What Ever Happened to Dragonlance? 

Weiss and Hickman were my childhood. The legend of Huma started it all for me.

What I think hurt Dragonlance more than anything was how TSR at the time had Weiss and Hickman write Dragons of Summer Flame to cater to a new direction they wanted a game system of Dragonlance to go. They wanted to make a game system for Dragonlance with no gods and more of a storytelling game. So in DoSF they had them remove the gods and remove 'magic' from the world on top of killing off great characters set up in The Second Generation. And to be honest it never really recovered from that.

Randomly pulling Dragons of Autumn Twilight off the B&N shelf one day while waiting for the next Redwall to come out was the best decision I made in my youth! Thanks for covering Dragonlance!

absolutely loved the dragonlance novels, Tanis Half elven is my guy

I'm not ashamed to say that Flint's death always brings me to tears.

Most of us were drawn to Dragonlance because of the art, and then discovered a good story. Unfortunately the new owners of Dragonlance care only about modernizing the look and feel of Dragonlance and that has stifled it's continued success.

Time, Test, and War of the Twins are some of my favorite fantasy books of ALL TIME. Go Raistlin go!

True story: In 1991 I was 14 and had been playing D&D for about a year when our GM converted our Greyhawk campaign to Dragonlance. I fell in love with the grittier and more epic setting, and started reading the novels immediately, adoring the original trilogy. However, by the mid-90s there was just soooo many books being released (most of poorer quality) that I got overwhelmed and just stopped reading them. TSR literally released so many books that it became a chore to keep up and so I stopped trying... kinda like how Disney has killed off superhero movies by oversaturating the market.

You know what would be amazing, but would never happen? Larian Studios going from Baldur's Gate 3 to doing an epic Dragonlance game.

My little corner of DragonLance is alive and well. I first picked up the modules when they were released in 1984, and I end up running them about once every ten years. My current group began in the fall of 2017 and just wrapped up their 11th module (Dragons of Deceit) about a week ago. I run the two groups of the split party concurrently, so not quite in numerical order of the modules. As we close in on the end of the series, I'm looking at running Shadow of the Dragon Queen next, but I'll agree, it has required a lot of editing to make it fit into the world I've been running games in for the last 40 years. I find it a little amusing that one of the Wizards of the Coast contributors who wrote for the 5e DragonLance material was introduced to DragonLance at my table back around 2002 when I first started my homebrew conversion to 3e (Before the Sovereign Press release). As I write this, I'm working on my 3.5 conversions of Dragons of Triumph, Shadow of the Dragon Queen and New Tales: The Land Reborn. Not sure if my players will want to play the prequel adventure or push forward, so I'm preparing for both eventualities.

I had completely forgotten about Dragonlance, wow this just brought back a flood of memories, thank you so much for reminding me haha. Gonna listen to the audiobook this weekend!

The Elmore art sold me on the first modules. Unfortunately the style of play didn't get me excited about playing the modules, but I did borrow inspiration from the setting - especially from the art!

Although I've never heard a lot of the things you've covered on this channel, I appreciate how much obvious time and effort it takes to make these videos while also delivering information in a concise but passionate way. You deserve way more subs dude.

In 1989 I got the Dragonlance game through Scolastics without knowing anything about D&D or even the Dragonlance books. I just saw a fantasy game and I was interested. Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out how to play the game, so I gave up and it's been collecting dust ever since. A friend got me the chronicles for my 17th birthday in 1997 (don't math that to figure out my age!!!! :p ). I was hooked from the word go. It wasn't for another 9 months when that same friend introduced me to D&D and sometime after I discovered the connection between the two. Another friend gifted me his entire collection of Dragonlance books and I absorbed most of them throughout the next few years. I loved this series, and I loved D&D. Favorite character? Tie between Tanis, Raistlin and Tas. Although Tas is probably my true favorite with Kender now my favorite race.

What attracted us to Dragonlance was the calendar they sold before there was any adventure out. The art was incredible. There was one art called the flying citadels, but sadly the art was the tomb of of a Dwarven King, when we played the adventure. We only played the first four adventures. The problem was that it took too long between adventures, also the structure of the adventures was too strict, we had to play the pre rolled characters & they couldn't die. Also the second book, Dragon of Winter, was out before all the corresponding adventures were available.

