Let's Forget the Forgotten Realms

[Nivenus]

Forgotten Realms should be published differently than all other campaign settings for D&D. It's there to support the novel line, not grow one's own gaming world.

Greyhawk would be awesome. Make it < 60 pages and have page #1 all about Greyhawk's unique trees.

I don't know how unusual I am but I have read barely any FR books at all. I mostly just game with it.

 

[Mercurius]

A new setting sounds good in principle, but when it comes down to it, do we really need another one, particularly one that fills the slot Greyhawk would? After all, that's what Points of Light was supposed to be to a certain extent, but from what I'm hearing most people were largely unsatisfied with the setting (with a few exceptions).

New settings work better if they bring something unique but the core setting, by it's very nature, kind of needs to be generic and easily pliable. Greyhawk is that. Points of Light is that. But do we need another setting in their mold?

But why do we need more Greyhawk (or Forgotten Realms)? Both settings, especially the Realms, have been heavily detailed and across multiple editions. Why do we need a reboot of either?

I like the idea of a new setting for a variety of reasons, one of which is that I personally would find it much more interesting discovering a new world than seeing shiny new versions of old settings. I also think that Paizo's approach of publishing Adventure Paths and setting books alongside each other is a great model for WotC to at least look at, and that an ongoing setting creates a shared context and reference point for the community. This would be better facilitated, imo, with a new setting that doesn't have any baggage or isn't mired in decades of legacy.

As I said in this thread, I think that WotC can both support old settings and create a new one that better serves the need and design goals of 5E than older settings would.

 

[Nivenus]

As I said in this thread, I think that WotC can both support old settings and create a new one that better serves the need and design goals of 5E than older settings would.

But aren't the design goals of 5e mixed up pretty heavily in nostalgia and bridging edition gaps? Creating a new edition that may be ignored or rejected doesn't sound like a great way to do that, at least in my opinion.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I don't understand why Elminster has taken Mordenkainen's place.

Because WotC has always had uncontestable control of the IP of FR since Greenwood sold it all to TSR lock, stock, and barrel. I suspect that was not the case for GH which was probably a contributing factor to why they had been looking for a new setting at that time anyway.

FR? Give it a friggin' rest. It's boring!

Several years ahead of you there. I started running FR when it was first released for 1E in 1987 and ran it fairly exclusively through about 2002 when I ran a heavily modified take on it for my big 3E campaign. After that I was SO bored with it, bored with even tinkering with it, that I took an honest vow to never run it again. I've thought about reneging briefly once or twice but not with any significant danger of actually going back to it.

I could probably get into Greyhawk but for no particularly good reason I just never have. Well, ONE reason is simply that I never, EVER saw it on a store shelf anywhere, or if I did I was not at that time in the market for a setting. I'm only sorta thinking now about picking up a box set off Ebay, but I again don't really need a setting right now - not even for 5E. If I don't succumb to the itch to just homebrew something entirely from scratch I'll almost certainly use the Wilderlands materials I have instead as the framework to build a campaign on.

Sprout me a nice, new edition of Greyhawk for 5E (if I even LIKE 5E...) and I'll shell out my shekels for it. If money and a desire to know what I REALLY missed all these years starts burning a hole in my pocket I'll go Ebay for the original stuff. Otherwise - meh.

 

[Aelfwyn]

Excellent post! We are the same age and have been playing the same number of years (though I have to admit I've bought a few FR products here and there). I love Greyhawk and Dragonlance. DL was my intro intro into gaming as well. So I give you a resounding "Here, here!!!"

 

[Uzzy]

Excellent post! We are the same age and have been playing the same number of years (though I have to admit I've bought a few FR products here and there). I love Greyhawk and Dragonlance. DL was my intro intro into gaming as well. So I give you a resounding "Here, here!!!"

And then you've got someone like me, who's introduction to gaming was through firstly Baldur's Gate, then through the 3rd Edition FRCS. I'd hate to see the Realms forgotten to bring back another fairly generic setting of which I have little interest in, or fond memories of.

Anyway, it's not going to happen. The Realms are too commercially viable, and they do have a number of advantages over the other settings mentioned. The books, games and other multimedia will help bring in a continuous stream of new players. WOTC still have the creators of the Realms freely on tap as well.

That's not to say they shouldn't change things up a little. A high level overview of the Realms, just like the 3rd Edition FRCS, should be the only thing needed for any DM, and tell DM's in big bold 72pt letters that they can change things up in their setting, just so they get the message.

 

[southernmagnus]

Glad this is out there- nothing makes me feel as narcoleptic as the mention of Khleben "Blackstaff" Arunsun in any context...

<stretch><yawn>

In our need to have all aspects of any given setting mapped out we've lost all sense of mystery and danger. Who are we helping with infinite detail? Unimaginative DMs? People who need to sell more supplements? D&D needs not one more of either.

Remember when all you got of Lolth was an incredibly creepy Erol Otus picture and a single entry in Deities & Demigods?

I'm not advocating an anemic lack of detail, but we can all agree that 5e needs more mystery.

More creepy, perverse, evil, terrifying worlds full of secrets. You can either join the fray and start your Cult of Doom or kick the darkness till it bleeds daylight, but the world needs to be dangerous and cruel.

Keep D&D evil.

 

[Gamerstable_Jayson]

At our regular Wednesday game session I went though my file folder that contains old characters, notes and maps from past campaigns. I found about a half dozen or so old FR characters that I have played over the years. With one exception, few of these characters or past campaigns had any meaning to me. The one that did was short lived and was fun, but not particularly noteworthy as FR - it could just as easily been on Krynn, Oerth or Mystara. The longest FR campaign that my cohorts ever played, mostly over the course of a summer long ago, I missed out on while working as a lifeguard. They speak of it fondly, but not with enough nostalgia to bring them back to Toril. The only thing FR has that would make me want to play there is the Ruins of Under Mountain. With some modification even that could be transplanted to any campaign setting. I like a good Dungeon Crawl.

Grey Hawk would be a fine setting for 5th Edition's infancy (to give it cohesion), slightly updated (stress the word slightly), perhaps a new map that shows some areas to the west and south, the Baklunish West, the jungles of Hepmonaland and the Pearl Sea archipelagos.

I don't see any reason why WotC couldn't support all campaign worlds from the past. Electronic media would be the way to go, and throwing support behind fansites like canonfire!, the Vaults of Pandius or the Burnt World of Athas. Fans have producing material for decades, and if WotC would select some few of these periodically for official production in the form of a PDF for $1.99 or so, they could reap a profit as well as recharge their respective communities. The same could be said of an entirely new campaign setting, one that the fans build from the ground up.

Make it so.

 

[Warunsun]

The announced here that Forgotten Realms would be taking center stage for the DDI content for this year. RIP Nentir Vale.

 

[The Shadow]

My first D&D world was Mystara, and I still have intense nostalgia for it, warts and all. That said, I far prefer to build my own worlds.

Greyhawk just never grabbed me, really. (Except for the Rain of Colorless Fire - Gygax did have a way with evocative names at times.) Oh, and I also like that Gygax thought out the prehistory of the Flanaess - movements of peoples and so on. Kind of overkill, but good worldbuilding! His nations, though, come across as rather dull.

Krynn and Toril both once appealed to me at one time. No more. Rereading the Dragonlance stuff would be an effective form of torture for me today... While the Realms are far too much about the NPC's. (And also have more than their share of excruciatingly bad fiction.)

I don't mind seeing old worlds revived for their fans. But I'd like to see something new at this point. Much as I dislike 4e as a system, I have to say I've been rather intrigued by the Points of Light.