Who is the most famous wizard in D&D?

[Kaelik]

Of course they are. But this is a thread about about Trivial Pursuit Questions.

No, it's a thread about fame. "Who is Barrack Obama" is not a Trivial Pursuit question because it is too obvious. That's the level of fame that Raistlin and Elminster were at when they were at their most famous, and they were at their most famous 15-20 years ago. People who were born before Raistlin's fame are not old enough to drink and very few of the people who learned about Raistlin during the heights of his popularity have died. Expecting Raistlin's recognition to have died in that short a time is like asking random people on the street who Captain Planet is and expecting to universally get blank stares. He's a generational fad, but that generation is still alive and those alive people know much more about him than just his name, which is all they know about Melf, Evard, and Mordenkainen.

1) Trivial Pursuit questions about entertainment work entirely on the principle that people forget things. Like 100% of Dragonlance. Because no one remembers that, not even the people arguing about it in this thread.

2) Raistlin at his highest point wasn't even close to the recognition you claim.

there's a strong case to be made that those novels have a much greater exposure than tabletop D&D material ever has.

And what does that argument look like?

"I REALLY WANT TO PRETEND THAT RAISTLIN IS FAMOUS!"

[Voss]

Of course they are. But this is a thread about about Trivial Pursuit Questions.

No, it's a thread about fame. "Who is Barrack Obama" is not a Trivial Pursuit question because it is too obvious. That's the level of fame that Raistlin and Elminster were at when they were at their most famous, and they were at their most famous 15-20 years ago. People who were born before Raistlin's fame are not old enough to drink and very few of the people who learned about Raistlin during the heights of his popularity have died. Expecting Raistlin's recognition to have died in that short a time is like asking random people on the street who Captain Planet is and expecting to universally get blank stares. He's a generational fad, but that generation is still alive and those alive people know much more about him than just his name, which is all they know about Melf, Evard, and Mordenkainen.

No. They were at their 'most famous' almost thirty years ago, when those books came out and actually flirted with the best seller lists. 20 years ago, the property was buried (5th Age). 15 years ago the property was briefly rezzed and then buried again (2nd Generation and the gods abandoning the world again because Chaos. Which notably didn't feature Raistlin in any significant way, mostly just the other characters' bastard offspring).

It's the perfect thing for Trivial Pursuit questions because you have to be in the niche demographic at all to have any real memory of it, and most people who cared at the time can't be arsed to remember.

[erik]

Before this thread, essentially all I knew about Raistlin was that it is some canon D&D wizard based upon someone's character who role played that he was frail/chronically ill because he had an average constitution. I didn't even know he was from Dragon Lance. I would literally have rated Jim Darkmagic as more famous. Heck, I'm still semi-serious about that even.

Now, I'm more familiar with the Greyhawk and Faerun wizards since I bought/read the FR campaign setting books, played LG, read the Greyhawk gazeteer, and followed D&D minis so I know what Mordenkainen is supposed to look like.

Sort of.

I will change my answer from Jim Darkmagic to Mialee. There's more pictures of her and appearances in D&D tabletop books than any wizard I can think of, even fucking Bargle, that rat bastard.

[JonSetanta]

I had to Google Bargle....

[Chamomile]

No. They were at their 'most famous' almost thirty years ago, when those books came out and actually flirted with the best seller lists.

Backlog matters a lot more than the sales of a single book in overall revenue and especially in building familiarity, but we don't even need to argue about that, because we're talking about 25-30 years ago. Are you going to try and convince me that most of the people who read Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms 25-30 years ago are now dead? Because you don't seem to be arguing with me about their being much more famous than anything from Greyhawk at their peak.

[Judging__Eagle]

Almost like descriptions of the physical characteristics of people who are literary figures who's primary characteristic is using magic powers to alter reality isn't the best metric of anything.

Especially seeing as how their "common" form is probably their most magiced up form possible, and their real form is almost never visible when they're not at the limits of their magical abilities.

e.g.: The scene in "(War) Wizards" (1977), the only time when Avatar's form is ever revealed to be anything other than a comical seeming characterization of a wizard.

https://youtu.be/hNkuj3mS5Cg?t=974

Even when he's freezing to death; he's spelled up to remain a comical wizard; when he finally confronts his evil twin brother and shows him the one spell his mother didn't teach Blackwolf (i.e. a gun); cases when he's not tapping into his magic at all, he remains a comical little wizard.

