How does something become D&D canon?

Post/Author/DateTimePost
#1

Synjin

Feb 26, 2015 10:05:33

Is it from the D&D game designers, and the settings published? Is it from the novels that take place in those settings? Is it from live gaming sessions at places like GenCon and other Adventurer's League play? A mix of them all?

 

Seems to me like it's a melting pot of them all. Game designers come up with a new system or book, detailing NPCs, new storylines, that the gamers then play with. Novelists take that and run with it, making changes to their characters and settings based on the game design. Game design upon a new edition, takes what was, and what the novelists did with major characters, and re-invents something new yet again. And on with the cycle.

 

Is that about right?  For example, The Sundering is supposed to reverse/correct/shift what happened in the Realms during 4E. But all that shifting in the first place was due to 4E itself.

 

Quite the "Chicken or the Egg?" situation it seems.

 

 

#2

Devils-Advocate

Feb 26, 2015 10:52:04

I wouldn't say the spell plague was because of 4E, it's just a metaplot event that happened at the same time 4E was out.

#3

Zardnaar

Feb 26, 2015 10:58:17

Synjin wrote:
#4

Brock_Landers

Feb 26, 2015 11:12:14

Zardnaar wrote:
#5

Synjin

Feb 26, 2015 11:25:39

Zardnaar wrote:
#6

Zardnaar

Feb 26, 2015 11:31:21

Brock_Landers wrote:
#7

Shasarak

Feb 26, 2015 11:45:06

Synjin wrote:
#8

Brock_Landers

Feb 26, 2015 12:04:59

Zardnaar wrote:
#9

seti

Feb 26, 2015 13:16:43

'Canon' is what players who've been playing and DMing since the 70's-80's say it is on the internet. Usually when also saying that your D&D isn't proper D&D.

 

For me, it's anything print- published by TSR or WotC with 'Dungeons and Dragons' on the cover* in the edition we're playing ATM.  So...No novels, no video games, only actual rulebooks, splatbooks, campaign settings and official adventure modules. When I ran FR, back in high school, Drizzt didn't exist, neither did Elminster, etc. I wanted my PC's to be the heroes, not to have some uber-leveled author creation bending the setting to their will and actions, while the PC's just worked in the shadows beneath them.

 

*Also, Dungeon and Dragon Magazines.

#10

Zardnaar

Feb 26, 2015 14:46:36

Brock_Landers wrote:
#11

Shasarak

Feb 26, 2015 15:10:26

seti wrote:
(Reply to #11)

AaronOfBarbaria

Shasarak wrote:
#13

pukunui

Feb 26, 2015 23:12:01

Devils-Advocate wrote:
#14

CCS

Feb 27, 2015 3:19:54 		Q: How does something become canon (in D&D)? ANSWER: WoTC (or TSR before them) pays someone to think it up/write it.
#15

Synjin

Feb 27, 2015 8:39:20

I never understood that stupid gold cap on Drizzt's forehead that the earlier artists put in. It's never mentioned in any of the books. LOL

(Reply to #4)

feartheminotaur

Brock_Landers wrote:
#17

Brock_Landers

Feb 27, 2015 18:33:39

feartheminotaur wrote:
(Reply to #13)

Tony_Vargas

pukunui wrote:
#19

Brock_Landers

Mar 01, 2015 0:19:55

Tony_Vargas wrote:
#20

Shasarak

Mar 01, 2015 0:53:51

Brock_Landers wrote:
#21

arnwolf666

Mar 01, 2015 1:02:39

How does something become Canon?

 

In the old day Gary Gygax used to call me up and ask my permission to make something Canon, then later David Zeb Cook, and then Monte Cooke and Steve Jackson.  Mike Mearls hasn't been asking my permission lately, so very little has been Canon.  So if you need to know what is Canon, just ask me?