WoW Cataclysm VS 4e Forgotten Realms

[rounser]

What I've never understood about the changes made to the 4e version of FR is why Wizards just didn't create a new campaign setting, rather than radically altering the FR.

I think that was tried, and it's name was Eberron.

Mysteriously, the plagued Realms look more than passingly like Eberron than what went before, which is a bit of a pity if you liked FR and not Eberron.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Respectfully, I think this is mostly wrong. I can't even imagine what a FR would look like if it were designed by committee. Maybe would have a lot of drow rangers!

Not exactly "design by comittee," more, "it has to be an improvement, or the market isn't going to want to buy it."


Now, the 20/20 hindsight breakdown!
[sblock]

The design goals appear to have been:
1) Make the material accessible to someone who knows nothing about the Realms. (Ex: A large pantheon creates barriers for new player entry.)

A book focusing on the "highlights" of the Realms without getting bogged down in muckety-muck is entirely possible without blowing it up. They could've done a "back to basics" approach that a lot of fans seemed eager for, while saying "We're just turning back the clock to 0 hour. This invalidates nothing that comes after."

2) Make enough new material for people who have the old material. (Ex: The Spellplague changed some areas fundamentally.)

I don't even think Ed Greenwood has all of the old material, but those fairly well versed in the Realms will still want to pick up the new campaign setting, if for nothing other than the updated races/classes/monsters.

3) Make the material suggestive, but not exhaustive in detail. (Ex: Earth motes have appeared and they have these properties, but we'll leave the history and purpose to the DM.)

Smart, if you're not doing a drastic change. If you're doing a drastic change, though, that's really just telling the DM to do the hard work and making it less-than-complete "out of the box."

These goals in the end backfired since it meant:
1) Making sweeping changes that are bound to step on some toes.
2) Taking away the pleasure of just reading about a subject with no in-game use.

I don't think #2 was a major backfire. I'd say it's almost all #1. If the CS would've been a basic overview with some updated stats, it would've done its job nicely, I think. It wouldn't have been very ambitious, I suppose, but ambition can be broadcast in adventures and rules design where it isn't in story, since there's a substantial investment in FR story.
[/sblock]

In the game, I think the 100 year jump is what differentiates the FR change from the WoW change. The events of WoW happened to the players, at least nominally. The FR changes are mostly remote and the world is "new."

That's kind of a great point, actually. Instead of going back to basics, if the 4e FR was set during the Spellplague, giving DMs all sorts of suggestions on what might happen (rather than telling them what did), it might've been epic.

Back in 3e, I had a "Cthulu Comes To Town" campaign mashup with FR where the laws of magic suddenly and dramatically shifted, resulting in Elminster being insane and a hopeless atmosphere and cities blowing up dramatically. Not that different from the Spellplague. It was a rousing success, but I think if I would've set the game in the aftermath, rather than during, it would've fallen flatter. I also think if I had people who weren't willing to trust me to go along for the ride, I might've irked some FR purists in my group. They gave me time (about 9 months!) to win them over and deliver an awesome experience. WotC didn't have 9 months, they had about 600 pages. That's a much shorter time to achieve trust, especially when you're vague about details.

 

[wedgeski]

The cataclysm change was free.

The ~£8 leaving my bank account every month would like to have a word with you.

It's true though that subscribers can enjoy the substantial refresh of the old world without buying the new expansion.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I think I would add "throwing out the baby with the bathwater" to the list of FR's problems.

I'm glad Mystra's dead, and I don't really care how she died, as that's nothing the PCs get involved with.

But blowing up the Realms wasn't necessary. The Weave should have been allowed to take care of itself.

As for Cataclysm, I don't play WoW, but I know the expansion does cost money to buy. $40 or more, I suspect.

 

[Campbell]

The Cataclysm expansion is required to play the new races (goblins and wolfmen), access their starting areas, acquire the archeology secondary profession, level from 80 to 85 and access the new higher level content. The new class/race combos and revamped old world are still accessible without it.

 

[Dedekind]

Instead of going back to basics, if the 4e FR was set during the Spellplague, giving DMs all sorts of suggestions on what might happen (rather than telling them what did), it might've been epic.

That would have been very cool. I like the idea of the Spellplague myself, and the vagueness of it all is really too much.

To counter my own agreement, however, in Eberron, lots of areas are light on detail and it doesn't seem to be a big problem for most people.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

That would have been very cool. I like the idea of the Spellplague myself, and the vagueness of it all is really too much.

To counter my own agreement, however, in Eberron, lots of areas are light on detail and it doesn't seem to be a big problem for most people.

FR and Eberron are (obviously) very different settings. In fact, Eberron quickly developed a reputation for being the anti-Realms for doing many things differently (eg no high-powered good-aligned NPCs; the only two that I could name are geographically restricted).

They attract a different set of fans. It's not surprising some fans like lots of detail and some don't, and they gravitate toward different settings.

 

[Obergnom]

There is truth to that. Seems like they just forgot not all settings should be developed in the same way when they decided their 2 book rule.