Blue Dragons prefer hot and arid regions of Ansalon. They are notable for having the most tight-knit and martial society of the chromatic clans, and Takhisis frequently used them as loyal soldiers in her various Dragon Wars. They are also the most willing to interact with humanoid societies, and many serve as aerial units among the Dark Knights.* They will not betray or desert even mortal companions and command structures short of extraordinary circumstances. When Takhisis died the blues sought to live by their dead goddess’ example and continue the fight against her ancient enemies, effectively becoming a “spiritual but not religious” clan.

*formerly the Knights of Takhisis, who absorbed the Dragonarmy remnants during the Chaos War and are now a secular organization of Nerakan nationalists following the death of their goddess.

Green Dragons prefer to live among the forests of Ansalon, making liberal use of illusion and mind-controlled minions to act as guards and spies. They are more cautious combatants than others, loathe even to use their breath weapon due to the fact that its chlorine content creates vast destruction of surrounding plant-life and thus allows their enemies to more easily track them down. They are anti-social even among their own kind, and only worshiped Takhisis under duress; they were known to mock her many failed wars in private. After said goddess’ death many now worship Hiddukel, the Chaotic Evil god of trickery and greed.

Although mostly self-centered, the elven involvement in the deaths of the notable green dragons Beryl and Cyan Bloodbane during the respective wars of the 4th and 5th Ages have caused the clan to become violently racist against all elvenkind. They have begun taking humanoid forms to better enact political changes that will bring hardship among the elven diaspora communities. I find this rather ironic, considering that Beryl was one of the Dragon Overlords and thus helped contribute to the Dragon Purges for her skull totem power. But looking up on the Dragonlance Lexicon she had quite a number of green dragons minions herself. It still seems an odd thing for a mostly anti-social clan.

Red Dragons are the most physically powerful of the chromatic clans, preferring the mountainous regions of central Ansalon. Although Chaotic Evil, red dragon culture encourages following the universal Oath of Crematia, said to be the first of their kind: “Mercy is weakness, and weakness is death.” After the death of Takhisis they are now more self-centered, not as willing to fight for the sake of Evil or revenge and abandoned the Dark Knights in droves unless they felt that a mission or cause was worth their time. The text contradicts itself here, saying that without Takhisis’ iron grip they rebel against any form of control, but have been known to make temporary alliances with organized crime and bandits (which inevitably end in the dragon killing everyone). They strangely have a clan-wide truce with the phaethons, a race of mountain-dwelling elves who can manifest wings of fire, and both sides avoid each others’ territories.

White Dragons are the smallest and weakest of all the true dragon clans and mostly live in Ansalon’s far south. Many of them moved to Southern Ergoth after the White Dragon Overlord Sleet terraformed the island into an arctic wasteland. White dragons are less political and scheming than other chromatics, focusing mostly on personal survival and living day to day. The death of Takhisis freed up a goddess-imposed curse on them, making them become less beastlike and able to comprehend long-term planning. They are surprisingly loyal to their own family units: they mate for life and maintain ties with their children well into adulthood, even if the younger generation goes off to find their own lairs.

Our first scholarly side-bars for this chapter includes a Dark Knight report on an autopsy of a dead dragon’s anatomy which ends up setting the entire laboratory on fire. The second is an account of the portrayal of dragons in artwork and folklore over the ages. There is some variety among the cultures mentioned, such as Ergothian tales turning dragons into more comic figures in children’s fables, or chromatic dragons being replaced by more generic monsters in Istaran art so as to distance any confusion between the angel-like metallics and Takhisis’ servants. Chromatic dragons were favored antagonists in Solamnic literature and were often described as being impossibly large, being the size of cities and mountains.


Book 1, Chapter 3: Clans of Metal

As Takhisis is the chromatics, so is Paladine to the metallics. And like their counterparts, each clan’s cultural attributes reflect his virtues: the golds exemplify justice, the silvers inspiring others to worthy causes, the bronzes patience and protection of others, and the copper and brass the charitable need to lend aid in their own ways. Although Paladine is now mortal, the metallic dragons felt that this was a failure on their part, that they could’ve done more to prevent this, and all have their own ways of coping with this.

Brass Dragons prefer warm climates and are the most sociable of all the true dragon clans. They go out of their way to interact with others regardless of race, and many among their number take up the study of linguistics so as to broaden their horizons. It’s not unknown for brass dragons to safeguard local communities by adopting the equivalent title of leader* in a ceremonial manner. They do not directly govern in most cases, but protect the settlement from dangers in exchange for food, artwork, and friendly company. After the Dragon Overlords warped much of Ansalon’s landscape for the worst, brass dragons became patrons of environmentalist causes, supporting the efforts of scholars and spellcasters in healing the land. They do this after the example of a famed member of their race, Iyesta.

*Most bandits and armies are loathe to assault a town which has a dragon as mayor.

Bronze Dragons prefer to live anywhere with a sizeable body of water, and often dig their lairs along shorelines to take advantage of tidal flows both to guard against intruders and to catch seafood. They are often fond of disguising themselves as animals to passively observe mortal affairs, and the clan as a whole has historically close ties to the Knights of Solamnia. After the War of the Lance they served as mounts for Dragonlance-wielding Knights, replacing the silvers in this endeavor after said clan went into isolation during the current Age. Those not part of the Knighthood took up roles as wandering vigilantes going where their talents are needed most, patrolling the oceans to save ships at sea, or even joining the Legion of Steel.* The clans’ own culture is a matriarchal gerontocracy where gender and age determines leadership structure, and they worship the other Gods of Light after Paladine’s willing abandonment of godhood. Habbakuk, good-aligned god of the sea, is a favorite choice.

*a more modernist knighthood which operates via independent cells.

METAPLOT ALERT: I’ve seen this mentioned in a few of the other 3rd Edition Dragonlance books, but Shinare the neutral-aligned goddess of trade is gaining increased prominence among the Knights of Solamnia. Some even rumor that her advocates wish her to replace Paladine as one of the Knighthood’s three patron deities. Her involvement is worrisome to more than a few people, including the bronze dragons, although the deity’s church seems to have benevolent goals so far in rebuilding communication and trade routes in post-war times.

Copper Dragons live primarily in low mountain ranges and hills, with the other territories claimed by other clans both chromatic and metallic. Having red and blue dragons as precarious neighbors taught them to be stealthier than usual, and coppers tend to be wildly emotional and mercurial. They can be lovable companions and are ineverate pranksters, but their moods quickly darken regarding those who don’t react positively to their jests. Historically Takhisis’ forces went out of their way to target the clan during the various dragon wars, making coppers the most rare clan on Ansalon. As a result the clan has recently entered into alliances with humanoid races to ensure their survival, and the gnomes of Mount Nevermind have offered living space for copper dragons on their island. Most have not taken up the gnomes on this offer due to a nearby red dragon* living near the mountain. Said red dragon tried to take over Mount Nevermind, but found trying to govern the gnomes a maddening affair and has retreated into isolation.

Gold Dragons are the oldest of the metallic dragon clans and the most religious. They have been known to live anywhere on Krynn, provided that they can build a lair of stone in the area. But most nowadays live in the capital city of the Dragon Isles and spend most of their time conducting research into some subject such as magic, history, or the arts. They’ve been known to disguise themselves as humanoids to covertly join academies and trade guilds. In the current Age of Mortals the gold dragons seek to find a new homeland for the elven diaspora, or hiring mercenaries to help drive out the minotaur invaders from Silvanesti.

Gold dragon family trees are matrilineal and a knowledge of one’s ancestry is highly encouraged to avoid inbreeding. After Paladine’s fall, seven among their number swore to guard their god-turned-mortal in elven forms. Some gold dragons devote themselves to more theological pursuits, helping restore temples and religious orders destroyed during the War of Souls.

Silver Dragons traditionally lived among the tallest snow-capped peaks of Ansalon, but now they rarely inhabit their lairs. The majority has been traumatized by Paladine’s fall, more so than the other clans. Some find themselves losing control of their own emotions in mental breakdowns or seize up in combat from PTSD, while others retreated from the world fearful that the gods will punish them for their “failure” to protect their former patron deity. Some sought to find atonement, such as finding ways to revert the draconian race to their “pre-corrupted” state, follow their god on his mortal journey across Ansalon, join the Legion of Steel or Knights of Solamnia, and other ways of doing good in the world. A notable number allied with the merchant guilds of Tarsis, using the city as a staging point for reclaiming Qualinesti from the Dark Knights while safeguarding trade routes across the Plains of Dust.

We have three scholarly sidebars for this chapter. The first is a female Knight of Solamnia writing on the many difficulties of raising eight highly energetic brass dragon wyrmlings and a list of amusing “do’s” and “don’ts.”* The second is a narrator writing of the things they saw in a now-abandoned copper dragon’s lair. Whose former inhabitant was said to have been a star-crossed lover of a red dragon. The third is a military journal talking about tactical breakthroughs during the War of the Lance due to the introduction of aerial dragon units on both sides of the conflict.

Sample Do’s and Dont’s posted:

Keep ample food handy and be sure to remind your young dragons that sheep are not playthings.

Do not allow dragonlets to fly indoors. Such activity helps keep the cobwebs down, but dragon talons are hard on the tapestries.

Do not engage eight brass dragons in an argument all together. Brasses can talk con-men into insensibility. Arguing with more than one at a time will make you lose your reason.

Thoughts So Far: I really like this chapter. I don’t have many bad things to say about it, and while the chromatic dragons are a bit predictable, I do like how the clans have a more direct impact on the setting. The Blue and Metallic clans in particular have close ties to nations and social orders, doing their part to work with the humanoid races in pursuit of some larger goal. This particularly works well in the fact that while Dragonlance’s most popular eras take place when dragons are rarest, it gives more opportunities for why and how PCs doing Big Important Hero Stuff will cross paths with these serpents of legend. Even more so when you consider the fact that the core setting book has a literal Dragonrider Prestige Class where you gain a mount of the species as a class feature. Having said mount show up as a shape changing vigilante, as part of a knightly order, or safeguarding travelers in the wilderness makes for a better hook than “there’s now a dragon in the vicinity for some reason.”

I found it a bit strange that even the chaotic-aligned clans had some unity in this regard, and found the brass dragons odd choices for environmentalists. But overall we have a strong start.

Join us next time as we cover the final two Chapters of Book One, detailing the minor true dragon clans, the clans spawned by Chaos, and an overview of the Dragon Isles in the current Age of Mortals!

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!
It does a lot to make the dragons have more personality than just "is shiny, is nice" or "is colour, attacks you on sight, also has inscrutable metaplot you'll never learn!!!!"

I enjoy that the blue dragons may be evil, but still have loyalty and are the ones most likely to have a semi-equal relationship with mortals.

Also, what the hell is that weird tusked monster in the bit of art you posted between the Chromatic and Metallic sections?

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

PurpleXVI posted:

It does a lot to make the dragons have more personality than just "is shiny, is nice" or "is colour, attacks you on sight, also has inscrutable metaplot you'll never learn!!!!"

I enjoy that the blue dragons may be evil, but still have loyalty and are the ones most likely to have a semi-equal relationship with mortals.

Also, what the hell is that weird tusked monster in the bit of art you posted between the Chromatic and Metallic sections?

