Official Sources (3.5)

[ezkajii]

I have some confusion regarding which sources are considered 'official', and why they are or aren't. Obviously the DM always determines which sources are allowed in his or her game, but while we can all agree that the Monster Manual is official, there seems to be some disagreement about Dragon Magazine, primarily.

So I assume everything published by Wizards of the Coast is official. I've also heard that there are some 3rd-party supplements that WotC has declared official. Meanwhile, many people disregard or disallow DragMag content but the magazine itself seems to assert that it is official content. There's also reference to a Dungeon/Polyhedron magazine, which I know virtually nothing about.

So, so far my personal 'official' list has been: all default campaign materials published by WotC, along with their FR, Eberron, Dragonlance, and some Kingdoms of Kalamar material, along with OA, Ghostwalk, and Dragon Magazine. Disallowing Sword and Sorcery, Legends and Lairs, etc. etc. - Are there campaign settings i'm missing that are considered official? What are the specific arguments for/against allowing magazine or non-WotC-published material?

[tyckspoon]

'Official' is generally taken as 'produced directly by WotC'. The next tier is officially licensed as D&D material; this is where Kalamar, one of the DragonLance books (but not most of them, which puts DragonLance in a kind of odd spot) and Paizo-produced Dragon Magazines are. And then you get 'compatible with the d20 System', which is material that is OGL compliant but is not produced or endorsed in any way by WotC. That sticker can't directly claim it works with D&D; it just uses the d20 System and also happens to maybe fit in a fantasy world such as might be found in a typical D&D game. Wink wink.

That second tier tends to be where 'official' is a bit of a weird thing, since it's a lot like.. oh, say, your favorite artistic creator gave somebody else permission to 'officially' make more of the music/movies/books/whatever that you look. Sure, it's the same characters or tones or something like the same style, but it's not the same person. Kalamar/Dragon/et al have that relationship to 'real' first party D&D. They also have a tendency to have even more uneven quality than WotC productions, because they're produced by groups that don't have the resources to do even the level of playtest/editing/proofing that WotC did. And you probably know how infamously WotC failed at that sometimes..

People tend to be particularly wary about Dragon because, in addition to that material not always being submitted by professional designers or having anything playtested or edited beyond 'yeah, that sounds pretty neat', they had to obey a monthly production schedule. DMs have enough stuff to worry about within the canon of hardbound first-party D&D supplements without having to figure out whether or not multiple years worth of monthly content is any good and modifying it to work if it's not - it's just easier to ban it.

(Kalamar and DragonLance don't get mentioned as much because they're just sort of obscure, I think.)

[Thurbane]

Several different "levels" of official:


Official WotC 3.0 and 3.5 D&D books, and errata/enhancements/web content
WotC "official" FAQ
Things like Dragonlance Campaign Setting and Dragon Magazine Compedium
Dragon and Dungeons magazine issues
Licensed books like the Kalamar setting books


Some consider Dragon Magazine Compendium 1st party, some consider it 2nd party. Shackled City hardcover falls into the same category...

[Psyren]

Several different "levels" of official:


Official WotC 3.0 and 3.5 D&D books, and errata/enhancements/web content
WotC "official" FAQ
Things like Dragonlance Campaign Setting and Dragon Magazine Compedium
Dragon and Dungeons magazine issues
Licensed books like the Kalamar setting books


Some consider Dragon Magazine Compendium 1st party, some consider it 2nd party. Shackled City hardcover falls into the same category...

Around here I've seen people give more weight to Dragon Compendium and Dragonlance than to FAQ.

[Vhaidara]

Around here I've seen people give more weight to Dragon Compendium and Dragonlance than to FAQ.

Dragon Compendium != Dragon Mag. Compendium was actually published by WotC and is therefore undeniably first party.

I don't think I've ever seen someone really give credit to Dragonlance.

The FAQ is usually stupid :smalltongue:

[Psyren]

Dragon Compendium != Dragon Mag. Compendium was actually published by WotC and is therefore undeniably first party.