Great video, great commentary. Deserves more views and subs for the channel. Well done!!

Haven't watched yet, will later! BUT my husband grew up reading these books and we've started reading the new trilogy!! Super interesting takes on the DnD world, I especially love the Kenders and their lore!

i found this series in the late 80s... read about a dozen books and loved them

Dragonlance is alive and kicking on the DM's Guild. The Dragonlance Nexus has sourcebooks, adventures and even new short fiction from Richard Knaak in their books. Maybe take a look.

The novels were one of the things that got me into D&D in the early 90s. My one complaint about the impact that Dragonlance has had on the D&D landscape is the move towards adventure paths and narrative campaigns. Site based adventures - not necessarily mega-dungeons - fell by the wayside

The first WTF i can remember of my teenage years reading a book is the death of flint.

My first introduction was the prequel novel Riverwind the Plainsman. I read it years before I had a chance to read through the Chronicles.

Besides the main books, I really liked The Legend of Huma and The Black Wing. Rare to get a DL book from a dragon's perspective, even rarer to get a book from the an evil/chromatic dragon's perspective. I actually had that animated film on DVD. Man, that was disappointing. It could've been good, but nope. Surprised they didn't try making DL into an anime. Westwood Studios made a Dragonlance game!? I really didn't know there were video games as I got into the Dragonlance books during the 2000s. Not really into fantasy video games, but I might check out a new Dragonlance game.

The problem with DnD in general is that Wizards and Hasbro are toxic companies in many gamers' eyes. The implementation of MtG into DnD has not gone well, and the problems they created with the OGL and DND One is just not giving them any credibility. Basically, they can't manage multiple settings in a TTRPG like they can in a card game (where setting doesn't matter) and they don't understand what TTRPGers want out of their games, which is everything they aren't doing and none of what they are. We're not here to be monetized. We spend godawful amounts on our hobbies because we want to. Force us to spend money by nickle and dime-ing us, and we'll take our money elsewhere and leave you struggling. Also, not paying $70 for a game book. WTF, Hasbro. Topically, I used to love the DragonLance setting, but I never really read the books. I consumed all the 2nd Edition stuff for it that existed. I loved the Minotaurs, and the Kender. Tass was my fave, of course. Then it just kinda disappeared. No one was playing that setting anymore. It was all about the Forgotten Realms. Never really felt the pull of the Realms. Mostly because I hate elves. Give me the real Doom Patrol and the Twins. Never felt anything for Greyhawk, either. Guess that's why I created my own setting. 2000 pages and I really should type them up and get them published in some format. Meh. BTW, the "L" in DragonLance is capitalized.

Good gravy mate, pullin out all the gud stuff💓

TSR's focus on advancing the plot via the novels undermined at least two settings - Dragonlance and Dark Sun. Dragonlance had more setting-shifting events because of it, but Dark Sun was screwed right out of the gate when the Prism Pentad basically fixed the core conflict of the entire setting. They'd eventually get it right with Birthright, where the fiction all took place historically, but by then the wheels were falling off and they'd sell to WOTC not long after.

Though I liked the early novels-- even the questionable ones, where Tas meets the half-orc-- I gave up on _Dragons of Summer Flame._ Weis and Hickman butchered their own product, because they forgot it was, in fact, a _product._ The Dragonlance timeline changed so much, that D&D players had no time to actually _play_ it, as the authors changed it from "something to read after the Ring books," into their Mormon-ized version of Warhammer Fantasy. I wish game designers would just stop constantly messing with the timelines, and just design adventures for players in the already established world. This is Dungeons & Dragons, where the player-characters are supposed to shape the world, not wait for the next series of novels and game books to find out what happens.

Loved this when I was a kid, legend of Huma got me into it

I was one of those people who binged Dragonlance from about 15-19 years old in the early 2000s One of the many reasons I think Dragonlance fell off was a combination of retreading the same story over and over and they had no where to go after they had killed of certain characters

I have been enjoying your content a lot! You pick some interesting subjects to discuss, ones that really aren't talked about much anymore. Here are a few suggestions for topics you could cover in future videos: Bone (graphic novel) The Dark Crystal (film) Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (video game) Xena Warrior Princess (TV) Keep up the good work!

