Discussion:
The Dungeons & Dragons TV show from the director of Red Notice is really happening
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Spalls Hurgenson
2023-01-14 17:43:02 UTC
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On Fri, 13 Jan 2023 10:16:54 -0700, Jibini Kula Tumbili Kujisalimisha
I'm certain it will live up to the standards of the various movies.
You know, the garbage.
What a *stupid* idea.
The problem with a D&D TV show is that - as a source for narrative -
D&D is boring.

I'm not saying the games we play are boring (I wouldn't still be
reading a nearly empty Usenet newsgroup after all these years if that
were the case ;-) but that D&D, alone, lacks the structure and
character for an interesting movie.

Sure, you can take elements from the game - regenerating trolls,
wizards who memorize spells on a daily basis, heroes who plunder
ancient tombs - and work them into a story... but then you've got a
fantasy movie that happens to use D&D tropes. It's not the D&D stuff
that really makes that movie interesting; it's everything around it:
the stories, the setting, the characters. I mean, if you look at a lot
of D&D games we play, they rip off movies and TV shows incessantly
because D&D, itself, isn't that interesting.

Now, were Wizards to license some of its IPs - Dragonlance, Gord the
Rogue*, Planescape, Spelljammer - then we might get an interesting
movie or TV series. But that never seems to be the case. Instead we
get a generic fantasy movie - usually written by the cheapest hack
they could find and then tailored to fit the broadest audience - that
has some recognizable features from D&D taped onto it.

Don't get me wrong. I think D&D is great, but it's just a framework.
It's a great framework upon which to build fun game experiences. But
it is like the easel upon which great works are painted. But nobody
goes to look at easels in a museum. Yet it seems as if that's what
Wizards wants, and then they're surprised when their efforts are in
vain.


TL;DR: I expect the TV show to be a flop too. ;-)




* yes, I know, Wizards doesn't actually own Gord the Rogue. I still
consider it a D&D property though, because those books really captured
the ideal of early D&D ;-)
Spalls Hurgenson
2023-01-20 21:00:20 UTC
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Aren't there YouTube channels or something with people playing D&D?
I heard they're fairly popular, or maybe that's just with gamers.
Yeah, but people aren't really watching them for the D&D ruleset. The
videos are popular because of the interactions betwen the players and
the stories they create, not because you need to specifically roll a
16 to hit a particular armor class or because trolls have a Perception
+2 skill.

Now, people certainly may have a preference to watch people play D&D
games versus, say, Rollmaster* but that's due to a familiarity with
the system and because D&D lends itself to a certain style of gameplay
and setting. So D&D is a guide, but not of interest itself (at least
not to people watching).**

SO I can't get excited about a "D&D movie/TV series" because the "D&D"
part isn't that interesting; it will stand on (or fail) on everythign
around that license: it's characters, its setting, its story, its
acting, etc. But, man, I'd go for a Spelljammer movie...

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