Actually it wasn't - it was published by Paizo. ("Paizo Publishing, LLC 2700 Richards Road Suite 201 Bellevue, WA 9S005-4200. First Printing October 2005.") It has the D&D logo on the cover, but that is a licensing thing.

Dragonlance Campaign Setting meanwhile was published by WotC, so if anything it should be the more legitimate of the two. :smalltongue:

[Thurbane]

I've seen some intense debate as to whether Dragon Mag Compendium is 1st or 2nd party over at the BG/Minmax forums.

[ezkajii]

So, it sounds like there are some definite grey areas, with regards to the D&D community as a whole, which I already knew/suspected - what is each of your personal consensuses (consensi?), and what is your reasoning? Also does anyone know which non-WotC-published materials they designated official / allowed to license / etc.?

[endur]

Dragon Compendium != Dragon Mag. Compendium was actually published by WotC and is therefore undeniably first party.

I don't think I've ever seen someone really give credit to Dragonlance.

The FAQ is usually stupid :smalltongue:

Dragonlance is only used in a subset of campaign worlds, but it is a very cool setting.

The FAQ is considered by some as second tier at best. There are instances where the FAQ blatantly contradicted itself and the rules as written (RAW). While the FAQ was published in dragon, the rumor was that the writers generally didn't spend as much time on it as the regular dragon articles.

I've always used the FAQ as one person's interpretation of how to apply the rules. Its good if you want to get a 3rd party's perspective, but I don't consider it as binding as the Player's Handbook.

[Telonius]

Here's my general list on "official-ness."

Officially D&D: The published books and online errata/other content.
(Subheading) Officially D&D, but not for use with every campaign: setting-specific material; optional rules listed in various rulebooks and (especially) Unearthed Arcana; subsystems like Incarnum, Psionics, Tome of Battle, etc
(Subheading) Officially D&D, but not actually maintained by WotC: d20srd.org. Contains all of the OGL materials, conveniently linked and searchable.
Semi-officially D&D, high end: Dragon Magazine and similar. Published under WotC auspices, but not an official rulebook. I think of it as "Homebrew Plus."
Semi-officially D&D, low end: The WotC FAQ. I read it as "one DM's rulings," but the DM happens to be a WotC employee and it's published on a site WotC owns. I'd mainly use it if there were a rules question where getting the designers' intent is important.
Not officially D&D, high end: designers' personal blogs and websites. Something they've published that isn't under WotC license, but it can help give background to certain design decisions.
Not officially D&D, low end: third-party products, Giant in the Playground (and other similar though less awesome) forums. WotC has nothing to do with this stuff.
Not officially D&D, abandon hope ye who enter here: dandwiki. Like a roaming demon hoping to ensnare the unwary, this site engages in an elaborate masquerade, tricking the reader into believing it's an official product. By the time the hapless soul realizes their mistake, it's far too late.

Note that this is only for "official-ness," not quality. There are third-party books and homebrews that are awesome, just as there are things in the PHB that are horrible.

[Bronk]

This came up on the Q&A thread here:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=18607822&postcount=90

[Chronos]

Whatever Dragon Magazine Compendium is, it's definitely not second party. Second party is the houserules you and your group made up for use around your table. If you publish your houserules, then they're third party.

[VisitingDaGulag]

I understand your confusion. If you limit your search to around here then you are out of luck (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=3007.0). Save a handful, the people to ask are all banned (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=10871.0). You may want to try legitimate questions somewhere more tolerant.

[ezkajii]

What about Planescape, Spelljammer, Ravensloft? Are those official?

Also, for fun: If WotC released a list of what material was considered officially endorsed 3.5-legal material (not that they ever would), would the community accept that list itself as official? Or would it be pointless to even do so?

[Flickerdart]

What about Planescape, Spelljammer, Ravensloft? Are those official?
Those are settings, not books.

[ezkajii]

Yes, I know, I was wondering if they're considered official campaign settings.

