D&D 5E Campaign Settings 5e- Why I want to Forget the Realms

[Maialideth]

To me, Forgotten Realms lack flavor. It doesn't have that special feeling that just makes me want to explore every inch of the world (Ravenloft, Eberron, and Planescape does that to me). I think most of the names of nations and cities in FR sounds wrong (I think it was Tolkien who said something like, never or very rarely use the letter 'Z', because it is so rare in our own languages that it sounds wrong). I know this may seem really weird or nit-picky, but the colors and fonts of the FR books just turns me off as well. They're just too boring. Also... Elminster urgh (though I do like Driz'zt, as long as my players don't try to make a CG drow with two swords).

 

[MG.0]

I know this may seem really weird or nit-picky, but the colors and fonts of the FR books just turns me off as well.

Not weird at all. That was one of my problems with Planescape. I love planar adventuring, but the entire Planescape setting irritated the heck out of me. The fonts and pictures were hideous. The obnoxious lingo in every ... single ... piece ... of ... text - berk, cutter, etc. Beyond that though were the changes made for 3rd and 4th editions, where it seems whoever was writing the material forgot what the planes were supposed to be and just made them fit whatever was going on in the latest Forgotten Realms novel. Ugh. My 5th edition cosmology is much closer to 1st edition than anything, although it takes some ideas from very early Dragon magazine articles as well as my own refinements.

 

[pkt77242]

I have to agree. DragonLance doesn't feel like an open world to me. Starting a campaign there would make me feel like I'm messing up or interfering with a preexisting story in some way. I'm sure not everyone feels that way but it's why I prefer other campaign settings.

I think it depends on what time period you play in. One of my favorite campaigns was set in DL right after the Cataclysm.

 

[Jester David]

Yup... Every setting has the problem to so e extent, the more popular the harder it is...but I feel the realms was that perfect storm of Mary sues and popular to hit that you either love it or hate it..

I really think that so many of the problems people have with the Realms have more to do with what poor DMs have done with the Realms than the Realms themselves.
There's a lot of NPCs in the Realms that can become DM PCs or portrayed as Mary Sues. Even if they're really not.

 

[Agamon]

I really think that so many of the problems people have with the Realms have more to do with what poor DMs have done with the Realms than the Realms themselves.
There's a lot of NPCs in the Realms that can become DM PCs or portrayed as Mary Sues. Even if they're really not.

Some players can be to blame, too. For every wannabe that insisted on playing a Drizzt clone, there's likely more than one person who played with him that hates Drizzt.

 

[Jester David]

Some players can be to blame, too. For every wannabe that insisted on playing a Drizzt clone, there's likely more than one person who played with him that hates Drizzt.

I'd agree with that.
But, then again, I have a long history of making half-elven fighters and rangers that are a lot like Tanis Half-Elven...

 

[Agamon]

I'd agree with that.
But, then again, I have a long history of making half-elven fighters and rangers that are a lot like Tanis Half-Elven...

Tanis was typical, Drizzt was meant to be a one-of-a-kind.

 

[Raith5]

I think it is fair to say that the FR is a polarising setting! I have played in the FR a fair bit in the early (grey box) years but I have never completely understood the love for FR. I never had a problem per se with super NPCs because they were background. But I just generally find the politics, the culture, the geography and the religion of the FR simultaneously too fiddly/complicated to be useful and just too beige to be interesting .

For some reason the map annoys the hell out of me and I never quite understood why the territory around Baldurs gate and Waterdeep did not get occupied by states rather than just city states.

On top of this the, various spell plagues, revisions, counter revisions etc have not augmented the beauty of this setting. In my mind it is all a bit of a mess.

 

[Remathilis]

Tanis was typical, Drizzt was meant to be a one-of-a-kind.

Heh, in my group it was the sheer number of Raistlin/Dalamar knockoffs... Sooo many evil human or elven mages....

 

[Hriston]

1.) The Forgotten Realms is not the default. The Multiverse is the default, which means that no matter what world your campaign takes place, the Realms are a part of it.