One of my favorite aspects of the Druid Cycle campaign world -- second only to keeping in touch with some of my oldest and dearest friends -- is the rich narrative history that we've created over the past 19 years. However, some of that history jumped out and smacked me in the face the other day.
It all started when I got a call from Tim B, who expressed interest in resurrecting (literally and figuratively) his character from a storyline called The Castellan's Journal (see my recent post chronicling the history of the major Druid Cycle story arcs), which we started about ten years ago. This adventure lasted for parts of three years and was conducted online in a private chat room. The storyline focused on a powerful magical artifact (the aforementioned journal) and the heroes' efforts to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. Although this adventure ended in 2004, I've always considered the journal to be one of the iconic magic items of the Druid Cycle world. With Tim B about to return to his old character, I thought it would be ideal to bring back this fabled book for another go-around. I managed to dig up my notes from that earlier adventure, including the summaries I had written of each game session. It was there that I discovered a potentially show-stopping problem.
The Castellan's Journal no longer existed.
Gulp. It was right there in black and white: Rather than allow their enemies to obtain the book, the heroes elected to destroy it using a sphere of annihilation. How could I have forgotten that?
The major continuity problem resulting from this discovery is that the book has made some appearances in Druid Cycle adventures over the past few years. Player characters have held it and studied it. At least one player knows its current location. On top of all that, I still want to use the book as the focal point for the return of Tim B's character.
What can be done? I think the only remedy is a retcon worthy of that other great DC -- not the Druid Cycle, but DC Comics. Their tangled, contradictory storylines are the stuff of legend, and each successive attempt to correct the problems only ends up adding more layers of complexity. (My beloved Hawkman has endured more than any other superhero in that respect.) But despite the decades of retcons, we keep coming back to the DC Universe because they're telling great stories about characters we love.
So...here's my retcon: The heroes of yesteryear fully intended to destroy the Castellan's Journal, but it turns out that the sphere of annihilation was a ruse -- it was actually a portal that transported the book to the clutches of the dragon-lord Ironside, who held it for a time until his home was destroyed during the recent Quintessence Rifts story arc. From that point, the book's travels are just as they have played out in the campaign.
There you have it. Is it perfect? No, but it doesn't have to be. I have big plans for that book and for Tim B's old character. As much as I respect and cherish the history that we've forged in past adventures, I'm not going to let a nearly-forgotten episode bog us down.
Retcon...and move on!
Meh...if this is the biggest and worst thing that's happened in the DC world that goes counter to what really happened...then I think it's just fine! Your plan to fix it is good...and makes sense. Even if I was one of the characters that wanted it destroyed in the first place...hehe.
ReplyDeleteIf I remember correctly, we shoved the Journal into the "Astral Stone" in a dragon cave. It took me a while to remember the Journal from that time because once that happened, it was good as gone and we had plenty more stuff going on afterwards. Here's my variant plot offering:
ReplyDeleteThe "Astral Stone" was a bit more literal in its name than had been considered...while appearing to function as a sphere of annihiliation, it actually transported the Journal (and whatever else had come into contact with it) into some distant eddy of the Astral Sea. It would've remained there lost & forgotten for all time if it weren't for those Quintessence Rifts, which managed to drop the abandoned Journal back into reality somewhere. Alternately, if the Journal appeared before the Rifts, maybe it was brought back to reality by some precursor instabilities that led up to the full-blown Rift events; or in a different twist, perhaps some ambitious arcanist (or whoever) somehow managed to breach the barriers between planes just to grab the Journal and inadvertently *cause* instabilities that climaxed with the Quintessence Rifts.
Not that you have to use these ideas, but when we brought up bringing back my character because of the Journal, I was confused by A)initally not remembering said Journal, and later B)remembering that we *had* possessed said Journal until dumping it in the Astral Stone. Since we hadn't discussed the Journal plot since then, the above ideas were among the options of what I figured the plotline was going to be.