So, I'm one of those weird folks who really likes Dragonlance...and never read a DL novel. 😊 Still, I really enjoy the setting, and I'd love to see more of it. For me, though, one struggle has always been its characters. I LOVE Forgotten Realms, but part of that is because the world is usually so fleshed out, and filled in. It has awesome NPCs, but I still feel like I can weave my own characters into places; I don't have that ease, as much, with Dragonlance. To me, it feels a lot more like it depends upon its smaller cast of iconic characters, and some of them feel like they'd just be being picked up from 25 years ago, and marched our now, in a jarring way, but without them, it feels less like Dragonlance. I don't know if I can explain it better. I got the 5e book, and I guess it was okay, but it didn't feel like much, and since I didn't expect another, before One D&D, or 6e, it didn't do a lot for me. Wizards seems to have stymied several authors, leaving to not a lot of world development, and DL is a fine example. Still, a BG3 style game with its characters, themes, and stuff could be great. There are several words I'd love to see again, but they've been gone for ages (Birthright), or couldn't be handled amicably (Dark Sun), but Dragonlance could, if various agencies could agree.

I had 41 of their novels at one point, ending with the Elf dynasty trilogy. Dhamon Grimwulf being my introduction novel. I forget what it was called. Eventually I looked up the original trilogy and started collecting and reading the rest. Got through every book starting before and ending after highschool. Before that I never read a novel not assigned by the school. Edit: The Book was Downfall, saw the cover in the video, easy enough to recognize, lmao. The Minotaur Trilogy was probably one of my favourites.

I had got hold of this series really late, then again the novels were translated into my language far later than it was released. The OG of the fantasy fiction LOTR was translated in my language like in the 90’s! This ushered in an era of a fantasy boom coinciding with my late teens and early twenties, that’s when I got into the books. I liked the more humanly, imperfect nature of the heroes and the humor.

Still the most expansive fantasy world I've ever read. I've been busy buying up the books I never got to in my initial collection in high school. Can't wait to start reading them.

First grabbed The Legend of Huma in the mid 80's and was all in from there. Also read Weis and Hickman's Darksword Trilogy early amongst the Dragonlance Chronicles, and loved all of their work. Great vid, keep up the good work!

I read the DL novels as a kid, and I also had no idea they were D&D branded! When I finally got a chance to start playing D&D a few years ago and saw the connection it got me to reread the OG Trilogy, and I am currently playing a Raistlin inspired Wizard in a campaign!

I was a huge fan of Dragonlance growing up and I can clearly say why I stopped being a fan, only a handful of the books were actually any good and the timeline and arcs were a messy disaster which made getting into any of the side series that weren't the Heroes books a massive pain. And now I refuse to give WotC a penny so I will not be getting anything new from the franchise unless they buckle and give it back to the creators.

I spent probably about half of my childhood glued to my Amiga, playing Champions of Krynn, and Death Knights of Krynn.

I recall devouring TSR books as a teenager. I loved the dragon lance chronicles and bought so many more of the books in that worlds, and then the forgotten realms. When I was in my mid ish 20's I felt like some nostalgia and decided to try reading some of my favorites again. I went with the Legend of Huma as I think it encompassed so much of what I liked. I think I got a third of the way through before I decided to stop and never touched one of the books again. Rather than read them as an adult after expanding my reading repertoire, I would rather have had the fond memories of a child enjoying the books, rather than realize the books were written on the cheap for a much younger audience. And this isn't even a knock on Richard Knaack. The books are what they are and we all have to accept that.

in elder days, i had personalized license plates that read RAIST. loved those books. the best piece of dragonlance media is still the musical, however (i'm not claiming that its good, only that its the best).

Awesome video! thanks

Legends was absolutely amazing, honestly prolly one of the best time-travel storylines in modern fiction

For me I remember reading some of these books when I was younger, finding them in the local library. While they only had a couple of them, I still remember loving them. And of course, I then found the Deathgate Cycle as well, though sadly again, only some of the books.

Never dove into these, but have every intention to now. You have a gift and wit my friend.

I really liked the concept of the Noble Draconians. It's a crime they were snubbed in Fizban's. Steel Dragons, too.