[Mechalich]

And what does that argument look like?

No. The argument is that Raistlin is the most memorable character from Dragonlance - which is probably true. I mean who's next? Tanis Half-Elven? Tasslehoff? And that the number of people who read any Dragonlance book that Raistlin was in (the original Chronicles trilogy, the Legends trilogy, Dragons of Summer Flame, and a couple of obscure ones) is greater than the number of people who played D&D with enough regularity that they remember anything about it at all.

There are plenty of people, probably millions even, who read Dragonlance novels without ever playing D&D. Even today the Dragonlance chronicles come up regularly if you search for high fantasy or epic fantasy. Dragonlance and FR are both top 50 fantasy universes (which is not a quality judgment, so is fucking Twilight). Notoriety is difficult to measure with any sort of precision, but I don't think it's a completely unreasonable claim, especially given that the Dragonlance novel line continued for 10 years with hardly gaming material being produced for it.

I will change my answer from Jim Darkmagic to Mialee. There's more pictures of her and appearances in D&D tabletop books than any wizard I can think of, even fucking Bargle, that rat bastard.

Mialee's an interesting case. She's certainly more famous than Evard or Bigby - pretty much everyone who cracked open a 3e core book would know who she is, and that's pretty much the high water mark of D&D tabletop fame.

I think you could go with Mialee as the most famous tabletop source wizard, Elminster or Raistlin as the most famous D&D novel wizard, and whichever BG wizard you think is most notable as the most famous multimedia D&D wizard. Once you line that up its just a matter of the relative popularity of the various categories.

[Kaelik]

There are plenty of people, probably millions even, who read Dragonlance novels without ever playing D&D.

If there are 1000 people in the entire world who meet that standard, I would be surprised.

Again, I get that you personally live in a delusion where Dragonlance was the most popular thing ever written, but back in reality, the 3e PHB probably outsold any single book, and probably has 100% overlap with dragonlance readers.

[souran]

I have to second Voss on this, I used to chill in Barns and Noble on my lunch break when I worked over the summer during high school. I used to live in the fantasy section of libraries. I still checked out books from the library and bought physical books until like, 3 years ago? I read the first three Mistborn books and Alloy of Law before I owned a Kindle. That's fucking recent. I never saw a Dragonlance books in any book store or in any library in my life.

Kaelik you must live at the ass end of a bullshit state because I live in the suburbs of a bullshit state and every non-used bookstore I have ever been too going back 25 years and to when waldenbooks was a major book retailer has carried an 6-8ft. wide bookshelf stocked full of bullshit D&D novels. My fucking high school had dragonlance books in its fantasy literature section. Fuck I still see craploads of D&D novels at airport bookstores too.

Dragonlance isn't a big fucking deal. People like shit, sure, but that doesn't mean any shit you can think of has a following still.

Also for what it is worth, I can't describe Evard or Mordenkienen, but I read like, 3-4 Eliminster books and I can't describe him either. Almost like descriptions of the physical characteristics of people who are literary figures who's primary characteristic is using magic powers to alter reality isn't the best metric of anything.

If you read 3-4 Eliminster books and can't descibe his motivations, personality, goals, and yes some aspect of his physical appearance then you need to improve your reading comprehension or Ed Greenwood is a shittier writer than even I would have guessed.

I also think that your whole comment above proves the fucking point. What you know about Raistlin is that he started as red robes, and moved to black. Presumably you also remember a little bit about what that fucking means?
Now, by comparison, what do you know about Biby's adventures? How many fucking people do you know who could tell you if Evard and Mordenkainen and Otlieuk are good guys or bad guys?

However, this whole thing is starting to sound like an argument about who is the most famous of the following 3 Jedi: Kyle Kartan, Mara Jade, or Galen Malek.

There are people who say its clearly Mara Jade because she has the most novels. Others say Kyle Kartan because the dark forces video games reached a wider audience than books that only appealed to a subset of star wars fans anyway, and people who will argue that it has to be Galen Malek because he is in something that the newest.

