Quote from: Marleycat;524954Hell I never had a clue or even give a flying fuck it used the themes you and Windjammer are discussing, but at least I know why I like it. Those very themes resonate deeply with me and I am not a minority or weird fringe of the Dnd playerbase, I am your typical casual player.

A story about love and self-sacrifice it may be. But it's a poorly written story, even by the relatively low writing standards of fantasy literature.

There's not a lot wrong with the themes themselves, it's the heavy-handed, immature treatment of these themes (complete with characters as human as a GI Joe doll) that we're talking about.

Hence, my comment: I still do not understand how is it that such a poorly written story, notwithstanding the universality of the themes at work, could be such a huge commercial hit.

Quote from: Windjammer;524888That's getting close, but not quite.

See, it's become a standard criticism of Dragonalance that it scripted certain narratives. What's a lot less critiziced is what I find personally a lot more problematic: the content of these narratives. In particular, the ethos which infuses the key NPCs and the pantheon.

To be precise. I recently reread Dragonlance Chronicles II and III after many, many years, and was shocked by the following.
1. The stupid sentimentalism. Characters cry all the time. For no reason, other than their being disappointed with themselves. There's no actual strength or character development, people simply migrate from one type of immaturity to another. There's no emotional maturity. The only way to be emotional is to display them, and display them in the most immature manner. Anything less and you qualify as 'cold' and 'unfeeling'. This is a frequent criticism the characters in the novel level at each other, by the way. It's a "lesson" of the setting.
2. The deeply warped understanding of love as self-sacrifice. Again, this oozes over with pathos. The entire Chronicles is bereft of a single functioning long term relationship, because couples gravitate from one type of immature relationship (not being able to be honest about it) to another (being sentimental etc etc). You can see a pattern here.
3. The very, very warped moral code that extreme goodness is blind. Supremely good characters, in the mortal realm and the pantheon, subscribe to the idea that good is best promoted by destroying, not evil, but people who occasionally display (traces of) behaviour which could be interpreted as evil or selfish. (Remember, if self-sacrifice is the ultimate form of love and goodness then any trace of self-concern must be EEEEEVIL.) This silliness breaks the setting literally in half. The most intelligent and wise beings in the cosmos have not advanced to a mature understanding of morality, of self- and other-concern, and flout the most primitive notions of integrity. Any 'moral development' they undergo is - surprise! - a transition from this type of immaturity to another: the idea that destroying people etc. who display evil tendencies is bad. Something you might tell a child for when he or she is 5 - that's the moral pinnacle of the setting, the upper bound of moral development.

Now, strip that out of Dragonlance, and you have ... very little left. The morally repugnant sentimentalism of the novels and the modules, of the characters (Sturm, Lauranna, ...) and the pantheon... there's nothing that remains except AD&D class+race combos. They are literally nothing but templates on which Weis and Hickman foist again and again tropes 1. to 3. Without the tropes there are no characters.

By extension, the only sense I can make of Dragonlance as an campaign world is a template against which players experience the same sentimental journeys in self-realization, journeys of the very nature outlined above: bumbling from one type of immaturity into another, but feeling (feeling!) more mature at the end, feeling to have come out of it with a more profound understanding of self and others.

Initiating these 'journeys of self-discovery' can be a success only with an audience that is emotionally and ethically immature enough to experience exposure to the Dragonlance cosmos as personal growth towards maturity when it is anything but. The fakeness of it all, the cheap sentimentalism and the naked grab at that audience' most immature urges, with no inclination to actually address them as adults or move them closer to actual adulthood - all this makes the Dragonlance enterprise, despite its ostensive pretension towards morality and maturity, the most deeply immoral and cynical thing ever attempted by TSR.

Quote from: Windjammer;524975Thank you.

And let's not forget about the ancient dragon ladies falling into luv with human studs. They get the strict look from papa Paladin ('what have ya done, gal'), and then break into tears. Totally my understanding of century old beings: Al and Kelly Bundy.

