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From: Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd
Subject: Re: edition wars
Date: Sat, 16 Nov 2024 11:18:43 -0500
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On Fri, 15 Nov 2024 16:22:12 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>On Fri, 15 Nov 2024 12:05:50 -0500, Spalls Hurgenson
><spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>>I think it just outlived itself. The original Dragonlance adventures 
>>>might not be my favorite, but they told a story. The whole franchise was 
>>>basically desperately searching for what it's point was afterwards, and 
>>>failing.
>>
>>
>>That's a problem with almost all Epics. Once you get to the end, it's
>>_really_ hard to move on from there. 'Congratulations, you've defeated
>>the Big Bad... but now what?' Well, you can decide the Big Bad comes
>>back, or maybe there's a bigger Bad, or maybe you just have some
>>half-hearted adventures in the world you just saved... but none of
>>those choices really have the same impact as the original quest. The
>>best thing you can do is just move onto something new entirely. 
>
>Babylon V handled it pretty well. Shadows are gone, as are all the elder
>god races. Well, now what? You thought they were the *real problem*, but
>somehow you still have problems, because there's never just one. There's
>the big one, and you made the mistake of ignoring the rest.
>
>It turned out that the BBEG became a distraction, their lurking allies
>are *pissed*, and other evils, now blossoming, have flourished. There are
>now multiple NQABBEGS (Not Quite As Big Bad Evil Guys). They're fighting
>for the scraps and doing a lot of collateral damage. And one of them, by
>the end of the campaign, will rise to become the new BBEG. After all, you
>can't take on all of them at once. Will you make the same mistake?
>
>Nothing half hearted about that. Heroing is hard.
>
>Now, Babylon V didn't produce good *tv* after the 4th season retaking of
>Earth, but the premise for the next season was great, and there were some
>real gems in their 5th season.
>
>I also have a boxed set of Crusader on my shelf as a cautionary tale.
>
>(Yes. This is a threadjacking to Babylon V. I didn't crosspost though
>because that group is dead.)

The difference, of course, is that the plot of Babylon 5 from the
beginning included the 'post war' storyline. There's very little to
Tolkien or Dragonlance that supports 'what happens after' adventuring.

And I'd point out that even _with_ that, there's been very little
support for new Babylon 5 material. Crusader tried, and it didn't do
very well. It's hard to get invested in a series when the
bigger-than-life heroes aren't involved, and all the villains are just
local ruffians compared to the Big Bads that were defeated in the main
arc.

I mean, once you Save The World, it's really hard to top that. 

You either end up increasing the threat to ludicris new levels (see
Star Wars prequels: new death star, except this one can blow up FIVE
planets at the same time and not even be in the same solar system! And
two movies later, the good guys face off against a fleet of thousands
of spaceships each armed with a death-star laser!) or you just have a
bunch of guys fighting orcs. Either way, there's just no sense of
tension. There's no drama, because the stakes are either worthless
(because you know there will be a sequel with an even more stupidly
overpowered boss, or because the villains are nobodies).

When an epic's over, the best thing you can do is just... let it go.
Sure, logically there still might be adventures to be had, but none of
them will have the same emotional impact. You're just weaking the
original story while offering poor and poorer sequels.

And that was DragonLance's problem to a tee. There was no real place
for the story to go after Takhisis was defeated in "DL14 Dragons of
Triumph". Sure, there was the usual 'I'll be back' villainous ranting,
with a bit of 'the adventure continues...' at the tail-end, but it
could never top the main quest. Especially since the whole world of
Ansalon was built around that main quest, and attempts to wedge in
more adventures felt incredibly artificial. The Dragonlance world was
a shell designed to facilitate the main quest. It didn't have the
depth for anything beyond that, despite all the work and effort of TSR
to prove otherwise.

Still... that main quest really was something. It's remembered fondly
by millions for a reason.