Customer Reviews

Dragonlance Campaign Setting (Dungeon & Dragons Roleplaying Game: Campaigns)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I've been a fan of the Dragonlance Novels for a number of years now (well... 95% of them). I've also been running the original Dragonlance modules in a campaign for the past year. Until now, I've had to work with both my own 3rd edition convertions and unofficial materials I've found online. However with the return of the official campaign setting (designed for edition 3.5), my preparation for the RP sessions have gotten much easier.

The campaign book contains the history of the world of Krynn in its covers. Whether you're new to the world or if you are an old time DL gamer, the Campaign Setting has what you need to get started.

It has everything needed to play a Knight of Solamnia (of any order), a Knight of Neraka (of any order), or a Knight of the Legion of Steel. It also contains the information describing the full benefits of becoming a Wizard of High Sorcery, and shows how different the abilities of the three Robes are. A variety of races are available for play (including two of the Draconian types, Minotaurs, Gnomes, Kender, two Sea Elven races, etc...) along with good descriptions of each.

Although the book covers everything up to just after the end of the War of Souls novels, enough is here to let you run at any time in Krynn's history. Much more specific details for each era will be coming out in the upcoming years. I already have the 5th Age book, and it gives what I think of as additional 'required' information in order to play in those times. But the DLCS is what is needed to get the broad general overview which anyone (especially a newbie to the world) should become familiar with before diving into the details. But if you don't wish to get the additional books, don't worry. There is enough in here to get you going in order to develop your own Krynnish campaign.

In short, the book is well put together. The coverage of the pantheon is clear. The timeline explains clearly how things came about. The new classes I look forward to using. The prestige classes I'm already having fun with. And I'll stop there because I said 'in short'.

Finally! An updated campaign setting for the Dragonlance world. While this book does live up to expectations, it's not quite perfect. The organization of the book comes across as somewhat sporadic, and the information within isn't as detailed as, say, the Forgottem Realms campaign setting book.

With several source books already planned for release soon, I believe the Dragonlance setting will become even more popular. If you're a fan of Dragonlance, and not necessarily a gamer, I highly suggest picking up this book.

This is a pretty good campaign setting.

Though not without a few errors here and there, it is better produced and edited than the "World Book of Ansalon" that came with the AD&D 2nd ed. "Tales of the Lance" set. The main things it seems to be missing are details of non-standard weapons and equipment (kender in particular), information on famous heroes and NPCs from before the Age of Mortals (no Heroes of the Lance or Dragon Highlords), details of many famous locations (Foghaven Vale, High Clerists Tower, Istar) and almost anything regarding the Dragon Orbs, the Device of Time Travelling, the Portals to the Abyss and several other key artifacts from the Age of Despair.

What it does have is enough to run fairly detailed adventures in the post War of Souls period and somewhat generalized campaigns in all the major time periods since the Cataclysm (or First Cataclysm for Age of Mortals folks). It is effective for updating older Dragonlance settings, modules and characters to 3rd edition or 3.5. What it lacks in detail of maps and NPCs it makes up for with sections allowing for PC Draconians and Knights of Neraka (or Takhisis) among others, as well as very detailed chronologies and geographical information.

I am running a game using both the old, out of print Dragonlance Classics reprints of the original DL module series AND this new campaign setting. I am finding this combination very effective for running the original campaign using v.3.5 rules. The Classics series and the original DL modules are all available from retailers such as NobleKnight.com and TitanGames.com. If you like modules the old ones definitely still stand up, but 3rd ed. has many significant changes. If you want to make your own campaign in the old period I recommend the Sovereign Press book coming out later this year (see next paragraph).

So once again I emphasize that this product is designed mainly for playing in or after the War of Souls period. It is also (currently; see below) the only good way to play in the Dragonlance setting using D&D 3 or 3.5. Hopefully the "War of the Lance" expansion (published by Sovereign Press, due out later this year) will solve many of the problems I have mentioned here. Ideally, it will give enough information to allow play in that period without purchasing this WotC Dragonlance campaign setting, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Ok - to sum this up briefly, if you want to play Dragonlance in 3rd edition rules, buy this book.

