Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

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Ares
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Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

Post by Ares »

Namely, as part of a series of car commercials in Brazil.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZF51vmLli14

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuoIY1NIEkQ

More commercials are on the way.

From what I understand, the old 80s D&D cartoon was a huge hit in Brazil, to the point they kept re-running over and over. So apparently a car company decided to use the cartoon as part of their advertising.

If not for the relatively crappy state of Western Animation these days, I'm hope this could be used as a platform for new D&D cartoons. A D&D cartoon done with an Avatar: The Last Airbender budget and care? That'd be pretty damn awesome.

I think if I was going to play around with the formula, I'd have it be a continuation of the 80s D&D cartoon, but with a twist. The idea being that the kids of the original cartoon were able to do what Dungeon Master had wanted, which was to redeem Venger and turn him back towards the path of good. The story would take place several decades later in another realm where Venger has to serve as the Dungeon Master. And he actually does a decent job of it, until some great evil rises on the land and he can't directly intervene because of his status as DM. So he takes a page from his father's book and summons some kids from Earth to his Realm, outfits them with magical gear, and use them to help fix the land.

And the kids do indeed defeat the evil. Unfortunately for Venger, he didn't choose quite as well as his dad had, and these kids wind up becoming menaces as great as what they just overthrew. They actively refuse to go home and instead start conquering the realm themselves, with the goal of amassing an army and leading their forces to invade other realms. As before, Venger can't interfere, he can't go to his dad for help, and only has some limited options for what he can do to fix this.

His only real option is to pull another group of kids, ones who watches more closely and makes double sure are the kind of kids that once redeemed him. These kids unfortunately can't get any magic weapons of their own. Instead, he gets them training from masters in certain classes, with a spell cast so that they can learn from their teachers at an accelerated rate. After that, the new kids will have to travel across this realm and other realms, fighting evil, gaining experience, acquiring epic weapons of their own, and growing into heroes who might have a shot against the bad guys. They'd travel to established D&D realms, meet other heroes and villains, and when the time comes, learn what happened to the original D&D kids, leading to a team up between the old and new heroes against the fallen heroes.

I'd also go with less conventional D&D classes, such as Paladin, Monk, Druid, Bard and Sorcerer, so there'd be less overlap when they meet up with the original kids.
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Ares
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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

Post by Ares »

And the official commercial:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC9-bfsNne8
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

Post by FuzzyBoots »

Ares wrote: Mon May 20, 2019 3:10 am I'd also go with less conventional D&D classes, such as Paladin, Monk, Druid, Bard and Sorcerer, so there'd be less overlap when they meet up with the original kids.
Just as a point of order, the original kids were the less conventional classes. Barbarian, Cavalier, and Thief-Acrobat were additions from Dragon magazine, and later made official in Unearthed Arcana, and Ranger was a more rare variant Fighter. Thief and Mage (albeit with Wild Magic), I'll grant you.
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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

Post by RUSCHE »

Ok, that commercial is awesome! maybe will take head and run with the idea. We could only hope.
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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

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FuzzyBoots wrote: Thu May 30, 2019 10:46 am
Ares wrote: Mon May 20, 2019 3:10 am I'd also go with less conventional D&D classes, such as Paladin, Monk, Druid, Bard and Sorcerer, so there'd be less overlap when they meet up with the original kids.
Just as a point of order, the original kids were the less conventional classes. Barbarian, Cavalier, and Thief-Acrobat were additions from Dragon magazine, and later made official in Unearthed Arcana, and Ranger was a more rare variant Fighter. Thief and Mage (albeit with Wild Magic), I'll grant you.
Right, but the classes you mentioned were generally sub-types of existing classes. So Eric was a Fighter, Diana and Sheila were both Thieves, Presto was a Magic User, etc. Hank's Ranger class was made its own class in 2nd Edition, with Bobby's Barbarian class being the really odd man out until 3rd edition.

Generally speaking, save for the lack of a Cleric, the kids adventuring group wasn't that far off of what you could build in D&D at the time. They mostly fit the Fighter/Rogue/Cleric/Wizard breakdown, as has most D&D-style fiction since then. By now, what is a "less conventional D&D class" has changed quite a bit.
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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

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:-P I do find it a bit funny that you mention Paladins since that's been a core class since AD&D. Cavaliers were essentially a secular version of them. Now bards, those were unusual, requiring creating dual-classing. Actually, I'm pretty certain that Monks were core since AD&D as well. You only get older if someone takes the character class of Elf or Dwarf. Druids have been standard since 2E. Sorcerers are basically the new kids on the block, them and Warlocks, having been 3E options.
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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

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FuzzyBoots wrote: Fri May 31, 2019 1:48 pm :-P I do find it a bit funny that you mention Paladins since that's been a core class since AD&D. Cavaliers were essentially a secular version of them. Now bards, those were unusual, requiring creating dual-classing. Actually, I'm pretty certain that Monks were core since AD&D as well. You only get older if someone takes the character class of Elf or Dwarf. Druids have been standard since 2E. Sorcerers are basically the new kids on the block, them and Warlocks, having been 3E options.
You're missing the point. Consistently. I know Monks and Paladins have been a part of D&D since the early editions, with Monks skipping an Edition until being reintroduced in a splat book. Paladins meanwhile varied from being just a different flavor of Fighter to being their own thing with Divine Magic. Druids were just a different flavor of Cleric until they got their own class in later editions as well. Bards were this weird thing where you had to level as a Fighter, then a Rogue, then a Druid before you could even unlock the Bard class.

I'm well aware of my D&D history. Virtually every class mentioned in this thread has been an official core class since at least 3rd edition, with most going back further.

When I'm saying "less conventional", I'm not saying that they're odd outlier classes found in some obscure splatbook. Any of the classes I mentioned can and have been played regularly at a D&D table. They aren't even like the really outlier D&D classes like Duskblade, Dragon Shaman, Psychic Warrior or Swordsage.

What I'm saying is that the classes I mentioned tend to not get featured as much in promotional material for D&D, in the art and in the fiction. Most D&D fiction, with good reason, tends to be built around the Fighter/Mage/Thief/Cleric dynamic, since that was the core of classic D&D and it tends to cover most of the bases. the cartoon actually branched out quite a bit by having a Barbarian and Ranger in the group. I suspect they went with Cavalier over "Fighter" simply because parents groups would not have approved. You almost never see a Monk in D&D art and promotional material, Sturm Brightblade is probably the only D&D Paladin anyone's heard of, and for him, "Paladin" just meant he was a Fighter with a strong code of honor and chivalry.

Essentially, if I used the classes I listed for the cartoon, it would be the first time any of those classes has really appeared in a major way in any D&D fiction outside of the older Dragonlance.
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
- Captain Marvel SHAZAM! : Power of Hope (2000)

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Re: Live Action Dungeon and Dragons to hit TV in an unexpected way . . .

Post by FuzzyBoots »

Ah. I understand now. The cartoon also made the interesting decision of no Cleric, of course, although that was probably a matter of not wanting to appear to be portraying religion in a Saturday Morning cartoon.

Interestingly enough, there was apparently a spike in sales of Unearthed Arcana due to the cartoon, so it was effective in that respect.

*wry grin* Admittedly, most of my sources for this are from the article before, which cited TSR employees who had commentary on the choice of classes.
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