Great great posts, Windjammer. Spot on.

Quote from: The Butcher;524987A story about love and self-sacrifice it may be. But it's a poorly written story, even by the relatively low writing standards of fantasy literature.

There's not a lot wrong with the themes themselves, it's the heavy-handed, immature treatment of these themes (complete with characters as human as a GI Joe doll) that we're talking about.

Hence, my comment: I still do not understand how is it that such a poorly written story, notwithstanding the universality of the themes at work, could be such a huge commercial hit.

We were teenagers and our brains were not fully formed. No, seriously.

Quote from: Benoist;524962You're kidding, right? You like this type of moral hogwash that turns common sense upside down, shakes it to steal all it might be carrying of value, to then rape it, set it on fire and throw it through the window yelling "KEEEEWL!!" as it crashes in the moat down below?

It doesn't make sense. Even as a Disney-like moral tale, it doesn't make sense.

Maybe it's even more insulting considered that way.

Come on. COME. ON. Now.

Back when I played DL we never used the modules we just went in with the understanding that the character classes were slightly different.  Point is back then I never paid any attention to whatever module was being run, if one was at all.  Remember that I played more for my brother than any real interest of the game until far later.

I was trying to point out that Judeo-Christian values resonate deeply with me so maybe that's why I like DL unconsciously.  Like I said I never even knew that stuff was in there until it was pointed out in this thread, never played the modules.  About the only module I ever played was the Keep on the Borderland one without it being so altered as being unrecognizable like I do or any of the GM's I played with did with all the modules that were used.

QuoteA story about love and self-sacrifice it may be. But it's a poorly written story, even by the relatively low writing standards of fantasy literature.

There's not a lot wrong with the themes themselves, it's the heavy-handed, immature treatment of these themes (complete with characters as human as a GI Joe doll) that we're talking about.

Hence, my comment: I still do not understand how is it that such a poorly written story, notwithstanding the universality of the themes at work, could be such a huge commercial hit.

Just speaking for myself I am a sucker for sentimental sappy stock fantasy and other things. It's familiar and safe like an old shoe even if it's terrible.  Somewhere in there may lie your answer I don't know but there it is.

Quote from: Imperator;524991We were teenagers and our brains were not fully formed. No, seriously.

Quote from: Marleycat;524995Just speaking for myself I am a sucker for sentimental sappy stock fantasy and other things. It's familiar and safe like an old shoe even if it's terrible.  Somewhere in there may lie your answer I don't know but there it is.

Both of these probably explain it. Some of us were young and didn't know better, others just dig the formula no matter how cheesy its implementation.

Quote from: The Butcher;525010Both of these probably explain it. Some of us were young and didn't know better, others just dig the formula no matter how cheesy its implementation.

Definitely, for both cases.

(For the former, I elaborated on it in previous posts in this thread)

For the latter, I still like to occasionally read cheesy sci-fi/fantasy novels or watch cheesy space opera type tv shows, which fit into some generic predictable formulas.

Quote from: The Butcher;524987Hence, my comment: I still do not understand how is it that such a poorly written story, notwithstanding the universality of the themes at work, could be such a huge commercial hit.

DL is pure brain candy. Sweet, obvious, and a nice treat in between meals. I get it, it's not high-literature, but the market proves that plenty of people who like it for what it is.

Think of it this way:
- How can Harlequin keep publishing romance novels?
- How is it that The Asylum keeps making movies that are either clear B - C movie fare or outright ripoffs?
- Do you really think that pulp magazines were successful in their time solely because every story was equal to the quality of REH, Lovecraft, Doc Smith, or any of the other writers that posters on forums like these wank over on a regular basis?

Everyone has their guilty pleasure.

Quote from: JamesV;525021- Do you really think that pulp magazines were successful in their time solely because every story was equal to the quality of REH, Lovecraft, Doc Smith, or any of the other writers that posters on forums like these wank over on a regular basis?

