D&D 5E The case for (and against) a new Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Unless my GM was changing a lot of stuff behind the scenes, there was no Death Curse related materials in 80% of the places we visited. The few places that did have something to do with the DC were mostly "Go here, find this person, talk to them to get pointed to the next location".

I don't agree that you can't run Chult: Generic Adventures from the ToA book with little to no adjustments.

Yeah, your DM was leaving it out for your group. Without looking up the exact plot, the reason your PCs even travel to Chult to stop the curse is because it is worldwide and affecting the people who hire you to travel to the jungles and stop it. And if you use already leveled characters to jump in past the intro bits, and any of the PCs have been previously Raised, the curse affects them too.

 

[Hoffmand]

We really don’t need a new sourcebook. We can order the books from previous editions for setting information.

 

[Demetrios1453]

We really don’t need a new sourcebook. We can order the books from previous editions for setting information.

I'm the case of the FR, that's like taking a current affairs class and buying textbooks from 1900. Yes, Germany, Russia, Turkey, and so on are all there, but things have changed just a wee bit in the last 120 years or so...

 

[Mercurius]

We really don’t need a new sourcebook. We can order the books from previous editions for setting information.

I agree, but the complaint I’ve seen from a lot of Realms folks is that a lot has changed in the years between 3E and 5E, and even if you ignore the Spellplague or relegate it to something that happened but then everything basically returned to normal, you’re either faced with the choice of picking an earlier iteration (FRCS or before) or filling in the fuzzy edges that are only implied beyond the Swird Coast.

Experienced DMs can do the work, although still might (understandably) not want to put the time in, and new DMs might be a little lost.

Either way, the only real reasons NOT to do it is either they don’t think it would be lucrative enough and/or they have other fish to fry.

 

[aco175]

I'm the case of the FR, that's like taking a current affairs class and buying textbooks from 1900. Yes, Germany, Russia, Turkey, and so on are all there, but things have changed just a wee bit in the last 120 years or so...

This is like my fathers road map in his car. It is from the 80s, never mind that there is maps on your phone- but he will never have one and still uses his map.

The old map works, but there is so much more you can do with new stuff.

 

[Parmandur]

I'm the case of the FR, that's like taking a current affairs class and buying textbooks from 1900. Yes, Germany, Russia, Turkey, and so on are all there, but things have changed just a wee bit in the last 120 years or so...

Difference is, you can play an RPG set in 1900. Or 1373 DR.

 

[Mercurius]

See, I think you're confusing one argument (that FR is the most well-known and most used setting) with a completely different point (that most people want another FR setting book).

Point 1 is indisputable; FR benefits from the video games as you say, but it benefits most from being the setting in nearly every hardcover adventure book for 5E. That alone will make it easily the most used and well-known setting used by 5E players, no question. Even Exandria can't match that.

But just because Point 1 is true, it does not mean that all of those users want another FR setting book. In fact, it could mean the exact opposite, and that those users want something other than what they have; they may ask for more material for gothic horror campaigns, or epic fantasy campaigns, or steampunk, whatever.

I suspect that WotC internal market research points to that same conclusion, that most 5E players want more setting books, but for material that is outside of FR's purview; that's why we have gotten settings for Ravnica, Eberron, and Theros, which are decidedly not FR. And if you look at the recent UA, they seem to be pointing to either Dark Sun or Planescape material.

I have no problem with this, as I personally prefer new settings to rehashing the same old settings again and again -- if it is an either/or choice. Couple that with the fact that I'm not faithful or dedicated to any single setting, plus limited exposure to Magic the Gathering, and I'm quite happy with the idea that the future of WotC setting books is probably going to be focused on new/old Magic worlds.

But I don't think the two are mutually exclusive. Unless WotC really believes that a new and updated FRCS wouldn't be financially lucrative, or that it would stall the backlog of planned projects, given all of the factors, it just makes more sense to publish than not to publish. IMO.

In other words, if I have to choose either new settings (including Magic) or old settings (FR, Greyhawk), I'll choose the former. But I'm not sure that it has to be one or the other. If they're going to publish three setting books every two years, my preference would be two new and one old -- a pattern we've seen over the last couple years that may continue in the near future. Of the old settings, personal preferences aside, I think FR, Planescape, and Dark Sun make the most sense, folllowed by a group that includes Greyhawk, Dragonlance, and Ravenloft, then a third group of Mystara, Spelljammer, and others.