Kaz the Minotaur , and Riverwind the plainsmen. I cant remember the exact title of the third, but i think it was about the boy think who becomes a squire. Still cant remember where the hell i got them from

My favorite was Doom Brigade. I didn't quite understand when it was recommended to me that it was from the point of view of the draconians. I always thought that was neat. I heard they made at least one sequel to it.

oh its great, its just that trying to run D&D on krynn always feels like playing D&D against the backdrop of krynn unless you are down with quantum permutation, which, most die-hard DL fans are not. You can run a game in dragonlance but just not for dragonlance fans, as they don't want anything changed or reinterpreted at all in the slightest...until you get to the parts they don't like, which seems to be chaos war onward.

You know, I was very much onboard with a Dragonlance TV show, or an openworld videogame. That all sounds amazing. But then I realized with DEI, and Sweet baby Inc running rampant I'd rather they just left it alone entirely. Krynn is a living breathing world to me, and all of the ethnicities and genders of the characters are the way they are for a reason. And if you are a true fan and have read the books you know there is plenty of representation in the source material. I can seriously already see it, Tanys is now a strong, diverse, powerful, girl boss, who doesn't need love from Laurana, or Kitiara. She along with Raistlinda, and Cherrimon. Take out the Dark King Travis-is, who is the many faced, White Dragon. 😢

Land of the Minotaurs was my introduction.....still remember it fondly 28 years latter.

Just like with LotR, I had the most fun when we avoided playing railroaded Dragonlance D&D modules and encountering the novel's main characters and storylines. When we used main characters in module play, knowledgeable players were too frustrated by players who hadn't read the books. It was rough (and funny) to see Raistlin be called a "little bitch" by Caramon, to have Tasslehoff swipe his tea, and to get shot to death by goblins before he got to cast his Sleep spell.

15 years old in a book store and the cover of Meeting Sextet volume 1 with Tanis and Flint caught my eye, that started it for me. Cheers

I thought it was great. I really miss the "D&D novels section" that had been in bookstores for decades. They seem to have all but completely disappeared with only an occasional Salvatore novel popping up now and then. C'mon Hasbro! You had a decent stable of writers (that I haven't seen any published work from in some time) and probably more, like Weis & Hickman, that would be game.

Would love to see you cover other DnD campaign settings as some have been left in an even more neglected state than Dragonlance. I'm speaking of course of Dark Sun which is an incredible John Carter of Mars-style setting, inspired by the Dying Earth and Richard Corben's Den series. Though my number one pick for you to cover would be the Planescape setting (and game) IMO the best DnD setting and the one with the most potential.

There was also tension/controversy over Lord Soth being included in the Ravenloft setting, and when wizards allowed sword and sorcery to publish Ravenloft products for 3/3.5 they weren't allowed to use any Dragonlance specific terms beyond the name of the domain, so no Soth, no kinder vampires, and the elves seem to have forgotten where they came from even though the name Sithicus is a dead give away. All of that kinda ruined the vibe of Sithicus, and the darklord position still being denied to Azrael Drak is the only redeeming thing about it. It's too bad the 5e version of Ravenloft is so disjointed with everything that came before.

I came to Dragonlance in an odd way. I found the Art of the Dragonlance Saga which prompted me to pick up the novels. I was a kid who struggled greatly with reading, and always responded more to Science Fiction, but I devoured the novels. I read the first two trilogies and kept pushing through the short stories, and other novels. I tried to read the Chronicles again a few years ago and I just couldn't do it. The writing was awful. 12 year old me VS 48 year old me simply have different abilities to ignore problems.

8:50 i know some are not into that movie, but i think it was ok .

I would like to point out that the books came before the Settings. As the Settings were made around the first book series. As Marget wiss and tracy hickman were hired to write the story that was to be the lore of the setting :P

I remember playing Dragonstrike. It took forever to beat it.

I love the books and the setting it was the first real adult fantasy novel I ever read. For me the high water mark of the series is the 3Rd and 3.5 edition books published for the game, it had fully fleshed out the world and even if your not a gamer it has tons of wonderful info and stories that were driven by the original authors publishing company in partnership with WOTC.

