D&D 5E Mearls on other settings

[Zardnaar]

Note, I did mention 2e era settings excluded monks. Greyhawk added monks as soon as monks were added to the game. But, even going from 1e forward, monks were always part of the game and setting. That's not true for any setting that started in 2e. IOW, you're claiming that no monks (as an example) is a defining trait of Dark Sun. Thing is, it's not. It's a defining trait of EVERY 2e setting. Because there were no monks in 2e.

Barbarians are the same. Are you seriously going to try to claim that barbarians don't fit in Dark Sun? Really?

Earlier you mentioned anthropomorphic animal races should be excluded. But, this is a setting with bug people. Anthropomorphic bugs. Considering the strong Egyptian flavor of the setting, I am having a problem thinking that cat people and jackal people wouldn't fit. Never minding that Dark Sun is the setting that gave us Aarokocra as a playable race. Hrm, bird people and bug people are groovy, but cat people are out?

I'd much rather they go the other way. Give us everything that they think could fit into Dark Sun and then let DM's sort out their own campaigns. Don't want war forged in DS? Ok, fair enough, ban Warforged. Make the setting your own. But, it's not groovy to insist that your vision of the setting is the only one that should hit the shelves.

That's certainly bad for WotC.

Bug people are fin but a lot of animals are extinct on Darksun or have been wiped out.

I think they have cats or somethig similar to them but most earth based mammals are gone. No horses, dogs, sheep, goats, Centaurs got wiped out.

So bug people are fine, maybe cat people (They have lions and Kirre), but even by 2E standards DS was not a sandbox play anything you want type race (neither was FR or GH come to think of it).

 

[Zardnaar]

This reminds me of the OTHER thing I hate about some of these thematic settings; the use of theme to club the PCs into submission.

Monks and Barbarians get around bad armor and weapons. THAT IS THE POINT. You know what they call creatures that cannot adapt to their surroundings? Extinct. It makes MORE sense that in a world where armor is poor and monsters are deadly, they'd rely more on things like this. The same thing is usually use in Ravenloft to bludgeon any class feature that might remotely help them fight evil and/or undead; its nerfed to high heaven. (Fun fact, read the weaknesses section of the 3.5 Ravenloft PHB; it literally punished fighters for fighting and wizards for casting light). A setting with airships should FULL of races that can fly; they're naturally suited to thrive in that environment. Ditto a seafaring game and aquatic/water-breathing races.

D&D shouldn't be an endurance test for punishment, its an RPG where the heroes are expected to be better than the common rabble. If the class modeled after Conan the Barbarian is too powerful for the world modeled after Hyperbola, then something has gone off the rails.

Themes are not used to club people into submission.

If everything is allowed then you have no theme.

A theme defines a setting, that was the point of the setting in the 1st place.

The 5E DMG has specifically mentioned excluding things and DS has a lot of things you should exclude.

Monks
Dragonborn
Half Orcs

Its like a low magic world as a theme.Perhaps the spellcasting classes do not exist or you can only multiclass into them via a teacher or the setting has added some rules making magic harder or the classes have been rewritten.

Say you have a Dune RPG game, aliens do not exist and Humans are the only race. Its not here to force you to play humans its there because its the Dune universe.

Parents say no to kids demanding chocolate all the time, there is a reason. FR, Eberron, Nerath, Spelljammer are buffet Darksun is a lamb kofta dish with spiced rice.

You don't go to a Greek restaurant and expect to order a Chicago style pizza.

 

[Yaarel]

Is it my imagination or are Remathilis and Zardnaar moving closer to each other?

Remathilis seems more respectful of the tropes of a setting, and what doesnt really fit. Or at least advocating what would fit well.

Zardnaar seems more flexible about what new things might fit after all.

 

[MechaPilot]

Is it my imagination or are Remathilis and Zardnaar moving closer to each other?

Remathilis seems more respectful of the tropes of a setting, and what doesnt really fit. Or at least advocating what would fit well.

Zardnaar seems more flexible about what new things might fit after all.

Shhh!

Don't spook them, or you may disturb the delicate TTRPG gamer mating dance.

 

[Zardnaar]

Is it my imagination or are Remathilis and Zardnaar moving closer to each other?

Remathilis seems more respectful of the tropes of a setting, and what doesnt really fit. Or at least advocating what would fit well.

Zardnaar seems more flexible about what new things might fit after all.

I never said just because its new it doesn't belong. Any new stuff just has to fit the theme of a setting and generally the original should be the best source if there is a contradiction.

Some of those setting do not want or need 38 archtypes IMHO and if you shoe horn things in you run the risk of ruining the setting or chasing off the fanbase (see 4E FR for a prime example).

 

[Zardnaar]

Is it my imagination or are Remathilis and Zardnaar moving closer to each other?

Remathilis seems more respectful of the tropes of a setting, and what doesnt really fit. Or at least advocating what would fit well.

Zardnaar seems more flexible about what new things might fit after all.

I never said just because its new it doesn't belong. Any new stuff just has to fit the theme of a setting and generally the original should be the best source if there is a contradiction.

Some of those setting do not want or need 38 archtypes IMHO and if you shoe horn things in you run the risk of ruining the setting or chasing off the fanbase (see 4E FR for a prime example).

Some things are borderline (requiring an Athasian sub class at the very least) other things should be out, other things the base class might need a slight tweak (5E Barbarians unarmored defense, 2E Barbarian was fine for DS).

