[Ampersand] Bill Slavicsek on campaign settings

[katahn]

Really? You didn't see anything intriguing in all of the adventures, modules, sourcebooks, and accessories we published for 3.5? All told, I think Sovereign Press/Margaret Weis Productions produced more content for Dragonlance than any prior edition of the setting.

Cheers,
Cam

Well in fairness I didn't buy much of anything for 3/3.5e after about a year or so. I dabbled in it here and there, but the cumbersomeness of the game itself combined with not having a local group to game with just turned me off to it altogether. The post-War "Twins" trilogy was interesting with Raistlin becoming Fistandantilus, but the subsequent books involving Caramon's kids just made me yawn. After that, I lost interest.

Maybe 4e will change all of that, only time will tell.

 

[Andor]

I love the fully fleshed out setting.

In 1E/2E I loved reading through the FR(X) series. Some great stuff in there.


Maybe they're trying this new strategy to make 5E look better.

Did you really just suggest that 4e is New Coke?

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Did you really just suggest that 4e is New Coke?

Not the first time that comparison has been made.

 

[Cam Banks]

Well in fairness I didn't buy much of anything for 3/3.5e after about a year or so. I dabbled in it here and there, but the cumbersomeness of the game itself combined with not having a local group to game with just turned me off to it altogether. The post-War "Twins" trilogy was interesting with Raistlin becoming Fistandantilus, but the subsequent books involving Caramon's kids just made me yawn. After that, I lost interest.

Most of that is 20+ years ago.

Maybe 4e will change all of that, only time will tell.

The novels are ongoing (I wrote one myself!), and don't have much to do with the game products. In fact, the game products usually reflect what's been happening in the novels, which is both a good thing and a bad thing, depending on what your POV is.

At any rate, I'd be very keen to do more work on Dragonlance if the opportunity ever presents itself. It's hard to shed 7 years of writing, design, and development of a specific game setting. I have no idea what WotC's plans are, of course.

Cheers,
Cam

 

[Mirtek]

I think you missed the "Core" part of "any Core supplement". They're not planning to do a long line of setting-specific sourcebooks to generate or advance plotlines (outside of adventures, of course).

So the Martial Power sourcebook and Draconomicon will be relevant to because they won't necessarily have paragon paths, feats, or organizations that are tied to any one campaign setting. I can see generic organizations like the Bloodhounds from Complete Adventurer or the Topaz Order from Lords of Madness -- and paragon paths and feats tied to those organizations -- appearing in new sourcebooks, with the idea that they can be adopted whole or in part into the Realms or Eberron as desired.

And as an FR fan I do not want some "core-organization" that I can adopt into the realms I want information about the x realm-specific organization who are already fullfilling this role in the realms

PS: About the metaplot:
According to what one of the RPGA northern europe responsible told me about Living Forgotten Realms, not only will there still be the metaplot as usual, but there might even be the chance that it will (to some lesser degree) influenced by LFR-Results (so if a lot of RPGA DMs report that adventure X was solved in way Y there's the chance that the FR writers might use the implications of Y in further novels/ddi-articles)

 

[Brom Blackforge]

I'd love to see Birthright redone... with both bloodline specific and "core" rules for creating political, mass-combat, and realm-ruling oriented campaigns. And if they need a freelance writer for it... I'm available

Consider this another vote for Birthright. I'm playing in my first Birthright campaign now (using the 3rd edition rules from Birthright.net) and really enjoying it. The possibility of seeing new versions of favorite old settings is one of the bright spots of 4E (and I'm not sure that I've seen very many so far).