I don't know whether you just didn't know about it, or chose to leave it out, but in the section where you were talking about Dragonlance blowing up, mentioning games and the movie, I wanted to add there was a DC comic series that lasted 34 issues from 1988-91. DC were publishing a bunch of D&D related stuff at the time.

190 books? Holy crap!

Another reason Shadow of the Dragon Queen didn`t do so well was that it was THE product WoTC was releasing just as the whole OGL thing blew up. So it was affected by the controversy and "I`m not going to buy anything else from WoTC" stuff that was going on. Then WoTC lost interest in promoting it as they went into damage-control mode. The module itself was arguably ok but definitely needed input from the Hickmans, the big casualty of this though was the board game they put out as part of Dragonlance which was a solid product made by a third-party developer that had the potential to be developed into a decent generic mass-combat system for 5e. As it was the game passed largely unnoticed and unplayed by anybody and probably the only good side of that is the game can now be bought for a small fraction of what they were originally selling it for if you can find it.

One of the biggest pulls of the setting was that it was the first one to tell players that they couldn't play something. They restricted the races, which made the setting unique. That didn't mesh with the new game approach of fifth edition

I loved every book Laura Tracy and Margaret did. I also enjoyed most of what Richard put out but when authors would write using their characters it just made my stomach turn.

Larry Elmore's art...top tier.

While not my first experience into the fantasy genre, the first trilogy of dragonlance novels was my first time reading fantasy books, they got me hooked as a kid. I still have a large bookcase filled with roughly 50% dragonlance novels and the other 50% forgotten realms novels.

Sturm Brightblade hands down the best character.

Dragonlance is and always has been so much better than forgotten realms. It makes me cry that everything keeps breaking towards forgotten realms.

My first Dragonlance book was the one about the gullydwarves. Certainly an interesting place to start

My first book I read that wasn't a school assignment was DragonLance in the year 2000. I bought it at a church yard sale. Kaz the Minotaur. That very copy is still on my bookshelf today.

Used to read these all the time when I was younger! I should read a few again would be fun. That Raistlin series was my favorite!

I think was what killed it was when the writers took creative control of the ip in the early 2000s and started their own publishing company. Their relationship has never recovered. I think that really set bad with Wizards and caused them to focus more Forgotten Realms with 5e and just try to forget Dragonlance if it means working with Weis and Hickman. The latest adventure book was just fan service and Wizards really went out of their way to exclude the writers, even while they were in open negotiations with them on a novel.

Its too bad Mangianello's show got canceled. I bet it would have been the way to show that Dragonlance can be modernized by a passionate fan without losing its identity.

I'm really looking forward to the next book but DAMMIT. It feels like the new series just finished the introduction to the story part, and I can't see how all of the plot from the last book can be concluded in only one sequel. We need another trilogy after that.

Didn’t they make a chronological balls up? Can’t remember exactly what- think it was something to do with the cataclysm and Huma. It was rather feebly amended later on if I recall.

Krynn is still the best DnD world. Awesome books (read all >200 :D), great games (back in the days) but Hasbro is just a shitty company that does not care bout its lore, fans and employees.

Hard to say what it was to me as for me... It was a flawed gem. I had enjoyed a couple of the books and trying to navigate the setting was a bit tricky. As I had got into the series between the Summer Flame and Soul Storm era... The odd point where they handed the book series to another author and was having alien dragons rule the world. It was a very odd time reading the older books, seeing the TTRPG setting with its flawed, but interesting setting... And then the mix of authors, setting changes, and general backroom chaos. It has its strength, it's flaws... And a lot of flawed authors not understanding the charm of the setting and going with more formulaic approaches. Like one of the newer books having a time traveling Mary Sue to dance in the old setting as nostalgia bait. Yes the setting has had its oddities... Alien dragons, Seeker cults, A mage who nearly killed a god and didn't because he saw what would happen if he won. Yet in an attempt to make it more... Main stream, modern, insert buzz word... A lot of things seem to strip away that unique charm it had which you know is missing when it is gone despite them claiming that it is still there. Sort of like the Iron Kingdom settings. A flawed, but enjoyable setting with its unique take on magic for the TTRPG and its concepts... And how it got gutted to become a standard template DND 5th edition format. There is a flavor to it... and while it may be flawed... It is the charm of it that brings you back rather than the flaws.