[Curmudgeon]

Semi-officially D&D, low end: The WotC FAQ. I read it as "one DM's rulings," but the DM happens to be a WotC employee and it's published on a site WotC owns.
"Semi-official" is exactly right for the Frequently Asked Questions document. The questions, selected from thousands of submissions to illustrate particular D&D rules issues, are official. The answers are just the work product of whoever happened to be manning the Sage desk that week, and not declared to be official.

[Thurbane]

How do the "Rules of the Game" articles fit in?

[Curmudgeon]

How do the "Rules of the Game" articles fit in?
They're like the FAQ, except without the official questions; it was the same guy — Skip Williams — writing both the RotG articles and FAQ answers at the time. Note that Skip often doesn't distinguish between rules as written and his house rules in the Rules of the Game articles.

[ezkajii]

The answers are just the work product of whoever happened to be manning the Sage desk that week, and not declared to be official.

That's one thing I was confused about, because that was my understanding, but looking at the segment for the FAQ in each Dragon Magazine issue there's a big stamp saying 'official answers' or something like that.

[Thurbane]

Unfortunately, it's pretty hard to get a consensus on exactly what is and isn't "official" - everyone has their own bias on the subject.

[Curmudgeon]

That's one thing I was confused about, because that was my understanding, but looking at the segment for the FAQ in each Dragon Magazine issue there's a big stamp saying 'official answers' or something like that.
The column was "Sage Advice", and generally had a subheading of "Official Answers to Your Questions". Note that the answers were official, but the questions were not so labeled. :smallconfused: Also, those were Paizo Publishing official answers, not WotC.

[lsfreak]

Since the question of personal opinions was raised, Dragon Mag may be more official, but I'd rather blanket-allow certain people's homebrew (The Demented One, The Vorpal Tribble, and Fax's non-d20r stuff, for examples) and treat Dragon Mag as dandwiki-quality garbage until proven otherwise.

[Renen]

Except dragon only has a select few things that are really broken. Most broken stuff comes in the form of magical candles that summon you wish granting outsiders.
Meanwhile dragon mag has low LA templates that give high STR Ohhhh... scaaaaaaaaaary

[Psyren]

Except dragon only has a select few things that are really broken. Most broken stuff comes in the form of magical candles that summon you wish granting outsiders.
Meanwhile dragon mag has low LA templates that give high STR Ohhhh... scaaaaaaaaaary

It's less that DragMag is broken, and more that other than the minority of obviously broken stuff within it, very little in it gets the exposure to the community needed to really kick the tires and identify any problematic combos or interactions. In that respect, even well-known homebrew like the ones lsfreak listed is easier to evaluate.

Dragon ends up tainted by association because the folks hunting for power are the ones most likely to comb through every page, and so the unbalanced stuff is more likely to be surfaced as a result. So when a DM hears "Dragon Magazine" they immediately think of poorly play-tested things like Easy Metamagic, Alternative Source Spell, Extra Familiar, Faerie Mysteries Initiate, if they think of anything beyond the hearsay at all.

[Renen]

Yeh... :-(

[lsfreak]

Broken goes both ways, too, though. While it's the powerful stuff that gets most of the attention from Dragon, much of what (granted, little) I've seen of Dragon stuff searching on my own ranges from a bit limited to Toughness-level underpowered. Solid options that are neither too powerful nor too underpowered are in the minority. The official sources have lots of handbooks and the like that help sift through the extremes, but with Dragon I'd rather just direct players to something I know is going to be useful.

[atemu1234]

It's less that DragMag is broken, and more that other than the minority of obviously broken stuff within it, very little in it gets the exposure to the community needed to really kick the tires and identify any problematic combos or interactions. In that respect, even well-known homebrew like the ones lsfreak listed is easier to evaluate.

Dragon ends up tainted by association because the folks hunting for power are the ones most likely to comb through every page, and so the unbalanced stuff is more likely to be surfaced as a result. So when a DM hears "Dragon Magazine" they immediately think of poorly play-tested things like Easy Metamagic, Alternative Source Spell, Extra Familiar, Faerie Mysteries Initiate, if they think of anything beyond the hearsay at all.

Don't forget the templates.