Obviously, most Starwars fans don't know who the fuck these characters are. Similarly, only a small fraction of D&D players could name any wizard except Rockstaff the Solid, the wizard they currently play in their active game.

[souran]

There are plenty of people, probably millions even, who read Dragonlance novels without ever playing D&D.

If there are 1000 people in the entire world who meet that standard, I would be surprised.

Again, I get that you personally live in a delusion where Dragonlance was the most popular thing ever written, but back in reality, the 3e PHB probably outsold any single book, and probably has 100% overlap with dragonlance readers.

On this you are just wrong. The novels have wider distribution than the game. I am no doubt far from special and could probably come up with a quarter of a hundred people who have read a roleplaying novel and never played. There are at least as many people who come to D&D as novels - to -game as there are people who start reading the novels after they begin playing the game.

[JonSetanta]

If there are 1000 people in the entire world who meet that standard, I would be surprised.

I don't know where you live, but it most likely resembles a small sealed box.

[Kaelik]

Kaelik you must live at the ass end of a bullshit state because I live in the suburbs of a bullshit state and every non-used bookstore I have ever been too going back 25 years and to when waldenbooks was a major book retailer has carried an 6-8ft. wide bookshelf stocked full of bullshit D&D novels. My fucking high school had dragonlance books in its fantasy literature section. Fuck I still see craploads of D&D novels at airport bookstores too.

D&D =/= Dragonlance. I've seen Drizzit plenty in the last 15 years. Just no Dragonlance. Because one of those stopped being a thing anyone gave a shit about before 3e D&D even released.

If you read 3-4 Eliminster books and can't descibe his motivations, personality, goals, and yes some aspect of his physical appearance then you need to improve your reading comprehension or Ed Greenwood is a shittier writer than even I would have guessed.

Look dumbfuck, all you had to do was read the very next sentence to know that when I responded to the person who was talking about physical appearance. I can tell you about other things, but for fucks sake, why on earth would I remember a single thing about the physical appearance of a character in some shitty books I read 15 years ago when I was 14, that weren't even that good. Maybe you have perfect memory, but then again, I've read your posts on TGD, so I know you don't, and you don't remember the physical descriptions of characters from books you read 15 years ago either.

Now, by comparison, what do you know about Biby's adventures? How many fucking people do you know who could tell you if Evard and Mordenkainen and Otlieuk are good guys or bad guys?

You seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of the point. While of course, I know way the fuck more about Greyhawk Wizards, because I was arguing about basic/1e modules with someone a month ago, but that isn't the point.

The point is that if "there once was a Wizard named Raistlin. He wore colored robes like every other Wizard in Dragonlance" counts as knowledge of Raistlin for famous purposes, then "There once was a Wizard named Evard, he made a spiky tentacles spell" counts just as much for Evard and Evard wins because more people know that second thing, and if neither of those count, than fuck all no one knows anything about either of them and the order goes:

Imoen, Irenicus, Mailee, Eliminster, Jim Bob Cooter, then Raistlin.

On this you are just wrong. The novels have wider distribution than the game. I am no doubt far from special and could probably come up with a quarter of a hundred people who have read a roleplaying novel and never played. There are at least as many people who come to D&D as novels - to -game as there are people who start reading the novels after they begin playing the game.

D&D novels =/= Dragonlance.

Someone who picked up some damn FR book yesterday might exist.

Someone who picked up Dragonlance 30 years ago, read them, kept reading them, remembers them well enough to remember anything at all about any character, and then just never once in 30 years thought "hey maybe I should look into this D&D thing" is very unlikely. More people have played 3e D&D than have read Dragonlance books, I have no reason to expect that one isn't basically a subset of the other.

[souran]

D&D novels =/= Dragonlance.

Someone who picked up some damn FR book yesterday might exist.

Someone who picked up Dragonlance 30 years ago, read them, kept reading them, remembers them well enough to remember anything at all about any character, and then just never once in 30 years thought "hey maybe I should look into this D&D thing" is very unlikely. More people have played 3e D&D than have read Dragonlance books, I have no reason to expect that one isn't basically a subset of the other.