Doesn't matter if you didn't like the Fifth Age or the War of Souls. If you did, fantastic.

What this book provides is a comprehensive translation of all outdated material from the previous editions into a newer supplement. It explains the history of the setting from the creation of the world to the end of the War of Souls.

There are new races, new prestige classes and base classes. New magic items and artifacts. Now so, more than ever, DL3E is richer and more vibrant than ever before.

My pet gripes which prevents this from being five stars:
- The history had several spoilers, which, I think the book should have done a better job at warning the reader against.
- I found slabs of text which where copied and pasted from previous editions of Dragonlance campaign setting(sections on the Wizards of High Sorcery being a good example, ripped from the Tales of the Lance boxed set, and from the AD&D 1st Ed campaign setting as well IIRC).
- The art could have been greatly improved (the art in the Age of Mortals however, is the best I've seen in any recent d30 DnD 3e book, so that made up for it really).

The book lives up to reputation however, the material is substantial, well written (albeit poorly illustrated) and I thoroughly recommend it. I recommend you purchase Age of Mortals with it, as you'll wind up with a lot of questions which are answered in that book anyway.

First off, yes, I'm a little bit biased. I've loved Dragon lance for a long time, but this book seems to be getting a lot of bad reviews that aren't all that justified.
Yes, there is an inch and a half margin which really shouldn't be that large. They should have at least added the chapter titles into the margin if they were going to make it that big.
The art isn't all that great. In fact there isn't a lot of art at all. Which means that the inch and a half margins don't sacrifice text, but rather pictures.
The other peeve I have about this book is that there is a lot of repeated information. The whole Chapter on other eras of play really isn't necessary, and everything that is in that chapter should have appeared somewhere else in the book.
The good thing is there are two new character classes, several prestige classes, and a lot of history for those people who don't feel like reading ALL of the Dragon lance books. But once again there is a lot of repetition of the history. There are also stats for some of the magic items used by the characters in the novels, and 2 mini adventures.
I want to comment on one prestige class. The dragon rider. Even if the dragon rider isn't used in your dragon lance campaign it can be easily changed to a different animal. I think I'm going to convert it to Star Wars and use it for the Rancor Riders.

I still remember the day I first saw the ad for Dragons of Despair in Dragon Magazine. I still remember playing that adventure for the first time. I still remember when Dragons of Autumn twilight became the first fantasy novel to hit the New York Times best seller list. These are some of the defining moments in my gaming career.

So it only stands to reason that I'd be excited to see this revisiting of one of my favorite settings. There was a certain feeling of trepidation as well. I thought that Dragonlance Adventures had lots of problems. I never cared for the Saga System at all. Still, I sucked it up, forced my expectations low and opened the book.

I have to admit, I liked it. It brings the Dragonlance rules nicely into the 3.5 game system. Prestige classes alone were something that the Dragonlance setting desperately needed. This book is a must-have for anyone who loves Dragonlance.

The book starts with the obligatory race chapter. There are some surprises, though. Fatherless dwarves (dwarves without a home), thinker gnomes (the "insane" opposite of tinker gnomes) and afflicted kender (kender who have had the spunk scared out of them) leap out immediately. Then there are the draconians. (When I was a kid we didn't have player character draconians. Draconians were the enemy and we liked it that way!) The irda have entered the player character arena, crushing the hopes of all the munchkins out there by presenting an official (and balanced) treatment of the race. On the strength of this chapter alone, I decided the book was worth it.

Then we enter class-land. The mystic (a divine version of the sorcerer) and the noble base class are two pleasant surprises. There's a nice little boxed text explaining why certain classes (like the paladin) aren't appropriate in Krynn. Then we move onto prestige classes, with a more reasonable treatment of the Knight of Solamnia than in Dragonlance Adventures (no week long spell prep times, for instance). Then we move onto the evil knights and the Wizards of High Sorcery (which are one class with plug and play powers). There are several other classes, the most notable being the dragon rider. The chapter rounds out with a nice selection of world-specific feats.