Well it's certainly not a Drider, given that Drow do not exist on Krynn. The monster is a Dsir, who are an underground race from Bestiary of Krynn who have scythe-arms and tusked mouths. Their society is like an ant or bee hive, where they have a single queen matriarch and a bunch of drones which grow up from larval stages.

Also this is the pic used for the Brass Dragon entry. I was debating between using that or the Silver Dragon artwork, but I felt that a brass dragon swooping in to save what looks like a captured damsel in distress from an evil monster cult really encapsulated the heroic aspect of Krynn's metallic dragons.

Here's a pic of the Dsir's Bestiary artwork:



Here's the Silver Dragon Artwork. It was also another good one of a dragon in an action scene, and the other three metallic clans were a bit more sedentary or just in cool poses. But given that without knowing the context said dragon could for all we know be menacing those poor human and reptilian...centaur...dragonspawn I think...I went with the Brass instead.

Libertad! fucked around with this message at 11:26 on Jan 20, 2020

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo

PurpleXVI posted:

It does a lot to make the dragons have more personality than just "is shiny, is nice" or "is colour, attacks you on sight, also has inscrutable metaplot you'll never learn!!!!"

I enjoy that the blue dragons may be evil, but still have loyalty and are the ones most likely to have a semi-equal relationship with mortals.

Also, what the hell is that weird tusked monster in the bit of art you posted between the Chromatic and Metallic sections?

I like that the blue dragons are the most devoted to Takhisis but paradoxically the chromatics potentially most likely to become good. A group of kind desert nomads finds and raises a clutch of blue dragonlings then gods help anyone who tries to gently caress with those nomads.

Meanwhile, I like the characterization of black dragons as the mopey Goths of dragonkind.

Humbug Scoolbus
Apr 25, 2008

The scarlet letter was her passport into regions where other women dared not tread. Shame, Despair, Solitude! These had been her teachers, stern and wild ones, and they had made her strong, but taught her much amiss.
Clapping Larry

Libertad! posted:

1. Well I'm considering reviewing SIGMATA, as the last reviewer abandoned it early.

2. Another idea was to do a review of the Ravenloft adventure's evolution through editions: the original AD&D I6, 3.5's Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, and 5th Edition's Curse of Strahd.

3. Al-Qadim setting. It has both an Arabian Adventures and Land of Fate as its two main products, the former covering the more game mechanics side of things and the latter a more bird's eye view of the setting. I've played and read 1st Edition AD&D, but not so much 2nd so I'm thinking of reviewing the latter.

4. 3rd Edition's Book of Vile Darkness, both for its controversy at the time and also Monte Cook's puritan hang-ups and juvenile mindset at the time.

5. The Red Hand of Doom, an incredibly popular adventure for 3rd Edition.

6. This is more something I would immediately review given that it's more of a backburner for a book I haven't read in like...forever, but the Midnight Campaign Setting by Fantasy Flight Games doesn't look like it's ever gotten the FATAL & Friends treatment.

If I had to rank them based on how I'm feeling right now, I'd be the most game for SIGMATA, Ravenloft, and/or al-Qadim. Ravenloft can be an interesting case study of an iconic adventure's evolution plus the whole Gothic goodness really tickles my fancy. SIGMATA because I figure a thorough rundown of the game's politics can be good to examine. Al-Qadim because it's a pretty neat and innovative setting which despite being in the Forgotten Realms has some new things to contribute besides "D&D but Arabian Nights."

Book of Vile Darkness may end up being a mock or hateview, which I fear may be draining.

Red Hand of Doom is shorter than the others I have lined up, but the plot is rather straightforward so it may be more of an analysis review. "Okay, it's the classic 'fight the invading army, but HOW does it do things right?"

I'll put up a Strawpoll to more accurately judge audience enthusiasm than last time where I tallied up individual posts.

I was in a Midnight campaign for a while. It is an interesting setting, and if run right you really feel like the plucky underdogs struggling against the overwhelming might of a Sauron who won.

Just Dan Again
Dec 16, 2012

Adventure!

Libertad! posted:

6. This is more something I wouldn't immediately review given that it's more of a backburner for a book I haven't read in like...forever, but the Midnight Campaign Setting by Fantasy Flight Games doesn't look like it's ever gotten the FATAL & Friends treatment.

I vaguely remember seeing part of the Midnight movie trailer at a GenCon many years ago. Kind of wish I'd picked up those books during one of FFG's year-end fire sales now. Was the limited spellcasting system of any use in correcting caster supremacy, or did the rest of the d20 system's limitations still hold it back?

Night10194
Feb 13, 2012

We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

The thing is, say you limit casters in d20. You're still playing d20, just now everyone has nothing to do unless they have the right feats, which they don't get many of. It's the same problem Spycraft 1e ran into; sure, the classes balance a lot better without some of them being 'I have access to a much more useful and completely different game system', but the game system they're all using is still pretty dull and overcomplex.

Drakli
Jan 28, 2004
Goblin-Friend

Libertad! posted:

Well it's certainly not a Drider, given that Drow do not exist on Krynn. The monster is a Dsir, who are an underground race from Bestiary of Krynn who have scythe-arms and tusked mouths. Their society is like an ant or bee hive, where they have a single queen matriarch and a bunch of drones which grow up from larval stages.

Here's a pic of the Dsir's Bestiary artwork:


I love them.

I swear I've drawn things like these guys after/during a particularly frustrating day at work. I love them. And I kind of want stats for them, except that I'm afraid they'd be underwhelming in the way 'These guys look so fun!' monster stats often end up.

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!



Book 1, Chapter 4: Other Dragons

This chapter details six new true dragon clans. Two of them are warped by Chaos’ touch, while the other four have mostly uncertain origins. There’s a bit of a watery bias, in that three of the four non-Chaos clans involve the habitation of underwater realms.

Amphi Dragons are toad-like dragons who can live on both land and water. They are rather clumsy out of water and as such tend to make their lairs in sea caves and shipwrecks. They are quite aggressive in spite of their relatively small size in comparison to the chromatic and metallic clans, and instead of wings they can attack with a long grasping tongue in addition to spitting a line of corrosive acid. Nobody else, even other dragons, have managed to make peaceful contact with them, so what is known about their society is that they are solitary hunters in coastal and swampy regions. Lord Toede is the only person known to have had such a dragon as a mount.

It’s not in this entry, but amphi dragons are created when a black and sea dragon (detailed later) mate.

Aquatic Dragons are good-aligned beings who worship Habbakuk. They claim to come from Krynn’s northern pole, having once lived in isolated caves of ice in a civilization known as Saturnalia. They were forced to migrate south during the War of Souls when a sea dragon known as Urchin wrecked their civilization and placed a curse upon it. Their diets are similar to whales, eating small sea creatures filtered through their mouths. They can survive in warmer ocean climates but prefer to find lairs which remind them of home. They tend to be rather whimsical and curious, and often act as protectors of natural oceanic ecosystems such as coral reefs.

Fire Dragons were creations of Chaos after the breaking of the Graygem, and reflect this entities’ destructive nature. It is theorized that they were artificial creations rather than a true species in their own right by this ungod, but it seems that his mad designs exceeded beyond anyone’s wildest imaginings and now they are effectively a true clan all their own. They appear to be made of animated magma, and although sapient do not seem to possess any free will or higher intellect. They seek only to destroy, and even in combat alter their attacks between enemies at random. The only times it seems when they do not act violently is when it comes time to mate, and the mothers raise their children until they come of age at which point they’re violently driven off to spread Chaos.

Frost Dragons are the other Chaos Dragon clan, and have origins far older than Fire Dragons. When the Graygem made its way across Krynn during the Age of Dreams, a group of white dragons within vicinity grew warped and insane from Chaos’ mind. They exiled themselves to the farthest south pole of Krynn in Icereach’s wasteland, and came north when the Graygem broke to lay waste to Creation. After their patrons’ defeat, they are now doing their best to survive in a realm alien to them, competing with the white dragons for territory. Frost dragons have no emotions: they are driven by the need to fill their all-consuming hunger, and are immune to fear-based and mental manipulations.

Sea Dragons are the evil counterparts to Aquatic Dragons. They have not been known to the people of Ansalon until the Fourth Age, although the sea dragon Midori is the oldest known creature on Krynn. Their origins are unknown, but scholars theorize that they were either created by Zeboim as a means of competing with Takhisis at creating her own dragon clan or an offshoot of black dragons. Most are native to warm waters and reside in remote ocean trenches, coming out of hibernation to embark on a destructive path of seemingly endless gluttony. They are sadists who get off on torturing others, care for nobody else, and only reproduce due to an instinctual drive. They only bothered to worship the evil gods if blackmailed or sufficiently threatened.

Shadow Dragons have unknown origins even compared to the other dragon clans, and have grayish-dark scales which blacken with age. True to their name, they stick to the most lightless environments possible. It is theorized that they are not ‘born’ so much as artificially created: the first known shadow dragon, Necridian, was believed to have been a chromatic dragon who made a pact with Nuitari for unique powers. The shadow dragon Whisper, who was summoned by Fistandantilus to watch over his fortress during the Dwarfgate Wars, is believed to hail from the Plane of Shadow. As such, they do not have a typical family social structure and tend to make alliances of sorts with other races, although said relationships are usually superficial given their chaotic evil natures.


Book 1, Chapter 5: the Dragon Isles

The final chapter of Book 1 details the remote homeland of the metallic dragons. Although detailed to some extent in the War of the Lance sourcebook, this update is more in-depth and discusses things in the more modern Age of Mortals. This archipelago’s ecosystem has been artificially shaped to be an ideal tropical resort for the metallic clans, and is capable of teleporting around Krynn’s oceans to prevent others from easily discovering it barring a selected few.* Although they lived all over the place, the five clans retreated to the Dragon Isles after the end of the Third Dragon War as part of a pact wrought from Takhisis’ defeat. The only time the Isles came into real danger was when the chromatic clans stole the eggs of the metallic dragons during the Age of Despair, and later on during the Age of Mortals when the Second Cataclysm caused deadly storms and invasion by the forces of Chaos.

*The Isles always maintain their equatorial feel regardless of where they’re present.

As of now the Dragon Isles are still a largely peaceful place, albeit with more isolated corners full of monsters. Chromatic dragons and pirates in particular linger on isolated roads and the fringes of waterways. There are various non-draconic races living here in small villages with no hint of racial strife, and the capital city of Auralastican is a grand place with mansions sized for both humanoid and dragon occupants. It is ruled by a council of dragons made up of the five clan leaders in theory, but in reality they leave most communities to govern themselves save in times of crisis. More political factions arose after the end of the War of Souls. The first is the Cirraculum, a cabal of wizards who inhabit a floating citadel and gather magic items of all kinds to destroy them. It is thus believed that they want to destroy magic itself. The Harmony of the Heart was formerly a religious movement preaching peace and equality for all people, but has been perverted into a xenophobic and violent sect seeking to keep the Dragon Isles free of foreigners. The Legion of Steel operates openly as a legitimate faction in several villages. Finally, the Order of Brass is a joint humanoid-brass dragon organization which uses supplies and resources to guard their island against outside threats and also handle immigration matters.