Kalek you are just factually wrong. There are 190 Dragonlance novels. They fucking started selling novels to sell dragonlance novels. D&D novels ARE fucking dragonlance and a person can go to a bookstore and see that you are wrong. Additionally, the number of people who read fantasy literature is exponentially larger than the number of roleplayers. You are just fucking wrong. There are lots of people who can read a paperback trash novel in an afternoon and those people gooble up all this shit.

Now the things thats obviously stupid about this whole thing is that we are really arguing who the third most well known D&D character is because the first two are so obviously drizzt and eleminister. This whole thing is about as relevant at this point as arguing who is the third most famous Baldwin brother and it only keeps going because the Kaeliks keep saying that they should get to include "Adam Baldwin".

[Kaelik]

D&D novels ARE fucking dragonlance

...

the third most well known D&D character is because the first two are so obviously drizzt and eleminister.

It's like you don't even read the dumb things you type.

Additionally, the number of people who read fantasy literature is exponentially larger than the number of roleplayers.

And now everyone who reads fantasy books is now a Dragonlance reader, there is literally no end to the lengths you will go to to lie about Dragonlance popularity is there?

[Whipstitch]

Overlap hits me as a winning argument if we're truly talking about name recognition and don't care about being a draw--which, honestly, is pretty fair, given the title. I say this because while Raistlin & Dragonlance were the recipients of a nice push in 1987 and sold more merch than Melf or Bigby that push came in the form of Dragon articles and hobby shop standees. That's nice for sales but that's mostly because you drummed up a way to monetize your existing fanbase rather than busting into the broader video game market or whatever.

[Voss]

No. They were at their 'most famous' almost thirty years ago, when those books came out and actually flirted with the best seller lists.

Backlog matters a lot more than the sales of a single book in overall revenue and especially in building familiarity, but we don't even need to argue about that, because we're talking about 25-30 years ago. Are you going to try and convince me that most of the people who read Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms 25-30 years ago are now dead? Because you don't seem to be arguing with me about their being much more famous than anything from Greyhawk at their peak.

Backlog? Backlog doesn't mean shit in the book business, especially for mass market paperbacks, which almost all DL books were. (except the failed reboot 2nd gen shit) Backlog in that case is literally trash- strip the covers and throw the books away, because they aren't worth their shipping costs.

I'm not sure what your obsession with people being dead is, but no, that is not my argument. My argument is people forget trash tier novels from 30 years ago, but remember characters when they have a constant stream of reminders present. Every PH reminds people that bigby and company exist. Nothing reminds people that Raistlin exists, ergo, bigby and company are more famous, because name recognition is continually refreshed.

[deaddmwalking]

This is an unwinnable argument since there is no definitive evidence either way.

Personally, I think Raistlin is up there with famous wizards. I know non-gamers that know him, moreso than Elminster, but among gamers, Mialee is a good choice. It wasn't one I thought of, but as soon as it was mentioned, I realized EVERYBODY that plays knows who she is.

But certainly D&D wizards are not nearly as famous as non-D&D wizards like Gandalf and Harry Potter; not even within an order of magnitude.

[Chamomile]

Backlog? Backlog doesn't mean shit in the book business,

Have you ever in your life been to the fantasy section of a bookstore?

My argument is people forget trash tier novels from 30 years ago,

You're wrong. Mostly you're wrong about how many Dragonlance readers haven't read the books in 30 years, because you think major franchises with over a hundred individual books in them work exactly the same as standalone novels. The first Dragonlance trilogy continued to get reprinted and released in new formats and in new editions and with annotations and so on and so forth up until 2010. The year of original release makes up a plurality of readers compared to any other year, but it is extremely unlikely to make up ten percent of the total readership.

But you're also very importantly wrong about how good people's memories and taste are. Twilight is going to remain in the public memory pretty much to the extent that its first generation of readers remains alive. There isn't likely to be a second generation, but people aren't going to forget Twilight, they're going to die. Raistlin reached significantly fewer people in the first place and has less of an impact on the people who did read him, but the number of people who will actually forget is not even close to being all of them. People liked Raistlin, and they will remember liking Raistlin for most of their lives.

[Kaelik]

You're wrong.

I don't think that proves what you think it does. He literally met Margaret Weis at GenCon, it's not like he was throwing in a Raistlin joke because, hey everyone knows Raistlin and I was just thinking about him. It's literally a story about how he didn't even remember that Dragonlance was a thing, and then accidentally bumped into Margaret Weis and only then remembered that Dragonlance is a thing.