From there we move on to the chapter on magic. If you've seen the former Dragonlance treatments and know 3.0 or 3.5, there aren't really any surprises here. This section even has its own domains, ala Forgotten Realms. While it might not be anything too surprising, it's well done. After that is the deity chapter, which is more of the same.

The book then moves onto Geography and then Creatures. There isn't much to say about these, except that they bring some of out favorite old creatures into 3.5 (spectral minions, anyone?). Then we have a chapter on Dragons and ariel combat (very important), and a final chapter on Eras of Play.

This book is very satisfying and I look forward to future supplements (which I hear are being done by Sovereign Stone). It is on sale this year at GenCon, but goes onto the market en masse on August 22. Look for this book and enjoy.

P.S. Yes, they did reduce the power of the Dragonlance to the level of an item you can actually give your players. Now the dragons are waiting in the sidelines, itching for a rematch with your players.

This book is an excellent resource for the running of a Dragonlance campaign. The choices and handling of the races, character classes, and prestige classes is fantastic. There is a good rundown of the deities,magic, history and geography of the Dragonlance world.
My complaints are that the book is mainly set in the "current" timeline of the books, where as I am mainly interested in the War of the Lance era. I think a whole War of the Lance supplement should be created seperately. There are too few character profiles in the book, and the bestiary is rather small. An example Death Knight is given-why not just give us the stats for Lord Soth? That's what everyone wants! Also, I couldn't find the 3.5 edition stats for the hoopak stick! What gives? If it were not form these mostly minor omissions, I would have given it 5 stars.

Ok, no index, but that is ok, i can deal with that. There is no spelcial items pages, but all the cool items that i as dieing to know that stats about are in there spread out...other then that it has everything you would want. It has fantasitic art work, detailed airial comabt rules, the poems of the dragonlance books, new classes, new prestige classes, a detailed history, new races, new critters, new gods, new spells, new domains, This is the book htat i ahve been waiting for and it did not disapoint...i would defently suggest buying yon book...you wont regret it...sorry for all the spelling mistakes...im not the best speller in the world

This book was absolutely brilliant. The races filled out nicely all of the racial attributes described in the books, the classes were well adapted, the spells very campaign specific, and the monsters, like the races, filled out nicely all of the racial attributes described in the books. The only downside is that if you haven't read the books, it will take a long while of pouring through the timeline and reading fluff to be able to actually set a campaign in Krynn. If you haven't read the books, it's still a great supplement. The idea of draconians is easy to adapt (change their origin), the races are all interesting and can be switched for any setting (the irda could be made into an elven offshoot race, and the gulley dwarves children of gnomes and dwarves [this was their origin in Krynn as well]), the death knight presented here is much better then that in the MM II, and so on.

The new classes were the only part that disappointed me. The noble was just a mixture of a bard with some special powers and decent combat abilities, and the mystic a perfect cleric parallel (except worse).

This book covers the DL setting in a way that shows the writters passion for the world and actually tells you both the rules and great ideas for future stories. I have rarely held a setting book that you can just flip through so easily in terms of flow, in a way it is like reading parts of a novel.

The PrC's in it are good and the standards for the DL world, the races are there and even information on the different geographical locations. It has everything you need. It is set primarily after the War of Souls, which is the current time in the DL setting. That said it gives a great deal of detail to allow play in other time periods. And there is another excellent WotL supplement if you want to play in the fourth age more anyway.

I give this the lowest rating I would give any of the newer DL gaming material for the fact that after reading everything else it is the worst. That speaks more for the quality of the later supplements. Some of the PrC's are presented here but flushed out much better later. This is a great intro and starting book, but there are much better books in this line. From the WotL, Legends, Age of Mortals, Wizards of High Sorcery, Holy Order of the Stars, Knights of Ansalon, Dragons of Krynn are all very very good supplements. Probably the best I have read. Even the beastiary, monster manual, is cool. I am just sad they did not get to the Chaos War.