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I mostly run a home game (the one I've discussed a couple of times in this thread, where I play a bit fast and loose with the FR lore). I also sometimes DM at my FLGS. I've also used FR as the setting there, and hewed pretty close to canon as described in the SCAG (though I did throw in a few...

I'd jump right onto something like this too, which would be a nice way to supplement the build-your-own-multiverse stuff in the DMG using a bunch of worked examples. And you wouldn't half need to leave Planescape behind to use any or all of it, either. Like, in my campaign, there's a dwarf...

Ah, see, I wasn't plugged in to the conversation in the days of previous editions, so I missed all that. If that's the word I'm looking for. Now, me, I love the heck out of Planescape, which pushes a huge number of my Cool Stuff buttons, but I'm no more eager to beat people over the head with...

Yes, right, that's also true. DW makes a lot of the same assumptions as old-school D&D about the kind of world you're exploring, and a back-loaded relationship with lore is still a relationship with lore - it's just, in addition to "play to see what happens," "play to see what's here." Thank...

This is true, and salient. I don't think you'll find may players, even in this discussion, on the side of "Lore is stupid! No settings! Trash it all!" (Well, I mean, that's kind of where you are with Dungeon World, I guess, but that's probably orthogonal to a 5e-centric discussion anyway.) Make...

I'd be kinda curious to see you unpack this a little. It doesn't jive with my read of PS, so I'd be interested to know what you're seeing that I'm not.

Most welcome! To be clear, I tinker with stablocks all the time, either because I want a new monster and it's easier to modify an existing one than start from scratch (my penanggalan is essentially a nasty, souped-up vampire spawn) or because I want a specific sort of variant - one which may end...

Answers, plus some assorted thoughts: 1. I run for a big table - seven, sometimes eight players: valor bard, paladin, battle master, arcane trickster, bear totem barbarian, moon druid, war cleric, and sometimes dragon sorcerer. No one will be shocked by now to learn that 5e's challenge math...

As an aside: I don't know about anyone else, but I really, really want a print of this painting now.

There is nothing about this I don't agree with. Whether you love canon or disregard it entirely, this is a sensible, respectful approach all around, and I endorse it utterly. But let's be clear that pemerton has said repeatedly here that of course it isn't canon. His sole stance, as far as I...

Hang on a minute, though; that's not what Maxperson said (and in fact he's even talked about having changed the lore himself sometimes). I don't want to speak for him, but I would guess, from reading just a bit between the lines, that he considers adhering to lore as a baseline, in the absence...

I'm happy enough to play the "I started this thread, so it wanders where I let it" card - in part because I agree with you, and the material we're getting to here is both interesting and relevant, if only a little indirectly, to the subject of how to add complexity to encounters (and, by...

Thank you, this, yes - you've pinned down something that I was flailing at without quite being able to bracket so neatly. Omniscient-author text provides (establishes, even!) some aspect of the lore. But an in-world speaker is part of the lore. This in itself should alter, if subtly, the way we...

That makes total sense. In practice, I think you and I would handle things in much the same way, even if we can't get on the same page in re. WTH "established" means. :) As I said waaaaaaaay back in the early pages of this thread, this is a rilly rilly important conversation to have. When I...

LOL, yes, that makes sense too. The protocols of skill checks are one of those things a table has to work out on its own. There are good reasons for all kinds of approaches, and yours has the additional benefit of cutting off the "I'm using Investigation!" callout while the die's already rolling...

Absolutley. The "sometimes you have to go too far to figure out what far enough is" method is often a useful way of exploring, especially in creative pursuits. Just a caution that discussions that start to go there can get really, really bogged down in the edge cases at the expense of losing...

So if it's not deference to the vision of the creator (or at least not exactly), and that aspect isn't one you have a personal stake in,* what inherent value would you say it has for you to hew as closely as possible to what feels like the structural essence or foundation of the setting? (I'm...

5e's selection of feats seem pretty well-designed to me in that they all "break the rules" in some way - they give you action economy options or bonuses you wouldn't normally be able to get, or avoid limitations you otherwise can't get around. So, e.g., anyone can probably use their action to...

I dunno. What's the quintessence of Mystara-ness? Is it geography or something else? It's an intriguing philosophical question in a white-room theory kind of way, but the chance of encountering it in the wild seems astronomically small. As with genre, it's probably a mistake to try and define...

Gotcha. Do I have the right understanding that you're defensive of lore because you want to preserve the creator's vision? (If so, I have Thoughts about this, as you will be shocked, shocked to learn. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.) I'm curious, if this is so, whether that's simply a...