Of all the Other Worlds boards, DL has seen the highest post count, and had for a while, due to popularity and to save space, had it's own novel board.
Why is it that there is so little fan material created for it in comparison to something like Ravenloft? I know that the Whitestone Council has worked long and hard over the years, and it has even paid off by having significant contributions to the books Sovereign Press has released... but it seems that the lines between inspired fans and creators of the source material is very blurred. Trampas has excelled himself, and is probably the single biggest and best contributor to DL gaming since WotC bought TSR. He now is writing the Legend of Huma comics, creating various things for SP directly...
... But what about everyone else?
We all have our own theories as to why dragonlance material is not as prolific as other settings. The reasons I don't produce more material are:
1) I'm very lazy. This is the bigger reason. I tend to put off projects, or jump from project to project without sticking it out. So I have hundreds of ideas, but very little finished works.
2) I'm a little leery of producing material in the Dragonlance world right now, because there are several world changing plothooks in the works right now, including the WoHS vs. Sorcerer war, the fate of Mina and the Knights of Nereka, the missing seats in the pantheon of the gods and more. If there was only one or two major world-changing events going on right now, and the setting's stories concentrated more on characters and individual regions, I'd feel a little more comfortable coexisting.
Now as for why others don't produce more info, I have some theories.
1) Dragonlance fans are largely dragonlance fans because they follow the novels, not because they game in the setting. Most of us here do not have a current dragonlance campaign going on, and the new books haven't created a great number of excited converts who want to play in the setting. This is the exact opposite in every way to the Forgotten Realms, whose gaming audience vastly outnumbers its novel readers and whose new exemplary gaming materials brought in a lot of new fans.
2) There is a rather lukewarm reception to materials in the dragonlance community. Unlike on other boards, when fan material generally gets posted it does not recieve much encouragement or comment. This prevents people from posting new material for others to examine. Why fan material is less enthusiastically received on boards is unclear. Perhaps because we've had so much unnofficial or non-canonical material, we're kind of sick of it.
While we all would love to see our name attached to the creative process that is Dragonlance the reason it is not, is fear and respect.
Dragonlance has a very distinctive feeling.
For every piece of material created for DL it slightly, even if very subtley, changes or alters the feeling of the setting.
We as fans are afraid that if we create material for DL, then we may or will change the feeling of the setting in a bad way, and we have to much respect, and many would say love, for the setting than to take this chance.
Originally posted by darthsylver
We as fans are afraid that if we create material for DL, then we may or will change the feeling of the setting in a bad way, and we have to much respect, and many would say love, for the setting than to take this chance.
There are some pretty big shoes to fill, I completely agree!
As to the writing of unofficial Dragonlance material by fans - I think there's actually a lot more of it than you might think. Not all of it gets posted, but every person who runs a Dragonlance campaign is in some way adding to unofficial material. The stumbling block for some people seems to be that they don't want their work to be inconsistent with that of the "official" work. If you can set that aside, and just write what you like without any real concern for how different or non-canon you make it, I think you'll find a lot more people will sort through the stuff to mine it for ideas in their own games.
I will also note that I think there are many more Dragonlance campaigns being run at this point than in the past three years, and a large part of that is the resurgence of the published materials to use as a baseline for a group's additional material and storylines. We're something of a minority group, though, those of us who frequent these boards, so basing the current state of fandom gaming on WOTC message board posters is probably not accurate.
Cheers,
Cam
Originally posted by pddisc
Why is it that there is so little fan material created for it in comparison to something like Ravenloft? I know that the Whitestone Council has worked long and hard over the years, and it has even paid off by having significant contributions to the books Sovereign Press has released... but it seems that the lines between inspired fans and creators of the source material is very blurred. Trampas has excelled himself, and is probably the single biggest and best contributor to DL gaming since WotC bought TSR. He now is writing the Legend of Huma comics, creating various things for SP directly...
... But what about everyone else?
You have my thanks for the kind words, although there are lots of other great fan creators out there that should be mentioned as well.
James O'Rance did one of the earliest fan conversions of Dragonlance to 3rd edition. He has also done the most fan work on Taladas. I've seen his name in a book by Bastion Press, and he's working somehow with the fan site for Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed.
Richard Connery has another early conversion of Dragonlance to 3e with his Ansalonian Gazetteer. Richard currently works with the Tobril e-zine (with Neil and Luis).
Kipper Snifferdoo is the man behind Kencyclopedia.com, one of the best Dragonlance fansites on the web. Kipper is the author of the Kencyclopedia Kender Handbook, an invaluable resource for anyone who loves to play kender.
Cam Banks has risen from fandom to be one of the writers of the upcoming Bestiary of Krynn. Cam's rules savvy is second to none. He also looks suspiciously like Tanis Half-Elven. Hrm...
Andre' La Roche is another writer on the Bestiary, who is also known for his site, Dragon's Run. Dragon's Run was an early work for Dragonlance in 3rd edition as well.
Rooks - There's a man with more energy than he knows what to do with. Rooks not only worked with me on War of the Dark Lance, he's also done his own 5th Age conversion. He's working on a couple of special projects right now, and I'm anxious to see the end result.
