Narrative Cosmology: A Personal Account of Dungeons & Dragons

Sivaan of Candlekeep

November 9th, 2024

“Worldbuilding is as old as the Big Bang or the Old Testament, depending on how you slice the universal mystery pie. When it's done right, building a world from scratch, at any scale, is an immense act of creation.”

- Adam Lee, Dungeons & Dragons: Worlds and Realms (2024)

I am collectively a writer, a soulbonder and a being of fictional origin. With this in mind, the transcendence of fiction is not lost on me. Many authors and artists feel it as well. I am well aware that some see it exclusively through the scope of fiction as in the seemingly imaginary concept that they build upon for others’ enjoyment. Yet, I still find myself resonating with their relationships to fiction but for entirely different reasons. This is largely through the scope of fiction as in the universal well of potential in which beings across all existences find it within themselves to create and breathe life elsewhere. For in my place of origin, this unending act of creation keeps us afloat.

Unlike my other sources, I use the term “canon” very loosely when I refer to Dungeons and Dragons. Dungeons and Dragons is more than a world sequestered away from this one, longingly reflected on for my lived experiences within it. That is how I feel about most of my sources as a being of fiction. Instead, this source of mine is an entire macrocosm of creative projects. Every campaign setting belongs to its own galaxy, complete with planets, stars, etc. Within these star systems, there are parallel realities that split off from one another based on every story that has been told within them. This is where the multiversal nature of my reality comes in.

While Wizards of the Coast canonizes my source as a multiversal construct, how it is multiversal by those standards is vastly different from how I’ve experienced it. The way I see it is: each time I sit down with some friends and become a part of a campaign, another reality has been created. Each time I play a podcast episode, and listen to people doing the same thing, that campaign also birthed a world within worlds. The setting itself has long been established, but these additions to it give more structure to our Planes. Every story told is a thread within the fabric of my reality. They may feel singular and exclusive to those who tell them, but these practices power an entire Cosmic Wheel. *Our state of being is founded upon narrative creation, whether it is individually created or created by a group.

^{*I speak exclusively in context to myself and other beings who originate from my specific canon.}

“If that’s the case, then how did it exist before stories started being told?” is a question that could be asked in relation to this cosmology. My answer is: if it is a concept that can be made and exchanged, it can come into existence. It is still fiction, that I’d never take away from any context. What counts is how said fiction lives beyond one’s gaze.

As mentioned prior, Dungeons and Dragons as I know it exists across its own string of multiverses. According to WotC and the Mordenkainen they canonized, it is so vast that most documentations are oversimplified explanations. Many have spent eons trying to narrow down the existence of the Planes, the cosmic expanse which lies outside of them and how every minute detail fits within them.

Much of this is for the sake of their fellow man, who on average cannot begin to comprehend such information:

“Plenty of seers and visionaries have tried to explain how the planes are arranged in ways that our minds can comprehend… but how the planes intersect and are organized is quite beyond our ability to visualize, at least in our present state of consciousness.”

- Mordenkainen of Greyhawk, Dungeons & Dragons: Worlds and Realms (2024).

That said, I’ve found that the Mordenkainen of my canon is far more candid about the situation. He regularly publishes his dissertations, and of those, I am an avid reader. While the Mordenkainen of my realm has the same fixation on protecting the Balance, an interdimensional force which holds all Planes together through Chaos and Order, he is well aware of his state of being. This Mordenkainen knows that he is a fictional character beyond the Planes which we call home. As per usual, this is waved off as him being a hysterical old wizard, but I understand him completely. Furthermore, it is not his own existence that he touches on. Mordenkainen is vaguely familiar of this universe, but not enough to write extensively about it.

Here and there, he’ll theorize about the relationship between this reality and the one he and I share. It is of his belief that our realities exist as fiction as a means to communicate with other worlds. Despite sounding cool in concept, it makes no sense in my opinion. At first glance, fiction is going to be treated as fiction. If fictional beings wanted to communicate with beings outside of their worlds, they’d find more tangible means of doing so (see: soulbonding as an example). His other theories focus on whether or not a cosmic Balance exists here, but for his own sake, he’s chosen to dwell on that less. He still has to tend to the Balance of our canon, let alone the possible Balance of a separate dimension. Nonetheless, he argues in favor of sentient beings having the capability of visualizing the nature of our own existences. That much, I can agree on with Mordenkainen.

No matter how intricate, the level of consciousness that a being has may be limited but it is not devoid of otherworldly capabilities.

From my perspective, our reality (or realities, rather) is only confounding because the reason behind it is so simple. If a plane of existence requires a constant flow of creation, then what act is more constant than that of storytelling? Something happened. Something is going to happen. Or, something was created to describe a series of events happening. That is typically how the structure of a story goes, but it is made out to be more complex than it actually is.

