Original Dragonlance authors Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weis are working with actor and celebrinerd Joe Manganiello to develop a new D&D Dragonlance World Book, according to photos and a video shared via their social media on Thursday. According to Hickman, since Monday the trio “have been meeting with Dan Ayoub and the incredible D&D team outlining the world book for Dragonlance as well as future product beginning in 2029”. And a handy photo of a white board gives us an overview of the plans!
While the notes that have been shown off are ostensibly just the outputs of a planning meeting, we’re going to assume that they’ve been greenlit by someone in marketing and aren’t far from the actual book outline. And while we’ll refer to the “book” throughout this article, the notes also refer to “1 x Map Pack” – good news for the cartography nerds!
According to the notes, the book focuses on Krynn during the War of the Lance, the iconic conflict covered in the original D&D Dragonlance novels and AD&D Dragonlance adventure modules. The assumed start date for campaigns is after Ariakas dispatches the dragon lords to go conquer the continent of Ansalon – pretty much the same starting point as the original DL1 module from 1984 – but there are multiple possible starting locations. And with the players now in the picture, the original Heroes of the Lance won’t exist, at least not in their original form.
While that may suggest this is going to be a straight retread of the original DL modules and the books, this is a setting guide, which the notes on the board call “everything you need to be drawn in without making an encyclopedia”. The first three chapters cover the War of the Lance, the state of the world, and then “narrative examples” that follow the story: presumably the canonical Dragonlance story, but maybe paired with an as-yet unconfirmed Dragonlance adventure book?
A new system, called “The River of Time”, will be some kind of minigame “the DM plays at the start of campaign and again at the start of each season”. Questions abound – if the DM needs a whole minigame to manage some aspect of progression, that suggests that the intended mode of campaign development is quite procedural, with the player’ actions potentially changing key features of the world.
Such a system might be needed to accommodate two of Dragonlance’s key topics – dragons, and all out war. A dragon chapter will cover a whole host of subjects: “riding, combat tactics, corruption, heirarchy, history, ecology, complex, temperaments, individuality”. And a chapter on epic-scale war suggests the project needs to look at both the high level army-view with objectives and vast numbers, and then the more gritty and personal soldier’s view.
One chapter will focus on the bestiary, which the notes specify is specific to Ansalon, rather than Krynn as a whole. Likewise a chapter on new or altered DnD classes and DnD races will focus on the region, with added content for Wizards, Clerics, and a mention of Knights – whether that will be a subclass, a title, or a whole dang class isn’t clear.
The white board suggests that the 10th chapter will focus on the cosmology, from the formation of the universe to the Gods and Followers – Krynn is a very material material plane, so a chapter of (meta)physics seems worthwhile.
After that is a chapter on magic items, and then one more that’s reserved for “adventure / canon moments / lego bricks”. Looking at the teasers for the World of Warcraft supplement, WotC seems to be leaning into a design style that favors giving the players tools and components rather than heavily detailed adventures, a smorgasbord approach to supplement design.
Finally, we get a history of the world, and then an intriguing reference to “Map / branching paths”. I wonder if those branching paths are temporal rather than spatial, and account for different outcomes of the War of the Lance depending on how key battles play out.
One intriguing note isn’t part of the main book outline, a flowchart that reads: “Sacrifice -> Pick up legacy -> Character off-ramp and player on-ramp”. That looks like a system to encourage big dramatic deaths and dynastic storytelling. And then there are a couple of notes in red that we really, really hope are gags: “Dragons riding humans?” and “”Kender Highlords?!” Shudder.
It’s exciting stuff! Even if you’re not interested in Dragonlance, systems like mass warfare and dragon riding could find homes in other campaigns, assuming they’re good enough. But what part of this outline has got you the most excited? Let us know in the Wargamer Discord community!
Source: Wargamer