We have a list of interesting places to adventure in, such as five mysterious brass pyramids visited at night by strange creatures performing rituals, a magical coral reef home to magical seaweed which grants the ability to temporarily breathe water to those who eat it, a once-pristine silver mountain lake whose scenic nature has been disturbed by what people believe to be Chaos spawn, a massive growing sinkhole in the center of the forested island of Alarl, and a Chaos-touched goblin cave lord* who has taken control of a once-peaceful tribe of goblins to perform more warlike pursuits.

*A special subrace of uber-goblinoid unique to Dragonlance, who gain more power by feasting on the flesh of their fellow goblinoids.

Thoughts So Far: The newer dragon clans don’t really hit that sweet spot like the traditional ten do. They feel a bit one-note in function and their lack of history among the historical Paladine-Takhisis rivalry makes them feel out of place. There are no true stats for them either, meaning that you’ll have to consult the Bestiary of Krynn sourcebook for mechanical information.

The Dragon Isles during the War of the Lance era were like the Shire: a mostly-ideal utopia which is the type of place PCs defend from outside evil rather than having adventures involving domestic problems. The War of Souls changed things around quite a bit, and making its magical seclusion from the world no longer work forces its inhabitants to deal with outside problems. I overall like these changes, although there is still the inevitable question of “why aren’t the powerful true dragons handling this” that will come up even if the metallic clans are less numerous than ever before.

Join us next time as we move on to Book 2 and learn of all things Draconian!

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!
Dragonlance



DL12: Dragons of Faith

"But wait," you ask, "Purple! The last module you did was DL10? Where's DL11? We love Dragonlance and want to know everything about it! I bet DL11 is full of kender! Give us those kender right now!" and I'll laugh and say thta DL11 is basically contentless, if you're super hype for the BATTLESYSTEM(tm), then DL11 is mostly just an overview of the large battles of the War of the Lance, both the ones the PC's were and weren't around for, so you can run them on your own. Done a different way it could have been interesting, if the whole module series was more... freeform, like the players had to beat the Dragonarmies, and they could do that either by force of arms or booting Takhisis back to the Abyss and thus decapitating the Dragonarmies, and the whole adventure series was a set of actions the party could take to increase their odds of success. Infiltrate or invade Sanction to find evidence of Egg Crimes? You recruit dragons to your side. Put up with Fizban for a while? You might end up finding the Dragonlances. Go suffer in a swamp? Might manage to recontact the Gods and get divine magic back on your side. Maybe even have alternate ways of accomplishing some of those objectives, but instead of having a straight adventure path, just throw the various adventure locations in there, along with some other places where the party might get magic equipment, recruit allies, do random acts of good, gain valuable intel, etc. so there's more to do on the side than jus tthe metaplot.

But no, instead we get this, so we're doing DL12 now, fuckos, and we're still sticking with the team from DL10 for this one: Tanis, Caramon, Raistlin, Goldmoon, Riverwind and Tika, bolstered by Serinda and Kronn, two new PC's. Waylorn is also still hanging aroudn as an NPC if the players found him in the last module, otherwise he gets forced into the party when Serinda and Kronn do.



At least the cover looks pretty loving metal, and Douglas Niles didn't write this one, so it might not suck rear end!

Chapter 5: The Prophecy


So the start of this adventure is :effort: as gently caress "okay, the players are farther to the north after DL10, make up an adventure that gets them there or something whatevs, anyway they're north and poo poo happens." I mean seriously, it loving says that, not quite verbatim, but just "they've travelled north, if you give a gently caress give them a reason, otherwise just lean over the table and tell them that they went north, end of story." But whoops lol turns out north... is DRAGONARMIES TERRITORY!!!!! What a wacky mistake, better hope they can charter a ship to take them to a place where people don't want to stick their heads on pikes!

They're on the south side of the BLUD SEA doing sweet gently caress all when suddenly some other travellers(Serinda and Kronn, also Waylorn if they didn't grab him in DL10) are getting their asses kicked by some Draconians and Hobgoblins. There's no accounting for the party choosing to not get involved, instead it's just assumed the party will hoover them up on raw principle. I forget if there's anything interesting about Serinda, but Kronn's dealio is that he is, or becomes, a MIGHTY REBEL WARLEADER to the Kender just so we can pretend they're not a loving blight on the setting.

There are of course also the usual events along the lines of: "if so and so many days have passed and the party aren't on the rails yet, start hitting them with "random" encounters until they die or get the hint." Because this is a module in the loving DL series. Now, where are the rails leading the party, you might ask? To loving Kendermore. Welcome to a lovely, cursed module that forces you to deal with Kender in bulk. Either the party wanders there on their own, or they get captured by kender rebels, and either way they have to endure putting up with the Kender for way longer than they would ever want to, i.e. any time at all. They engage in a bunch of extremely tiresome and "wacky" antics just so they can eventually tell the players that they're, gasp, the fated heroes of prophecy and that they should go see the old Oracle in the woods.

However, they don't know where the Oracle is, so instead they send the party to yet another loving Kender who supposedly knows. When they find him, he spends a while pretending he isn't who they're looking for an other, similarly tiresome bullshit that the PC's have to put up with because he's the only way onwards in the story. And then the directions he eventually gives them are bunk and just waste their time(and possibly risk their lives when they get attacked multiple times underway, what wacky folk, the kender!) when the oracle is basically right next door. gently caress kender.

The Oracle goes: "Yep, you guys sure are the fated ones" and throws some tarot cards around, you're supposed to cough up for a TALIS(tm) deck to use for this, but don't loving bother, because the only useful "prophecy" it can generate is summarized as thus: "There are some real bad dudes around, also you guys gotta go hang out with the SEA ELFS. Later, nerds." Then the Oracle peaces out.

If the party decides to give the GM poo poo, they can waste some time wandering around the countryside instead, seeing such sights as A RIVER, SOME TREES, ANOTHER DRACONIAN PATROL and MORE KENDER. The Kender also have some local ruins the party can raid, but module fiat declares that anything the party recovers from the ruins, the kender steal from them and put right back in the ruins. Oh those wacky little scamps by which I mean utter assholes. There are a few other ruins around, one of them is just nothing but random monster encounters, some minor items and "THE HEARTSBLOOD GEM, WHICH POSSESSES ITS OWNER" and then has no description of how this works or anything else about it anywhere else in the module. There's a spring that heals the party! But if anyone drinks from it twice and fucks up a saving throw the second time, they go insane for 2d6 days which may include attacking the rest of the party. For 2d6 loving days. And the party has basically no indication that there's anything shady at all about the spring.

In general it's all kind of a boondoggle zone because sure, sure, the party can go hunt up a bunch of valuable metals and gems, but the party is already at that stage of power in D&D where gold just... doesn't really matter, there's nothing to spend it on. They have all the mundane gear they could ever want, and they can't buy magical stuff, and nowhere are there any situations where they can buy big stuff or make any meaningful bribes because all their enemies tend to be fanatics in some sense or another, and on top of that they bypass the usual AD&D assumption of settling down and buying land and stuff, because they've got a big important quest to be on that'll gently caress the world up if they don't complete it.

Everything is kind of on pause until the PC's drag themselves to Flotsam, the only decent-sized non-kender town on the landwards side of the BLOOD SEA.

Chapter 6: Flotsam



I'm reminded of those discussions about inaccurate population numbers when the game describes Flotsam as the capital of a region with all of its 4000 citizens, 1500 of which are armed men, draconians and mercenaries. The place is ruled by HIGHMASTER TOEDE, who's risen in the ranks, with Kitiara hanging around being a shady rear end in a top hat like usual. If the party spend any amount of time in this shithole, Toede will literally walk past and drop a document that might as well be marked "PLOT" that goes: "OH MAN WE'RE TOTALLY CONQUERING THE BLOOD SEA! WE BETTER HOPE NO ONE TRIES TO STOP US!!!!!"

The PC's can also buy semi-useless intelligence from a guy who's literally named "VERMINAARD LIVES" backwards. Real loving subtle. Verminaard somehow survived yeeting himself into a pit under the dwarven kingdom, got stripped of his divine power and now tries to gently caress up all of Toede's plans because he's salty that the frog-looking little rear end in a top hat has done better than him. He even hates Toede enough that he'll help save the PC's from him despite the fact that they directly contributed to his current fall in stature. You might think this was part of some sort of redemption arc or something, but Grandma Flamestrike is about as close as Dragonlance comes to a morally complex character, and even then mostly only by accident.

At this point Berem, the guy who accidentally hosed up Takhisis' plans and got himself made immortal against his will and now has mild dementia, is also being actively hunted by the Dragonarmies since they've figured out what the gently caress happened and he's back in the gameworld again.

Flotsam also has a bunch of "whoops you didn't pass a % threshold, now you're arrested, disarmed and gonna die in two days, lol"-events, and in the Verminaard fashion, any PC's who disguise themselves as Dragonarmy troops will get invited over for drinks by any of the three Dragon Highlords in town that they meet. If they're also of the opposite gender and not insufferable boors, they'll also be unceremoniously asked if they're DTF. Remember that back in DL3 Verminaard did the same thing to Laurana, so I can only assume that you have to be a highly desperate incel to get picked for Dragon Highlord status.

Ultimately there are only two things of interest that happen in Flotsam other than your crying GM having to describe sex between Kronn and one of the dragon highlords, is that a few days in, there's a meeting between the Dragonarmies and some Ogres to make an alliance, and the party can crash that meeting and gently caress it up. Secondly, Berem has ended up being the helmsman of a ship, and somehow Verminaard, that dumb motherfucker, is the first person to figure out that Berem is the person all the Dragonarmies are looking for, so he kidnaps him and drags him off to the sewers to figure out how to profit off it. The party busts him out, presumably, the game again doesn't really account for them not doing this, but by this time the rest of the Dragonarmies have woken up to who Berem is, so the party flees on board the ship that Berem is the helmsman of.

Chapter 7: The Blood Sea of Istar

Basically no matter what the party does, there's an endless sequence of encounters intended to force them into the Maelstrom to escape, where they'll eventually either get sunk by the attackers or gently caress up a navigation or sailing roll and head straight for the center.

What, you expected agency?

Nice joke.

Chapter 8: Istar of the Deep

So anyway the party drowns but PSYCH!!!! turns out that water elfs saved them. The conflict down here is that the wet elves are fighting some fish people, we're invited to use the BATTLESYSTEM(tm) to handle this at the same time as we play out the rest of the module. No! gently caress you! gently caress that! Focus on one thing at a time or it's all going to be a lovely muddle, rear end in a top hat authors! The sea elves want the party to go assassinate some enemy leaders to make the fish folk federation fall apart, and I guess the party's gonna do that because what else are they gonna do under the loving sea?

The best part here is that the party can add to their menagerie of animal buddies, by kicking a sea slug's rear end and then jumping on its back(where there's already a saddle), they now gain what's stat-wise a giant slug for a mount, and nothing anywhere says they can't take it out of the sea. Hell yeah? Hell loving yeah. Nudibranch slugs are cool and colourful and with giant slug stats, it can really kick rear end, too. Otherwise Istar is just kind of, eh. "Here's a room, there's an enemy, it attacks on sight, have fun. It drops these items." For beign a weird undersea neighbourhood literally on the edge of hell, it's surprisingly... non-weird.

Chapter 9: The Battle of Istar

Ha ha no, we're not loving around with that BATTLESYSTEM poo poo.

