Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

Jeremy Irons better be in it. :p

Ya know, best Dungeons & Dragons movie wouldn't actually be about modules or any in universe stuff, it would be something like Princess Bribe except group of geeks instead of son and grandpa :P Why? Because that would fit better into the nature of the game.

Actually, it's based on a Gygax module.

You and I know which one it'll be based on. Just a guess.

I hope it's the one where a wizard kidnaps people to make a movie about them. Because I want to see swords-and-sorcery heroes mix it up with Captain Kirk.

Could be Temple Of Elemental Evil

^^^Thats why I said best D&D movie that would capture spirit of it wouldn't just be adapting the module into a movie

Well, I always thought they could adapt a book or two.
Set in the Forgotten Realms.
With-
Screw it, I'm talking about Drizzt.

edited 8th May '13 9:56:15 AM by Zeromaeus

Looks like we're back out of Development Hell. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is in production with Paramount, with a release date of March 3, 2023.

Almost a full ten years after this thread was started.

I've seen a lot of 'they should write it to be about people actually playing the game' today, so it's kind of funny to see people saying the same thing a devade ago. Also, time isn't real.

I'd rather see it based on the '80's cartoon, myself. That iteration already has the "regular people in a magical world" bit going on, plus the use of magical weaponry, nods to character classes, a Dungeon Master, etc.

Really, if you don't include a nod to those elements, all you've got is a standard-issue fantasy project.

That last line is what I've felt for years.

What separates Dn D from atypical fantasy genre works is the improve collaborative storytelling between a group of people.

Plus it's just kinda fun as an actor to play a nerd at a table and then be the badass warrior they want to be. Or play jokes about spell slots or Crit 1s vs Nat 20s and how those can derail the plot for better or worse.

Make it fun.

I think it's why A LOT of people really loved The Gamers 2 as a movie. Does it have cheap amature budget and iffy audio quality? Sure. But they're having fun and know how to mock but enjoy this game we're all fans of.

So we just want it to be an isekai? Really? Like, can we not?

Is that not what DND already is?

But yeah I don’t know if going the New Jumanji route is the best way either.

Either way I hope it’s a more faithful adaptation than the first “official” DND movie we got.

I would dig something like The Lego Movie, where the amazing, fantastical adventure the characters are having is an abstraction of wha their players are going through IRL.

I always wanted to see something like a live-action Darths & Droids or DM of the Rings where they actually cast actors well suited for a fantasy epic but then proceed to make the whole story a farce.

I suppose the problem with adding the gaming elements is that at this point it would seem like they were aping Jumanji.

I recall reading that the original pitch for the '80's Dungeons and Dragons cartoon was that it be a bunch of kids playing D'n D in an old theater, with the janitor serving as their DM. They discarded that premise because it was felt there wouldn't be any stakes if the audience knew that the action wasn't real to the characters.

A way to counter that, I guess, as I think Known Unknown suggests, is to have perhaps a double narrative, with one kind of stakes for the "real world" mirrored by fantasy adventure stakes in D'n D world.

Re: Known Unknown: I think in another thread, you suggested something like a Muppet D'n D movie, remarking on how funny it'd be to have, for instance, Ms.Piggy's voice coming out of a Barbarian played by Jason Momoa. Let me say I agree, that'd be hilarious. I wouldn't want it to be the only D'n D movie out there, but I'd really like to see that one get made.

Edited by Robbery on Apr 24th 2022 at 9:48:38 AM

For myself, I think that D&D has specific settings that are distinct enough that an adaptation could stand without a connection to board-gaming or "our world".

Give me a movie set in Baldur's Gate, or the Underdark, or some such, and with recognisable peoples, creatures, spells and abilities, and so on, and I think that it could work.

And, speaking for myself, I think that I'd prefer it that way.

Now that you mention it, I would like see The Film of the Book of The Dark Elf Trilogy.

Or just make an adaptation of an adventure. There's plenty of epic Dungeons and Dragons adventures that could be a good movie.

The best and most insane thing would be to go batshit and have a write a script but invite actors, let them create their own characters and improvise as those characters, then alter the script based their decisions. How to decide which improv ideas remain on the movie? Why, you roll the dice...

I don’t know about their improv skills but the cast at least seems to be charming and at home in speculative fiction.

Do we know anything about this right now besides the title? Is it going to be set in Forgotten Realms or Greyhawk, or the generic "not-Greyhawk but basically the same thing" of 3rd edition?

Honestly, I wish they'd do some Eberron shows in the vein of Arcane. I've been reading Keith Baker's blog, and he's got deep lore on the setting. But this movie definitely isn't that (or Dark Sun or Ravenloft or Spelljammer), because they'd have the campaign setting in the title to make it clearly unique from the more standard settings.

We know essentially nothing about it.

Michelle Rodriguez’s character will probably die though.

I honestly hope that she survives for a change! XD;

That would certainly be an interesting project! I think that it would make for a neat approach.

That's not what I said though.

What you're suggesting is that the characters be transported into the game as a Portal Fantasy. That's what an Isekai is.

I am suggesting that the plot be "The characters sit down and play a game". Acknowledge that the characters are players with character sheets and sitting at a table together. Cut between the players at the table and the players dressed as their characters in the game. Have the role player who talks in thees and thous only to switch to normal vernacular when not "In Character" contrasted to the new player who isn't quite used to speaking as a character or the guy who isn't here for the role playing and just wants to do big damage numbers.

You can still have the big action sequences and everything as the players would imagine them in their collective heads but you could make jokes or pull tension on dice rolls.

We've all had badass moments inexplicably interrupted via a bad roll and plans having to dramatically change on the fly. Or the utterly normal chicken that rolls a crit attack on a player.

Or that locked door that was never supposed to be a challenge but we're now 20 rolls into trying to get passed it because everyone keeps flubbing their rolls.

As far as stakes, they can still be as high as you want. Sure, it's a fantasy but as much of one as a movie would be anyway if we're just acknowledging it as a narrative. We can care about the outcomes because the characters/players care about the outcomes.