Dungeons & Dragons: Fell's Five Preview

8/13/2019 Dungeons & Dragons: Fell's Five Preview

1/11


2/11


3/11

DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: FELLS FIVE. JANUARY 2014. FIRST PRINTING. DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, WIZARDS OF THE COAST, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the USA and other countries.Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. All associated characters and character names are property of Wizards of the Coast LLC. Used with permission. 2014 Wizards. IDW Publishing, a division of Idea andDesign Works, LLC. Editorial offices: 5080 Santa Fe St., San Diego, CA 92109. The IDW logo is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Any similarities to persons living or dead are purely coincidental. With the exception ofartwork used for review purposes, none of the contents of this publication may be reprinted without the permission of Idea and Design Works, LLC. Printed in Korea.IDW Publishing does not read or accept unsolicited submissions of ideas, stories, or artwork.

Originally published as DUNGEONS & DRAGONS issues #015.

Ted Adams, CEO & PublisherGreg Goldstein, President & COORobbie Robbins, EVP/Sr. Graphic ArtistChris Ryall, Chief Creative Officer/Editor-in-ChiefMatthew Ruzicka, CPA, Chief Financial OfficerAlan Payne, VP of SalesDirk Wood, VP of MarketingLorelei Bunjes, VP of Digital Services

IDW founded by Ted Adams, Alex Garner, Kris Oprisko, and Robbie Robbins

ISBN: 978-1-61377-846-3 17 16 15 14 1 2 3 4

Special thanks to Hasbros Michael Kelly and Ed Lane, and Wizards of the Coasts Jon Schindehette, James Wyatt, Chris Perkins, Liz Schuh, Nathan Stewart, Laura Tommervik, Shelly Mazzanoble,Hilary Ross, and Chris Lindsay.

www.IDWPUBLISHING.com

Become our fan on Facebook facebook.com/idwpublishing

Follow us on Twitter @idwpublishing

Check us out on YouTube youtube.com/idwpublishing

Written by John Rogers

Art by Andrea Di Vito

Colors by Aburtov and Graphikslava

Additional Colors by Andrew Dalhouse

Additional Art by Denis Medri

Horacio Domingues JUANAN

Guido Guidi Vicente Alcazar

Nacho Arranz Andres Ponce

Lettering by Chris MowryShawn Lee Neil Uyetake

Series Edits by Denton J. TiptonJohn Barber

Collection Design by Neil Uyetake

re its

Collection Cover by Wayne Reynolds

Collection Edits by Justin Eisinger

Alonzo Simon


4/11

Introduction

W

hen IDW was nice enough to offer me one of theDungeons & Dragons comics they were launching,

while on the phone for the very first conversation Iscribbled working class heroes on a pad. And so FellsFive was born

Working"

Im fascinated by systems. Your proto-Dungeons &Dragons group travels the world, kills monsters, and takestheir stuff. Im not the inventor of the term murderhobos, but it certainly seems appropriate. But what kindof world, exactly, requires traveling bands of skilledmercenaries? What kind of world has dungeon ruinsreeking of magic and death scattered across the landscape

like deadly reality-bending Easter eggs? And perhaps mostimportantly, what kind of towns spring up in betweenthose cursed places? Whats the economy like? Evensubsistence agriculture requires a thriving trade system(axe heads dont grow on trees, kids), never mind thesprawling stone metropolises that support wizard towersand griffin stables.

Fells Five work for a living. Theyre not speculativespelunkers in exotic ecosystems, slaughtering native lifeforms in order to collect the gold coins left behind byprevious, less-talented adventurers. They act as security,investigators, trouble-shooters, bounty hunters. Their

world has a frontier vibe, a mix of the Old West and theCaribbean during the time of high piracy. Just becausepeople in a world of dragons live surrounded by violencedoesnt mean they want to live in chaos. A stableadventuring party would only be allowed to exist becausethey reliably solve more problems than they cause.Because they work for a living.