Chapter 10: Friends in Need

No matter what the party does here, it actually doesn't really matter. Whether the elves get kicked out of the sea or the players kill the balrog-esque thing leading a bunch of regenerating sea demons allied with the fish people, they can just leave by the same path, the only difference is whether the upbeat or the sad music plays.

Anyway, back to the plot. Turns out the crew of the ship the PC's were on ended up on Pirate Island, where they've ended up needing to battle the PIRATE KING for their freedom, except, good news! They can substitute the PC's if they want to. And what PC's don't want to fight a pirate king? Lame loser ones, that's who. Berem, meanwhile, has ended up on Minotaur Island... except, not. The party can show up and be all "HEY MINOTAUR KING, GIVE US BEREM." and he'll be like "oh yeah sure whatevs I'll help if you PASS MY CHALLENGE" and then toss them into the MAZE OF DEATH except Berem has already left the island, so by the time the party is done all they'll have accomplished is wasting some time... and picking up a pair of hitchhikers. The Maze itself is really just a litany of Dex checks.

See, Kitiara, wearing the equivalent of a fake moustache in terms of disguise effectiveness, and her dragon, Skie, polymorphed to look human, will attempt to join up with the party to get closer to Berem, essentially pretending to be wacky foreigners with just enough competence to be useful. Any time their disguise is rumbled, they effectively yell, "IF IT HADN'T BEEN FOR YOU MEDDLING ADVENTURERS AND YOUR KENDER," Skie drops the disguise and they fly away. Their plans are only very vaguely defined, so it comes off more as comedy than a genuine threat.

Chapter 11: A Hidden Refuge

So funny thing, if the party skipped the PIRATE COVE and the MINOTAUR ISLAND and happened to figure out where Berem was heading right away and went there? Everything went perfectly well without them, the sailors beat up the pirate king and even picked up not-Kitiara and not-Skie on the way, which means that anything other than just skipping straight to the end was literally pointless.

Turns out Berem has decided to go treasure-hunting with a bunch of minotaurs on a haunted desert island with literal giant sandworms and an abandoned automated gnomish fortress where they might get trapped in the laundry room. It also turns out that Kitiara can literally just phone up Takhisis to scry out Berem's location for her, which makes you wonder why she needs this whole charade of following the party around in disguise at all. The module assumes that Kitiara will steal a march on the PC's by locking the party in the gnome fort and then running off to the nearby lair of a metallic dragon that Berem is hiding out with. The lair is a classic dungeon full of traps, most of which have however already been triggered, so it's mostly just an extended chase sequence where Kitiara escapes by GM fiat, poisons the dragon, steals Berem and tries to run back to Skie with him.

It's another pointless sequence, however, because no matter what, the party gets Berem back. If the party catches up with Kitiara, she drops Berem and flies away on Skie. If they don't, Skie flies away with Berem who jumps to his "death"(he's functionally immortal) and the party finds him just in time to save him.

Wait, wait a loving moment!

What's up, Skeleton Warrior?

You're telling me, no matter what the players do, it all turns out the same loving way? Unless they straight-up die? They could just spend a week partying in Flotsam and banging a Dragon Highlord and it all turns out the loving same?

Pretty much, skeleton warrior.

KREE!

On the one hand, this module sucks, on the other hand, a module you can complete by not even bothering to play it, does at least technically let you skip all the poo poo parts.

Anyway, once the party's all done, some NPC depending on who the players haven't gotten killed or pissed off will tell the players that they should see the KING OF ALL GOOD DRAGONS who'll surely unfuck the world if they can wrangle a meeting with him. And this is what they're gonna do in...

Next up! DL13: Dragons of Truth!

PurpleXVI fucked around with this message at 03:14 on Jan 22, 2020

Leraika
Jun 14, 2015

Luckily, I *did* save your old avatar. Fucked around and found out indeed.
Giant slugs do rule. Too bad about the rest.

MonsterEnvy
Feb 4, 2012

Shocked I tell you
Wait is this not an opportunity to kill several major villains in the campaign.

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

MonsterEnvy posted:

Wait is this not an opportunity to kill several major villains in the campaign.

Oh you scamp, see.

The Obscure Death rule is no longer in effect for players, but still for NPC's they're not meant to kill yet!

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo

PurpleXVI posted:

Dragonlance


DL12: Dragons of Faith

*Snip*


I had vague memories of the sea elf business but had completely blotted out the rest of it.

I don't suppose there's any reason we can play through DL6-9 and then just skipped to DL13 with "Yeah, those other folks had adventures, too, but they sucked."

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!


Dragons of Faith: 3rd Edition Changes

I may have overdone myself, but this adventure had quite a lot of changes. This module is longer than most, so for the D20 update it was split into two chapters: Dragons of Shadow, which covers the PCs’ landbound journey from Silvanesti to Flotsam and Port Balifor, and Dragons of Faith which covers nautical travel in the Blood Sea of Istar. Although the latter chapter shares the name as its AD&D predecessor, there was never a Dragons of Shadows module or term in any of the AD&D books. So I’ll split my section in two:

Dragons of Shadows Changes:

1. The Talis deck still plays a role in determining future events, but only the AD&D version has cut-out handouts of individual cards and illustrations for them.

2. The original adventure begins one month after the end of Dragons of Dreams. In 3rd Ed it is two weeks.

2. Serinda and Kronn-alin are recruitable DMPCs, whose stat/class changes I outlined in the last adventure. They are encountered in different circumstances: in AD&D they are being chased by a hobgoblin patrol led by a bozak draconian, while in 3rd Ed an adult black dragon is chasing them down to capture them and Serinda has fallen unconscious in the fight.

3. AD&D insists that it’s important for Waylorn Wyvernsbane to remain with the party. 3rd Ed is more lenient and says he can join the party later if they parted ways or did not meet, and also mentions that Alhana may continue adventuring with the PCs if they desire and it makes sense for the group’s plot and party dynamic (although it makes more sense for her to stay behind and rebuild Silvanesti IMO).

4. Percentage chances for attracting unwanted attention by Dragonarmy patrols are excised. They still exist as an encounter but it’s up to the DM’s judgment when to deploy them. There’s also a mandatory encounter where they come across a search party making an arbitrary arrest of merchants on the side of the road (and who Waylorn may be among if he’s not with the party). However, the AD&D version has a wanted poster for elves captured dead or alive (worth more alive), which was relocated to the entrance to Flotsam. Both versions however emphasize how dangerous it is to be openly an elf in Dragonarmy territory, and those who speak the language in public or cannot hide their ears are going to get jumped. But strangely there’s not any info on what happens for kender PCs (who the Dragonarmies are at war with). As for PCs who can cast divine magic of a non-Takhisian origin, there’s a chance that Goldmoon/Prophet archetype will be recognized by a Dragonarmy soldier during a military parade in Port Balifor as the Black Dragon Highlord’s procession heads down the city streets. Same goes for Tanis/Leader archetype; their faces are famous by now!

5. The meeting with the kender rebels in Goodlund is moved from the initial event and encounter areas to its own proper section; kender NPCs involved in the pranks have leaders with proper names and stat blocks, as well as Iron Bands of Binding (teleport a struck character to a predetermined location) which the kender will throw at the PCs to teleport them to Kendermore rather than using a weighted net trap to catch and drag them. In both cases the PCs can escape or avoid said traps, and there’s explanations of various other ways the kender will try to herd the PCs to Kendermore. There’s more detail of the structures of Kendermore and how the kender live within the ruins along with write-ups of various traps the kender set up around the wilderness of Goodlund.

6. No mention of any heartsblood gem.

7. The AD&D and 3rd Edition books are organized a bit differently in the presentation of random encounters, traveling events, and proper locations. AD&D has the encounters and events listed first and the locations last even if said encounter/events are confined to certain locales. 3rd Ed has a similar set-up, but takes pains to shift events and encounters into their proper regions so entries for places like Port Balifor/Goodlund/etc are as self-contained as possible. Additionally, 3rd Ed cut down on the amount of minor encounters based on regions and put them into random encounters which can be triggered anywhere within the region. There’s also some new encounters, including one where a group of kender “borrow” a ship from Balifor to take on a joyride and which can be repaired and rendered seaworthy.

Quite a few have been cut; some of them were chaff (“2d8 taer live on this lone island,” that’s it) but some included cool write-ups such as the Bloodwatch Ruins. Although bare-bones with no map, this one had a line-item list of thematic encounters such as walls that weep and and endless corridor which teleports PCs back to the beginning. Another one is the abandoned tower of Death’s Teeth which had a similar list, but in 3rd Ed is confined to a randomly-generated rumor among the inhabitants of Kendermore.

8. An encounter involving a terrified village under attack by a giant constrictor serpent mentions a human family and a hobgoblin farmhand taking refuge indoors. In the AD&D version the hobgoblin was just listed as a ‘hobgoblin’ with no explanation on his relationship with the humans. While it doesn’t out and out state it, it is kind of interesting seeing the normally monstrous races having civilian duties.

9. Stat blocks being much shorter, every AD&D adventure has a table of combined generic enemy statistics in a cell block format with one enemy type per row. For the human encounters AD&D lists them as “Men, Common/Guard/Warrior” and don’t really differ.

In 3rd Edition we get more variety; this is also the first module where the PCs start encountering rank-and-file Dragonarmy soldiers that are human. The various “nameless” mook encounters are surprisingly competent with proper PC classes, although it makes a kind of balancing sense given the PCs are 10th level by now. For Dragonarmy soldiers specifically, the rank and file are 4th-level Fighters, Sergeants 8th, and the rare Captain 11th. Only the Captain possesses actual magic items, and they’re a +1 breastplate and +1 longsword with the Sergeants having masterwork gear at best. Even the draconians encountered in overland patrols have a few levels in Fighter.

10. There are short write-ups on interesting locations around Balifor, including nomad settlements and a plateau with a layer of polished glass known as the Window to the Stars. We also get a brief discussion of the Khur tribes, who are fantasy counterpart Arabs who live both in traditional nomadic bands and the larger port cities. The PCs get a chance to meet one of the tribes at an oasis where they get an outline of the current situation in the region: Salah-Khan, the Green Dragon Highlord, used his power to kill off leaders in rival tribes which began a local insurgency against the Dragon Empire’s rule. They advise against heading to Salah-Khan’s stronghold in Ak-Khurman due to being the most fortified region, and if the PCs do they will get into an encounter with a powerful Dragonarmy officer (13th-level fighter) astride a green dragon mount.

11. The settlement of Port Balifor gets a very in-depth entry spanning 8 pages in length. There’s a map, brief write-ups for the local power players, and seven locations to visit along with 5 random encounters. Some of the more interesting encounters include a bar brawl between Dragonarmy soldiers and incognito Silver Fox rebels and a mini-plotline involving the Duskmen, a local cult of Hiddukel (god of deceit and dishonest business) running a smuggling ring. They can make for some very risky allies or merely a third party to play off against the Dragonarmies.

Finally, the PCs meet allies of the Silver Fox, the local insurgent rebel leader, here and get safe passage to Flotsam via their contacts.

12. Outside Flotsam a group of Silver Fox rebels are disguised as a mixture of Dragonarmy officers and merchants, one of whom in the latter appears to be a Kagonesti elf. This is a secret test of character to see the PCs’ intentions in resisting evil. If the characters take (or appear that they will take) violent action they will congratulate the heroes and take them to their leader’s base in town. If the PCs attack and continue the assault in spite of protestations then the ‘merchants’ will also join in the fight.

