Does Metaplot ever work? Forked Thread: Greyhawk 4e

[fletch137]

I think metaplots are great and look at each one as great campaign outlines and opportunities to put my PCs in the heart of world-changing events. The only time they become troublesome is the risk of sidelining the PCs or railroading them along the pre-determined script.

Wrath of the Immortals is one of my all-time favorite game accessories, mostly because of the metaplot/timeline update. It was presented in the form of a campaign that featured how the players could get involved. Even though the outcome was predetermined, the PCs were right there the whole way.

Legend of Five Rings seems to have a similar approach despite being inspired by the card tournaments. I haven’t actually played this myself, but I’ve seen a number of campaign books that describe different periods in the setting’s history and how PCs can be involved with events as they happen.

But the granddaddy of all playable metaplots as far as I’m concerned was the Boy King for Pendragon. This campaign outlined literally decades worth of campaign events and the adventures that spawn from them. I’ve never seen a multi-generational campaign done this well since.

 

[Staffan]

Karameikos - being a politics/history buff, I have a hang-up over the politics. I can accept all kinds of Mystaran weirdness, but I can't accept the premise that Karameikos is (a) ruled by Thyatian settlers and (b) independent of Thyatis. In the absence of a war of independence, it just goes against human nature and makes no sense to me that Emperor Thincol, head of an expansionist empire, would grant complete independence to a territory on his doorstep. Making Stefan a Grand Duke within the Empire, fine. Freedom from taxation, fine. Ejecting the Grand Duchy from the Empire, not fine. I can't think of any historical parrallel for what's described as having occurred.

As I recall, back in the D&D days, Karameikos was a Grand Duchy, and nominally still a part of Thyatis. Grand Duke Stefan had traded his ancestral lands for this frontier territory and independence in all but name, which the Emperor thought was a good deal.

Then during the War of the Immortals, when Thyatis was too busy dealing with Alphatia, Duke Stefan took the opportunity to declare independence and pronounce himself King. Not sure Thyatis was in any shape to contest that after the WotI - IIRC, Thyatis got quite beaten up.

 

[Klaus]

To be brutally honest, I've typically gone for running homebrewed campaign settings over established settings due to issues of metaplot. Playing, OTOH, is another issue: it's more or less whether I enjoy that person's homebrew game or not over setting-specific (and metaplot-heavy) games they've run.

For example, from my personal experience, I've enjoyed playing Eberron over Forgotten Realms or Dragonlance. Eberron has a metaplot of its own, but nothing in scale of the Realms. Then again, I got tired of dealing with a plethora of drow, Spellfire wielders, saurials, thri-kreen, sinister mages, and the Trickster-kenders that always cropped up in the FR or DL games.

IMO, I think that a metaplot can work well as a good foundation for a game/setting, but can be a right awful pain as a script for future progression of that setting. The foundation is something a DM can work with & build on; a script is something a DM either needs to keep track of or compete with.

I can understand the need for changes in a game. However, FWIW, I think that FR dealt with its changes best by making the 100-year leap. There was just so much metaplot present that only advancing a handful of years really wouldn't have worked. What happened during the 100-year leap is up for debate, though.

Conversely, Greyhawk (IMO) may work well by regressing the timeline back to a "halcyon age" of the setting. Greyhawk doesn't really have the supplemental material (such as novels & the like) that establish big metaplot issues as settings like FR or DL do. Returning it to an earlier time may work best for the setting, and (hopefully) it'll help grab the interest of younger generations of gamers in the setting.

Eberron, I think, is currently in a "sweet spot"—it has a decent metaplot to provide opportunities for games, but not enough a monolithic metaplot that doom it to progress a certain way.

Dragonlance is going to be a tricky one, I think. It seems to be born & raised in metaplot, and its association with metaplot/novels is much, much stronger than in other settings (even FR, IMO). I think it may benefit from a timeline jump much as FR did, and future novels could work in the void between where the old edition ended & the new one begins, esp. with how world-shaking a lot of the DL novels & the like can be.

I can't say much about other D&D settings metaplot-wise (like Ravenloft, Planescape, Dark Sun, Spelljammer, etc.). However, IMO, they are really games & settings of the era they were introduced in (as full-blown campaign settings, that is)—the late 80's/90's. To me, they seem to have that aroma of trenchcoat & katana stuck on them—the trend of their time. Because of that, I can understand why they may get a "tip of the hat" from time to time in online material, but they may not get the full 2-hardcover book treatment like other D&D settings.