In the case of REH, Lovecraft, Doc Smith, etc ..., how much of the respect for them was due to their stories being the first to become popular, as opposed to anything to do with literary brilliance on their part?

Quote from: ggroy;525022In the case of REH, Lovecraft, Doc Smith, etc ..., how much of the respect for them was due to their stories being the first to become popular, as opposed to anything to do with literary brilliance on their part?

And then there's that.

Ultimately, I'm pretty sure everyone has that one thing they like that their friends/family/acquaintances don't get, no matter how many times you try to explain it. As a matter of fact, they probably think it's the dumbest thing on Earth to like.

Dragonlance wasn't made for the old-school gamers. It was made for an entirely new market demographic. The sales of the Dragonlance RPG was supported primarily by the (non-rpg) readers of the books. This wasn't a group of the original gamers buying, it wasn't even a group of the 1s ed AD&D, or even 2nd ed AD&D gamers that drove these sales.

I remember reading one of the Dragonlance novels in the early 90's, and  thought it was a blatant and not very well done rip-off of the Anne McCaffrey Dragonriders of Pern series (Which was a truly great science-fantasy setting). I never did run or play a game of Dragonlance.

It would have been good if TSR had tried to integrate the newer gamers with the older gamers, but that was all happening at about the same time the TSR legal dept. was pouring gasoline on the early fanbase and lighting it by sending cease and desist letters to the ardent supporters of the game that had set up gaming websites and who were offering supplementary indie material for D&D.

This was the time that the publishing Industry decided for some reason that they had the right to decide what D&D was to be, and become.

Didn't affect me much directly, as I was still running Rules Cyclopedia games then. Did like some of the Dragonlance artwork though, alot.

Quote from: GameDaddy;525033Dragonlance wasn't made for the old-school gamers. It was made for an entirely new market demographic.

Was there anything written for old-school gamers, besides maybe the "Gord the Rogue" novels written by Gary Gygax?

I would like to point out that while there is a lively discussion on the merits of DL, and some time was spent pointing out the flaws of later edition FR and Dark Sun, Birthright has barely come up.

The suckiest through sheer forgettability!
:hatsoff:

Quote from: GameDaddy;525033Didn't affect me much directly, as I was still running Rules Cyclopedia games then. Did like some of the Dragonlance artwork though, alot.

I think the art had alot to do with its popularity. Crticisms that it was immature or disney-like are I think well founded....however I always looked at it as a good PG fantasy setting (sometimes i do enjoy disney . I think that was the other thing that explains its popularity. It was very much a black and white , vaguely cartoonish line. I don't hold that against it (i do hold the modules against it). I could enjoy it the same way I can enjoy The Dark Crystal, Aladdin or Never Ending Story. But it was far from my prefered setting.

Quote from: The Butcher;525010Both of these probably explain it. Some of us were young and didn't know better, others just dig the formula no matter how cheesy its implementation.

I haven't read them since the fifth grade. I think I'll keep my memories of them rosy and hazy.

Quote from: JamesV;525039I would like to point out that while there is a lively discussion on the merits of DL, and some time was spent pointing out the flaws of later edition FR and Dark Sun, Birthright has barely come up.

The suckiest through sheer forgettability!
:hatsoff:

Maybe it hasn't shown up because this thread is supposedly about the worst ever. I'm sure that means we leave out the good ones.

Quote from: JamesV;525031And then there's that.

More generally, I don't have a good objective criterion for determining how much "literary brilliance" a particular piece of writing has.

For example, awhile ago I was reading some Lensman novels by Doc Smith.  As far as I could tell, his writing didn't seem much better than reading a run-of-the-mill Star Trek novel.

The only judgement I have on any piece of fiction writing I read, is whether it keeps my attention or not.  If I'm thinking "when is this going to end" about a particular piece of writing (or tv show/movie), then I know I'm largely wasting my time continuing further.