13. Flotsam has some keyed locations and descriptions, along with how many Dragonarmy officers are present or within in the vicinity in case the PCs do something to attract attention. Some more detail is provided on how the soldiers respond to a crisis and transmit information between each other (ringing gongs in gate-houses, blowing signals on horns, searching inn rooms the PCs last stayed at, etc).

14. PCs carrying visible weapons in Flotsam will be told to surrender them or risk arrest. But in 3rd Ed some guards are corrupt enough to look the other way for a small bribe (1 steel piece per visible/found weapon).

15. There are handouts for likely questions and answers PCs may have for the Silver Fox and Kronin:





16. Sevil/Verminaard’s high-stakes card-game is resolved with skill checks and die rolls rather than actually playing the Talis deck mini-game. He also has some other sidequests for the PCs to perform, such as attending an underground auction for confidential documents stolen from the Black Dragon Highlord. Verminaard in AD&D is still in Takhisis’ favor and can cast his cleric spells, but in 3rd Edition he’s forsaken by Takhisis and must survive on his skill at arms.

17. Two potential encounters (not rolled for by dice) include saving a gnome taxidermist targeted for assassination by a Black Robe wizard and his minions for coming into possession of a magical talisman (this has no connection to the Dragonarmies), and an encounter where Dragonarmy soldiers will stop the PCs on the street and demand that they tell them what they know about the Silver Fox and his rebels.

18. The encounter where a traumatized elf attacks the heroes if they’re disguised as Dragonarmy officers is given more description. He is a noble by the name of Piaras Starbreeze and wishes to avenge his murdered daughter who suffered at the hands of the Dragonarmy. He is armed with a +2 dragon bane longsword made of green-tinged steel with elven runes, a family heirloom. He cannot be reasoned with unless the PCs alleviate his insanity with magic.

19. Toede’s manor and its occupants and treasures were brief in AD&D, but there were some guidelines for who and what may be encountered in key rooms. There’s even less detail in regards to this and the variety of treasure descriptions, but there’s still a generous haul.

20. During the raid on the jetties the Dragonarmy soldiers act more competently. They surround the building and cordon off all foot traffic, and Gildentongue’s* orders to let the PCs escape so that he can follow the group is excised. The PCs will need to make their way through the sewers through a secret door in the cellar if they wish to escape discreetly. In the AD&D version the soldiers act like police with search warrants: they show up and begin knocking on doors in the inn, shouting for rebels, and leave the PCs when Gildentongue (disguised as an officer) orders them to leave them be. In 3rd Ed they act like soldiers on a night raid: are no knocks besides the kind to smash doors in and will drag people out of their beds to arrest as rebels.

*An aurak draconian who acts as a spy/ambassador/magical expert for the Dragonarmies.

21. Sevil/Verminaard has a trap where he can pull a hanging chain to collapse a section of above room in a sewer passageway. He will do this if things are turning against them and needs to beat a retreat.

22. Kitiara’s Journal has a half-page handout:



23. There are proper maps for the Jetties raid and the fight with Verminaard in the sewers.



Dragons of Faith Changes:

1. The Talis Deck only exists in the AD&D version. As such, the rather detailed write-up on how to use and apply them in games with unique effects is excised.

2. (This is more a novel/retcon in later products thing) One of the swords Caramon Majere gains as a gift from Alhana is Mantooth, which is a sword with powerful anti-magic properties. It has 3rd Edition stats in the Tower of High Sorcery sourcebook, but its presence is not in this adventure or any of the Spring arc ones.

3. The Perechon has its own map. Additionally, several members of the crew get more detailed backstory write-ups ranging from two to three paragraphs. A few get revised classes, like Lendle Chafka the gnome engineer being a Master/Gnomish Tinker rather than a Fighter. In the AD&D version Captain Marquesta is described as “a black woman,” while in 3rd Edition she is made Ergothian (who are Dragonlance’s Sub-Saharan African physical analogy, but culturally they’re Roman).

4. The ability score checks for naval combat/outmaneuvering Dragonarmy galleons are replaced with skill checks, Profession (Sailor) being quite important.

5. The random and predetermined oceanic encounters are different; AD&D has more environmental obstacles like choppy waters or an annoying albatross which if killed will cause the crew to hate the party for “bringing bad luck.” The 3rd Edition encounters are either new or altered to be more combatic. For example, the haunted ship in AD&D which is haunted by an insane sailor and 3 Taer is instead replaced with a vampiric coven of Dragonarmy soldiers driven insane with bloodlust from a supernatural red mist.

6. The Island of Kalpethis, which is home to the pirate crew of the Bloodhawk ship along with several other island-based locations and encounters are excised. Most of the bigger places (like the minotaur islands) have been detailed more heavily in the various 3rd Edition sourcebooks so it may be a case of not repeating information.

6. An encounter at sea with the Bloodhawk, a group of pirates with a grudge against Marquesta, are a mandatory encounter at sea. It’s a rather large battle involving 22 nameless sailor/pirates on each side and named NPC enemies and allies. Barring the PCs and their DMPC allies there are 56 people involved which...can be a lot even with two full-sized ships. The Bloodhawk will use hit and run tactics, retreating once one of their spies on Marquesta’s ship betrays the party and steals a treasure chest in the chaos of battle. They will be encountered later as the PCs get washed ashore after aiding the sea elves against the King of the Deep.

7. The koalinth (sea hobgoblin) minions of the King of the Deep have been replaced with Yrasda assassins, who are aquatic ogres. The ogres have some “elite mooks” among their number such as a spellcasting druid. Some underwater areas which were previously empty now have monsters, such as a coral cave with a school of barracudas.

8. In the AD&D version the magic fountain which granted the power to breathe water had a poison dart trap which caused targets to fall asleep and experience dreams. In the 3rd Edition version the dreams and their descriptions have been excised.

9. Zebulah’s laboratory has a lot more magical items, although the wizard will regard PCs taking things from here as theft.

10. The Old Tower location shows two different visions if its rune is activated based upon Edition: in AD&D it shows Highmaster Toede leading an army of koalinths into Istar. In 3rd Edition it shows a magical visual recording of Istar during the Cataclysm, including people running through the streets as it looks like the very sky is on fire.

11. Zebulah’s Dragon Orb which causes the PCs to go on a hallucination acid trip adventure in the AD&D version, no longer does this in 3rd Edition.

12. Zebulah has his own question/answer box for the PCs:



His appearance has changed as well. In the AD&D version he looked like a fit and buff bearded dude with braids. In 3rd Edition he’s a more heavyset bald man wearing glasses





13. The encounter in the Pit of Istar involving 96 individual lacedons are all combined into a single monster via the Mob template. They’re in thrall to a yrasda cleric.

14. The BattleSystem in AD&D is used to run the Battle in Istar between the sea elves and the King of the Deep’s forces, and battle turns pass concurrent with the PCs’ exploration of the pit. In 3rd Edition the result of the battle lies entirely upon the PCs: if they destroy the Death Statues bound to the King of the Deep and a battle against GIldentongue (disguised as Kitiara) astride a sea dragon mount with sahuagin mooks. At no point is Highmaster Toede present during this chapter; I take it there’s only so many times you can run him as impotetent comic relief to the point he cannot be seen as a threat.

15. The King of the Deep, being a unique creature, has his own stats in 3rd Edition. He’s a Colossal-sized Challenge Rating 22 Outside with an impressive 30 Spell Resistance (making him nigh-immune to most spells) along with powerful melee attacks some of which can paralyze targets. He has an Unholy Shockwave AoE attack he can emit once every 1d3 rounds and panic good-aligned beings, and a two-way telepathic link with all evil-aligned creatures within 5 miles. In AD&D can regenerate hit points and a roar attack which can instill fear (not damage) as an AoE, and instead of paralysis his razor-sharp scales that have a chance to disarm any weapon that strikes him in melee.

16. In AD&D the sea elves can lose the battle and be forced to abandon Istar. In 3rd Edition it’s presumed the PCs will aid them, and since the sea elves’ victory is concurrent on the PCs surviving the above two encounters, well…

17. The sea elves will be happy to give the PCs treasure as reward for driving off the King of the Deep. There’s no specific examples, but the module suggests Zebulah’s Dragon Orb, the Dragonlances, or even divine artifacts or magic items which sank with Istar.

18. There’s a few optional encounters in the Ruins of Istar. Most of them are various kinds of aquatic monsters, but one interesting encounter includes undead Knights of the Divine Hammer (Istar’s pseudo-paladin order) who can be nonviolently interacted with but will be murderous to any obvious arcane spellcasters. At least their base stats have a Lawful Neutral alignment rather than Lawful Good which the setting loves to portray the Kingpriest’s government. The other one is a gnome submarine called the Aqua Regis with a gully dwarf crew. Their ship malfunctioned during the expedition and is on fire, and will request the PCs’ aid in putting it out. Failing this will cause the submarine to explode. The Aqua Regis’ crew can be encountered later on the Isle of Karthay if they are saved, and will happily lend the PCs a ride to Kalaman.

19. The trial-by-combat obstacle course between Marquesta and the Bloodhawk pirates has a full map now along with room/encounter placements. In AD&D it had suggestions for the DM to make one themselves.

20. In the AD&D version there’s an encounter where the Pcs can go (or be misled) to the isle of Kothas. Here they can meet the minotaur emperor Chot Es-Kalin; the gnome Lenda Chakfa is a prisoner in Kothas and the PCs can earn his freedom by participating in Arena games. In the 3rd Edition version this little side-trek is excised as Lendle is already reunited with Marquesta’s crew.

21. Lady Lengstrien and the Blue Wizard (Kitiara and her mount Khellendros in disguise) have a sample question/answer box:



22. The sand worm enemy (which is a sea serpent in AD&D terms) is replaced by a purple worm. The encounter is otherwise identical.

23. Chafka’s Tower has a full map, and boxed text descriptions are included for most rooms.:



24. The gnome automatons in Chafka’s Tower include some “monster” constructs as well as traps. The enemy constructs are stationay monsters with partial stats to reflect the fact they are missing some characteristics, but can emulate a variety of spells and attacks via reflavored descriptive text such as a conveyor belt “casting” a Slow spell on those who try to move on it.

25. In the AD&D version the adventure suggests the possibility of Zebullah or his wife Apoletta telling the PCs about the Glitterpalace. In 3rd Edition it only mentions Clarion (the bronze dragon) as giving this possibility. It also suggests what happens if the PCs ask said dragon why he isn’t fighting against the Dragonarmies: he’ll ignore the question and tell them about the Glitterpalace.

Libertad! fucked around with this message at 22:46 on Jan 22, 2020

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

Everyone posted:

I had vague memories of the sea elf business but had completely blotted out the rest of it.

I don't suppose there's any reason we can play through DL6-9 and then just skipped to DL13 with "Yeah, those other folks had adventures, too, but they sucked."

The Spring Arc (Silvanesti and beyond) had a bit of a weakness in that the adventures caught up to the novels, and Weis and Hickman and the gang needed to ad hoc more things. A lot of the Dragons of Spring Stuff does not feature heavily in the Chronicles, so a lot of it feels last minute or not as epic as the Winter arc.

