Thread by @hexcrawl

The eighth installment of the #Dragonlance series expands the scope of the Saga once again by fully incorporating BATTLESYSTEM - the fantasy wargame designed to integrate mass combat into your roleplaying game.

This marks a significant shift in the Saga: Whereas in Volume I, the PCs were constantly forced to flee before the dragon armies, now the expectation seems to be that they will actually be leading troops into the maw of war.

We're continuing our Let's Read of the #Dragonlance Saga!

If you want to begin from the beginning, start over here!

https://x.com/hexcrawl/status/1528081088001605634

DL8 Dragons of War, by Tracy and Laura Hickman, can be roughly broken down into three parts:

1. The journey from Ergoth to Sancrist, eventually reaching the Tower of the High Clerist which is currently besieged.

2. A dungeon delve into the sealed upper reaches of the Tower in order to retrieve artifact(s) that may help save the day.

3. The battle!

Either the forces of good win their first significant victory against the dragonarmies, or Sancrist falls and "there is little hope left for all of Ansalon."

Throughout the three phases of the adventure, there is also supposed to be a significant political component.

This promises to be REALLY COOL... and then it mostly isn't.

The primary problem seems to be the Event/Encounter format of the DL series.

We've discussed this before, tl;dr: Events are keyed to go off at specific times. Encounters are keyed to specific locations.

The DL series is almost entirely jammed into this format. So basically everything is either an Event or an Encounter.

And the problem is that big political drama just doesn't fit the format.

The logical thing, of course, would be to toss the format and use one that's more appropriate. But the designers are, instead, trapped by it.

Let's take a closer look.

First, upon arriving in Sancrist, the PCs can/will attend the Council of Whitestone, where elves, dwarves, kender, and humans meet to discuss a joint defense against the dragonarmies.

The PCs get a seat at the table because...

Well, actually, it's unclear why. I would guess it's either because they have the Orb/Dragonlance and/or because they're the only reps from Abanasynia/Thorbardin.

But the entire Council is summarily dispatched with in a single block of boxed text.

So it's a complete dud, culminating in the Council trying to take the Orb and Dragonlance from the PCs.

Even if the PCs' inclination would be, "Sure! If it would help, let's do it!" the adventure makes sure to have an NPC helpfully tell them that they're supposed to run away and keep the Orb/Dragonlance for themselves.

This also, bizarrely, creates a continuity meltdown, because despite the adventure going out of its way to make sure the PCs hold onto the orb and dragonlance...

...the rest of the Saga assumes the gnomish Weaponsmith Guild inspects the dragonlances, reverse engineers them, and starts making new ones.

So dragonlances start popping up all over the place from here on out.

But what I really weep for here is the missed opportunity of the Council.

It's such a cool moment when a D&D campaign "tiers up" and the PCs start rubbing shoulders with the powerful; their adventures carrying them deep into the circles where big, meaningful decisions are made.