This is why these comics detoured into questions ofinfrastructure: why are there so many narrow-corridordungeons (because corridors that can only fit humans aredragon-proof)? How does air move around in anunderground complex? How do you move furniture up

into those high-topped wizard towers? What are theterms of an adventuring partys contract? Adric Fell isnever presented as a tactical genius. Hes just the guy

with the plan. Its often a bad plan, but at least its a plan.Hes a working-man with a sword, not the inspired leaderof armies.

Class"

Farm boy whos secretly the heir to the throne fantasyfiction is very nice to read when youre a misfit 14 yearold and can think, Ah, Im not socially awkward, I justhavent found my magic sword yet. But with age shouldcome the awareness that predestined greatness due tomagical bloodlines is the sort of claptrap real worldempires were built on. The sort of Empires that could onlyfunction by making sure that clever, resourceful yet non-special people didnt rise high enough to threaten thepositions of the random yobs who won the genetic lottery.

No, give me the working class. Liebers Fafhrd and theGray Mouserhalf-drunk and constantly in the wrong

place at the right time. Joe Abercrombies Nine-FingeredLogen, the barbarian too smart for his own good. GlennCooks Black Company, and Ericksons Bridgeburners,First in, last out. A hero who pulls off the impossible

with sweat and smarts and blood, not Daddys magicheirloom. In short, Destiny can go suck an egg.

Adric Fell is a war veteran running on charm and a preciseunderstanding of his capacity for violence. KhalKhalandurrins a poet serving a God for faith and truelove. Varis the elf is a bowman for hire, and TishaSwornheart is daughter of librarians. And Breedelightful, murderous, street-thug Bree. Not a single one

of them has a relative worth two copper pieces, not asingle one with a drop of royal blood in their veins.

Fells Five are scrappers. That means they talk likescrappers. No thees and thous for our group. No epicpoetry tripping off the tongue. Our role-playing adventureparties, in the end, are run by everyday friends who sound

just like we do. Why should our proxies in the fantasyworld sound like weekend theater productions of Camelot?

Heroes.

Anti-heroes are all the rage. But personally, I want my

role-playing game to be where I can fulfill my fantasy, andlets face it, in modern society, one of the most pervasivefantasies isjustice. Our world is unwieldy, a place wherechange comes slowly if at all. So why not let our fantasiesbe fantasies of sacrifice and kindness? Granted, Bree willslit your throat for a hot coffee and a cold coinbut shesa necessary evil in an evil world, not the ringleader. AdricFell and most of his friends are inherently decent folk.Theyre not saints. But youd be damn glad they lived on

your block, in a pinch.

Once we established our world of working class heroes,the truly great insight IDW brought to the table was inpairing Andrea Di Vito with this approach to fantasy,

Andreas got a classic look, a perfect complement to themeta-nature of the Fells Five books. Andreas clean artmade me believe in Adrics world. I believed they existed,they smelled earthy, their clothes were handmade. Ibelieved, thanks to Andrea, in a real world that justhappened to have magic in it. And he can land a joke,

which is crucial. Dungeons & Dragons, after all, is anintensely social game. It's used to tell a wide range ofstories over a wide range of world-types, but if you play ina bunch of groups you find the one common denominatoris laughter. D&D players love to have a good time.

Andrea, IDW, and I really wanted the book to be like thefun adventures of characters that you'd like to game with

every week. We're a pulp book. Pick us up, enjoy the greatfight art, laugh at the banter, and steal tons of ideas for

your own campaign.

Or, hell, if you really like it, maybe you'll try playing thegame if you're not already a player. That would be cool.

John RogersNovember, 2013


5/11

Art by Wayne Reynolds


6/11

CHAPTER


7/11


8/11


9/11


10/11


11/11

Dungeons & Dragons: Fell's Five Preview

Documents

Transcript of Dungeons & Dragons: Fell's Five Preview