Honor Among Thieves’ directors explain where and why they broke the D&D rules

polygon.com:

The triumph of geek culture has had some big, obvious effects, with adaptations of fantasy novels, superhero comics, and video games dominating movies and TV. Less talked about, though very much part of the equation: the rise of geek creators. These days, just drawing on an intellectual property that has a dedicated fandom isn’t enough. If the people behind the scenes aren’t fans themselves, the core audience will notice, and likely rebel. Which is a big part of the reason the movie Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves needed to be made by people who’ve played D&D themselves, and who don’t just know what tabletop gaming feels like, but actually care about it.

John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein — directors of Game Night, and writing partners on projects from Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 to Horrible Bosses to Spider-Man: Homecoming— are D&D fans, and it shows in Honor Among Thieves. The directors and co-writers (working with Michael Gilio, who also has a story credit) tell a pretty standard fantasy story, complete with an evil sorceress, a party of mismatched adventurers on a quest to get a magic item to stop her, and the requisite action sequences along the way. But Honor Among Thieves invests heavily in Wizards of the Coast’s lore and background for its setting, and in actual D&D rules for the parameters of its magic and its characters, right down to their stat blocks. Polygon sat down to talk with Daley and Goldstein about where they followed those rules, where they broke them, and why.

D&D players will certainly notice that Honor Among Thieves steps outside the game’s canon in small ways and significant ones — for instance, the party’s druid, Doric (Sophia Lillis), uses the standard Wild Shape power