I would be remiss if I failed to mention Paladin, the man behind Dragonlance.com.
There's lots of fan works out there. DL.com is full of fan works, from art to writing to gaming materials. People from these boards, such as Shugi, Ferratus, and Darthsylver have all contributed to DL fandom. There's a ton of other fan creators I haven't mentioned as well.
Now, it's true that we don't have a bunch of netbooks in the same sense that the Kargatane does. Yet there are many fan projects out there, some of which on that level. I guess we just do things a bit differently.
And, if there's a topic that you guys would like covered that wouldn't conflict with Sovereign Press' plans, we'd be interested.
Est Sularus Oth Mithas.
Originally posted by pddisc
Over the years of being on this board, I've seen loads upon loads of people, coming onto this board. Many are enthusiastic about dragonlance, many used to read the books and are interested in rping again, many are new to D&D altogether and are interested in learning what DL in particular has to offer.
Of all the Other Worlds boards, DL has seen the highest post count, and had for a while, due to popularity and to save space, had it's own novel board.
Why is it that there is so little fan material created for it in comparison to something like Ravenloft?
Just to say the post count is a misnomer, since most of the other worlds especially ravenloft have their own forums elsewhere in cyberspace and consequently there are less posts on the wotc boards. The main ravenloft board used to be at www.kargatane.com and is now at www.fraternityofshadows.com in addition there are other smaller ones around. I believe that birthright, dark sun, and planescape all have there own main boards elsewhere on the internet.
Originally posted by Nived
And Dragonlance's 'main' boards would be at Dragonlance.com... so your arguement there would be shot.
Jesus all I said was that the post count for the other messageboards are not accurate. To further update these are the main dark sun boards, but the main birthright boards are at www.birthright.net where there is over 18,000 posts. The main planescape boards are at www.city-of-doors.com where there are about 7500 posts. The main dragonlance boards are not at www.dragonlance.com they are here. The ones at dragonlance.com have only 19782 posts so the ones here beat them (barely).
that both frightens and amazes me, as i also live here in davis, and never knew that any other dragonlance fans were here besides me =)
hell, i run two separate DL campaigns =)
/edit and i now remember where i saw your SN last- on Steve miller's boards. just ignore me =)
Originally posted by frandelgearslip
The whole point of this was to say that these are not the only messageboards around, if you want to turn it into acontest leave me out of it I got better things to do
Okay, everyone, let's ease up here and get back on topic.
Pddisc has suggested that Dragonlance fans could be doing something more, perhaps something like the Kargatane's netbooks. What would you like to see, and are there any examples beyond the Kargatane of what you would like to see? What about Athas.org?
Athas.org went and put in a ton of hard work on making dark sun for 3e, and all of it was wasted because that one dude at wotc (david something, dont remember which one) is doing the 'official' conversion for dungeon/dragon.
DL fans try to do things, but the official canon changes so often that its not worth the time or effort, and DL fans are highly resistant to fanworks, in my experience.
Originally posted by talinthas
/edit and i now remember where i saw your SN last- on Steve miller's boards. just ignore me =)
That a reference to my last post there?
anyway on topic I don't see why canon or non-canon matters that much. None of the kargatane stuff was canon. But really what there needs to be is some kind of fan center where that kind of stuff can be accomplished. If the kargatane site had not gone up there would not be nearly as much stuff done. Same with Athas.org. All it takes is one site to be the center for the rest to grow around it. I mean look at every one of the official sites that grew up out of the official death of every setting not named greyhawk or FR. Some accomplished what they were supposed to and others are still converting the setting to 3rd edition years later. I once went to the dragonlance nexus (I believe thats what the site was called) to see where they were and there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to what was going on. I believe its the fact that one needs a central site for these things run by the right people.
Another problem is that dragonlance is too strongly associated with two people. None of the other settings have that problem. Even ed greenwood is less associated with FR then they are with dragonlance. With that any product that does not have their names on it seems less valid to the fans, including other fan work. Plus there is the fact that canon or non-canon rested on their shoulders almost as equal as it did with the tsr/wotc (as noted by their blanket non-canoning of a crapload of dragonlance novels in second generation). I don't know what the solution is, but I think a central site that every one can rally around would be a good start
Originally posted by talinthas
DL fans try to do things, but the official canon changes so often that its not worth the time or effort, and DL fans are highly resistant to fanworks, in my experience.
DL fans are resistant to any change and almost everything.
And WotC doing the things they do doesn't help the fan situation - the removal of the novel boards, the lack of DL support on the WotC website, etc.
Moderator could you please take care of this person ?
~B4Real
I don't think the problem is resistance to change after all dragonlance has undergone more change then any of the other campaign worlds of D&D. FR, Dark Sun and others had some changes like the time of troubles or the death of the sorcerer kings, but nothing on par with dragonlance. After all the campaign setting has fundamentally been rewritten twice now. The three seperate eras of dragonlance classic, fifth age, and age of mortals are almost like 3 seperate campaign settings. If anything I would think dragonlance fans should be inured to change by now.
