FR Update at WotC-Year of the Ageless One

[Walking Dad]

Hey, don't laugh, I used a red wyrmling dragon to play through the first adventure of the Cauldron adventure path of Dragon Magazine with my wife. With the high AC, decent attack bonus, and rechargeable area of effect spell (breath weapon), she was actually quite effective.

She didn't clear out the dungeon all in one go, but she probably cleaned out the dungeon sooner than a party of 1-3 level PC's would, who would have to rest for all their spellcasters. She on the other hand, was able to keep going with the healing potions she found.

This actually could be a viable style of gaming play for people who don't get to play D&D very often because they lack players in the area, or simply can't make their schedules match up with other couples. Use a Solo Monster, match the monster level to a lower adventure level, and see how well a monster can go through the adventure.

If I got the power level right, you should use an elite monster to match an adventurer.
Solo is for "alone".

I have the Dragon Magazine with dragon PC rules (3.5!), but I found their HD progression to slow.

 

[The Grumpy Celt]

The fact that NOT ONE SINGLE POSTER on this thread has set a campaign in the Mulhorand speaks for itself.

This isn’t about Unther (Mulhorand has not been mentioned in official literature yet) but people keep mentioning it probably because it seems to be one of the most poorly thought out examples currently available. But I’ll get to Unther in a minute.

Case No. 1: Thay

Thay is a better example of what feels wrong about 4th Ed. In the current time line (as the 4th Ed. Realms book has not be released to up date the setting officially), Thay is a sinister nation of evil wizards that has at long last descended into civil war. People do play games involving the Thay we have been presented with for the last two decades. People are interested in the civil war. On some boards there are entire threads about Thay, the war and its major players.

The new setting does not advance this plot, it shoot this plot between the eyes. Following the events of Spellplague, Thay (or at least parts of it) were pushed up by magical geology so that its elevation is thousands of feet higher than it was. That’s it – that is the development. In place of a traditional evil enemy that people did use, in place of an interesting plot… we have geographic hurdles. Flipping through the books to check out the rules for mountaineering is going to replace an on going civil war in an evil wizards’ nation. If I wanted to climb a G*d*a*n*d mountain I would go to a mountain. I go to Thay for evil wizards and the civil war, not bare-handed rock climbing.

What was the thought process behind this decision? If the Realms had to have some hard to climb mountains, why put them of Thay? How is that (the mandated and seemingly arbitrary destruction of the long-standing villain) a better idea than seeing the civil war to its conclusion and possibly letting the players have a hand in the outcome?

Case No. 2: Unther

Unther was, like Thay, in the middle of an on going plot – it was being conquered by Mulhorand. According to the time line in Grand History, this eventually happened. Further, there were developments that had not been seen to completion, such as the appearance of Untheric people transformed by Selune and the growth and goals cult of Tiamat.

However, this is all s*i*c*n*e* so we can have a nation of Gorn-wanna-be’s. Granted, having a nation of warrior-reptile people is a fairly standard trope in science fiction and fantasy. But why Unther? There were other places that could have been replaced with out shooting another on-going plot in the head. For example, there had been little official development with either the Vast or Chondath in recent years. Putting the nation of Gorn-wanna-be’s on one of them would have been development (after a fashion) rather than a random act. Further, Chondath is going to be destroyed in 4th Ed. anyway – it could have been replaced by the nation of Gorn-wanna-be’s, (still a kind of development) and allow the situation with Unther and Mulhorand to develop. In addition, Chondath is closer to places like Cormyr, Sembia and the Dalelands than Unther, thus the new nation of nation of warrior-reptile people would be situated to be more of a threat than it is based on its replacement of Unther.

But that did not happen. Unther was destroyed and replaced and Chondath was simply destroyed and were are supposed to think this is all good.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So they shouldn't have touched anywhere in the FR that had an on-going plot as of 2007? Good lord, they could barely have modified anything.

Unther was a place, to be honest, that less than 1% of FR players really cared about. You may have been one of them, but you're hardly representative.

I don't think there was anything "random" about them smashing Unther and Mulhorand - they were always silly overly faux-Egyptian settings with really dated the FR, and would make much better "Forgotten Realms" than current realms, as it were.

 

[Faraer]

Unfortunately, when the decision-makers change every several years, each with their own preferences and enthusiasms, those explicit and implicit threads are liable to be submerged and lost in the bright, shiny new plots. Trends in the originally published Realms as basic as the open, unpredictable new Inner Sea sphere after the departure of the elves, and the growing confrontation between old (noble, religious) and new mercantile power have been ignored or reversed. I think it's an incompetent way to run a shared world, and Grumpy Celt's cases are just the latest and, with the big timeline jump, most unremediable, of many dozens.