Amusingly enough, the 2nd Edition 15th Anniversary Edition more or less excised much of Spring's arc besides Silvanesti: the seafaring adventures don't happen, and the Godshome in the next adventure is but a single encounter. The entire campaign has been restructured so that not splitting up the party (and even playing the adventures out of order, plus some new chapters) is possible.

Aoi
Sep 12, 2017

Perpetually a Pain.
Man, the best thing the books did for Verminaard's character was kill him off very permanently in his 1vsFighters battle with the Heroes in the middle of the Pax Tharkas uprising at the end of the first novel.

Every single thing he's done in the modules beyond that point has just been more and more embarrassing.

Gun Jam
Apr 11, 2015

Libertad! posted:

Aquatic Dragons...Their diets are similar to whales, eating small sea creatures filtered through their mouths.

Only some whales - namely, Baleen whales. Filter feeder, this method's called. By no means exclusive to them - to name but one, whale shark eat like that as well.

As for the other : toothed whales - as per their name, do have teeth, and feed on thing other than plankton (from fish, to other whale young). Orcas, sperm whales and narwhal, for instance.

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

EimiYoshikawa posted:

Man, the best thing the books did for Verminaard's character was kill him off very permanently in his 1vsFighters battle with the Heroes in the middle of the Pax Tharkas uprising at the end of the first novel.

Every single thing he's done in the modules beyond that point has just been more and more embarrassing.

If I recall correctly Dragons of the Dwarven Depths were the “fill-in” material for the dwarf kingdom arc of Autumn Twilight which was not in the novels. A draconian was impersonating Verminaard in order to seize upon his infamy.

Also what’s funnier about the whole Green Gemstone reveal is that depending on the ending sequence revealed in the next adventure he may not even be important! So the Spring Arc is clearly inferior in terms is doing important stuff.

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

Libertad! posted:

If I recall correctly Dragons of the Dwarven Depths were the “fill-in” material for the dwarf kingdom arc of Autumn Twilight which was not in the novels. A draconian was impersonating Verminaard in order to seize upon his infamy.

More or less all of DL3 through DL5 aren't in the novels, it skips from end of Pax Tharkas to the ice town shenanigans more or less instantly.

Libertad! posted:

Also what’s funnier about the whole Green Gemstone reveal is that depending on the ending sequence revealed in the next adventure he may not even be important! So the Spring Arc is clearly inferior in terms is doing important stuff.

Also it just... okay gently caress, let me just talk a bit more about DL12 here. So, one thing I kind of skipped over, because it never loving matters, is that the Aurak Draconian superspy GILDEDTONGUE is stalking the party, mildly loving with them, etc. all along the way but it never really comes to a head. He never warns the Dragonarmies where the PC's are so they can get dunked on, he could be keeping an eye on their quest for Berem, but this is clearly pointless since Kitiara at several points just has Takhisis scry out Berem's location(the entire "climax" of DL12 relies on that), so they don't even need the PC's to lead them to him.

In the novels it makes some degree of sense since Kitiara is severely thirsty for Tanis(and vice versa) and she could be keeping an eye on her favourite source of half-elven dick, to make sure he doesn't get stabbed in the wilderness(in the novels he actually gets split up from the party and travels with Kitiara for a while), but in this adventure it just... doesn't... make an awful lot of sense. The whole Blood Sea thing is also a pointless side trip. Berem isn't there, and who controls the ruins of Istar doesn't really have any noteworthy strategic/wider world impacts that we're told of, because it's a loving haunted vortex of hellwater, no one wants to go there anyway.

The good dragon at the end of the adventure that Berem tries to shelter with also potentially pops up at multiple locations depending on the PCs' actions, either to try and haul them out of the blood vortex(but he only manages to rescue some of the NPC sailors) or to gently caress up some draconians when the party finishes the underwhelming MAZE OF DEATH. But he kind of suffers from the issue of all the good dragons here which is "well if he can just casually do all this poo poo, why isn't he helping more?" Especially since he's one of the dragons who didn't hang around to swear the Oath of Non-Interference in the first place.

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo
So, really, instead of pursuing the adventure, the PCs are better off just hanging around in Flotsum having a huge orgy with the Dragon Highpeople to build some useful goodwill with them for DL14.

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!



Book 2: Children of the Dragon
Chapter 1: Base Draconians


As warforged are to Eberron, as thri-kreen are to Dark Sun, the draconians are to Dragonlance. They are popular outside their setting fandom and hold a lot of appeal even though they did not get status as a PC race until 3rd Edition,* and even then only the baaz and kapak subraces. But Dragons of Krynn seeks to make all five subraces, as well as their Noble draconian counterparts, playable for the first time...using the underpowered Savage Species style monster class rules. This chapter heartily recommends readers to check out the Kang’s Regiment book series for further reading. From what I heard the series is quite good: it details how the draconian remnants of the Dragonarmies eventually discovered the female eggs of their species and found a nation of their own in a post-Takhisis world.

*to my knowledge, any readers can feel free to correct me.

The term “base draconian” is a bit of a neologism, used by noble draconians to describe the original draconians created by the Dragonarmies as a sort of alchemy term for “base metals.” Said original draconians regard this as a slur, so in the interest of political correctness I’m going to say “original draconians” instead where differences are important. We get a brief history on not just draconians, but also prior attempts in Ansalon’s history of creating human-dragon hybrids or artificial dragons. Said creations never amounted to much beyond unpredictable monstrosities, and it was only during the rise of Takhisis’ Dragon Empire that the draconians as a race came into being. Initially brainwashed soldiers who knew of no other life than warfare, human officers kept their numbers low via only using male dragon eggs for the ritual. The dissolution of the Empire, combined with the recovery of the female eggs by a regiment of draconian troops, has allowed draconians to become a “true race” rather than expendable shock troopers.

Draconians are still finding their place in the world: although they have a city-state of their own by the name of Teyr complete with civilian occupations, old habits die hard and many still found themselves fighting under various forces such as the Dark Knights or the Dragon Overlords. Their martial ancestry still exhibits itself, and many draconians often used rank and regiment labels as surnames. In the case of civilians in Teyr, the name of their profession is used. Personal names are drawn from Nerakese, the human tongue of central Ansalon which saw the rise of the Dragon Empire. Their death throes, which cause deadly side effects upon their enemies should they die, has resulted in a rather curious outlook on mortality. Many draconians are taught to not throw their lives away lightly, or without forethought. The destruction their bodies can do make them mindful of collateral damage, and in lieu of traditional burials most draconians gather the combusted remnants of the fallen into jars. In the event of mass deaths and war, draconians gather as much of the substance as possible and bury it under a large marble block with a memorial listing the names of the fallen. In the event that no physical remnants can be recovered, the deceased draconians’ friends and family take their prized possession or something representing their life and bury it in a small casket. Older generations of draconians who are proud of their time in the Dragonarmies are sometimes known to wear their old uniforms and armor as a reminder of their service, more as ceremonial than protection given the age and wear of said uniforms.

Every draconian, even ones born after Takhisis’ death, experience dreams which manifest of an alternate life. Of how things would be if they were born as a true dragon instead. Draconians interpret these dreams as differently as humans would in regards to prophetic visions: some take it as an ideal or life path to guide them, others an unpleasant reminder of their ‘warped’ origin. Like true dragons they possess a draconis fundamentum which supplies innate supernatural abilities and violently ruptures as they die, resulting in their iconic death throes. Their relationship to true dragons and noble draconians is complicated: in the case of chromatics they served under many of them during the War of the Lance, although with Takhisis’ death and the Dragon Empire’s deception of their origins many draconians feel like they were taken for fools by their creators. They view noble draconians as arrogant and there’s still bad blood between the races due to the inevitable fallout when the noble ones rebelled against the Dragonarmies. They feel some measure of sympathy for dragonspawn given that both have similar origins of artificial creation. They overall do not like their metallic forebears: original draconians view the Oath of Neutrality as a betrayal or abandonment rather than grieving parents not wanting their children to be killed. The fact that many metallic dragons consider killing draconians an act of mercy is viewed as rank hypocrisy.

Aurak Draconians are derived from gold dragon stock and are born with innate sorcerous powers. They tend to be quite arrogant and lonesome, as they were often deployed as special forces during the War of the Lance. They were the first among the subraces to discover that Takhisis was hiding aspects of their heritage, and although prized for their talents were the most likely of subraces to desert. In modern times they are the least likely to adapt to a regimented military subculture, but many auraks found the concept of a draconian nation appealing and moved to Teyr en masse. Female auraks are more likely to be of good alignmen, as unlike many of their older male counterparts they were not raised in the environments of the Dragonarmies.

Baaz Draconians are the least powerful and most numerous of the draconian subraces. Derived from brass dragon stock, they are rowdy and reckless and are often prone to alcoholism, although the women are likelier to end up as qualified leaders.* Their human pseudo-parents in the Dragon Empire would often pit them against the kapaks in competitions to keep the draconians divided from uniting against them. While there was quite a bit of racism between the two groups, such attitudes are now fading in the modern era save among the older generation. The majority of baaz are nonreligious, not eager to run into the arms of a deity after being manipulated by Takhisis. They’re more likely than other draconians to suffer discrimination from mainstream society on account that their subrace was responsible for the majority of violent deaths during the War of the Lance.

*Exemplified by the males and females having Bluff or Diplomacy as respective class skills.

Bozak Draconians are the second draconian subrace to have inborn sorcerous abilities and come from bronze dragon stock. The Dragon Empire taught them that their abilities were divine blessings from Takhisis, and their subrace’s natural charisma saw many of them put them in charge of baaz and kapak units as well as serving as priests among their subrace. They are quite social and even feign politeness and friendship, either for their own self-benefit or to preserve social niceties. They’re also the subrace most likely to become wandering adventurers, and also the most likely to convert to another god after Takhisis’ death. There are still some who still honor her memory in spite of her passing.

Kapak Draconians are the second-most populous subrace after the baaz and have copper dragon ancestry. They are naturally adept at being stealthy and their glands can produce a special saliva. males produce paralyzing venom, and females a supernatural mucus with healing properties. They were often used as spies and assassins during the War of the Lance, and many in the modern era find their talents applicable to organized crime or hiring themselves out as mercenaries. They’re the most likely subrace to be anti-religious, and most of them cast off Takhisis as their patron goddess even before she died. Many of them feel that it should be draconians and draconians alone who determine their race’s destiny. Small groups often have a communal wealth pool to pay for things for the whole group, and those who leave often are given a share of what’s necessary to survive and can be used to buy their way into a new kapak band.

Sivak Draconians are the largest of the metallic subraces and have obvious silver dragon origins. They served as an elite fighting force and infiltration units in the Dragonarmies, and as such find their talents in high demand. As a result they’re the subrace least likely to transition to civilian life. They enjoy gambling and games of chance and are loyal to fellow soldiers and adventuring companions, although they are not zealous in this regard and will not charge to their deaths unless there is no other option. When it comes to religious matters they’re more likely to follow the beliefs of a mortal authority figure or if a cleric or divine caster made a positive impression on them in regards to a keen tactical mind and martial expertise.