And then it comes down to the fact that you can't do everything in limited amounts of time. Given that Planescape is more of a cap-setting and can be tied to a Manual of the Planes, I wouldn't include that in my hypothetical one old setting every two years, so maybe we see something like so:

2021: Forgotten Realms (or Dark Sun)
2022: Planescape/Manual of the Planes
2023: Dark Sun (or FR)
2025: One of Greyhawk/Ravenloft/Dragonlance

Etc. I don't think we'll ever see any of the "third tier" settings, but who knows.

 

[Fenris-77]

Let's separate this out and try to look at it form the outside. Pretend you're someone that's new, that's only kinda maybe heard of the Forgotten Realms. Maybe you've paged through the SCAG at a friend's house while pinching a loaf. Whatever. One of your leveled-up geek buddies says:

OMG!! There a new FR book coming out that will update the time line!

To which you reply, huh, cool, what kind of new stuff is it going to have?

Quivering with excitement, he replies Neat stuff about some countries in the Realms we haven't heard about lately!!

Does that sound interesting? Maybe, maybe not. It probably does to people who love the Realms, people who want to fill in holes on their map. To the gamer in our example it probably sounds boring as dirt. That's what WotC is working against. You need to build in enough player facing crunch that there's some interest outside the FR fanclub. In some ways you're actually working against the setting, which just isn't that sexy, not to a newer gamer anyway. It's a very generic fantasy world. Don't get me wrong, I love the Realms, and have for years, but there are issues in play that experienced gamers just don't seem to get, or be willing to admit to anyway.

 

[Mercurius]

Let's separate this out and try to look at it form the outside. Pretend you're someone that't new, that's only kinda maybe heard of the Forgotten Realms. Maybe you've paged through the SCAG at a friends house while pinching a loaf. Whatever. One of your leveled-up geek buddies says:

OMG!! There a new FR book coming out that will update the time line!

To which you reply, huh, cool, what kind of new stuff is it going to have?

Quivering with excitement, he replies Neat stuff about some countries in the Realms we haven't heard about lately!!

Does that sound interesting? Maybe, maybe not. It probably does to people who love the Realms, people who want to fill in holes on their map. To the gamer in our example it probably sounds boring as dirt. That's what WotC is working against. You need to build in enough player facing crunch that there's some interest outside the FR fanclub. In some ways you're actually working against the setting, which just isn't that sexy, not to a newer gamer anyway. It's a very generic fantasy world. Don't get me wrong, I love the Realms, and have for years, but there are issues in play that experienced gamers just don't seem to get, or be willing to admit to anyway.

That may be true, but then it applies to most old settings - certainly Greyhawk and Mystara, probably Dragonlance (which has tinges of exoticism, if only through more divergence from traditional D&D tropes). Dark Sun and Planescape may offer enough "newness" to make sense to publish, using your logic. I mean, they did publish Eberron, which seems to split the difference between the traditional settings and the more exotic ones.

So if we imagine it as a spectrum, from traditional to exotic, and if we assume that what you say is true--that WotC will only publish settings that are "new" enough from the standard default to excite the masses--and then we have the fact that they published Eberron, which in many ways splits the difference between a lot of axes--new/old, exotic/traditional, etc--the question then becomes, how much further, on either side of the various spectrums, will they go?

The Magic settings seem to be the obvious answer. They are new to D&D, although old to Magic players. They have varying shades of exoticism, yet aren't too extreme.

 

[Fenris-77]

I think it does apply to other settings, perhaps even moreso because people might be less familiar with them, so there isn't even that. I'm not suggesting WOtC won't publish FR material, only the the format and contents aren't going to be driven by notions like "update the timeline". WIldemount is a pretty generic fantasy setting too, but it has that other little thing going for it. The MtG settings have that little thing too (less of it maybe). I just think that some established players underestimate how uninterested newer player would be in some of the things they agitate for.

I do think that new books will need to have something going for them that will appeal to players who don't have any ingrained loyalty to, or enthusiasm for, established settings.