Lit The NU Continuity Timeline/Source List

Odd that the card would place ROTJ in 3 ABY. Leland Chee has confirmed that ROTJ happens in 4 ABY, and that's been pretty much accepted by most sources. ROTJ can easily be in both 4 ABY and six months after ESB; ESB simply happens late enough in 3 ABY that "six months later" falls into 4 ABY.

Maybe the card is a "misprint", so to speak?

 

Didn't Leland Chee say his tweet was not a timeline, just showing the span of years between between the movies? ROTJ could be almost 4 years after ANH so that it would be in the end of 3 ABY. And what other sources are you talking about? I do not recall hearing of that somewhere else in the new canon.

 

In "most sources" I was including Legends also.

Here's everything Leland actually wrote about the timeline: http://clubjade.net/?p=60118. Vague as he always is, I don't think one should assume Leland meant that by "numbers to convey the span of years between films" that he literally means that exactly three years pass between ANH and TESB, exactly one year passes between TESB and ROTJ, etc. You can't have one year pass between TESB and ROTJ and still have ROTJ happen in 3 ABY. The math doesn't work.

I still think the timeline holds together best when you assume that TESB happens late in 3 ABY, and that ROTJ happens six months after TESB, in 4 ABY. But if you want to place ROTJ in 3 ABY to validate the card, no one's stopping you. You could very well be correct. Either way, though, something won't be consistent. Until we have an actual calendar, we're simply not going to know for sure.

 

The Wedge Antilles (Snowspeeder Pilot) card calls him a "hero of the Rebel Alliance and the New Republic." Unless the Rebellion's turning into the New Republic is a NuCanon thing, I have to wonder how much Legends-specific info made its way into the cards. It's like Galactic Defense calling Boba Fett a Mandalorian though Lucas-via-Filoni said Jango didn't count as one and that Boba only wore the armor because his dad did.

 

So the paperback edition of A New Dawn (as per the preview here) has begun featuring a relative timeline called 'The Story of Star Wars' featuring the adult novels and the films/TV series. And it looks like it confirms placement of Lords of the Sith being before Tarkin, and, more interestingly, it looks to mention a title we haven't seen - Battlefront, in the between ANH/ESB timeline.

Notice that the series Clone Wars and Rebels are mentioned as being different than the novels. I think its likely Battlefront is a specific unannounced novel, perhaps tie-in to the new game, but not the game itself, which covers the entire span of the saga. It would seem strange to list the game in this list anyway. Interesting, none-the-less!

 

Well, that's a fly in the ointment, isn't it? While I guess there's a possibility that the New Republic is a thing in the post-ROTJ canon continuity, it's more likely non-canon info. So does that render the app as a whole non-canon, under the Imperial Handbook rule?

Given that the Story Group is unlikely to offer any clarification, I'm becoming increasingly of the opinion that the mobile apps probably shouldn't be considered canon. There's just too much ambiguity.

 

Lords of the Sith coming before Tarkin is interesting. Based on the excerpts, I thought LotS came after Tarkin. (Both novels refer to Vader's custom Eta-2 fighter, which is destroyed in the LotS excerpt. Looks like Vader got another fighter!)

Maybe Battlefront is the November hardcover?

 

It would make sense in so many ways if someone from the story group would actually communicate with fans and tell them what is and isn't canon. Wookieepedia is too big of a thing for them to ignore. Fans use Wookieepedia; if Wookieepedia makes an assumption on what's canon, fans will take it at face value and believe it.

I'm not saying they should answer every niggling question or post an update every time something new is released, but in general, "We're building a newer and better canon, but it's your job to figure it out" isn't a good strategy.

 

I'm with you there except for when it comes to Commander. So far it's doing a good job presenting a new story with canonically-believable game units (e.g. the Rebels using repurposed CIS tech) without being a "let's combine everything from everywhere" free-for-all with bonus gameplay.

 

But all they'd hear is "giveuslegends".

