How Would You Have Handled the Forgotten Realms?

[Daniel D. Fox]

I'd simply dump the overt magical nature of Forgotten Realms and take it back to a magic dark age.

The gods would withdraw from the world, preoccupied by some cosmis cataclysmic event left unsaid. Men would be without power, sorcery would fuel titanic battles between those that continued to pursue the arts and wittle down the amount of magical influence in Toril. Sorcerers would duel it out like old western gunfighters in remote mountains, as men scrambled to rebuild (and destroy) kingdoms who's power was leveraged upon the precipice of divine power.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

I'd have smacked the reset button so hard Elmunchkin would still be feeling it. And I'd have divorces the campaign setting from the novels ... the novels could continue on with each blissfully ignorant of the other.

 

[danbuter1]

I'd go back in time to the 1e boxed set.

 

[Simon Marks]

Advance the timeline...

Too much has happened in too short a period of time. Need some distance and some perspective.

 

[Vraille Darkfang]

I'd guess I'd advance the timeline.

It's the most logical way to link the FR now with the FR to be.

I'd just not have done it the way, ummmm, they chose to.

When I read the Grand History and got to the Helm/Tyr/Tymora Love Triangle Plot a Mexican Telenovla would be embarrassed to use, I knew my FR days were finally over.

(I kept hearing chants of "Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!" while reading it. This was the winner of the Dumbest thing I've ever seen in D&D. Miniature Giant Space Hamsters & the Volo novels I now consider the "Good Old Days")

If you are going to kill off dieties (I don't mind Tyr, Norse God getting the boot, just the execution method was cruel & unusual). Why have you got to kill off the good ones?

Helm I really liked, he'd really managed to get a unique FR feel to him. Could you kill off Cyric already? Next to Adon, he was the most whiny character in the Avator Cycle, and he still pales next to Myrkul & Bane.

I'd have been willing to advance the timeline far enough to let the new System meld into the Existing one (5-100 years depending on the depth of change).


What I would do.

I wouldn't dumb it down to the level the most incompetent DM can't screw it up. (Which, at present seems to be what they MIGHT; Might; be attempting).

Some of the Problems they are "Fixing":

1. The lack of Danger in the FR (Points of Light).

Of the Hundreds of Games I've ran & the countless more I've played in (under decent DM's). Number of times I've had this problem. Zero. I find the Mercantile/Trade/Diplomacy Game has an endless number of plot points which a true "Point of Light" kills dead.

2. The UberNPC. Elminster saves the day! Again!

Again. Never once had that problem. My adventures are for PC's not NPC's FR has enough stuff going on that there is plenty to go around. However, when my PC's get 15-20 level its nice to have the Stick of those Uber PCS to keep them from doing things like trying to take over Waterdeep.

I have played in games where an UberNPC does everything for the Players. That was always cause the Module Sucked or the DM did.


From what I've seen, I don't like where the FR is headed (nor a lot of 4th ed).

But, I'm withholding final judgement until the Final Thing comes out (anyway, most of my games are now in my own homeworld, I get FR stuff more out of a sense of habit than anything).

 

[Voss]

I'd set it on fire and kick off the new edition with a new setting that is actually built around the new game assumptions. I certainly wouldn't count on a new player base that doesn't care and an old player base thats actively irritated by the changes, and hope that the people who are actually happy make up a large enough market segment.

 

[Lord Fyre]

I'd set it on fire and kick off the new edition with a new setting that is actually built around the new game assumptions. I certainly wouldn't count on a new player base that doesn't care and an old player base thats actively irritated by the changes, and hope that the people who are actually happy make up a large enough market segment.

The problem is that Hasbro/WoTC are a profit making enterprise (. . . as is EVERY successful gaming publisher).

The names Forgotten Realms and Ed Greenwood make money.

 

[Voss]

The question wasn't how best to make WotC $$. It was 'How would you have handled the Forgotten Realms'.

But in the how to make $$ vein, I'd have repackaged it without major changes and everyone could pretend that magic was always like that. Rules changes don't need to be reflected in fluff. I certainly wouldn't have gone with 'anger the fantatics'

 

[dmccoy1693]

The question wasn't how best to make WotC $$. It was 'How would you have handled the Forgotten Realms'.

I hate to contrdict you, but ...

This assumes you are incharge of FR fluff writing and the company higherups said, "Write a FRCS book. We want to make it easy for new players to jump in and has to work with the PoL base assumption of 4E. Oh incorporate Tieflings and Dragonborn."

EDIT:

But in the how to make $$ vein, I'd have repackaged it without major changes and everyone could pretend that magic was always like that. Rules changes don't need to be reflected in fluff.

From your description, it sound like you'd go more for the reboot button.

 

[Voss]

Not at all. I'd just continue on from wherever it is now. A new magic system doesn't require a historical rewrite or restart. The characters continue, the background continues, the gods don't murder each other for an episode of Guiding Light, and everybody just adjusts to the new class abilities that they've magically always had.