[virgil]

I remember introducing my wife to gaming, and apparently she read a bunch of Dragonlance books about a decade ago and didn't know they had anything to do with D&D.

[Mechalich]

You're wrong.

I don't think that proves what you think it does. He literally met Margaret Weis at GenCon, it's not like he was throwing in a Raistlin joke because, hey everyone knows Raistlin and I was just thinking about him. It's literally a story about how he didn't even remember that Dragonlance was a thing, and then accidentally bumped into Margaret Weis and only then remembered that Dragonlance is a thing.

The more important point is that, in 2016, Penny Arcade fully expects their readers to get that reference. Dragonlance is still a thing that is known in the gamer/nerd/fantasy subculture. It's something a lot of people remember from their teenage years, including younger gamers, because you can still buy the books. Dragons of Autumn Twilight has Kindle sales rank #9,575 today. That's not a fabulous ranking by any means but it's still pretty good. Random point of comparison: Gardens of the Moon - the first book of the Malazan Book of the Fallen is #9,638.

People are still getting into Dragonlance. It's no longer a top-tier franchise in terms of active interest, but it's still around with ongoing sales and making long tail money.

If one was asked to list the most famous wizards in fantasy novels only, Raistlin would actually probably rank pretty darn high. The link Sendaz posted put Weis and Hickman at 34 & 35 on the highest sales list, but many of the authors above them have not produced any noteworthy wizard characters - ex. Sir Authur C. Clarke. If you allowed each author one 'wizard' (as opposed to letting Tolkien have a handful and Robert Jordan a few hundred) Raistlin's up there, top twenty for sure.

[Kaelik]

The more important point is that, in 2016, Penny Arcade fully expects their readers to get that reference.

They also expect their readers to get references to how tough it is being the DM. Or at least, they wrote a comic about that too, so whatever you can prove about "Dragonlance Readers" with a Raistlin reference you can also prove about an apparently equal number of "People have DMed D&D."

[Voss]

Backlog? Backlog doesn't mean shit in the book business,

Have you ever in your life been to the fantasy section of a bookstore?

Yes. Worked in several, decades ago, including shipping, receiving and returns. Spent a lot of time throwing out books that never sold, when the companies' computer systems recalculated which books should even bother to be stocked. A bay of warhammer/magic/D&D novels, less than half shelf of which was Dragonlance novels failed to make an impression beyond 'this shit barely moves after release.'

We were much more likely to throw dragonlance books in the trash than sell them, because that's how paperback returns are processed- the covers are stripped off and returned to the publisher for credit, because it isn't financially worth paying book rate to ship paperbacks back to the publishers' distribution centers.

Fun fact though? Big sets of related books? Don't sell. Large series with lots of words drive the majority of customers away... not that booksales are a healthy industry in the first place.

You're wrong.

You're an idiot. One of the two morons at PA are fanatic slavering fans of anything with dragons in, and work on a comic obsessed with trivial details of nerdy things. They aren't a yardstick for jack/shit, let alone what real people recall.


Also, the current version of Autumn Twilight is 2000.
https://www.amazon.com/Dragons-Autumn-T ... 0786915749

The legends set is 2002
https://www.amazon.com/Dragonlance-Lege ... VVF3D6K5FF

But you're also very importantly wrong about how good people's memories and taste are.

Because you say so? People's tastes are trivially provably shit. You're just about to do it by bringing up Twilight. But you picked the best company for Dragonlance that I can imagine.

Memories? Go fuck yourself. This year has given me the absolutely 'privilege' of seeing the deaths of David Bowie and Prince, and watching people blink and wonder who the fuck they were, and on listening to the short bits on the news, comment on how terrible 'modern music' is. Human memory, especially cultural memory, is absolute rubbish.

Fucking fuck. If you aren't feeding that shit and creating cultural memory for people, it absolutely falls apart. History departments all over the world have been salivating over the 'public history' thing for the last two decades plus for exactly that reason, and there has been a lot of ink spilled and studies done on public memory and why exactly it is so shit, and how best to manipulate it so that people remember things that are 'important.'