There was a time when social media didn't exist. I don't remember anyone complaining about a lack of communication.

Or it's just an error.

 

It's not about social media at all. Leland and Sue used to answer fan questions on the sw.com forums back in 2003. Give the story group an official blog, or any one of a dozen other ways that they could do it. There's literally no reason for them to keep it all in the dark.

 

Are you suggesting that I am overanalyzing something that really doesn't stand up to that level of overanalysis? Good sir or madam, I am a Star Wars fan. I do not indulge in that sort of thing.

In seriousness, I agree totally. And given the electronic nature of the "cards" it would actually be a relatively easy error to fix. That's the type of error, though, that just can't help but prompt additional questions about whether the Story Group is reviewing mobile app content or not.

 

Online errors are easy to fix, and hopefully they can be fixed before Wookieepedia creates an article on them that they then have to vote to delete.

 

I think its always hard with games because there is no much personalisation that can be done within them. TFU was a prime example of this and George even specified this in the old levels of canon.

Games like Galactic Defence which is an amalgamation of some of the key battles from the series has to be considered "canon" in that it resembles what we see on screen. In exactly the same way the movie novelizations are "canon" if they match up with what's on screen.

the difference between say GD and the novelizations are purely the dates. GD comes post Disney and therefore additional information would be considered canon, but the main campaign less so as the film would take precedent. It will the same situation with TFA novel. the films canon, plus the extra's in the book. Same with the rebels chapter books by Michael Kogge.

Commander I see as being different and I cant help but feel some clarity is needed. because it is so open-ended either empire or rebellion, its hard to determine which is the right path? the actual elements within the game are they canon? such as empire taking down this base, then the next? its very hard to suggest exactly what is canon?

I don't particually enjoy the game (not my thing) but I think if there ever was clarity it would be a fare more consendesed version of the what the players play.

 

Guys. You're trying too hard here. The individual storylines of the casual mobile games are irrelevent to creating new canon. Completely irrelevent. My understanding is the elements battles/planets/weapons/races/organizations, etc need to be consistent with canon, but the events of the game are not creating new canon, especially where Hero Characters come into play. It's a time-waster, not intended to be an epic part of the Saga. It would be like if they made a Jedi Temple Run, and uberfans tried to use that to sneak out a canonical map of the area.

Lucasfilm may have needed to be more clear in their statements, but only because certain fans parse them to a level of ridiculousness. Use common sense. No, references to old EU stuff in the novelizations aren't magically part of the New Canon. No, we're not learning new things that writers will need to take into consideration in Defense or Commander. If they make a Star Wars Bubble Pop, we won't have to find some way in which this is some in-universe game played by Gran children in the future of the universe.

"Is this game or story designed to add richnessto the saga?" - look at it from what the product can actually offer. Not every game is an immersive storytelling world. Some games are just game mechanics with some Star Wars-ese thrown in to make it a tie-in. Those should be seen/enjoyed or dismissed for what they are.

While we should look to actual developed stories under the Story Group to be consistent, as is their key promise, we come across as whiny and kill-joys when we try to call them out for stuff like not being clear on the status of casual gaming apps. Common sense says 'don't worry about it', until, maybe, you see some author being overly clever by making reference to some line of dialogue only spoke once during a battle in that game. And even then, homage does not need to equal 'everything contained in that one thing being referenced is now canon omg!'.

Common sense, folks.

 

Eh, if it's common sense, it was overridden all the time in the old EU. Like that time a game boy game had Dooku as a final boss, so Dark Rendezvous said that Anakin had killed a clone of Dooku. Things like that are why we're wondering why these casual video games are canon --- because in the old EU they were certainly taken seriously by the powers-that-be. Everything was in until it was out. Is that the case with the new EU? We don't know yet. Nobody's told us. Until they do, we're left wondering. And if Wookieepedia makes an assumption one way or the other, plenty of fans are going to take it as gospel. If you believe it's common sense that these games aren't canon, well, don't expect Wookieepedians to exercise the same kind of common sense.