Racial Traits and Classes: In this chapter we also have rules for draconians as a race: both their core abilities as a full-fledged member of a respective subrace, and traits given out piecemeal over the course of five draconian “monster classes.” They use Savage Species’ rules for combining Hit Dice and Level Adjustment to come up with an Effective Level, and as such most are not exactly friendly for low-level games. The Baaz and Kapaks are the most likely to be beginner-friendly as 3rd and 4th level classes, but Bozaks, Sivaks, and Auraks are 7, 10 and 12 levels respectively.

When it comes to how balanced said monster classes are, it’s a bit mixed. Their Dragon Racial Hit Die gives them high skill points, hit points, good saving throws, and all subraces have level-scaling spell resistance and natural armor as defensive measures. Various minor nifty abilities include immunity to all diseases, the ability to glide in the air (save for the wingless auraks), natural weapons, and death throes which can inconvenience nearby enemies with what is usually a blast of damaging energy. They also usually get a smattering of free weapon and/or armor proficiencies reflecting their subrace’s specialties during service in the Dragonarmies, with only the Aurak having just Simple Weapons Proficiency and nothing else.

There is one noticeable change from the 2003 Dragonlance Campaign Setting corebook: the wording for being “inspired by evil dragons” removes the ‘evil’ part, meaning that draconians can be inspired with a +1 morale bonus on attack rolls and saving throws when within the presence of a true dragon whose alignment is no more than one step removed from their own.

Generally speaking, the pay-off of the “monster levels” of a draconian as a worthy option depletes the more powerful the subrace. The Baaz and Kapak get a lot of things for their race in exchange for their dragon hit dice and low level adjustments, but a Bozak is clearly not as good as an equivalent 7th-level gish who is of a “core” race.

Bozak and Aurak both have effective sorcerer levels of 4 and 8 respectively, and the aurak gets some sweeter abilities such as the ability to shoot energy rays out of their hands and short-range teleportation. Sivaks are Large size, can outright Fly, have a natural trip attack with their tails, and depending on their gender can either have chameleon-like camouflage and cast disguise self (if female) or convincingly shapeshift into the form of a humanoid they just killed (if male).


Book 2, Chapter 2: Noble Draconians

During the late War of the Lance, a group of brave heroes with the aid of the silver dragon D’argent managed to rescue the metallic dragon eggs being used to create draconians. Deprived of their primary fighting force, Emperor Ariakas instituted a plan to use chromatic dragon eggs. As said dragons would not willingly give up their eggs, he managed to take them by trickery or from those dragons who during the war disobeyed orders or committed crimes against the Empire. The new subraces were said by Ariakas to be “strong and noble” upon seeing the first clutch of lightning draconians, although it soon became clear that they'd be more of a hindrance than an aid. Whereas the original draconians can be of any alignment, the gods viewed this latest plan as a violation of the Balance and thus made the noble draconians innately good-aligned.* The Dragonarmies found this out quite early, and began slaughtering them en masse; the weaker frost draconians were enslaved, but many managed to escape.

*In this chapter we get an explanation that true dragons have less free will than mortals in determining their moral outlook, thus explaining why true dragons are “Always [lawful/chaotic] [good/evil]” in their stat blocks.

Noble draconians are far fewer in number than the traditional kind, and many people do not even realize that they exist. Most races on Ansalon view them as being monsters like their metallic kin, and the original draconians hate them as well in no small part due to many being killed by said noble draconians for those who served the Dragonarmies, Knights of Takhisis, and Dragon Overlords. As a result, many noble draconians are isolated, depressed individuals constantly on the move, possessed by strong drives to make the world a better place even if most of said world hates them. Additionally, no female chromatic eggs were used in the creation of their race, so unlike the original draconians they have no hope of propagating their numbers.

Noble draconians have a lot of biological similarities to original draconians: they have a draconis fundamentum, wings, death throes, disease immunity, etc. However, when they dream of the chromatic dragons said dreams are often violent fantasies of them lording their power over others. The fact that noble draconians find these dreams subconsciously enjoyable is something which scares them all deeply.

Flame Draconians are the most physically powerful of the noble draconians and are predictably of red dragon heritage. They are quite passionate, and can become obsessed with fighting evil to the exclusion of other ways of doing good. There aren’t many of them left, and as such are typically solitary travelers. They are also the least “good” of the innately good draconians; although willing to fight evil, systemic discrimination has made them untrusting of most people. They are likely to go out and kill evil people without regards to the future consequences or considering the possibilities of nonviolent resolution.

Frost Draconians are the smallest, weakest, and most numerous of the noble draconians, although in the latter case that usually means they can be seen gathered in small bands at most. Like their white dragon ancestors they are not very bright, but are quite sociable. Many of them were forced to slave in the mines of the Dragon Empire, and when confronted with threats their first instinct is often to resist in light of never wanting to go through such suffering again. Unlike most of their brethren they’ve made peaceful contact with some settlements in southern Ansalon.

Lightning Draconians were the first of the noble subraces to be created and seek to embody the compliment Emperor Ariakas gave them, albeit in ways he’d hate. They all share the same blue dragon mother, Cacophanax, who still lives in the modern era. It’s for this reason that they feel a greater need than usual to make up for her crimes. They alone among the noble draconians receive divine power from the Gods of Light, manifesting as paladin class features up to 6th level (and can stack with the class), which causes them to act very honorably and knightly. Some have been known to gain the trust of some Knights of Solamnia, and after Paladine’s fall many rededicated themselves to other good-aligned deities.

Vapor Draconians are green dragon-descended draconians who prefer to make their homes in the wild reaches of Krynn. Oddly among the noble draconians, a few worship neutral-aligned deities yet still remain good-aligned as a race. Born with innate powers of mysticism* they often have a more spiritual outlook on life and have been known to earn acceptance as seers and herbalists in remote villages. They dedicate their evil-smiting by specializing in fighting the leftover spawn of Chaos. Some even made an unlikely alliance with Dark Knight elite scouts who hunting said spawn as well.

*Mystics are to clerics what sorcerers are to wizards, innately divine spellcasters.

Venom Draconians are like kapaks in that they’re the clear “sneaky rogue” subrace. They are more self-hating than other noble draconians, viewing their black dragon heritage as a reminder of their corruptive ancestry. They honor the gods of light every once in a while due to a belief that they’re unworthy of their grace. Venom draconians are better able to hide their physical features* which allows them to operate better in larger population centers, and they have a complicated relationship with the Legion of Steel. These draconians have been known to share information with the knightly cells, but they typically aren’t recruited outright.

*not in an innate or supernatural way, the text merely claims this.

Racial Traits and Classes: As mentioned before, noble draconians share much of the universal base abilities as the original draconians, although there are some differences. One, it’s strongly implied that they’re biologically good-aligned and as such cannot become evil. Secondly, their starting languages are different: they begin play knowing Nerakese and must learn Common as a bonus language. For normal draconians it’s the other way around: Common as base, Nerakese as a bonus language. Although the Speak Language skill costs a mere 2 skill points (not a class skill for any of them), this can be a heavy cost for the dumber ones such as flame and frost draconians who have -2 Intelligence.

Flame Draconians are an 11-level class. They’re Large and in charge, have an innate fire breath weapon, and can cast Fireball as a spell-like ability as part of their more notable class features. Frost Draconians are a 3-level subclass whose only truly unique feature is Cold Resistance which tops out at 10. Lightning Draconians are the other 11th-level Large martially-inclined class, have a natural trip attack, and the abilities of 6th-level paladins. Vapor Draconians are a 7th-level class who has a single divine domain and the spellcasting capabilities of a 4th-level Mystic as their unique class features. Finally, the Venom Draconian is a 4th-level class who has the ability to produce a natural Dexterity-damaging poison like kapak draconians and a 1d6 Sneak Attack as their unique abilities.

Said noble draconians’ death throes are rather predictable and involve exploding into gouts of flame, acidic vapor, or similar energy. But Lightning Draconians are special in that their death throes are arcing electricity and identical to the Chain Lightning spell.

Much like the normal draconians, the pay-off for noble draconian PCs diminishes the higher their “monster class” is in levels.

For these two chapters (and indeed all of Book 2) we have only 2 scholarly sidebars. The first is a Red Robe Wizard compiling interviews of one of Kang’s more innovative battles where they used a fake flying dragon laden with explosives and magical illusions to trick and kill a goblin army. This is in fact a scene from the Kang’s Regiment series. The second is written by Ed Greenwood and has nothing to do with the book: in fact, it’s a short tale which takes place in the modern real world, and details the narrator reflecting back on how his aunt disagreed with her evangelical Christian pastor’s view of the afterlife and explaining her view of things to him.

That last one really sticks out when you’re in the middle of reading game mechanics for Noble Draconian PCs.

Thoughts So Far: It’s safe to say that I like what Dragonlance did with draconians. Although initially the setting’s stand-in for orcs, the writers more or less deconstructed the “innately evil” aspect and has a more realistic examination of how their cultures evolved once the Evil Empire falls apart. The examination of the difficulties in casting off old habits and the rocky transition to civilian life are nice touches as well. Some still cling to the past, others realize that they were exploited by Takhisis, and some seek to carve out a homeland for their own with Teyr. While their influences were definitely Nerakan in origin, they took existing traditions such as burial rites and surnames and made them their own.

The noble draconians rub me the wrong way. Their innate goodness to “preserve the Balance” is strange when the original draconians’ alignment tendencies are explicitly spelled out as cultural rather than biological. We don’t have as many differences among the subraces, either: almost every noble draconian without exception is ashamed of their heritage, loners too few in number to create a larger society of their own, and are faithful to the good-aligned gods. Most of their racial classes feel uninspired and unoriginal, either aping the original draconians such as Venom, or the bulk of their features coming from existing classes like with Lightning and Vapor.

Join us next time as we cover the rest of Book 2, where we discuss the twisted origins of the Dragonspawn as well as the new draconian nation of Teyr!

Libertad! fucked around with this message at 00:36 on Jan 24, 2020

Mors Rattus
Oct 25, 2007

FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

Incidentally, does this book even acknowledge the existence of the proto-dragon Rage?

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!

Mors Rattus posted:

Incidentally, does this book even acknowledge the existence of the proto-dragon Rage?

I did not find any mention of any dragon named Rage, but there was a brief mention of two proto-draconian types (sesks and traags) were were dumb and made for poor soldiers. The Dragonarmies shipped them off to the shores of Taladas and let them loose to fend for themselves. As for why they just didn't kill them like they did with the noble draconians, it's not said.

It was but a single paragraph in the draconian chapter, so I did not include its mention.

U.T. Raptor
May 11, 2010

Are you a pack of imbeciles!?

Libertad! posted:

This chapter heartily recommends readers to check out the Kang’s Regiment book series for further reading. From what I heard the series is quite good: it details how the draconian remnants of the Dragonarmies eventually discovered the female eggs of their species and found a nation of their own in a post-Takhisis world.
It doesn't actually detail the actual founding of Teyr (I feel like there was supposed to be a third book in the series that never got written), but it is quite good.

The second book also had an appendix that provided stats for female draconians.

kommy5
Dec 6, 2016
There was a difference between them? What was it, out of curiosity?

Libertad!
Oct 30, 2013

You can have the last word, but I'll have the last laugh!



