How is YOUR Forgotten Realms Different?

[jgsugden]

It has been nearly 15 years since I last ran the Realms... In that last campaign:

Waterdeep itself was destroyed by a dracolich and her armies.

Thay had conquered quite a bit of land, and was on the verge of invading Cormyr.

There was a gate to Greyhawk in the bottom level of the Haunted Halls of Eveningstar.

The party (2nd edition, about 13th level) had given their lives in an effort to stop an assassination attempt on King Azoun. It was a TPK. It was clear that the assassination would be successful without the PCs, so we decided to start up a quick homebrew campaign for a few weeks while I figured out the ramifications and the players designed new low level characters. The home brew campaign was very popular, and we never got back to the Realms.

 

[Nightfall]

I say leave Waterdeep to the vampires. Make Skullport the new home for humans.

 

[Odhanan]

The main difference? Somehow, whenever something BIG happens in the game, all the uber-NPCs of the Realms are busy/can't take care of the situation, leaving the PCs fend for themselves. You can meet Elminster or the Seven Sisters, but they are not dei ex machina.

 

[Ranger REG]

Tell me what you've done to change your Forgotten Realms Setting.

I don't allow firearms in my FR game.

I don't mind the named characters, I just don't use them much. I'd rather the PCs be the "stars" of the game.

 

[Drowbane]

Wow, where to begin!?

Back when I started out DMing, I would tell my players "Alright, this setting is loosely based on the Forgotten Realms!".

Of my Realms~

1a) Nowadays: All Gestalt, all the time. All the bigname NPCs are Gestalt, as are of course the PCs themselves. I've never truely understood people's hatred for Drizzt, Elminster, et al. They're just tools for the DM, to be used or ignored as you will. They complement my own homebrewed BBE(or G)Gs, not replace them. I've never seen Greyhawk fans dis the Eight, Vecna or Iuz! Which brings me to #2...

1b) None of the major Realms NPCs are statted out exactly like the books would have them (this is obvious if you look above, but would be true even if I wasn't using Gestalt so heavily). My Drizzt (for example) features a splash of Barbarian with Whirling Frenzy, just enough ranger to satisfy events from the books, a healthy degree of Rogue to justify his drow-stealth and ten levels in the Dervish PrC (it seemed a shame not to use it... it appears afterall to have been written just for him!)

2) Open Book. Toril is a ridiculously big world. I allow just about every WotC or Paizo released classes and a huge number of races in my Realms. There are alot of races I disallow for the simple fact that they don't bring anything new to the table. On a related note, major NPCs from other settings are paralelled in my Realms. Vecna is an immensely powerful Lich on par with Szass Tam or Larloch. Iuz is widely believed to have been a Chosen of Ixactu (spelling?) Xvim. Etc, etc.

3) The Isles of the Council of Worms lies somewhere off the SW Coast of Faerun. While this was much more relevant in 2e, I'd say about 80% of my Campaigns 1/2 Dragons (or otherwise Dragon-related PC/NPCs) have thier origins here.

4) The heart of the Anauroch Desert is actually a demi-plane version of Athas.... known as the the Deep Anauroch.

5) Several ancient Ruins (especially those related to the days of Myth Drannor and Netheril), Waterdeep (read: Skull Port), Evening Star, Menzoberranzan, Ched Nasad, etc, etc have portals tying them to Sigil. I've always had room for Planescape in my D&D!

6a) Gods. FR has a staggering number of gods. With my 2e notes, I have a list of which gods are actual, and which are just regional/racial aspects. Amauntor (spelling), the Sun God from Netheril is Lathander is Horus-re is... Pelor! Azuth is an Aspect of Mystra (my Mystra is T/N), as is Velsharoon.

6b) Priests. Not every priest of every god is a fricking Cleric, Druid, Paladin or Favored Soul! In fact the majority of "lay priests" are expects with the appropriate skills.