The internet's going to map out what it believes canon to be, and people are going to take it seriously. If the story group wants to ignore that, it's their choice. Not the one I would make in their shoes.

 

When has common sense ever stopped a discussion like this?

On the one hand, Taalcon, you're obviously correct in that a healthy dose of common sense and measured expectations are required when approaching the subject. On the other hand, you might be a touch too dismissive of the mobile apps. Maybe they're not an Epic Part of the Saga, but maybe they don't need to be Epic to be Part of the Saga and thus worthy of attention.

Take Commander for instance. Commander introduces new characters and actually has a storyline, albeit a fairly loose one. Are you sure it isn't creating new canon? When Lucasfilm tells us that movies, novels, comic books, and games are going to be coordinated to form a cohesive experience, whither Commander?

I don't think anyone's really trying to cram something like Galactic Defense or Star Wars Bubble Pop into canon. God help them if they try. I think we're simply trying to sort out where the boundaries actually lie, and set our expectations accordingly.

 

This is hopefully something the new group will avoid happening. First fault: approving Dooku being an end-boss that you kill. Second Fault: approving a ret-con that reinforced its plausibility without just saying 'hey it's a fun alternate history/what-if story inspired by the clone wars project' within the canon in a sourcebook. third Fault: making direct reference to it in an adult novel, forever granting it legitimacy.

That's the impression I got from Endol, not determining IF the game was canon, but clarity as to what path, so he could know the one true story of the game! For Galactic Defense!

Hopefully Story Group will have learned their lesson, so when someone asks them, rather than finding weird ways to cram them into the story, they can go, "just enjoy the game, and don't look for new story elements in this one. It should be consistent with what you know of the world, but not intended on breaking any new ground. If you kill a hero character we still want to use in our stories, good for you! You've forged your own reality. Don't look for us to continue it or refer to it in the official storyline moving forward." That seems reasonable, and is my default position for games like that.

Yes, I have higher expectations for something like Battlefront, or anything along the lines of a Knights of the Old Republic-style RPG. But not for commander or galactic defense.

But we'll see. My suggestion is not to let it frustrate you, just enjoy, and if it turns out to be canonical, you'll get an extra buzz for knowing the references to it when they're made, and if it was just a fun game, well, then you enjoyed a fun game based on Star Wars elements you like.

 

I wasn't trying to suggest that Galactic Defence itself is canon - perhaps a poor example (its not a new story afterall), but as shown above, Commander is a "new" storyline at least unlike Galactic Defence. there is a clear storyline running through the game which is substantially different if you pick empire or rebellion.

there is a creative element on board, but I would expect there to be a canon path or canon storyline. Even if the eventual story entry on wookiepedia is that in 4ABY this base on tatooine helped the rebellion shore up supplies... (as an example)

As someone who is a huge Resident Evil fan and has invested a good part of my life in timelines with my work on the website Project Umbrella, I know it can be tricky. RE1 and 2 had different storylines depending on who you picked. there was never and you could never play the one true path - it was an amalgamation of all four paths (in RE2).

I don't know if the story group has this sort of plan with commander and with battlefront and how to unpick the story / saga elements that are contained in a generic point and click army game.

 

Additional info at starwars.com!It notes that it is the first in a trilogy of adult novels that partially serves to bridge the gap between VI and VII. Check out the additional details at the link.

Also, from the link:

 

That's a gorgeous cover.

 

Is there any indication on whether any of the fantasy flight games are canon? X-Wing, Imperial Assault, & Armada.

 

They seem to be a mishmash. They appear to get input from Story Group, but also freely draw from Legends material that is out of sync with Story Group Canon (Starkiller, etc). It kind of appears to straddle the line, which, without adding to the canon, allows players to draw from the best of both worlds. Which, for an RPG, I think is an awesome perspective.

 

The hardcover OT novels illustrated by Ian McCaig now have subtitles - not sure if these are part of the Journey to the Force Awakens line or not.

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