Book 2, Chapter 3: Dragonspawn

For you Dragonlance grognards who stopped reading the novels after Dragons of Summer Flame, Dragonspawn are a new pseudo-race introduced in the Age of Mortals. As mentioned earlier, Takhisis’ stealing of the world caused Krynn to pass by some strange realms in the Ethereal Sea. When she stopped, she accidentally put it next to a world full of absolutely titanic dragons. About a half-dozen of these “Dragon Overlords” moved to Krynn and began taking it over in no short order with some new magic thanks to the use of grisly Skull Totems. Khellendros, the blue dragon mount of Kitiara, was actually an early immigrant and one of these alien dragons all along, and sought to reincarnate Kitiara into a more suitable form. During his experiments he found a means of taking a draconian and imbuing said being’s soul into another humanoid. This would prove obviously fatal to the draconian, but turn the host humanoid into a dragonspawn. The magic used in the ritual made the dragonspawn a brainwashed and utterly loyal minion to the Dragon Overlord. The secrets of creating dragonspawn were leaked to the other competing Overlords via spies, who all began creating dragonspawn with their own twists.

Dragonspawn are divided into colors based on the chromatic type of their creator Overlord, looking like hulked-out, scale-covered versions of their host’s original race. They are more physically powerful, grow sharp teeth and claws, and gain latent sorcerous powers if they did not possess them already. They maintain a psychic link to their Overlord creator at all times and can be compelled by said creator via the dominate monster spell (no saving throw allowed) to hijack their free will if desired. However, this link has been severed in most dragonspawn: due to the plotlines of the War of Souls books all but the White Dragon Overlord are dead. And in the Key of Destiny Adventure Path, said Overlord is the final boss!

The destruction of the Dragon Overlords is a big game-changer for the dragonspawn. Most of them exploded or were reduced to bestial intelligence from the deaths of their Overlords, but a rare strong-willed few managed to survive. And fewer still remember their old lives as pre-dragonspawn memories flood back into their minds. And yes, there’s an entire sidebar for handling this: Fortitude saves to avoid exploding, Will saves to avoid mental degradation, with the result of said Will save also determining if they regain their memories upon the death of an Overlord. PC dragonspawn are considered to have made their saves, with or without their memories based upon the player’s desires.

The societies and outlooks of dragonspawn differ depending on their creator. The Black Dragonspawn were created by the depraved Onysablet who sought to use magic and alchemy to turn southern Ansalon into a swampy nightmare. They managed the best to retain their minds, although quite a few manifest minor personality quirks with compulsive monomania being quite common. Blue Dragonspawn prefer belonging to a larger organization or cause rather than working alone, so they tend to join military and religious orders. A group known as the Bluescales are lead by a half-elf and are striving to make restitution for the evils their Overlord Khellendros caused. Green Dragonspawn served Beryllinthranox and most were tasked with locating the Tower of High Sorcery in Qualinesti before the death of their leader. Like the blues they are quite social and look for a new cause or society to belong, but they have huge egos and are constantly striving to climb to the top of the pecking order with the belief that they can do the best job.

Red Dragonspawn are the strongest of the dragonspawn subraces and are highly elitist and bigoted to everyone else. They view even the other subraces as deformed abominations who cannot hope to measure up to those fashioned by the greatest Overlord, Malystryx. Their arrogance makes them believe that they can achieve anything, and as such can be quite passionate in the vocations they follow. White Dragonspawn still have members of their race bound to the surviving Overlord Gellidus. Said Overlord delegated much of their creation to dragon minions by using magical items known as Scales of Proxy, and most of them now live a hunter-gatherer existence in the polar Icereach or the terraformed Southern Ergoth. Finally, the Sea Dragonspawn are almost never seen on land, their ranks bolstered from kidnapped sailors and fisherfolk unlucky enough to be caught by the Overlord Brunseldimer’s minions. Like the white dragonspawn they too mostly live a subsistence existence, but some yearn for a longing to live on dry land long-term.

We have racial traits for all six subraces, but no monster classes. Unlike draconians they are a template which is applied to a human or a half-human subrace.* As universal traits they all gain the spellcasting capabilities of a 1st-level sorcerer (or cast as 1 level higher if already a sorcerer), natural armor bonuses, claws and teeth natural weapons, and a mind-control link with their Overlord in addition to their base racial traits.

*Attempting to turn nonhumans into dragonspawn causes them to become a Dragonspawn Abomination, a unique beast which is not detailed in this book but instead the Bestiary of Krynn.

Further subraces get their own abilities. All of them have Death Throes which manifest as appropriate energy explosions of their draconic parent, a Breath Weapon which manifests as a line or cone the same energy as said parent, immunity to damage from said energy type, and a fly speed (or swim in the case of sea dragonspawn). They gain bonuses to a wide assortment of ability scores depending upon their subrace, although physical ability scores are preferred and the numbers in question get larger the more powerful their draconic parent type. They sadly all have very large level adjustments (ranging from white’s +1 to red’s +4), which bizarrely increase by +2 if they are not bound to their Overlord. Which seems like a silly rule, given that the Level Adjustment is being paid for cool abilities but rather to “buy off” a penalty which can let the GM hijack your character. The breath weapon, flight, and energy immunity are quite nice to have, but are really only make a big difference at lower levels than higher ones. Which is sad because this text has some role-playing advice and encourages the possibility of making them as PCs.


Book 2, Chapter 4: Teyr

The Age of Mortals may be maligned by Dragonlance fans for changing the setting too much, but one thing we can agree on that’s cool is that draconians are no longer always evil cannon fodder but now a playable race unto their own. Sometime after the War of the Lance, a bozak draconian officer by the name of Kang discovered the existence of female draconian eggs. Now that they no longer had to rely upon the Dragonarmies or Takhisis for their existence, they could take destiny into their own hands. So Kang and his allies sought to claim some abandoned dwarven ruins in northern Ansalon to forge a city-state of their own. And perhaps in due time, draconians can find a life besides war: lives where they can raise families, build roads, houses, and farms just like every other race on Krynn. The city would still have an army of course, for they still have many enemies, from those who suffered their peoples’ depredations during the War of the Lance to the Dark Knights who seek to bring the draconian race under their control like the bad old days.

Teyr began as a city-state, but it expanded its reach to outlying areas, some newly raised towns and (in one case) the mostly-human city of Robann who pledged allegiance in exchange for protection. A caravan network of traders and rangers ensure that the roads remain both safe and prosperous, linking as far as the grand city of Palanthas in the west and Solace in the far south. The creation of a civilian class was necessary for all the industries required of civilization, but Teyr still has a very martial subculture and the hot political issue of the day is whether or not to institute a universal conscription of adults. The reason for this is that a sizeable segment of older generation and soldier class feel that the younger generation needs to understand the sacrifices which made Teyr possible. And the practicality of having civilians who can be mustered into a standing army.

Major draconian holidays center around their origins as war machines for Takhisis’ Dragon Empire. The largest holidays are the Victory of the Living and Victory of the Dead: the first is a nationalistic parade, while the second is a day of quiet reflection and mourning for soldiers who died or went MIA in conflicts. The Day of Hope celebrates Kang’s discovery and retrieval of the female draconian eggs, which is an all-purpose cultural festival where art, music, competitive games, and other displays of joy are held. The Day of Hope is also a popular day for weddings where women (who are far less numerous than men) announce who they seek to be their husband.

In terms of folktales, most of them come from old war stories which then take on an increasingly fictionalized account to pass on important lessons. Some are quite bitter about their metallic dragon ancestors: one involves a troop of draconians coming upon a seemingly peaceful town which is in reality a trap by the metallic dragons to kidnap them. Once they find out they cannot change their children back, they slaughter them all. The moral is that draconians should be wary of even their ancestors, who “will destroy you if you don’t become what they want.”

Newer folktales are more light-hearted with the first two generations of draconian parents, and often feature silly and clever stories of Kang and other famous draconians which may or may not have been undertaken during the War of the Lance.

Troubles in the Kingdom: Not all is well and good in Ansalon’s newest nation. Kang has his plate full with all manner of problems foreign and domestic. Although most armed forces serve the government, there’s been talk among some commanders forming private mercenary companies “in the service of the draconian race,” while a few units have been raiding non-draconian border towns. The gender ratio is still balanced in favor of men, and there’s a bit of misogynistic possessiveness: while it is the standard for women to choose their mates (and not necessarily for life), a riot among the sivaks once broke out when the two sole existing women of their subrace* married the same officer together. Kang also had a vast spy network operating as double agents under the Dragon Overlords, but with said Overlords having fallen said spies have found themselves with less gainful employment as they cannot operate as well in traditionally humanoid lands.

*Which makes you wonder how you’d get future generations of sivaks without incest. Unless draconians can breed between subraces, although I don’t recall the text confirming this one way or the other.

Then there are the various problematic factions. A draconian by the name of Gott is encouraging a democratic form of government which can provoke a bloody civil war with the military dictatorship. The Queen’s Own are a group of Takhisis fanatics who believe that Kang’s regime has forgotten their origins and are planning a coup among sympathetic voices in the military. A group of draconian supremacists known as the Draconia Consortium aren’t fond of Kang’s alliances with other races and seek to make Teyr an all-draconian nation...violently. Finally, there are a group of monarchists who hero-worship Kang and believe that his bloodline should form a monarchy to rule Teyr and are thus enemies of the Queen’s Own.

And if that’s not bad enough, there’s a secret order of noble draconians encouraging the civil strife and infighting in the belief that Teyr will inevitably show its true colors for “evil feeds upon itself.” And the Dark Knights seek to foment rebellion and seize upon prejudices in neighboring Nordmaar and Solamnia to isolate Teyr and starve out the fledgling nation.

Our section ends with a one and a half page description of Teyr’s geographic environs and interesting places. The nation is mostly an arid savanna with some marshland to the east, with migrating herd animals and game a secondary food supplement in addition to farmland. Teyr has made an alliance with a village of gnomish scientists in the swamps to help grow crops, while in the western mountains there’s a maddened silver dragon named Ascandia who kidnaps draconians in the hopes of turning them into true dragons out of a twisted sense of maternal protection. Teyr’s Corps of Engineers are building a castle which they hope to turn into a flying citadel, an aerial mobile fortress once used by the Dragonarmies in the War of the Lance. An outlying community by the name of Nowhere has been besieged by bandits taking slaves to mine the nearby mountains, and the draconians are planning to fight the bandits to get the settlement in their good graces.

Thoughts So Far: The dragonspawn suffer from the Fifth Age’s attempts at trying to be new yet familiar. Like draconians they are artificial creations of evil overlords of differing color themes, much like the Dragonarmies of the War of the Lance. And they also find themselves with new purpose after the fall of their old masters. But unlike draconians they...don’t have as much going for them, in terms of established iconic status in the setting. They could have a role as shell-shocked victims who became aware of their old lives, but too much of their culture reads them as “still evil and violent, but now independent” barring rare exceptions like the Bluescales. Their lack of Dragon Racial Hit Dice due to being a template makes them rather poor options as PCs in comparison to draconians.

But Teyr, on the other hand, is a very strong chapter. It’s brief, but what it has packed into its pages are ripe for adventure material while also making the draconian nation feel alive and evolving. The numerous political factions, along with the conflict between the older soldier and new civilian classes, makes the future of the nation feel uncertain that can go down a potential number of paths.

Join us next time as we move on to Book 3, Kindred of the Dragon!

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

The Chad Jihad
Feb 24, 2007


I realize the setting is called Dragonlance but this is too many dragons

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply