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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Viktyr Gehrig" data-source="post: 2493369" data-attributes="member: 9249">I am no longer specifically speaking of Dragonlance-- as I noted earlier, I've spoken my piece on the subject. However, there is, in my opinion, a flaw in your argument. You are absolutely right in that whatever campaign setting I am playing is my world, and as DM, I am able to do with it as I see fit. This is one of the most basic principles of roleplaying games, and in my opinion is what makes them superior to even the most cinematic and epic electronic games. But, if I have to take ownership of a setting-- if I have to cross lines through the setting and change things in order to make it my own-- then the setting is not what I wanted as-is. If I can change any campaign setting to be exactly the setting I want, then there is no difference between any two settings, or even between off-the-shelf settings and the myriad homebrews that other people are willing to share with others. The standards by which I judge a campaign setting are based mainly on how it functions as-is-- how much I would enjoy playing or running a game in that setting if I were not capable of changing it. The less I need to change it, the easier (and more satisfying) it is for me to use it, and the more of the supplemental materials I will be able to use with it. I don't use anything without taking it apart, getting elbow-deep in its guts, and then putting it back together the way I think it ought to be. To a lesser extent, I also judge a setting based on how the ideas therein inspire me to run my own games within that setting. The settings I love-- Planescape, Star*Drive, and Gamma World (and to some extent, Marvel Universe and Spelljammer), are the ones for which I have a nearly endless supply of ideas, and the ones which give me ideas that I feel a burning need to use. The settings I like-- Eberron, Star Wars, Dragonstar, among others-- are the ones that give me a number of interesting ideas that I'd like to try, or ideas that I'd love to apply to games in one of my favorite settings. I will admit that Dragonlance simply does not give me any good ideas-- reading the Chronicles and War of the Twins filled me with a sense of awe and I eagerly devoured them, but I found nothing therein that I could apply to my own games. This is not a flaw in the setting-- which is why I did not mention it earlier-- but it does prevent me from considering it among my favorite settings.</blockquote>

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