[Ampersand] Bill Slavicsek on campaign settings

[el-remmen]

Out of those 3 Mystara probably has the least chance of coming back.

You make el-remmen sad.

 

[malraux]

It won't seem that way soon enough. With everything Core everything is needed to play the game by the "Official" rules. That was the great thing about 3.x Core Rules. The official policy of WotC was that you only needed the "Core" books to play. Now the official policy is that every book is Core including setting books and that players should buy all of them because all of them will have relevant information to every player. I would love WotC to come out and say that players will be fine just buying the PHB, but with them releasing a PHB2, PHB3, PHB4, PHB5, etc. I just don't see that. Now they expect players to buy 3 campaign books a year as well, including ones for settings they are not interested in because those books will have generic material useful to everyone. I might change my mind on the setting books if they republished the classes, powers, and feats from these books in later PHBs, but I don't see that happening.

Assuming a new player wants to play a class available in the PHB I, why on earth would he have to buy every book? Heck, even in 3e, which ostensibly had 3 core books, a new player only had to buy 1. And even with multiple PHBs, at worst, the new player will have to buy 2 books at most, the first, and whichever contains the class that most interests him.

 

[katahn]

I'm not overly stressing the old campaign settings being revisted, although I would definitely be excited to get a look at a 4e version of spelljammer. I've never had an issue inventing (or liberally stealing/adapting sources on) worlds and settings, so the idea of branding the settings as 'core and go ahead and mix and match stuff' won't affect my purchasing decisions much. I will be inclined to grab some of the settings, even if only out of curiosity, but that's always been true.

 

[ki11erDM]

This is all about selling the concept of DDI. WotC sees that as the future and they are trying to get as many people to buy into it as possible.

You will buy the Complete Monkey book, which will be rather generic as they are now, with ideas on how to incorporate it into your home brew world and then use DDI to integrate it into whatever campaign world’s they have out. You will buy a Eberron setting book which will give you a complete and in-depth look in to that world and DDI will have ideas on how to incorporate it into FR and will keep you updated on Eberron.

This is perfect for me. And I bet this is perfect for many other groups as well. If you don’t think paying $10 a month for a lot of D&D content, adventures and utilities along with conversion material for those books then I guess this is not for you. I paid more than that for years and years for Dungeon and Dragon and I pay more than that for Pathfinder now so I guess I just don’t see the issue some of you have. *shrug*

This is just remarketing the same type of information that has always been produced for D&D but moving part of it online so they can have a consistent revenue stream.

 

[malraux]

No in 3.X Core was the PHB, DMG, and MM. They said "Core" on the front cover. The definition of core was that they were all that was needed to play the game. In 4E "Core" has been stated by WotC to be expanded and that they now consider all books and DDI information to be "Core" does that mean that you can't play with just the 4E PHB, DMG, and MM, probably not (but with certain races, classes, and monsters intentionally left out to be put in future books I am not sure). But WotC is sure trying to make everyone think that they need everything else now or they wouldn't have expanded the definition of "Core".

Not according to WotC. Check out the product page and filter by core products. You'll get more than the PHB, DMG, and MM. WotC means something entirely different when they say core.

 

[The Hitcher]

I think what they're trying to say is (as White Wolf did with their WOD re-launch):

GOODBYE METAPLOT!

Except maybe in novels. But good riddence. There is nothing more annoying than trying to run an evolving game in a differently evolving world, with new supplements coming out that contradict what you've already told your players. Give us broad brushstrokes, and we'll fill in the rest.

That said, I don't buy campaign settings (for the reason above, amongst others), and I'm fairly unlikely to start now. Although a shiny new set of Planescape books would certainly tempt me to change my mind...

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

I think what they're trying to say is (as White Wolf did with their WOD re-launch):

GOODBYE METAPLOT!

Except maybe in novels. But good riddence. There is nothing more annoying than trying to run an evolving game in a differently evolving world, with new supplements coming out that contradict what you've already told your players. Give us broad brushstrokes, and we'll fill in the rest.

That said, I don't buy campaign settings (for the reason above, amongst others), and I'm fairly unlikely to start now. Although a shiny new set of Planescape books would certainly tempt me to change my mind...

Welcome to the boards!

And I'd tend to agree with what you're saying. I'm very likely to get the published adventures and the PHB / MM / DMG - for me, I'll leave it to the players to buy other materials if they want to introduce stuff to the game.

 

[MaelStorm]

Out of the box thinking, as others pointed out, was always there in the background, but maybe for some it wasn't clear. Granted some FR stuff was broken, and I hope this will be fixed in 4E by involving the same team in every book from A to Z. Freelancers can create as long as the same core team review the material.

One thing I like the most with 4E is the modular approach, there'll be elements that'll glue themselves together, there'll be elements that'll be suitable with a little tweak, and there'll be other stuff that won't fit together. Like LEGO blocks, you'll be able to build what you want, and that's what I'm looking for when I choose a RPG. This was one of the strength of GURPS also.

One of the setting I'm looking for in 4E is Al-Qadim

Other settings I would be interested to make a comeback for 4E: Greyhawk, Ravenloft, DragonLance, Dark Sun, PlaneScape.

Another aspect that will be interesting to see is if WotC plan to make new game with the same system developped for D&D 4E. Genre like farwest, cyberpunk, sci-fi, supers, etc.

 

[jelmore]

I am also puzzled with the "any Core supplement will also be a FR/Eberron supplement" thing. So a supplement talking about the newest plan of the Zhentarim to take over the trade between Sembia and the Dales will also be just as usefull to Eberron?

I think you missed the "Core" part of "any Core supplement". They're not planning to do a long line of setting-specific sourcebooks to generate or advance plotlines (outside of adventures, of course).

So the Martial Power sourcebook and Draconomicon will be relevant to because they won't necessarily have paragon paths, feats, or organizations that are tied to any one campaign setting. I can see generic organizations like the Bloodhounds from Complete Adventurer or the Topaz Order from Lords of Madness -- and paragon paths and feats tied to those organizations -- appearing in new sourcebooks, with the idea that they can be adopted whole or in part into the Realms or Eberron as desired.

 

[nothing to see here]

I don't like it. I don't think a future Complete Divine (-like product) would serve the players of Eberron as well as Faiths of Eberron. I don't think writing Faiths of Eberron to be appealing to players in FR would make the book better for players of Eberron. And so on. By trying to dance in all weddings, WotC will create so-so products that don't really serve well any one setting.

Can I take the Red Wizard and apply it to my Birthright game? Sure. But I would be better served by a Wizards of Anduria book, and the guy playing FR would be better served by a Red Wizards of Thay book than by a Red Wizard class in the Arcane Power book. By producing the Arcane Power book, WotC provides a so-so gaming experience to both of us; if they produced The Red Wizards of Thay, they would make a better game experience for the guy playing FR, and the guy playing Birthright could harvest ideas and mechanics from it about as well as it could from the generic Arcane Power book.

I don't think you can do both generic and setting specific. Well, you can't do it well.

As for settings, I'd love to see a new Birthright. But I doubt it. Birthright (like Darksun) appears to be too restrictive, i.e. not generic enough for WotC's new philosophy - you can't use much of the core (or, supposedly, expansions) material (certain races and classes in Darksun, for example, with their associated feats, paragon paths, and so on). Birthright is also far, far less common in popularity polls.

My bet is that after FR and Eberron, we'll see Planescape/Spelljammer, followed by Ravenloft. A new 4e-based setting is possible at any point too.

Sadly, as pleasant as it is for individual gamers, this was the approach that killed TSR.