Are there too many settings out there?

[Nightfall]

trance,

Well Bluffside can be ported in as a mini-campaign. Freeport isn't the only city. I also believe you can use a lot of the Seven Cities in various locales.

Course for me, I'm liking the fact some things are self-contained. The example I use of over-meta-ing (I think that's a word ) is the whole death and undead return of Orcus.

 

[Darrin Drader]

I really don't think that there are too many settings. That's like asking if there are too many movie series. I mean if we just look at science fiction movie series, we have Star Wars, Star Trek, The Alien series, the two predator movies, 2001 & 2010, The Riddick Chronicles, and so on. And those are just the cream of the crop.

Campaign settings allow DMs to buy a book that contains the bare bones for their world, allowing them to flesh out the rest. The quantity of settings is a good thing because it gives DMs more preassembled campaign options, which allows them to adopt a flavor that suits the style of play they prefer.

Personally I don't get into setting bashing. A world of sword and sorcery with some powerful and iconic characters is a good model to work with. That happens to be the Forgotten Realms. A dark setting where the evil overlord has won the major battle is another great theme to work with - that would be Midnight. A world made up of numerous beings and civilizations pulled from other settings is also a very good campaign model - that being Oathbound. A post apocalyptic fantasy world is also very cool - that would be Darksun (among a few others). I do get a little annoyed when I pick up one setting that's just a clone of another, but so far that really hasn't happened much.

I also love dead settings. Why? Well, being an RPG freelancer, I have a lot of creativity that I want to put into a world. I want to be able to change my world without worrying about contradicting something that may or may not be published in the future. Once I've bought a series of setting books, its nice to be able to incorporate everything that's out there for it, and then make the rest my own. Of course I have a definite appreciation for extremely detailed and fleshed out setting, like the Forgotten Realms, which almost comes alive due to the sheer amount of detail available.

 

[fusangite]

I guess I can see people's point about using published settings for inspiration. Generally, though, the inspiration can usually be gleaned from a 20-100 minute flip through the material. No sense in actually buying it... at least for me.

 

[Teflon Billy]

Though I love most of the stuff that's been made for the Scarred Lands setting (it's just a good read in general), and Midnight in its entirety, I don't really have much mechanical use for Fantasy Settings.

Modern settings (Freedom City, Europe 2089, Dark Inheritance and suchlike) are more likely to see use.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It's also true that there's a lot of variations on the same theme. You can have COUNTLESS worlds run by a dark overlord who has won the fight against goodness, and they could have only THAT in common with Midnight, and otherwise be worlds apart.

 

[bekkilyn_rpg]

I'm baffled that people purchase settings; creating a setting is my main source of fun as a DM. I'm always kind of confused by the popularity of these things.

...

A published setting is kind of like getting to both play and DM at the same time in a sense (good for players who don't always get to play as much as they want or who like settings their DM's don't use, and good for DM's who never seem to get to play.)

When you completely make up your own setting, you already know everything from the very beginning. There are no surprises (not counting player actions) and nothing to discover that you don't make up yourself. But with a published setting, you can make up all sorts of things and fill in lots of details and add whatever you want to it, but you also have the fun of discovering unknown things about various places within the setting. Of course, you have the option as a DM as to whether or not you wish to use the new information, but it's still fun.

It's also fun to be able to discuss common settings on messageboards and discussion groups and see what other people are doing with them.

And even if you don't actually use a setting in your game and/or have your own setting, you can still use them for inspiration and for just sitting down and having a good read.

If there are published settings based on novels I've liked, I enjoy discovering more about the world and the characters of that world and don't care if I ever use it in a game of any sort. I just like it is my only reason in such cases.

 

[bekkilyn_rpg]

...

Of course I have a definite appreciation for extremely detailed and fleshed out setting, like the Forgotten Realms, which almost comes alive due to the sheer amount of detail available.

Ah yes, that's another thing. I rarely get this sort of detail outside of published settings (as a player) and detail is something I really love. The more the detail, the more the world comes alive for me. DM's don't always have the time to come up with this sort of detail too, so oftentimes a well-detailed published setting will give them a good starting point and then they can detail in the things they want to emphasize the most.

 

[trancejeremy]

trance,

Well Bluffside can be ported in as a mini-campaign. Freeport isn't the only city. I also believe you can use a lot of the Seven Cities in various locales.

Course for me, I'm liking the fact some things are self-contained. The example I use of over-meta-ing (I think that's a word ) is the whole death and undead return of Orcus.

Well, my point was, Freeport is the only one that is designed to be set in another setting, and has several products in the line. I think 7 or 8 books (plus some free pdfs).

Bluffside is well done, but it's use of many non-standard fantasy races, and background makes it not very generic (IMHO.)

7 Cities is also excellent (and very generic D&D style fantasy) but is a one-shot dealie (as are several other products).

 

[MaxKaladin]

I've done both. I ran the Forgotten Realms for ten years, Harn for two years and I'm now three years into my own homebrew setting. The big advantage homebrews have is that you can set them up exactly how you want them. Published settings had a couple of big advantages for me. One was that there was support material I didn't have to make up myself, especially the large scale stuff. The other one was support, which both gives me new stuff I wouldn't have thought of and has an aspect of that ability to play bekkilyn_rpg mentioned. The first allowed me a lot more time to focus on local stuff and details rather than worrying about making up the large scale stuff. That's the part I'm really missing right now as I find myself spending so much time on making things like religions that I don't have as much time for creating adventures and fleshing out the local area.

 

[Krug]

Considering how popular some of these settings have become in a short period of time, (Midnight, The Diamond Throne, Scarred Lands), nope, you can't have too many settings. As long as the company producing them is making $ from them, hell, why not?