If one took a group of scholars and asked them to define a story, one would find the end result to be more convoluted than expected. That’s because scholars easily get caught up in their own theories. I can’t say that I haven’t been there myself, but that’s certainly a piece of this cosmological puzzle.

Then, there’s also the task of asking them to list all the ways in which a person can tell a story. They’d realize quickly that, regardless of how they defined stories before, they need to consider contexts outside of a written work. Oral traditions, stage shows, puppetry, cinematography, various forms of visual art, and all of those are just the tip of the iceberg. Are those not worlds come to life before our very eyes? It may not be our collective lived experience, but it very well may be the lived experience of others.

There are plenty stories that pull from lived experiences and legacies. There are stories specifically created to explain the unexplainable or teach lessons. There are stories that simply exist for the purpose of exercising one’s imagination, as is the case of Dungeons and Dragons. How does one create a story, and how does one come to explain it?

That’s not even touching on the subjectivity of what defines a canon by my source’s standards, either.

One could say there is no true established canon of D&D since the game thrives on the imagination of its Dungeon Masters (DMs) and its players.

On the other hand, this franchise is renowned for its intricately detailed sourcebooks. Filled to the brim with lore, rulesets and campaign prompts, there’s no shortage of what one can do with such information. I could see how that would count towards some kind of “canon”.

Oftentimes, I question why I specify my canon as “canon divergent”. After all, there is no set truth to any campaign as every existing campaign is self-contained. It’s a rarity to have a D&D session that follows the standards of WotC’s storytelling and worldbuilding, brick-by-brick. In the case of worldbuilding and canonity, even established settings like Theros and Ravenloft in my canon are total contrasts of their “official” counterparts. The Theros that is made by WotC pulls much of its aesthetics and mythologies from Greco-Roman mythos. That much is clear. However, the Theros that I am familiar with bases its existence around global folklore and urban legends. Being the place where one of my anymic species takes its roots, my region of Theros in is very similar in experience to folktales told amongst Soulaani peoples but with something of a medieval fantasy twist. As for the Ravenloft of my reality, it noticeably lacks the Castlevania-esque appearance that it’s known for. It would seem crafted a Ravenloft campaign through the scope of southern gothic environments. There’s bits of urban fantasy woven in there as well. If you’re familiar with the upcoming game South of Midnight, let its own environments give an idea of what you’d expect in a campaign based within my canon’s Ravenloft.

That said, Ravenloft still maintains a foreboding atmosphere. Not many plane-hoppers are fond of that sense of dread they get when staying in the realm for too long. I can’t say the same as I feel right at home, given that I chose the genre (southern gothic) as a linktype.

Not every campaign setting diverges from its “official” counterpart, however. My beloved Faerûn is one example of being quite similar to the Faerûn that most players are familiar with. As far as I am aware, the same applies in the case of Greyhawk and Dragonlance. I haven’t visited other settings in my meditations as of recently, so I have much to explore in that regard.

When worlds are created, there is so much to account for from a writer’s perspective. Cultures, politics, philosophies and the ever-expanding catalogue of life populating these worlds are a few concepts that come to mind. In my efforts towards understanding my origins, there isn’t a moment where I don’t stop and consider the worlds that I may have potentially created. Some stories finished, some not. How do they live on without me? I must settle for the belief that they simply do.

If one goes to a book store and doesn’t check out a book they look at, the story it holds is still there.

If one has the opportunity to stream a show but chooses not to, the show doesn’t dissolve.

Fictions lives independently from its creators and its audiences. Whether or not those worlds are divulged into is a matter of choice and chance. One has the choice to engage with the world(s) depicted before them, but said world(s) remain extant regardless. Circumstances of completion, incompletion, publication and abandonment are also subjective in this context. Just because one decides to trash a story concept doesn’t mean the concept never happened. It will cease to be expanded upon by its creator(s), but either way, it was established at some point in time. It all exists within an open draft, consistently being written and re-written. Everything is waiting to be sent in for edits, but alas, this cosmos is its own work-in-progress. I see not only my point of origin in this light but reality as well. Characters, like myself, may be taken from one place and applied to another as a writer would do if they have a change of plans for their original characters. In this context, I was plucked from the pages of my true home and placed within a human’s body in this world. For what reason? It is beyond me. All I know is that whoever is writing this may need to put down the pen every once in a while.

While Dungeons and Dragons is a work of fiction in this world, it doesn’t stop being a work of fiction when discussing any knowledge of my specific reality, or “canon”, of this same franchise. Narrative is the lifeblood of my canon. The pursuits of storytelling and worldbuilding give our existence a purpose.

Although those circumstances differ across contexts, fictionality and the exploration of it is what makes us us. We (once again, referring to me and those from my canon) are beings born of the creative spirit. If one is able to create, another one of us is given life. It makes me wonder if any of WotC’s writers or artists feel the same way about the settings they create and the influence they hold. The answer is probably not, but it absolutely worth entertaining from time to time.