Less is More? Less books per setting equal more enjoyment?

[resistor]

I have mixed feelings on it.

Like Shemeska, I view the (later) 2e era as sort of a golden age of setting creativity and support. Unfortunately, the business model underlying that has been shown to be unsustainable in the long term. The 3e approach of two settings, period, with full support, was OK if you like one or both of those, but not so great for setting innovation.

I like the concept of limited run settings as a solution to this dilemma, but I think three is a little too few. Most settings have room for one or two "highlight" books that focus on specific regions or themes, without exhausting the setting entirely. I think a run of 5 or so would be a happier medium for me.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Not interchangeable, but often functionally equivalent. ... But as the quantity books is always composed of individual books, "less books" is both accurate and grammatical.

Um, no, pretty much not grammatically accurate. But I have very little interest in taking the thread hijack any further to debate it.

 

[doctorhook]

It really depends. Forgotten Realms, for instance, was a great setting because of all the written support. I liked how I could just take one or two books of FR and run a game in a given part of the world without having to think about the name of a village or the god being worshipped in the local church.

On the other hand, Dark Sun is a clear case of less is more. As you read through the sourcebooks after reading the first boxed set, the initial magic irradiating from it fade away.

Vampire (the old one) became a worse game with each new sourcebook, in my opinion, while its cousin, Werewolf, improved. So, I think each setting deserves a different take on the matter.

Cheers,

You're right, "more" definitely works better for some settings than others. The problem lies with predicting which settings are which, and then convincing fans about it.

"Forgotten Realms" is probably a misnomer -- these days, there's hardly anything "forgotten" about it, nor is mystique a big part of the attraction for most fans. Personally, I think "Living Realms" would be a lot more accurate these days.

Well, theoretically you could have "less book," using book here volumetrically... For example, if you bought PHB2 you got less book than PHB1 (or, equivalently, fewer pages).

But yeah, pretty much. I feel I should point out that in my own reply I bolded and italicized the word "fewer." Math majors can be grammar nazis too, y'know.

Not interchangeable, but often functionally equivalent. Technically, you might say "less of books" (books are something I have, and this amount is less), but the "of" can be understand. The distinction is important in cases like "less memories" versus "fewer memories" where the word memory has a different sense as a general noun versus a regular noun. But as the quantity books is always composed of individual books, "less books" is both accurate and grammatical.

"Less books" is incorrect from a prescriptive perspective, but from a linguistics standpoint (a descriptive perspective) it isn't actually incorrect. Why not? Because people do use "less" that way, and it's clear what they mean when they say it. In other words, "less books" isn't how the word ought to be used, but it's how it is used, regardless. Language changes gradually over time, and this is a good example of one way English is changing: "less" is gradually claiming the semantic territory of "fewer". (Consider that "less books" sounds fine to most of us, but "fewer water" doesn't; the change isn't going both ways.)

I suspect people started confusing these two words because they share the same opposite: "more". Less and more; fewer and more.

It depends on what you like in a setting.

I really, -really- enjoy heavily detailed settings, and I look at the setting support from 2e for the various TSR settings like FR, Planescape, Ravenloft, etc as the high mark for setting support and awesome ideas and innovation through D&D's entire history.

It certainly was a high point for some of those things, but was also lethal to TSR's business. It's a bit like saying that a store's going-out-of-business sale is a "high point" for low prices -- it was good for consumers, but bad for the business.

 

[Shemeska]

It certainly was a high point for some of those things, but was also lethal to TSR's business. It's a bit like saying that a store's going-out-of-business sale is a "high point" for low prices -- it was good for consumers, but bad for the business.

Was that the reason for TSR's financial woes though? Between Buck Rogers, dragon dice, and a number of other things I would put heavy setting support to have been pretty minor on the list of TSR's problems near the end of 2e. It might have made each product line perhaps a smaller market as time went by, competing against each other, but I've never seen it said by someone in the know of TSRs financial details that the 2e settings were part of the problem as opposed to other things.