7a) I don't use either the Great Wheel or FR's Cosmology, but my own. There is no Bloodwar between Demons and Devils (though reading Shemeska's SH, I might revise my choice here)... rather the "Blood War" relates to a struggle between two distinct types of "vampire"... Vampires and Nosferatu.

7b) Vampires are pretty much unchanged from the MM. Nosferatu are in some ways less powerful (no Energy-drain w/slam), but in others more powerful (they have a supernatural ability called Celerity that works as a constant Haste). Vampires are considered an abomination by Nosferatu, and are alot more common as they then to be more feral and alot less selective of who they make undead. One among the Nosferatu, a Drow Psion / Priest by the name of Krov'Xalyn Odran (originally a PC, later a BBEG) put events into motion to bring Kanchelsis (old deity of Vampirism from the 2e grey-cover Monsterous gods book... can't remember the exact name!) into the Realms Pantheon, using the Time of Troubles as a catalyst. This ended with a rather large showdown between Krov's forces (a considerable number of necromancers, vampire wannabes, vampires and nosferatu) and the PCs (all 13th-16th level... the lower leveled ones being triple-multiclassed)... at the time Krov was attempting to slay a very weakened Avatar of Kanchelsis in hopes of replacing him as the new God of Vampires in the Realms. (ahh... memories) All of this played out in a lengthy campaign in 2e... with a few "Nosferatu" PCs created using the Requiem Boxset. The vast majority of my Vampiric Villains have one way or another of entering the Underdark close at hand, in fact most of them fulfill thier entire existance down there... away from the hated Sun.

Damn, I had more to mention... but my memories of the Bloodwar campaign have pretty much chased everything else out of my thoughts. :/ Anyways, this should suffice as a taste of "My Realms".

 

[Drowbane]

The main difference? Somehow, whenever something BIG happens in the game, all the uber-NPCs of the Realms are busy/can't take care of the situation, leaving the PCs fend for themselves. You can meet Elminster or the Seven Sisters, but they are not dei ex machina.

I think you'd find that this is the norm, not a difference. The Major NPCs are only Deus Ex Machina in the novels and perhaps Mr Greenwood's personal game.

 

[Odhanan]

I think you'd find that this is the norm, not a difference. The Major NPCs are only Deus Ex Machina in the novels and perhaps Mr Greenwood's personal game.

Probably true.

 

[The Thayan Menace]

Bust Out the Flutes, Boys!

Do you run a FR campaign? What have you changed about the basic setting?

In my version of the 3.5 FRCS, Ao is Azathoth.

-Samir

 

[ruleslawyer]

I think you'd find that this is the norm, not a difference. The Major NPCs are only Deus Ex Machina in the novels and perhaps Mr Greenwood's personal game.

Probably not the latter. Ed has consistently said that his preferred protagonists and "active characters" are the adventurers of the Realms: Mirt, Durnan, the Knights of Myth Drannor, the Rangers Three, etc. The Chosen are there as narrators (Elminster) or flavor elements of the setting (the Seven). They've never been seen as "DMPCs" or similar interventionist characters. In fact, Ed mentions in The Seven Sisters that the book is intended to serve as a template for high-level adventuring for the PCs in one's own campaign, rather than a guide to "look at how 1337 my personally-created NPCs are!"

 

[Pozatronic]

WOW! I want to thank everybody for their input. This is so much more than I expected. And just to clear a few things up, I don't HATE the named characters. I actually really like most of them, even Drizz't, although way back in one of my 2e games he was a cambion with two flamberge's instead of scimitars. He was the son of an evil Alustrial who consorted with demons and was ruling over the North as an evil witch queen. The other five sisters were doing other dispicable deeds, but what about the mysterious seventh one?

Oh, and Nightfall? I meant no disrespect to the Scarred Lands, your unholiness. I just can't help but like sooooo much of it. I really want to drop Calastia over Cormyr. Maybe Geleeda can be from Rashemen? Maybe the Charduni can be dwelling inside the Great Rift? I'm sure I can find a spot for Hallowfaust. Oh, and those forsaken elves.......