D&D - Thinking outside of the box

[Jürgen Hubert]

The biggest problem I think you are running into is you are associating the common style of D&D as not being at the same calibure of play as these other worlds.

I wouldn't say that. I rather like the Forgotten Realms, and no doubt I will play in them again. But each setting and each RPG approaches gaming from a different perspective - perspectives you might not otherwise be ware of. Even knowing the sheer range of possibilities out there will help you come up with new ideas that will keep your players on their toes.

Sounds to me like your fighting your own boredom MR. Hubert.

No, that's not it. I am not at all bored with my current, long-running Exalted campaign, and I am also writing a d20 fantasy world (which I hope to publish one day) that on one hand adheres to the D&D Core Rules much more closely than most settings out there while being deeply unconventional in a large number of ways.

No, I am not bored.

 

[Mark CMG]

All this to me seems to be rather close-minded. Why not expand your ideas about what is possible and what not in gaming (. . .)?

(. . .)

Do anything, except getting stuck in your One True Way(TM).

You seem to both admonish people for not gaming differently than they do and to accuse those same people for admonishing others for not gaming differently then they in the same post. Some people enjoy finding a style of gaming they enjoy and then sticking with it. Others enjoy trying new things all of the time. Most fall somewhere in between. It's all good, no?

 

[Aaron L]

Some of my best Forgotten Realms adventures were inspired by Delta Green: Countdown, a sourcebook for modern conspiracy horror set in the universe of the Cthulhu Mythos. .

I once had characters in a DG game run afoul of a Wizard from my D&D world who had come to speak to Stephen Alzis about a matter concerning Azathoth and a resident Great Old One of my D&D setting

They also once read about great wizards of ancient times and other worlds, including Eibon and such, but also Mordenkainen and Vecna.


I've had characters come across Stephen Alzis and Randall Flagg in my D&D games. In my D&D world there is a war going on in space between the Ilithid and the Mi-Go. Characters have traveled to the great library of Caelano.


Mixing things up is good and fun!

 

[buzz]

This is . . . errr . . . cow poop? Fantasy is a genre. Greyhawk is a particular universe within a genre. It'd be like saying that science-fiction literature can only be set in the Dune universe.

You're missing my point; I'm not talking about Greyhawk. "D&D as its own genre" is not a new idea.

D&D is not a generic fantasy system. D&D has a number of default assumptions built into the rule system that describe a world-view uniquely its own. This, in turn, has inspired a whole body of fantasy fiction that is "D&D" in style; there's pre-D&D fantasy and post-D&D fantasy.

 

[buzz]

Now, if you want to actually address what I've been posting about...

Which, it might be noted, isn't really the same as the subject of the thread.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

You seem to both admonish people for not gaming differently than they do and to accuse those same people for admonishing others for not gaming differently then they in the same post. Some people enjoy finding a style of gaming they enjoy and then sticking with it. Others enjoy trying new things all of the time. Most fall somewhere in between. It's all good, no?

Like I said later, I regretted putting it quite like this...

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

This is . . . errr . . . cow poop? Fantasy is a genre. Greyhawk is a particular universe within a genre. It'd be like saying that science-fiction literature can only be set in the Dune universe

It depends on how broadly you define genre. Some call Hard Sci-Fi, Soft/Sociological Sci-Fi and Space Opera genres, others call them something else - sub-genre, whatever - within the genre of Science Fiction.

Fantasy has a similar split, with genres (or sub-genres) like Epic Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, Dark Fantasy, Romantic Fantasy, etc. In the more specific sense, sub-genre if you will, D&D, or at least RAW D&D is a genre unto itself, as different from Sword and Sorcery and Epic Fantasy as they are from each other. D&D posits a lot of things completely alien to other sub-genres of fantasy, including a superheroic power scale and powers that grow directly from experience, the ubiquity of magic, the blending of Epic Fantasy trappings with Sword and Sorcery stories, and the alignment system as a defined, palatable force. These things are present in Greyhawk - but also in the Forgotten Realms, Eberron, Mystara/the Known World, Spelljammer, Planescape - even Ravenloft and Dark Sun. To say nothing of much of the fantasy fiction written since D&D came out.

If D&D must equal Greyhawk then I guess I play d20 fantasy and I should stop reading this message board.

I absolutely play d20 fantasy (along with various non-d20 games) rather than D&D and have felt no compulsion to stop reading ENWorld. It is, after all, Morrus' D&D / d20 News & Reviews Site.

 

[helium3]

D&D is not a generic fantasy system. D&D has a number of default assumptions built into the rule system that describe a world-view uniquely its own.

What are these default assumptions that creates a world-view uniquely its own? Are you talking about alignment? The various classes? Vancian magic and levelling?

 

[buzz]

What are these default assumptions that creates a world-view uniquely its own? Are you talking about alignment? The various classes? Vancian magic and levelling?

All that and more; see what MoogleEmpMog posted above. This is why D&D (*not* d20 generally) is a suboptimal choice for emulating fantasy settings/genres that are not it's own; it's simply not designed to emulate anything other that it's own established tropes. This is not a criticism, it's just observation. "D&D does a great job of being D&D."

Again, this isn't something I just made up. The concept of "D&D-style fantasy" is way old.

 

[Aaron L]

All that and more; see what MoogleEmpMog posted above. This is why D&D (*not* d20 generally) is a suboptimal choice for emulating fantasy settings/genres that are not it's own; it's simply not designed to emulate anything other that it's own established tropes. This is not a criticism, it's just observation. "D&D does a great job of being D&D."

Again, this isn't something I just made up. The concept of "D&D-style fantasy" is way old.

The concept of "D&D style fantasy" isn't new to any of us, but it isn't a genre; its far to narrow. Fantasy is a genre. D&D is a flavor or something.