 

[Belorin]

One of the reasons I based my FR campaign in the Gray Vale was aside from a couple of modules and books, it was fairly untouched by anyone but me.
I had my npc characters running inns or smithys, pc's retired there providing training or that little bit of extra 'muscle' for an adventure. One of FR 4E's tenets was to explore some little used areas and wouldn't you know it, but my base of operations Loudwater, was there new sample town.
So, all my history get's wiped out.
I start over in the Moonshae Isles, one of the things I try to avoid is setting a campaign too close to large population centers, cuts down on the diversity of equipment and makes those trips to major cities all the more anticipated.

Bel

 

[S'mon]

Forked from the 3 and out statement being bantered about on another thread.

Does having less books per setting make for a more enjoyable setting?

Yes, I think so. The 3-book model is a good one; enough to get started with, inspire the imagination and provide play hooks and options, without drowning the campaign in the minutiae of fetishised 'canon'. Certainly the 4e FRCS looked to me like a setting done 'right', even though I personally wouldn't have gone with the spell plague setup. The book has a very nice mix of geography, background and stuff immediately useable in play.

 

[jdrakeh]

Was that the reason for TSR's financial woes though?

It was a big part of it. The biggest contributor was probably the debt racked up by the Blumes way back in the day as by all later accounts, spending was off the charts crazy.

The Blumes had forced me to accept three "outside" directors on the board. These three petty businessmen, two executives and a lawyer, were absolutely ignorant of the gaming business, and under their direction, and with the Blumes leading the way, TSR had accumulated $1.5 million debt that they couldn't figure out how to pay. Amongst their ideas were the dropping of the RPGA and the sale of DRAGON Magazine. After some thought, I presented a long letter to the entire board, outlining the mismanagement of TSR by Kevin Blume, and demanding his resignation and replacement. The board voted four to two, the Blumes abstaining, to remove Kevin and put in place a pro-tem president, one Richard Koenigs. Some 90 relatives of the Blumes were removed from the payroll, various corporate owned and leased cars, scores of them, were gotten rid of, unused system office furniture owned and leased was likewise sold or returned, and two major releases were rushed into print - Unearthed Arcana and Oriental Adventures (both 1985).

There are also several former TSR and WotC employees who pointed to the fact that TSR had been overprinting and underselling for quite a while. From Ryan Dancey:

I discovered that the cost of the products that company was making in many cases exceeded the price the company was receiving for selling those products. I toured a warehouse packed from floor to 50 foot ceiling with products valued as though they would soon be sold to a distributor with production stamps stretching back to the late 1980s. I was 10 pages in to a thick green bar report of inventory, calculating the true value of the material in that warehouse when I realized that my last 100 entries had all been "$0"'s.

A link to the whole article is here. The thing that seems to be consistently mentioned, however, is Random House calling in their markers for unsold books (most of which were D&D books). I'm certain that things like Buck Rogers and Dragon dice played roles, as well, but they were apparently very small roles.

 

[S'mon]

One of the reasons I based my FR campaign in the Gray Vale was aside from a couple of modules and books, it was fairly untouched by anyone but me.
I had my npc characters running inns or smithys, pc's retired there providing training or that little bit of extra 'muscle' for an adventure. One of FR 4E's tenets was to explore some little used areas and wouldn't you know it, but my base of operations Loudwater, was there new sample town.
So, all my history get's wiped out.

Uh, you know you don't *have* to use their version? You could have kept your own Loudwater, maybe importing anything you liked from theirs.

 

[jdrakeh]

Uh, you know you don't *have* to use their version?

Liar! If it's printed, it must be adhered to! WotC owns our brains!

 

[questing gm]

[nitpick tangent]

There's no such thing as "less books." It's fewer books. The two words are not interchangeable.

If you can count it, it's "fewer." If you can't, it's "less." You have less water, but fewer cups of water, because cups can be counted numerically but water cannot. If you have fewer friends, you experience less friendship. And so on.

This message has been brought to you by your Friendly Neighborhood Creative Writing Major. We now return you to you regularly scheduled thread.

[/nitpick tangent]

Thanks. I learned something.