What should the default setting be for 4th edition?

[Moon-Lancer]

i think you forgot to put ravenloft as one of the options for the poll...

 

[Kae'Yoss]

i think you forgot to put ravenloft as one of the options for the poll...

Thanks, now I can't sleep tonight.

 

[Flyspeck23]

Very mature. Good for the boards' climate, too. Always strife to tick "the other side" off.

At least I'm not calling warforged robots - how mature is that?

But really, I gave my reasons why I voted Eberron. The fact that some posts are ripe with Eberron hate wasn't really a factor. To each his own.

There you have it. Even the Rabid Eberron Fanboys share my opinion.

Huh?

It's not like I mind being called a rabid fanboy because I didn't vote for your preferred option, but where did I share your opinion?

 

[pawsplay]

Nearly nobody does.

Funny, the shield guardian seems to be both venerable and popular. And what about the abyssal retrievers?

 

[Flyspeck23]

Funny, the shield guardian seems to be both venerable and popular. And what about the abyssal retrievers?

Construct, not robot. As in: the warforged's no robot, and neither is the iron golem.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

At least I'm not calling warforged robots - how mature is that?

I tell'em as I sees'em.

Huh?

It's not like I mind being called a rabid fanboy because I didn't vote for your preferred option,

You did see the smileys, yes? I assume that I'm allowed the occasional tongue-in-cheek, too?

but where did I share your opinion?

Where you said "rulebooks - that's for rules, not for setting". We both seem to favour the D&D approach to settings over the DSA approach (setting hard-wired into the game). Now you just have to realize that any implied setting, in order to stay discreet and not force itself upon the rules, must be vanilla.

Eberron miserably fails in that. Greyhawk excells in it. As far as I know, GH was the Col's home setting, so it evolved directly from D&D. Over the years and editions, it adapted to the game, rather than the other way around. It's as baseline as you can get. Correct me if I'm wrong, but GH is 100% RAW. Everything you need to add to turn the core rulebooks into a GHCS (and other generic D&D supplements into GH supplements) is background info. No extra races, no extra feats, no nothing.

Eberron would probably not be Eberron without its quirks. The core rules should not contain a construct player character race, but they're an integral part of Eberron. It should not use action points, but they're in Eberron. They shouldn't contain exotic stuff like the Thunderrail, and yet if the PHB were Eberron, you'd have to add train fare to the equipment section, right beside carriage fair and that stuff... Eberron might or might not beat the living hell (or what pases for hell in Eberron cosmology) out of Greyhawk flavour-wise, but the standard setting isn't chosen for flavour, but for compatibility.

 

[Thorin Stoutfoot]

Voted: Eberron

I voted for Eberron (despite never having played in one) because I feel that the default baseline setting should be a setting designed for the game, rather than one designed for an archaic version of D&D. One that integrates the default level of magic into its assumptions, as well as what being a play-pen for PCs to explore as they see fit.

Ideally, 4E would have its own setting designed around the assumptions of the rule system, but if that's not possible, then I believe Eberron would be the best fit.

 

[Flyspeck23]

You did see the smileys, yes? I assume that I'm allowed the occasional tongue-in-cheek, too?

You don't see mine, I don't see yours

Where you said "rulebooks - that's for rules, not for setting". We both seem to favour the D&D approach to settings over the DSA approach (setting hard-wired into the game). Now you just have to realize that any implied setting, in order to stay discreet and not force itself upon the rules, must be vanilla.

Eberron miserably fails in that. Greyhawk excells in it. As far as I know, GH was the Col's home setting, so it evolved directly from D&D. Over the years and editions, it adapted to the game, rather than the other way around. It's as baseline as you can get. Correct me if I'm wrong, but GH is 100% RAW. Everything you need to add to turn the core rulebooks into a GHCS (and other generic D&D supplements into GH supplements) is background info. No extra races, no extra feats, no nothing.

Eberron would probably not be Eberron without its quirks. The core rules should not contain a construct player character race, but they're an integral part of Eberron. It should not use action points, but they're in Eberron. They shouldn't contain exotic stuff like the Thunderrail, and yet if the PHB were Eberron, you'd have to add train fare to the equipment section, right beside carriage fair and that stuff... Eberron might or might not beat the living hell (or what pases for hell in Eberron cosmology) out of Greyhawk flavour-wise, but the standard setting isn't chosen for flavour, but for compatibility.

I can see where you're coming from. But remember that what's part of D&D is prone to change from edition to edition - and even the Eberron-specific stuff could be changed to accomodate that. Just because something's part of the Eberron setting doesn't mean it has to show up in the rulebook - warforged, artificers, action points, whatever. Likewise, the train wouldn't have to be featured in the rules.

Just looking through my PHB for Greyhawk-specific material, and there's preciously few. Why should it be any different with Eberron?

Some things that could be included if Eberron was the baseline setting are: deities (obvious), a new NPC class (magewright) to explain the abundance of magic items in the world, and stuff like that.

Really, Eberron does a great job at explaining some of the stranger aspects of the D&D rules and their applications to the campaign world.

That's all I'm saying. Never did I say "Make the ECS the new PHB".

 

[LostWorldsMike]

Greyhawk all the way. And come out with a nifty-new hardcover campaign setting book for it as well. Please.

 

[an_idol_mind]

I voted for Eberron (despite never having played in one) because I feel that the default baseline setting should be a setting designed for the game, rather than one designed for an archaic version of D&D. One that integrates the default level of magic into its assumptions, as well as what being a play-pen for PCs to explore as they see fit.

Ideally, 4E would have its own setting designed around the assumptions of the rule system, but if that's not possible, then I believe Eberron would be the best fit.

I think the concept of Eberron being designed around the game is arguable. It was certainly designed to work with D&D 3.5, but it also had to expand quite a bit on the core material in the campaign setting. I think a core setting for D&D, if there is one, should be able to use the core materials without having to expand on them to fit the world.