Part of the problem may be that there is a hesitation to accept anything that is not sanctioned by the original authors. Richard A Knaak seems to be the only other writer to have things accepted by the fans without the pre sanctioning. Now a lot of this is tsr's fault since back during the classic era most of the novels were blatantly non-canon and wies and hickman ended up doing the massive non-canoning declaration in second generation. Also I think part of the problem is that tsr decided the novels were more profitable and basically abandoned published products, with the few producst they did put out all revolving around the original story. Now the whole attitude is so ingrained in fans that it is hard to repair the situation.
Originally posted by frandelgearslip
I don't think the problem is resistance to change after all dragonlance has undergone more change then any of the other campaign worlds of D&D.
Just because change occurs doesn't mean the fans are sticking around to accept them.
Part of the problem may be that there is a hesitation to accept anything that is not sanctioned by the original authors.
There is also that, yes.
Originally posted by frandelgearslip
darn gremlins ate my original post.
Someone must have borrowed it. ;)
The three seperate eras of dragonlance classic, fifth age, and age of mortals are almost like 3 seperate campaign settings.
Dragonlance is a “setting of settings”.
You’re on the right line of thought, although that’s limiting to the potential Dragonlance has. I can see all sorts of settings within DL, from the Third Dragon War, to the fall of Istar, the Cataclysm, the Time of Darkness, the War of the Lance, the years of peace following, the Chaos War, the early 5th age, the War of Souls, and the present.
I think most people like to divide the setting up along the lines of rules systems (which coincide with eras), but there’s so much more beyond that.
Part of the problem may be that there is a hesitation to accept anything that is not sanctioned by the original authors.
You can get this with any setting, really. Some Star Wars fans won’t accept anything beyond the movies (sometimes even the originals).
Originally posted by silvanthalas
Just because change occurs doesn't mean the fans are sticking around to accept them.
True enough. Many fans left the setting after Summer Flame. I’m sure some left after War of Souls. At the same time, many fans are also entering the setting.
The complaints I hear most from my friends is that due to its size there is no cultural diversity. Sure the different races have their cultures, but the humans don't have a large variety of cultures.
Faerun in contrast is about the size of Earth with many continents and many countries with vastly different cultures (i.e. Oriental, Egyptian, Jungles with Barbaric cultures.
The other problem was that dragonlance lacked good official adventures in the days of 2nd Ed. Aside from the original War of the Lance adventures most were poorly put together and lacked realism. The other big problem with the modules was that they followed the books too closely making them useless if players had read the books. I was shocked when the original Saga adventures did the same thing and followed the books. I wanted my players to learn about the world but couldn't let them read some of the best books.
Originally posted by frandelgearslip
That a reference to my last post there?
But really what there needs to be is some kind of fan center where that kind of stuff can be accomplished. If the kargatane site had not gone up there would not be nearly as much stuff done. Same with Athas.org. All it takes is one site to be the center for the rest to grow around it. I mean look at every one of the official sites that grew up out of the official death of every setting not named greyhawk or FR. Some accomplished what they were supposed to and others are still converting the setting to 3rd edition years later. I once went to the dragonlance nexus (I believe thats what the site was called) to see where they were and there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to what was going on. I believe its the fact that one needs a central site for these things run by the right people.
Allrighty....I want to just point out that the site that you are bashing here is the best put together, easiest to navigate, and downright best one Ive seen...The Kargatane came closely second in my eyes though. And as far as whether the Nexus is run by the right people....these people were the ones who single handedly kept DL alive during those dark times of what I could only call the single most insulting thing WotC ever did...the killing of the campaign settings. Anyhow....just to address a point that I forgot to quote....Imagine...a game setting relying heavily on it's creator and the person who breathed life into it....Funny that...I guess I just never expected something like that....How could that happen....
Originally posted by frandelgearslip
I once went to the dragonlance nexus (I believe thats what the site was called) to see where they were and there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to what was going on.
Allow me to clarify.
The Dragonlance Nexus had two primary goals when it was created. The first was to create a set of official rules for Dragonlance gaming. We were in the middle of this process when Sovereign Press gained the license to Dragonlance gaming. Many of our materials were looked at when the DLCS was written, so that’s why you don’t see them on the site.
The second goal was to have a repository of alternate and new fan gaming materials on the site. So, if you didn’t like the official WoHS prestige class, there would be alternates to choose from. Or, if you wanted some new options that weren’t in the official rules, they would be there as well.
The Kargatane really has set a standard, but one has to remember they’ve been doing what they’ve been doing for far longer than the other official sites. Athas.org has been successful with their 3rd edition conversion. Other sites, such as Beyond the Moons, are still working on 3rd edition conversions, true, but circumstances there are a bit different. Many Spelljammer fans (at least on the Spelljammer-L mailing list) are still 2e fans, and there has been some resistance to change.
Every official site is different, and each one tackles things in different ways – each to varying degrees of success. Each setting has its own dynamics, and each setting has its own fan base. Various other circumstances vary as well, causing each situation to be unique.
Remember, though, that the official sites do what they do because they love the setting, and want to keep it alive. It’s all volunteer time, and there’s a lot of hard work and dedication that goes into it.