Do players really care for the campaign setting?

[Ghendar]

I care a great deal about the setting. If someone wanted me to play D&D and they said they were going to run a Spelljammer game, I wouldn't play. It's just not a setting I'm interested in playing. <shrug>

 

[GoodKingJayIII]

As a player, I always get invested in a campaign world. Sure, there are campaigns with specific themes and flavor I don't like and wouldn't want to play, but as someone said before the game feels a little empty without some kind of backdrop. IMO the game world is an important NPC: it should have a life and personality but should never take the forefront or spotlight.

With that in mind, I'm not sure how to answer the poll. On one hand, setting is very important to me, but on the other the genre is my main focus. So I guess setting is secondary, but I'd really prefer something like "A detailed setting acting as a backdrop for the characters."

I think the Ptolus Player's Guide is just the right amount of information to give PCs. It's meaty but doesn't give out all the details. It let's players create a character with some background anchored in the world. There aren't 20 pages of historical details that players probably don't want to read. I think if you give something like this to your players, and they read it, they'll get interested.

 

[painandgreed]

If the DM knows his stuff and the setting affects the campaign, and likewise, we can affect the setting, then I enjoy the game more.

 

[Doomhawk]

I really appreciate it when the game world feels complete and consistent. I also enjoy a game more when it's in a setting I like, and a little less in a setting I find dumb, but as long as I know enough about the world to not feel like an outsider or someone who just woke up with head trauma, I'm generally happy.
But I still would consider setting definitely secondary to the DM and the group as a whole.

 

[tek2way]

Personally speaking, I find that the setting itself is secondary to the game I'm playing. While I love reading tidbits of information about a setting, how the setting feels is really controlled by how the DM plays it out.

Consider:

I ran a Silver Marches campaign back in 2002. Everyone loved it, because I tapped the info in the region sourcebook, as well as the Silverymoon online resource, to really force the "little touches" to the forefront. To this day, people cannot think of fondue without thinking of that campaign. I deliberately ignored a lot of "canon", and the players enjoyed it more (basically, there was no Drizzt, no Elminster, and Alustriel was just a non-statted npc).

When I've played in published settings, I enjoy the setting, but -- at the same time -- I could take or leave the setting stuff. For me, while it's neat to have a specific pantheon of deities to worship and places to go, if the game itself isn't grabbing my attention, then I certainly won't be into the setting (because I could just read it in my spare time).

When I play in a homebrew, though, I want to know all that I can about the setting. There's something magical about hearing a new piece of information, and suddenly realizing that it fits into the big picture at just such a location. Plus, the DM is also rather happy when that happens, too. I cannot get enough of the details in such a game, even if it's not quite as well run as another game. Perhaps it just appeals to the problem solver in me. *shrug*

 

[Nyaricus]

No white wine.

D20 White Wine is slated for early 2007, and is a continuation of the ground-breaking material you found in D20 Ale and Whores.

 

[Odhanan]

The setting is one of the prime components of my immersion in the game as a player. Therefore, whether it is a published or homebrew setting matters not. What matters is the feel of it, and how I can believe in it enough to feel like I am "my character" in an interactive, rich and outlandish environment I can relate to on some degree or another (even a setting like Toon/Acme has some coherence to it. It is a parody, and a comical coherence is involved, obviously, but still, the setting does have an inner coherence).

 

[Ibram]

I love settings, and while a very detailed setting isnt the only way I can enjoy a game it is an important part of the game.

 

[ThirdWizard]

I only really care if the setting goes out of its way to be unique, like Planescape or Darksun. I really couldn't care less about playing in a game of FR or Greyhawk. Even Ravenloft could be replaced by generic horror setting and I'd be fine with it.

 

[Herobizkit]

"Then, another consideration comes to my mind: in a traditional medieval age, most people are ignorant and superstitous, and rarely leave, if ever, the vicinity of their native village. Then, maps of the planets are rarely available, if existing at all. So I guess, one idea would be of taking an already existing world (preferably a homebrew that no player knows about), but not show any map to the players, and not tell them anything beyond their imediate region plus vagu rumors. Then, to make the game more fun to the players, only make sure to make it fit with their preferences (i.e.: like high fantasy with elves, etc., or low-magic with humans only)."

I would LOVE a game run in this manner.

I run every homebrew like that, for some of the same reasons you listed. I don't do a lot of pre-gen when i make a campaign world. It's more fun for me to create on the fly than try and pre-create thousands of years of back history that really isn't important to the PC's.

I also tend to cram all kind of genres together in my homebrews. I am so tired of "generic" fantasy... but to be honest, if the story is gripping, it really doesn't matter to me that much.