D&D 5E Does it seem like Nerath was dropped like a bad habit?

[Steely Dan]

So, from the standpoint of a fan, the Nentir Vale and Nerath and all its associated proper nouns and cosmologies and histories and events are absolutely a distinct, different, unique, D&D setting. It's among the pantheon of Basic Fantasy Settings -- Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, and now Nerath.

That just does not seem to be the case, not nearly as definitive or iconic, yeah "...Nerath…what…?"

 

[I'm A Banana]

That just does not seem to be the case, not nearly as definitive or iconic, yeah "...Nerath…what…?"

Sure, with the word "Nerath," but talk about the elements of 4e, like, say Bael Turath or the Elemental Chaos of the Astral Sea, and you'll get a lot of folks who know what you're talking about just as if you said Neverwinter or Ansalon or Oerth.

 

[Tony Vargas]

It's a shame that 4E is such a pariah among editions, because it really did contribute and innovate D&D in some great ways: the Points of Light/Ruins of Nerath setting, the World-Axis cosmology, and the simplified default pantheon are all great examples.

The Dawn War was a pretty decent creation myth, as well.

 

[thewok]

The Dawn War was a pretty decent creation myth, as well.

I have adapted the Dawn War to my world and still use it as the Creation "myth." I'll be sticking with the cosmology of 4e as well. I prefer it to the great wheel. I am in the process, though, of "reordering" the world, replacing deities and even adding some that used to be PCs.

I make ample use of that CoN map, though. I got the jpg that had no borders around the regions. Good stuff there.

 

[Jester David]

There are a few problems with Nerath.

First, that's not the name. It alternates between "Nerath", "Nentir Vale", and "the Points of Light world". It didn't really have a brand name to reference.
Second, WotC really seems to want to double down on the Forgotten Realms and use the established world. They name drop Greyhawk and Dragonlance (two very, very popular settings) but don't reference many others like Birthright, Mystara, Ravenloft, and the like.
Third is the hard feelings regarding 4e. While they're not dropping everything related to 4e, they're not emphasising it either. Which is fine as they're working to win back lapsed players at this moment, and will likely give some 4e people some love later.

I have no strong feelings regarding Nerath. It was okay, but I imagine the strength of the setting - what made people like it - was being able to make the world your own. Which makes it hard to update or reference. It was a lovely example of a Tabula Rasa setting.
My problem with the setting was also one of my problems with 4e: the concepts of that world became the baseline. Nerath has a world axis cosmology and so Dark Sun gained the world axis cosmology. Nerath was a point of light world and so Eberron became a point of light world. Nerath had the Dawn War at the start of time, and so the Realms had the Dawn War at the start of time. Some of it worked (Dawn War in Dark Sun) but sometimes it didn't (Forgotten Realms as a PoL world).

 

[drjones]

I don't know that it was so much a casualty of 4e association as it was of just being less well known. They tried to mine every edition for 5e and went with what was probably most well known and had the most non-RPG tie-ins. I have a DDI account, read a bit of 4e Dungeon, played 4e for years and still had to remind myself what Nentir was. I always thought of it as Generic Town to stick into whatever campaign you wanted.

 

[Serendipity]

Despite the fact that ultimately we didn't change over to 4th ed, I still found that the PoL / Nerath setting-not-setting far more compelling than any of the big ones save Eberron honestly. The good news is that the parts I liked weren't mechanical for the most part so I can still get lots of mileage out of them.
That said, I rather doubt we'll ever hear of the setting again, at least officially.

 

[Haffrung]

Nentir Vale was the only thing I liked that came out of the 4e era. I was really disheartened when they canceled the setting book... Monsters of Nentir Vale was an awesome book.

Yep. I really liked the practical, scaled-down Nentir Vale as a location to start a campaign in. I'll be disappointed if WotC sets every adventure they publish in the Forgotten Realms by default.

 

[johnmarron]

Despite the fact that ultimately we didn't change over to 4th ed, I still found that the PoL / Nerath setting-not-setting far more compelling than any of the big ones save Eberron honestly. The good news is that the parts I liked weren't mechanical for the most part so I can still get lots of mileage out of them.
That said, I rather doubt we'll ever hear of the setting again, at least officially.

I agree, I found the 4E PoL setting very evocative and inspiring, more so than the heavily detailed settings. For whatever reason, I really find the maps of Fallcrest that Brandon Kruse did to be very inspiring. I'm currently playing in a 5E game (playing through the starter set now and plan to move on to Hoard of the Dragon Queen), but when I start up my own 5E game eventually, I plan to use the Nentir Vale as the setting. With Dragonborn and Tieflings in the PHB, and Eladrin an easy conversion from High Elves, I think all of the mechanical bits I would need are already in place.

 

[Tony Vargas]

There are a few problems with Nerath.

First, that's not the name. It alternates between "Nerath", "Nentir Vale", and "the Points of Light world". It didn't really have a brand name to reference.

That's like saying Forgotten Realms alternates between that, Toril, and the Sword Coast.

Second, WotC really seems to want to double down on the Forgotten Realms and use the established world. They name drop Greyhawk and Dragonlance (two very, very popular settings) but don't reference many others like Birthright, Mystara, Ravenloft, and the like.

I guess there's only so many gratuitous mentions they could throw in. Maybe they'll get around to Dragonborn from Arkhosia or whatever, eventually. Probably not, because...

Third is the hard feelings regarding 4e.

Between 4e fans necessarily including all those D&D-loyalists who adopt each new edition with enthusiasm, and there being no legal possibility of a Pathfinder-like alternative for any 4e holdouts, it was probably a no-brainer for WotC to decide to cater heavily to those feelings.