This is part of why the clamour for this sort of 'change' is dubious and often disingenuous, like an ADHD child moving on to a new thing before seeing the last one through. Ditto with the majority of unrevealed dungeons, heroes, magics, and so on in a world the incessant and careless timeline drive encourages the less well-read to mistakenly feel is played out.

 

[Faraer]

Gnomes and bards also have a heck of a lot of fans. Those two have just suffered from a lack of a clear conception for the former, and a lack of mechanical quality for the latter.

Realms gnomes have a clear conception, but it's unfamiliar because the more popular elves and dwarves have got so much more attention in print.

But leaving gnomes from the first set of PC races in 4E actually fits the Realms well -- the Forgotten Folk shouldn't be front-and-centre.

 

[Badkarmaboy]

This isn’t about Unther (Mulhorand has not been mentioned in official literature yet) but people keep mentioning it probably because it seems to be one of the most poorly thought out examples currently available. But I’ll get to Unther in a minute.

Case No. 1: Thay

Thay is a better example of what feels wrong about 4th Ed. In the current time line (as the 4th Ed. Realms book has not be released to up date the setting officially), Thay is a sinister nation of evil wizards that has at long last descended into civil war. People do play games involving the Thay we have been presented with for the last two decades. People are interested in the civil war. On some boards there are entire threads about Thay, the war and its major players.

The new setting does not advance this plot, it shoot this plot between the eyes. Following the events of Spellplague, Thay (or at least parts of it) were pushed up by magical geology so that its elevation is thousands of feet higher than it was. That’s it – that is the development. In place of a traditional evil enemy that people did use, in place of an interesting plot… we have geographic hurdles. Flipping through the books to check out the rules for mountaineering is going to replace an on going civil war in an evil wizards’ nation. If I wanted to climb a G*d*a*n*d mountain I would go to a mountain. I go to Thay for evil wizards and the civil war, not bare-handed rock climbing.

That's some fantastic hyperbole there man. We were given a snippet of information that Thay had a moutain range stuffed up its butt and you're acting like it's the end all things. Wasn't it also stated that Ssazz Tamm is still kicking about? And hey, holy crap, there just might be part of that wicked old nation still around. Maybe they'll get their act together now. Seriously, Thay was the COBRA of FR villains. Could they ever do anything right?

As for the Unther thing...faux Bablyon or warrior lizard kingdom? Eh.

 

[The Grumpy Celt]

This is part of why the clamour for this sort of 'change' is dubious and often disingenuous, like an ADHD child moving on to a new thing before seeing the last one through.

Thank you. That is what I'm getting at. I just felt a need to be specific with case examples and reasoning.

And Ruin Explorer skipped my comments about Thay to go on about Unther... again.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Thank you. That is what I'm getting at. I just felt a need to be specific with case examples and reasoning.

And Ruin Explorer skipped my comments about Thay to go on about Unther... again.

Well boo-hoo? Perhaps because your comments about Thay were patently ludicrous, and if I'm having to "go on about Unther again", dude, it's only because you're ridiculously bringing it up "again". I addressed your bonkers idea that nothing with an on-going plot Dr 1397 (or whever) should be touched in a 100-year jump edition change, the thinking behind which you seem reluctant to explain...

 

[BlackMoria]

I sense the heavy hand of the moderators unless people dial it down a bit with the personal snipes and asides.

As for the topic at hand, it is what it is. WotC has a plan and Chris Perkins and Rich Baker has as much as said that nothing will change based on the plan and the only thing that naysayers can hope for is a superficial change here or there.

The choices are simple

Accept the changes or

Don't accept the changes.

Debating (more like arguments now) the merits or lack of merits of the changes will not change the path that the 4e FR is going.

 

[Piratecat]

Well boo-hoo? Perhaps because your comments about Thay were patently ludicrous, and if I'm having to "go on about Unther again", dude, it's only because you're ridiculously bringing it up "again". I addressed your bonkers idea that nothing with an on-going plot Dr 1397 (or whever) should be touched in a 100-year jump edition change, the thinking behind which you seem reluctant to explain...

You've been around this site since its first days. There's absolutely no excuse for posting with that sort of attitude.

Don't post again in this thread.

Everyone else, please dial any snark, hyperbole or combativeness WAY down. I'm sure you know what's appropriate here, and we expect everyone to conform to that.

Thanks.