Twilight is going to remain in the public memory pretty much to the extent that its first generation of readers remains alive. There isn't likely to be a second generation, but people aren't going to forget Twilight, they're going to die. Raistlin reached significantly fewer people in the first place and has less of an impact on the people who did read him, but the number of people who will actually forget is not even close to being all of them. People liked Raistlin, and they will remember liking Raistlin for most of their lives.

Yay. Shifting goalposts again. That some corner of a corner of a niche might possibly have liked a shitty character isn't under discussion. Neither is the idea that 'everyone' forgets...which was posited by no one.

It is entirely fame and trivial pursuit. Whether or not enough people can successfully recall this irrelevant character from the 80s as a wizard. You'd have more success asking people to name any U.S. President from 1890-1910, and the failure rates for that are already horrible (and something many, many more people are actually exposed to).

but many of the authors above them have not produced any noteworthy wizard characters - ex. Sir Authur C. Clarke. If you allowed each author one 'wizard' (as opposed to letting Tolkien have a handful and Robert Jordan a few hundred) Raistlin's up there, top twenty for sure.

Really? If you stack the deck with sci-fi authors and others that don't write about wizards, and take away wizards in any case where there is more than one, your entirely serious argument is that Raistlin *might* be top twenty? Well. At least you're honest.

[Mechalich]

Really? If you stack the deck with sci-fi authors and others that don't write about wizards, and take away wizards in any case where there is more than one, your entirely serious argument is that Raistlin *might* be top twenty? Well. At least you're honest.

If sales data is used as a source, you have to restrict by author, otherwise you're just listing major Harry Potter characters until you get bored. That's true whether looking at 'wizards' or just all Science Fiction and Fantasy characters.

[Chamomile]

Fun fact though? Big sets of related books? Don't sell.

So the reason why Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms have consistently had entire shelves dedicated to them for entire decades is because of, what, pity?

One of the two morons at PA are fanatic slavering fans of anything with dragons in, and work on a comic obsessed with trivial details of nerdy things.

And thus fabricated an encounter with an author releasing a new book starring the character under discussion? Is Margaret Weis' website announcing the book also part of the conspiracy?

Also, the current version of Autumn Twilight is 2000.
https://www.amazon.com/Dragons-Autumn-T ... 0786915749

Later editions were sold as an omnibus.

This year has given me the absolutely 'privilege' of seeing the deaths of David Bowie and Prince, and watching people blink and wonder who the fuck they were,

Mine had me witnessing the same events and getting that response exclusively from people who were under the age of 20, and not even all of them, because David Bowie was in Labyrinth.

Yay. Shifting goalposts again.

Okay, I'm going to point you to something very subtle that you may have missed.

People liked Raistlin, and they will remember liking Raistlin for most of their lives.

Do you see the second half of the sentence, which connects the statement to the topic of discussion? Evidently you missed it the first time.

Neither is the idea that 'everyone' forgets...which was posited by no one.

Okay, and now I am again going to point you to the actual words that I actually wrote:

the number of people who will actually forget is not even close to being all of them.

You are absolutely and explicitly arguing that people regularly forget about things they consumed growing up, and you are doing this by equivocating between things they consumed and things they had fleeting contact with. People have fleeting contact with Mordenkainen. People read entire books about Raistlin. Mordenkainen needs constant reminders for people to even remember who he is, but Raistlin doesn't. He consumed enough of Dragonlance fans' time that they're no more likely to forget him than to forget the name of their high school. Some number of people will actually forget that, but not nearly all of them. The people who forgot Raistlin didn't like him or didn't care about him. The people who remember Raistlin remember him because they thought he was great (even if they found Dragonlance didn't age well).

You'd have more success asking people to name any U.S. President from 1890-1910, and the failure rates for that are already horrible (and something many, many more people are actually exposed to).

Is this a question about whether or not Raistlin is more famous than Teddy Roosevelt? If I missed that part of the OP, then yeah, I concede, Raistlin has nothing on even B-list historical figures. I was under the impression that this contest was between Raistlin and Bigby (I don't think there's any disagreement about Elminster trumping Raistlin), and Raistlin is better known because the number of people who know even so much as whether he is a good guy or a bad guy is astronomically higher than for any of the Greyhawk wizards.