D&D 5E Campaign setting strategy: Would a big campaign setting guide followed by regional books be better?

[Corpsetaker]

I didn't want to take over Mercurius' thread so I figured I would start my own here.

With the new Sword Coast Adventures book coming it seems like they are doing campaign settings region by region. Personally I'm not happy with this move because it almost forces people to use the first region, which may not be the DM's favourite, and possibly have to wait years for the region of their choice to come out.

I think it would have been in everyone's best interest if they had done a large campaign guide first which would allow everyone to have a bit of information so they could run their campaigns and then when a regional book eventually comes out, they could use it to gain more in-depth information.

Thoughts?

 

[steeldragons]

This sort of claim always confuses me. We see it related to classes, races, just about anything in the game that doesn't get a great big red "OPTION" stamp over top of it...and sometimes people refuse to acknowledge a topic's optional...-ity[?] even then.

WotC putting out a regional book instead of a full setting at once does not "force" anyone to play or use or do ANYthing with that book or region.

I do agree, organizationally, it seems an odd choice...but does have the benefit of presenting material in smaller, easily digestible (as seems all things in this culture must be now), chunks.

And, you are correct about the waiting (which has also become a cultural taboo these days). But the only way to satisfy everyone would be releasing all regional journals all at the same time...and STILL there will be people upset because they want a different setting entirely or the region/city/NPC/thing they like about a setting best isn't given its "due" in their eyes.

This is the same problem you'll find with a comprehensive single campaign setting prior to regions...people will claim they don't want/like/use the setting that was published and so another two years of releases of specific things within that world are ALL worthless to them...AND/OR you have the FANS of the setting upset because the thoroughness or completeness of their favorite elements are, inevitably, sacrificed (if not cut entirely) for sheer page count.

Bottom line, there is NO satisfying everyone in D&D on ANY possible topic.

And no real, measurable, "better" way to introduce settings/regions. The whole campaign book would have a wider breadth of immediate utility...for those [of us] with the knowledge and skill to fish ideas and/or flesh things out as they choose. Generations of others will lament the books uselessness because it doesn't tell them every minute detail and rule, exactly, as they "need" to conceive something.

So, is the full setting really "better" for the largest number of people? Maybe...Maybe not. I don't see how there is a discernible answer beyond "I like <one way or the other> 'better.'"

I personally, (and am looking at it for my World of Orea) would probably lean toward full setting book first, with smaller -possibly PDF only- gazeteer style things in quick succession to "zoom in" to different regions for details.

 

[S_Dalsgaard]

It isn't that different from when they updated FR to 2nd edition with the Adventures book. That one basically ignored the Sword Coast and concentrated on Cormyr, the Dalelands and the Moonsea. Of course that book was followed by a lot of supplements detailing the rest of the realms, while I wouldn't bet on much else than the Sword Coast book being released this time around.

 

[Corpsetaker]

This sort of claim always confuses me. We see it related to classes, races, just about anything in the game that doesn't get a great big red "OPTION" stamp over top of it...and sometimes people refuse to acknowledge a topic's optional...-ity[?] even then.

WotC putting out a regional book instead of a full setting at once does not "force" anyone to play or use or do ANYthing with that book or region.

I do agree, organizationally, it seems an odd choice...but does have the benefit of presenting material in smaller, easily digestible (as seems all things in this culture must be now), chunks.

And, you are correct about the waiting (which has also become a cultural taboo these days). But the only way to satisfy everyone would be releasing all regional journals all at the same time...and STILL there will be people upset because they want a different setting entirely or the region/city/NPC/thing they like about a setting best isn't given its "due" in their eyes.

This is the same problem you'll find with a comprehensive single campaign setting prior to regions...people will claim they don't want/like/use the setting that was published and so another two years of releases of specific things within that world are ALL worthless to them...AND/OR you have the FANS of the setting upset because the thoroughness or completeness of their favorite elements are, inevitably, sacrificed (if not cut entirely) for sheer page count.

Bottom line, there is NO satisfying everyone in D&D on ANY possible topic.

And no real, measurable, "better" way to introduce settings/regions. The whole campaign book would have a wider breadth of immediate utility...for those [of us] with the knowledge and skill to fish ideas and/or flesh things out as they choose. Generations of others will lament the books uselessness because it doesn't tell them every minute detail and rule, exactly, as they "need" to conceive something.

So, is the full setting really "better" for the largest number of people? Maybe...Maybe not. I don't see how there is a discernible answer beyond "I like <one way or the other> 'better.'"

I personally, (and am looking at it for my World of Orea) would probably lean toward full setting book first, with smaller -possibly PDF only- gazeteer style things in quick succession to "zoom in" to different regions for details.

Well they have already decided that Forgotten Realms is the main setting so we might as well go with that.

I'm not sure I agree with you about a regional book being a tidbit easier to swallow than a large campaign book that pretty much gives an overall synopsis of an area while a regional book goes into more detail.