I had all three books of the original trilogy and never read them. I think ill track them down and give it another go.

Im confused how so many people runn8ng aroud like they not heard dragon lance in years or it been gone for years they released a dragon lance module a fee years back the setting was revived in 5e

It's always strange when you hear about stories like these, in the case of the TV show and possible movie(s) not being made, you look at the success and the amount of money LOTR made at the box office and Game of Thrones for most of its run, execs must just see $$$$$ signs when they look at these products, BUT, for every LOTR you have many more flops, or didn't quite make it over the finish line movies and TV shows. The recent debacle with the Witcher series is a good example and a movie that was expected to be a HUGE surefire hit was World of Warcraft but it barely broke even. Then there is the most recent D&D Honor amongst thieves, which did relatively well at the box office and will probably get a sequel but again it's been critised as being D&D light for all the positives. I think the Dragonlance novels would indeed make great movies or even a tv series, assuming they are approached from the same perspective and direction of LOTR and GoT. They are both stories set in a fantasy land but firmly grounded in relatable characters and a world with magical beings and powers being the exception and not the norm, and if this was the case with Dragonlance it would work too. It took eighty years for LOTR to have a box office global success, lets just hope it doesn't take that long with DragonLance, otherwise I'll never get to see it..........

I was trying to buy the book autumn twilight for my son and couldn’t find it new except for $300 and $100!!! I had to buy a used book. What happened?!! Why aren’t they printing the first book by weis hickman

Tas not Taz. Tasslehoff not Tazzlehoff. TasSSssSss!

I bought one of these modules back in the day. I didn't like the way pre-made characters were integral to the plot ( for the one I bought anyway) My friend liked them though.

Man the twins Saga was my favorite. Even with all the time traveling fuckery I just loved the weird fall and redemption of Rastilin was just great. But after that, with the next generation just lost me completely. Like Steel being Kitiara and Sturm’s son. Like why? Palin was just a huge disappointment. Like can you stop failing or do something worth rooting for?

I have no idea why, and I should probably correct it. But I've read probably 30 Dragonlance books, and I own all the "Dragons of...", yet I've never read any of them.

Wotc is afraid someone can make a success of any of those settings they’re either ignoring or outright blocking because they’re that awful with their business!

I love tash the kinder

I loved Dragonlance. I have a tattoo of Lord Soth on my arm.

I want to play Tanis in the movies should they ever get produced!

I have around 100 DragonLance novels

I wish they left dragonlance alone, is not like we need more books

There were no issues of racism and sexism. WOTC brought in "diversity consultants," which went on to do their bs of calling everything sexist and racists.

WOTC happened

Hasboro is poorly managed and the only reason it hasnt gone under is due to Wizard of the Coast. Although, they are trying their hardest to fuck that up too.

It was 5th Age where I threw out the book I was reading and never went back. Can't recall which one it was, I was just disgusted with what I was reading.

Hasbro is screwing up everything. Now they have that new animated movie where Transformers act like my little pony characters

I stumbled across Dragons of the Autumn Twilight while shopping at Waldenbooks in our local mall. This would have been the summer of 1985, I think. At the time, I also played D&D but only sporadically; I was more interested in the world building and the creatures and concepts than in the actual gaming part. I read the first book, thought it was filled with fantasy tropes and Tolkien rip-offs (I'd read LOTR, Conan, and The Swords of Shannara by then, and seen Bakshi's Wizards and Milius's Conan The Barbarian). I also thought the reptilian baddies were kind of over the top for my taste. All in all, I thought the book was okay at best. I purchased the second book but never read it. Later, I'd read the Forgotten Realms books and quite enjoyed them, even though they can be a bit silly, but they're imaginative and fun. I still see tons of the Dragonlance novels at Half Price Books, so I figure they're still fairly popular amongst fantasy enthusiasts.

I found the first trilogy in my elementary school library. It was one of my first fantasy books and spawned a lifelong interest in fantasy. I also didn't find out Dragonlance is a part of DnD until a good decade had passed, well after I had started playing 3.5 haha. And let me tell you something brother, you cant truly trust a man if his OG isn't Rais. I should probably read the twins trilogy.

Est Sularus oth Mithas