Sable's swamp? Xak Tsaroth? The Desolation? Icereach? Someplace else?
In your opinion, can Dragonlance compete with Eberron, Forgotten Realms, and Greyhawk for classic D&D goodness?
What do you think are the best regions on Ansalon for good old fashioned adventuring? Exploring, discovering ancient treasure, uncovering relics of lost civilizations, braving the lairs of fantastic creatures, etc.
Sable's swamp? Xak Tsaroth? The Desolation? Icereach? Someplace else?
Ansalom is littered with tombs, ruins, and shattered castles from the Cataclysm, go wild anywhere.
What do you think are the best regions on Ansalon for good old fashioned adventuring? Exploring, discovering ancient treasure, uncovering relics of lost civilizations, braving the lairs of fantastic creatures, etc.
Dragonlance is filled with various ancient ruins that can be explored. Remember, one of the big themes of DL is the rediscovery of that which was lost (i.e. gods, dragons, dragonlances, etc.).
In your opinion, can Dragonlance compete with Eberron, Forgotten Realms, and Greyhawk for classic D&D goodness?
In my opinion, I'm not sure it should.
Dragonlance was created at a time when TSR was noticing that they had plenty of dungeons, but not so many dragons. It's a break away from the traditional fantasy that preceded it.
Now, this isn't to say that you couldn't approach Dragonlance with a "classic D&D" style. An old DM of mine once ran us through a dungeon crawl through a pyramid (from one of the 2e DM sourcebooks). We were looking for the Horn of Chemosh, or something like that. It was definitely a dungeon crawl, but also DL-related after the DM adapted it.
You can also search through ruins caused by the Cataclysm. In the young readers novel Temple of the Dragonslayer, there is a whole city that fell underground during the Cataclysm. Adventurers who are willing to clean it out could explore it and see what secrets it holds.
So long answer short, I think that Dragonlance is more than your traditional fantasy, but you can run some traditional fantasy games within DL.
An old DM of mine once ran us through a dungeon crawl through a pyramid (from one of the 2e DM sourcebooks). We were looking for the Horn of Chemosh, or something like that. It was definitely a dungeon crawl, but also DL-related after the DM adapted it.
Sounds like a campaign I ran while stationed in Cuba. The gods of Neutrality were a little mad about Lord Soth being kidnapped to Ravenloft, so to "even the balance", they stole a powerful evil creature and his domain from another world and plopped it right smack dab in the middle of Nightlund. So that whole area became a desert with a huge pyramid in the middle. The party stumbled upon it, not knowing the history of it and explored it and when they finished the pyramid, defeating the lich that lived there and all his undead buddies, the pyramid disappeared and Dargaard was back. Fun stuff I ran in Cuba.
For example, the theme of rediscovery makes sense but I had never really thought of it. Obviously the dragon theme. And the them of Balance. But is everything presented somewhere in a mission statement?
Is it stated somewhere exactly what the themes of DL are? I think that would be a great website idea, if it's not done already. I'm sure the themes are mentioned in different sources, but is there one place that encapsulates them all together?
For example, the theme of rediscovery makes sense but I had never really thought of it. Obviously the dragon theme. And the them of Balance. But is everything presented somewhere in a mission statement?
I'm not sure if there is a place that lists the themes all together and briefly explains them. The DLCS has a chapter on running a DL campaign, but I can't remember if it incorporates all the themes or not.
That would be a great article for the Nexus.
As for Megaplot items:
The Minotaurs are preparing for another war, next striking at the Ogre Kingdoms of Blode, as they are the most revalent threat to their empire. The Minotaurs see Abasinia as an easy target, but they are smart enough to know to not over-extend their supply line when a potentially dangerous enemy is on their borders.
Elderan Stardale, A Fighter/Cleric/Divine Agent of Kiri-Jonlith, is traveling, seeking out elven refugees to bring them to a new home in Abasinia, with the intention of later leading them to build an army to liberate Silvaneasti from the Minotaurs. He refuses to bow to any authority of the Silvanesti Nobles, despises Githanas of Qualenesti and bears a grudge aginst Alahna Starbreeze for taking away the defences of Silvansti, thus allowing the Minotaurs to take his beloved city. His preaching elven unity and opposition of the old order, was seen as treason by the Nobles and he was branded a "Dark Elf". He himself sees the Nobles as a falure to his people, and that the salvation of the elven people lies in the hands of the Commoners (He himself has NO noble blood, he's an Elven Commoner himself!). He has brought many elves, both Silvanesti and Qualenesti under his wing, and his rousing "do something" attitude brings hope to those who follow him. Now you MAY think a dark elf coulden't be a cleric of Kiri-Jonlith, but he has utter faith in his God, and his differing views do not put him in opposition with his faith, thus he's kept his class intact (And I did give him 1 level in Divine Agent, because Kiri-Jonlith himself came to him as an Avatar).
Some chaos beings who survived since the fall of chaos, have regrouped, and now are silently building cults to worship Chaos, and find a way to return him to the world. They call themselves the cult of the Blood Gem, and a number of chaos warriors, sorcerers, and other twisted beings serve as their leaders, beings who gained further sentience when Chaos was banished, but still kept their loyalty to the greater power. They have a number of currupt sorcerers and mystics working for them, and have the power to infuse worshipers with a chaos template (only those well deserving of it however). Their creed is
"By Chaos All Began, And By Chaos It Returns".
As for Mina, she's a Beloved of Chemosh now, a special form of vampire which has all their powers but none of the typical weaknesses (Unhurt by sunlight, dosen't need to coffin sleep, not repelled by garlic/holy symbols, feeds on blood). She now is furthering the will of her new God, and will likey bring destruction in her wake. She still remembers her oath though, that many will pay one, and thus she eventually will make Paladine suffer, by bringing her vengence on his people.