I say forced because there are a lot of people who do like the Forgotten Realms and who do want to play a campaign in it and so they are forced to use what's there.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Personally... I have found full world books to be good from a top-down instruction of the rules of a particular world, but fairly useless when it comes to actually running a game.

I own the 3E Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book. Fantastic book. Gives me all the flavor of the Realms I could possibly want and reading it was a delight. But I never once ran a game in it because there was like at most two or three pages of information of any one area where a game might be set. As a result... it was only when I picked up the Silver Marches mini-setting book that I thought "Okay! Here now is an area full of people, places, and adventure hooks all together that I can sink my teeth and a party into!" and now run a game in the Realms. I even pushed back the Tyranny of Dragons adventure that I was using into the 3E era just so I could use the Silver Marches softcover as-is.

I've also owned the Eberron Campaign Setting guide when it first came out for 3E and LOVE that setting... but have never run a game there for the same reason. The only mini-setting book they've done for it is Sharn, City of Towers, and I've not wanted to run a city-based campaign. So the ECS sits on my shelf taunting me. But in 4E? The Nentir Vale mini-setting (the DMG, HPE adventures, and Dragon Magazine setting material presented) was a godsend. I ran my players all over that darned place. It was small, it provide a crapload of adventure hooks that the party could easily get to, and was pretty thorough.

So for me personally... having a single area of the Realms described and hooked to set a campaign in is much more useful than a wide overview of every single kingdom across Faerun. Maybe someone else out there really needs to know two paragraphs worth of info of what is happening in Chult or Turmish in 1489... but that stuff is completely wasted on me for a useful campaign.

 

[steeldragons]

I say forced because there are a lot of people who do like the Forgotten Realms and who do want to play a campaign in it and so they are forced to use what's there.

And yet, they are not. D&D is a game of imagination. If they like FR and use FR and know about FR, then what about this release means they "must", then, play in the Sword Coast? They can play in any other area of the FR map they want and just make up details based on what they do know about the FR, in general, OR [preferably, imho] just make stuff up whole cloth!

No one is being "forced" to use anything. The fact people "will" is a given, and one that WotC is obviously banking on. But that doesn't alter the fact that the idea "people will be forced" is fallacy. A generally accepted one, and repeated over and over...self-fulfilling prophecy, in a way...but a fallacy nonetheless.

The bottom line is, this is a branding maneuver. I don't know FR that well, but I read here someplace that Waterdeep, Baldur's Keep/Gate/Whatever and Neverwinter are all located in the region of the Sword Coast. What are the D&D video games, in the FR, have there been? The most popular use Baldur's Gate, Waterdeep and Neverwinter, if I'm not mistaken.

Everyone who plays the MMO/CRPGs or has read any FR novel (and people like me who do neither, but are around fantasy rpg places to see/hear about FR) recognizes the names of these places. Hurdle to interest in try alternate products with these names [and your logo] on it leapt = Sword Coast book!

 

[Corpsetaker]

Personally... I have found full world books to be good from a top-down instruction of the rules of a particular world, but fairly useless when it comes to actually running a game.

I own the 3E Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book. Fantastic book. Gives me all the flavor of the Realms I could possibly want and reading it was a delight. But I never once ran a game in it because there was like at most two or three pages of information of any one area where a game might be set. As a result... it was only when I picked up the Silver Marches mini-setting book that I thought "Okay! Here now is an area full of people, places, and adventure hooks all together that I can sink my teeth and a party into!" and now run a game in the Realms. I even pushed back the Tyranny of Dragons adventure that I was using into the 3E era just so I could use the Silver Marches softcover as-is.

I've also owned the Eberron Campaign Setting guide when it first came out for 3E and LOVE that setting... but have never run a game there for the same reason. The only mini-setting book they've done for it is Sharn, City of Towers, and I've not wanted to run a city-based campaign. So the ECS sits on my shelf taunting me. But in 4E? The Nentir Vale mini-setting (the DMG, HPE adventures, and Dragon Magazine setting material presented) was a godsend. I ran my players all over that darned place. It was small, it provide a crapload of adventure hooks that the party could easily get to, and was pretty thorough.

So for me personally... having a single area of the Realms described and hooked to set a campaign in is much more useful than a wide overview of every single kingdom across Faerun. Maybe someone else out there really needs to know two paragraphs worth of info of what is happening in Chult or Turmish in 1489... but that stuff is completely wasted on me for a useful campaign.

Some of your post is with the assumption that you want to play in the specific area that was introduced in the regional book and your first examples of from an edition that pumped out books at a great rate so you didn't have to wait long for several setting books. I have the 3rd edition campaign guide as well and it was pure gold because it gave me an overview of the world and allowed my to pick and choose where I wanted to base my campaign. When specific regional books came out it was purely a bonus. This edition produces material at a trickle and if they are going to introduce the setting region by region with a year or more in between each region then that's just too slow for me, especially if the region I want is four years away. At least with a campaign guide I am able to use the smaller bit of info to get my campaign started.