You seem to be mixing "adventure hooks" or "campaign premises" with "metaplot". "Metaplot", at least to me, is a pervasing storyline that progresses from one supplement to the next. Like, say, if Eberron focused on the reason of the Mourning, and every supplement brought the secret closer to being revealed, until they came out with a New War adventure where it was all in the open.

 

[Nymrohd]

Eberron has almost no metaplot. Some things have been revealed between books but not through plots or any form of advancement. The timeline is static, and there is a comfortable number of mysteries that up until now they have promised never to give a definite answer to.

 

[S'mon]

As I recall, back in the D&D days, Karameikos was a Grand Duchy, and nominally still a part of Thyatis. Grand Duke Stefan had traded his ancestral lands for this frontier territory and independence in all but name, which the Emperor thought was a good deal.

Then during the War of the Immortals, when Thyatis was too busy dealing with Alphatia, Duke Stefan took the opportunity to declare independence and pronounce himself King. Not sure Thyatis was in any shape to contest that after the WotI - IIRC, Thyatis got quite beaten up.

This makes more sense than what I read in my Karameikos Gazetteer. AIR Karameikos had already been granted independence by 1000 AC and its title was just cosmetic. That didn't make sense to me - but then neither did much about Karameikos being an undeveloped wilderness with all those powerful civilised states around it.

If they retconned it to make more sense, I guess that's good.

 

[Dausuul]

I don't hold with metaplots. They are loathsome and should be abolished. The continuity of any novel lines based on a setting should be treated as "non-canon" from the perspective of the setting.

For a particularly popular novel line, there could be an expansion specifically based on the events of that line. For instance, if the core setting is Dragonlance at the start of Chronicles, there could be an expansion pack with updates for those who wish to start at the beginning of Legends. However, that expansion should be considered optional, and pre-Chronicles should remain the default for the setting.

(In regards to the big metaplot event of this year, the Spellplague, I'm a bit conflicted. I never liked Forgotten Realms pre-4E, and I honestly like post-Spellplague FR quite a bit better. But I suspect I'd feel differently if I were a Realms fan.)

 

[AFGNCAAP]

You seem to be mixing "adventure hooks" or "campaign premises" with "metaplot". "Metaplot", at least to me, is a pervasing storyline that progresses from one supplement to the next. Like, say, if Eberron focused on the reason of the Mourning, and every supplement brought the secret closer to being revealed, until they came out with a New War adventure where it was all in the open.

True, which has been done (to a degree) through the Eberron modules (IIRC, there's one module which has the PCs working for House Cannith, and they eventually go to Xen'drik and essentially find an ur-Warforged there, suggesting the giants were the first to pioneer the process that lead the way to the warforged).

The novels also seem to develop metaplot concepts as well. Just through sheer chance, I've read 2 Eberron novels (of different trilogies/sets) and both involve a mind flayer as the big baddie near the end. Xoriat seems like it'll be stepping up in the role for major metaplot contender (along with dragonmarks, the Prophecy, and Siberys/Eberron/Khyber Shards).

However, compared to Forgotten Realms & Dragonlance, these sorts of metaplots are lightweights in comparison—they aren't world-wracking events akin to the Cataclysm, the War of the Lance, the Avatar Trilogy, or the like.

 

[Staffan]

That didn't make sense to me - but then neither did much about Karameikos being an undeveloped wilderness with all those powerful civilised states around it.

The relationships between different states in the Known World is one of those things one shouldn't look too closely at, because then you realize that that's because the setting was created piecemeal by a number of different authors without more overall direction than "this here is Elfland, here's Dwarfland, that's Mageland, and down here we have Islandland."

 

[M.L. Martin]

IMO, Spelljammer fits in there: it's D&D ala space opera, much as Dark Sun is D&D ala post-apocalyptic or Ravenloft is D&D ala WoD (not that the PCs can necessarily be monsters as in WoD, but there's the aura/aroma of a "world of grim mystery, horror, & terror" permeating the setting much as in [old] WoD).

I don't know if that's quite the label to attach to Ravenloft, seeing as it predates the WoD by a year.

 

[Spatula]

True, which has been done (to a degree) through the Eberron modules (IIRC, there's one module which has the PCs working for House Cannith, and they eventually go to Xen'drik and essentially find an ur-Warforged there, suggesting the giants were the first to pioneer the process that lead the way to the warforged).

That was already spelled out in the ECS - check out the item section.