If every setting is the same generic sandbox wanna be why bother converting them, just make an environment book or magitech book or whatever. Whats going to make Krynn different from Greyhawk?

 

[Hussar]

Like I said, it seems a bit off to say, "Well, no animal people" when the baseline setting has bug people and bird people. Oh, and dragon people with Dray. Oh, and winged dinosaur people with Pterrans.

Umm, what's the problem with anthropomorphic-races again?

Look, I totally get wanting to take a setting and mold the game around that setting. I'm doing that right now. My Primeval Thule campaign has all sorts of major restrictions - no full casters, 4 playable races, just to name a couple. Great, fantastic. make the setting stand out. BUT, don't expect the publisher to do that. That's totally unrealistic. No publisher is going to cut off their own nose to spite their face. If they publish a restricted setting like you want, no one will buy it.

And certainly no one will buy later supplements for that setting. Basically, by making a setting that restricted at the outset, you're closing off the setting from far too many potential customers. You slam right into the Gnome Effect. How many people want to play a monk or a barbarian? If it's 10%, then you've just lost half the tables out there, because, out of every two tables, you're pretty much guaranteed to have at least one player who wants to play something that's not on the list.

Who then bitches and complains because they can't get what they want because your vision of the setting doesn't match their's. Never minding that they aren't even playing at your table. So, the DM scraps that idea and goes on to another setting where everyone at the table is happy.

And Dark Sun dies. Same as every other highly restrictive setting. Relegated to backwater niche products that only a handful of people ever buy. No thanks.

 

[Yaarel]

I never said just because its new it doesn't belong. Any new stuff just has to fit the theme of a setting and generally the original should be the best source if there is a contradiction.

Some of those setting do not want or need 38 archtypes IMHO and if you shoe horn things in you run the risk of ruining the setting or chasing off the fanbase (see 4E FR for a prime example).

Some things are borderline (requiring an Athasian sub class at the very least) other things should be out, other things the base class might need a slight tweak (5E Barbarians unarmored defense, 2E Barbarian was fine for DS).

If every setting is the same generic sandbox wanna be why bother converting them, just make an environment book or magitech book or whatever. Whats going to make Krynn different from Greyhawk?

For the record, I tend to lean toward your view about setting design.

A setting should focus on four or five tropes, emphasize two to five races that cohere with those tropes, maybe up to eight, and ban everything else.

(By ‘ban’ I normally mean ‘soft ban’: rare or unknown, but might exist somewhere else, as an alternate setting in the periphery. Sometimes the contrast between the central setting versus a peripheral setting can be interesting.)

If a player is enthusiastic but has different spin for a character, we can probably figure out a way to modify the character or the setting, while maintaining setting integrity.

 

[Zardnaar]

Like I said, it seems a bit off to say, "Well, no animal people" when the baseline setting has bug people and bird people. Oh, and dragon people with Dray. Oh, and winged dinosaur people with Pterrans.

Umm, what's the problem with anthropomorphic-races again?

Look, I totally get wanting to take a setting and mold the game around that setting. I'm doing that right now. My Primeval Thule campaign has all sorts of major restrictions - no full casters, 4 playable races, just to name a couple. Great, fantastic. make the setting stand out. BUT, don't expect the publisher to do that. That's totally unrealistic. No publisher is going to cut off their own nose to spite their face. If they publish a restricted setting like you want, no one will buy it.

And certainly no one will buy later supplements for that setting. Basically, by making a setting that restricted at the outset, you're closing off the setting from far too many potential customers. You slam right into the Gnome Effect. How many people want to play a monk or a barbarian? If it's 10%, then you've just lost half the tables out there, because, out of every two tables, you're pretty much guaranteed to have at least one player who wants to play something that's not on the list.

Who then bitches and complains because they can't get what they want because your vision of the setting doesn't match their's. Never minding that they aren't even playing at your table. So, the DM scraps that idea and goes on to another setting where everyone at the table is happy.

And Dark Sun dies. Same as every other highly restrictive setting. Relegated to backwater niche products that only a handful of people ever buy. No thanks.

They were reptilian anthromorphic people, that is fine. The mammal based ones do not really fit, most of the mammals do not exist.

You do not know that people will not buy Dark Sun it made the top 5 list of settings and it was one of the major TSR settings.

Just because it was restrictive doesn't mean it won't sell, maybe its popular because it is different?

The Gnome effect doesn't apply to non core books. Context when Mearls made that comment he was talking about the PHB.

5E was a success and the lack of warlords for example did not hurt it (the Warlord effect).

 

[MechaPilot]

Like I said, it seems a bit off to say, "Well, no animal people" when the baseline setting has bug people and bird people. Oh, and dragon people with Dray. Oh, and winged dinosaur people with Pterrans.

Umm, what's the problem with anthropomorphic-races again?

Look, I totally get wanting to take a setting and mold the game around that setting. I'm doing that right now. My Primeval Thule campaign has all sorts of major restrictions - no full casters, 4 playable races, just to name a couple. Great, fantastic. make the setting stand out.

I agree with all of the above.

BUT, don't expect the publisher to do that. That's totally unrealistic. No publisher is going to cut off their own nose to spite their face. If they publish a restricted setting like you want, no one will buy it.

And now you've lost my support. The publisher absolutely should do that. But, the publisher should also provide helpful advice/options for people to go against the themes of the setting if they choose to.

In general, the book should be written with the restrictions assumed. And then you add in little sidebars or a single section about how to include a thing that's ordinarily restricted if the group wants to.