 

[redrick]

The problem with releasing yet another complete Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book is that it would be hard to truly differentiate it from the existing FR books. Updated crunch is nice, but most of the overview seems pretty worthless, when you already have the 2e book, the 3e book or the 4e book to choose from. The solution to differentiation is to dramatically update the timeline, so you "need" the new book to stay current.

I think doing the smaller regional guides is a nice alternative. This way, Wizards can actually release a book containing new content, that achieves that without simply contradicting existing fictional content. New players who just want a campaign setting to help them run their own campaigns have a book that they can work with out of the box. Nothing is being taken away from them — if they're new to the game and the realms, it's not like they have another favorite setting that they can't use. The Sword Coast is all people coming in with 5e have seen anyway. Longtime players who want to continue playing in the Realms with 5e-compatible crunch can buy a book that actually complements what they already have in their collection.

For folks who want to run a campaign outside the Sword Coast, I imagine that some of the crunch contained in this setting book will still be helpful for that. And the fluff can still come from existing campaign sourcebooks. Updating the timeline is less important, because most of the "canonical" events have been related to the Sword Coast anyway.

There's no way Wizards will release the books to cover all of the campaign settings in D&D's history. I'd rather have them focus on the most usable packaging of whichever setting they choose to use, in this case, The Sword Coast, instead of doing massive catch-all books.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Some of your post is with the assumption that you want to play in the specific area that was introduced in the regional book and your first examples of from an edition that pumped out books at a great rate so you didn't have to wait long for several setting books. I have the 3rd edition campaign guide as well and it was pure gold because it gave me an overview of the world and allowed my to pick and choose where I wanted to base my campaign. When specific regional books came out it was purely a bonus. This edition produces material at a trickle and if they are going to introduce the setting region by region with a year or more in between each region then that's just too slow for me, especially if the region I want is four years away. At least with a campaign guide I am able to use the smaller bit of info to get my campaign started.

I don't disagree that other people such as yourself are fine with taking minimal information from a section of a world-spanning book and creating a campaign out of it. If it works for you, that's awesome. But I will say though... a potential reason why WotC might not care to go in your direction first (a world book rather than a kingdom book) is that if you are willing to take the 2 pages of a single location in a 200 page book and create a campaign around it (by just filling in all the gaps you obviously were going to have by making your own stuff up)... they might be more inclined to think that you are more than capable of taking one of the older world books (like 4E) and just making up and filling in the gaps of 5E by what you get from the other 5E products. If very little has changed within Turmish in the 10-15 years from the 4E book to the current 5E timeline (just pulling this area out as an example)... how really useful is it to reprint those 2 pages of information with the half-dozen(?) small 5E changes that occured in those 10-15 years? Are those six 5E changes worth reprinting the other 90% that is unchanged? Especially when the DM is going to be making up so much other 5E-era stuff anyway just to fill in the missing gaps?

It's the same reason why I find the idea of printing a 5E Eberron Campaign Setting book to be kind of useless if they don't advance the timeline. Both the 3E book and 4E book go over the exact same information at the exact same time with only a few small changes to take into account things like eladrin and dragonborn. Do we need to have the Five Nations described again a third time if nothing has changed? I personally do not see the point from a consumer point of view.

The same holds true with a 5E world book. If each kingdom or area across Faerun takes up so little page count in the book that barely any substantive changes that are worth mentioning in those 2 pages have occurred in the 10-15 years since the 4E book... why bother reprinting it? Or more to the point... does that service enough player needs moreso than a much more detailed single location within the Realms (for those unlike yourself who don't want to have to fill in and make up all the details that are missing in your traditional world book?)

I don't know what is better-- for both the playerbase and for WotC's sales projections. But I will say that I seem to recall a much more positive response for the Neverwinter mini-setting book for 4E came out than the complete Forgotten Realms world book released for 4E. And if WotC's sales numbers bore that out... I can certainly understand why they might continue to go in that mini-setting direction.

 

[Staffan]

It's clearly not the direction they're going in, and I don't know how much business sense it would make, but here's an idea on how I would do it.

First, I would release a honest-to-Ao good-old-fashioned boxed set. This would contain:

1. A large-scale overview of the setting, on the order of 128 pages, with part of it being related to rule bits, part short descriptions of the various regions (about a page per region), and part things like calendars, gods, and such.
2. A similar-sized book focusing on a single region.
3. Maybe a short book (32 pages) on an town and the surrounding area, for a nice sandbox. Possibly combined with a short adventure.
4. Poster maps - one for the whole setting, one for the region, and one for the adventuring area.
5. Various frills, like the stuff in the 2e FR boxed set with glyphs, holy symbols, and such.

That way, you get both an actually useful place for adventures as well as an idea about what's going on elsewhere. Future releases could then do regional books on other places, and have the large-scale stuff out of the way. Focus areas could either be separate releases or part of the regional books.