Forked Thread: Describing a setting in 12 bullet points

[Noumenon]

That's a great idea, Badwe, because those are settings you can actually get into. If someone bullet points a setting like Mirage and you're like "Yeah, jungle madness!" you can actually go buy or look at the cards, and get more and more ideas about stuff to put in your own campaign.

 

[Silverblade The Ench]

Iron Sky
the "revised" Dark Sun was...garbage, sorry, lol

It was worse than the 4th ed Forgotten Rleams fiasco, by a long shot, it would be like turning the Realms into, oh, 21st century Earth...blerg!!

Tyr now has a democracy, half the sorceror kings dead etc...what the hell crappola is that?! :/ Thus many players completley ignore the "offical" events history etc of Dark Sun and stick to the 1st boxed set: even the designers have admitted it was a mistake to drive the setting like they did.

your DM should have let you use character tress, it's implicit in Dark Sun's original rules to do so, and you need them! hehe I mean, where else can your characters be eaten by cannibal Frodos, eh?! wonderful that is!!

That is the fun of Dark Sun, it is not the usual, or "Tolekin-eqsue", it's more old style Robert E Howard/Leiber mixed with Clark Ashton Smith...which is a good thing.
I adore heroics, daring do, ship to ship battles etc so I love Spelljammer (I saw too many Errol Flynn and the like movies as a kid me thinks ), I also love dark, brutal gritty stuff, so I love Dark Sun (I love good post apocalypse stuff, and aforementioned authors)
it's bad ot mess with the identity and nature of a setting.

 

[Badwe]

since there was at least one positive response i'll bullet Ravnica. For those not in the know, that was the magic expansion block released in 2006-2007. Some of my points may bleed into Magic's almost eberron-like flavor of "mage punk" as MaRo refers to it.

*The plane of Ravnica is an endless medieval (specifically, eastern european) city, with the only "forests" life being secluded gardens high atop towering spires. some plantlife grows amid the city, especially in the rubble of decimated neighborhoods.

*All traditional landscapes are mimiced with an urban bent. Sprawling plains sit atop flat roofs. Islands of buildings sit between the canals of Ravnica's waterworks. Forges are stacked upon each other by the score, forming molten mountains. Finally, bogs and grim collect in the labyrinthine sewers to create swamps.

*Like most Magic settings, everyone is a mage of some kind. Anyone will cast a spell for the right price. Unlike eberron, high magic is also commonplace, though still limited to extremely powerful individuals.

*an untold number of centuries ago, 10 guilds signed the guildpact, a magical document of law. This document enumerated the domains of the guilds, and each guild leader sacrificed a portion of their power to give the document the ability to magically enforce its rules.

*the guilds constantly squabble for control and bend the rules when possible to gain advantage. The main casualties are citizens unassociated with guilds.

*Despite not having any well known planar travel, ravnica is cosmopolitan and has races from disparate planes of existence in the multiverse: viashino, vedalken, loxodon, goblins, etc.

*The ten guilds and their purview/style are: Boros - Military police, Selesnya - Communities/Conclave, Golgari - the cycle of life/death, Izzet - technology, esp. ravnica's infrastructure, Orzhov - Relgion and taxation, Azorius - Law magic, Simic - biology/evolution, Rakdos - Chaos, destruction, parties.

*Two guilds stand apart - Gruul are barbarians, outcast from civilization. They most aggressively cling to a primal state of being and destroy as much civilization as they can manage. The Dimir are keepers of secrets and attempt to assassinate/lobotomize anyone who learns of their existance.

*In ravnica, like in magic, there is no absolute morality. The closest is the struggle between white and black, the struggle of the selfless society vs. the greedy individual, but both have the potential for evil.

* Fantastic creatures find their way in the city. Crocodiles swim in vast undercity sewers, sphinxes fly among the spires, even wurms find a home in husks of buildings. One exceptionally intelligent dragon, Niv Mizzet, has become a controller of a guild.

* For some unknown reason, the dead are not passing naturally into the afterlife and their spirits continue to haunt the people of ravnica. What could be keeping them here?

* Before the guilds ever existed, ancient doom-gods called the Nephilim existed and wreaked havoc on all creation. Though they have slumbered for millenia, rumors circulate that they have awoken and are regaining their power as they leave a wake of destruction.