alhoon wrote:For canonical references, I dare say that some consideration must be made between novels etc that were indeed published by TSR/WotC and official setting material in case they diverge.
In some novels (or, well, published adventures) Strahd appears chaotic evil instead of lawful evil. And that's just one example. Another is that goblyns in some novel were blue. Or +2 repeating crossbows in the hands of a innkeeper in Evil Eye. Etc.
The goal in highlighting levels of canon was to make it as objective as possible. Some of those are a matter of opinion. (Strahd was CE in the original I6, and I don't know why he changed to LE in the Black Box. Seems to me that being driven by lust and trying to steal your brother's bride is pretty unlawful. I also like it as a contrast to Azalin's VERY LE nature to drive their mutual hatred). By all means point out any inconsistencies between otherwise "canon" items. That doesn't invalidate the canon-ness of the rest of that item.
All in all, I think the "Questionably canon" should include things as "novels" and "adventures" and be called something else than "questionably canon".
Actually, I think that's probably a very good use of Questionably Canon. Because unless there's a preponderence of evidence one way or the other, how do we know which canon is "more canon"? Is I6 more canon than the Black Box because it's the granddaddy of the setting? Or is the Black Box more canon because I6 was standalone and not in "The Setting" at all? Is House of Strahd more canon that I6 because it was published more recently? (He's LE there). Do we count up the instances of both versions and majority rules?
For simplicity I would say netbook canon should be added to FoS canon and use the awesome FoS symbol of the ouroboros.
But not all netbooks are ours. I wouldn't put the Kargatane's work in FoS canon. There's a case to made that their netbooks are "more canon" than ours because some of them eventually wrote for the canon books.
Anyway, to sum up...
1) it's all about clarity for those who are looking up stuff. not everyone "counts" everything, and we aim to give them the info to make that decision, not to decide what's canon and what isn't for them.
2) this discussion really should move to a separate thread if it continues... we've drifted far from DM's guild discussion (though still haven't really settled on what level of canon DM's guild releases should have :/ )
"We're realistic heroes. We're not here to save the world, just nudge the world into a better place."
