And the question is... What is canon? I keep seeing this word pop up in forums and I still don't know fully what it is. I'm not a solid newbie when it comes to roleplay, Forgotten Realms, AD&D, etc. Just not familiar with canon....

thanks

Dreh

Canon is anything that is known to be part of the standard 'campaign'. Right now there are two 'campaigns', or 'states of the world', known as Forgotten Realms and Ebberon (I think). Each campaign has a different history and set of things that makes that 'realm' unique.

Canon referrs to the commonly accepted 'state' of whichever campaign a given adventure is taking place. Treat anything 'canon' as 'real'.

EfU is NON-canon, meaning that the city of Sanctuary, does NOT appear in texts, monster manuals, realm guides and so on. Essentially it's a fictional town, if you considered the published texts as the 'real' world.

Events/Players/histories in this Non-canon server can refer to canon events/places/people, but not the referse.

((if I said anything wrong, please someone correct me before it's taken as gospel))

Canon means that it is true to the setting, in this example Forgotten Realms. If a server is non-canon, it means that it has been altered, and not everything in the game is exactly like in the original sourcebooks. 'In canon' or 'canonwise' means 'in the sourcebooks'.

Hope that made any sense to you.

What LoQi said......

Dictionary.com Canon –noun

1. an ecclesiastical rule or law enacted by a council or other competent authority and, in the Roman Catholic Church, approved by the pope. 2. the body of ecclesiastical law. 3. the body of rules, principles, or standards accepted as axiomatic and universally binding in a field of study or art: the neoclassical canon. 4. a fundamental principle or general rule: the canons of good behavior. 5. a standard; criterion: the canons of taste. 6. the books of the Bible recognized by any Christian church as genuine and inspired. 7. any officially recognized set of sacred books. 8. any comprehensive list of books within a field. 9. the works of an author that have been accepted as authentic: There are 37 plays in the Shakespeare canon. Compare apocrypha (def. 3). 10. a catalog or list, as of the saints acknowledged by the Church.

Definitions 3 and 8 are the most relevant to our server and setting.

The term comes up most often on these forums when speaking about religion, deities, and rules. For example, our pantheon of gods is almost entirely taken from the Forgotten Realms sourcebooks (canon), with a few minor changes and additions (non-canon).

While our setting is non-canon, the world it is set inside is canon, because it is from the official Dungeons and Dragons setting, The Forgotten Realms.

To give a non-D&D example: The Christian Bible contains certain key books, considered to be canon because they were agreed upon by a council during the formation of the Christian Church (Genesis, The Gospel of Matthew). But there are other books and texts linked to Christianity and Christian ideas, even whole gospels, which are not recognized officially but still read. These are non-canonical texts and gospels (The Infancy Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Mary).

djspectre Canon is anything that is known to be part of the standard 'campaign'. Right now there are two 'campaigns', or 'states of the world', known as Forgotten Realms and Ebberon (I think). Each campaign has a different history and set of things that makes that 'realm' unique.

((if I said anything wrong, please someone correct me before it's taken as gospel))

Hmm... Yeah. I think you're a bit confused there. There are a lot more settings (not campaigns. campaigns are single games run for what is usually a single party that follow a single storyline within a setting, not like PWs such as EfU) than just the Forgotten Realms and Ebberon. But the Forgotten Realms is the one NWN is based in (Neverwinter being a City in canon material). It is also the one EfU is based in, though a lot of the stuff has been changed or created as original material.

As Song of Orpheus has said, this server is a mixture of both. If you're unsure what is canon and what isn't in this module, just ask.

Ah, I got what you all are saying and it's clear. I just wanted to make sure I understood everything. Thanks!

Dreh

Song of Orpheus To give a non-D&D example: The Christian Bible contains certain key books, considered to be canon because they were agreed upon by a council during the formation of the Christian Church (Genesis, The Gospel of Matthew). But there are other books and texts linked to Christianity and Christian ideas, even whole gospels, which are not recognized officially but still read. These are non-canonical texts and gospels (The Infancy Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Mary).

I have a better example: The Star Wars movies is canon, since it is the original manuscript written by George Lucas. There are a lot of fan-fiction, however, played in the Star Wars setting, but not in any way accepted as official material. These are non-canon.

non-canon=fictional canon=real. i think this topic in cluded misc information. but then i learned something new

Thomas_Not_very_wise non-canon=fictional canon=real.

That's not really accurate. In the case of a fictional setting, the difference is in whether something is officially accepted within the setting, since both canon and non-canon material is fictional.