"Points of Light" setting--to be developed?

[Mercurius]

I just browsed through the "Worlds and Monsters" book earlier today and it struck me how developed the default "Points of Light" setting is, as if Wizards is planning on publishing a setting book. Now I've read in a couple places that this isn't the case, that it is simply the default template for other settings. But after skimming the book, it sure seems otherwise--they even include places--not just Feywild, the Astral Sea, etc.

Has anyone heard anything official from Wizards on this? Even if they say they won't publish a "Points of Light" setting, I wouldn't be surprised to see them do it due to popular demand...although of course then they'd actually have to design it.

On a side note, what are the official 4e settings? I know the Forgotten Realms, but Eberron as well? And is there any word of a new setting? I always think it is a good idea for them to develop a new setting or three for a new edition...1ed started with Greyhawk and ended with the FR; 2ed started with the Realms and saw a ton of settings rise and fall--Spelljammer, Planescape, Birthright, Dark Sun, probably something else I can't think of; 3ed dropped all of those except for the FR and added Eberron (although I assume the lack of new settings in 3e was largely due to the OGL and the settings developed by other companies).

So what of 4e? FR, Eberron, and...."points of light"?

 

[ChaosShard]

I just browsed through the "Worlds and Monsters" book earlier today and it struck me how developed the default "Points of Light" setting is, as if Wizards is planning on publishing a setting book. Now I've read in a couple places that this isn't the case, that it is simply the default template for other settings. But after skimming the book, it sure seems otherwise--they even include places--not just Feywild, the Astral Sea, etc.

Has anyone heard anything official from Wizards on this? Even if they say they won't publish a "Points of Light" setting, I wouldn't be surprised to see them do it due to popular demand...although of course then they'd actually have to design it.

On a side note, what are the official 4e settings? I know the Forgotten Realms, but Eberron as well? And is there any word of a new setting? I always think it is a good idea for them to develop a new setting or three for a new edition...1ed started with Greyhawk and ended with the FR; 2ed started with the Realms and saw a ton of settings rise and fall--Spelljammer, Planescape, Birthright, Dark Sun, probably something else I can't think of; 3ed dropped all of those except for the FR and added Eberron (although I assume the lack of new settings in 3e was largely due to the OGL and the settings developed by other companies).

So what of 4e? FR, Eberron, and...."points of light"?

I could be wrong, but I distinctly remember someone (Rich Baker?) saying that "Points of Light" was going to remain a concept, and that what we get from them in regards to the "setting" is really just an example of names for different places/objects/events and so on. For example, the "default" Tiefling (does anyone else pronounce it as "ty-fling" instead of "tee-fling"? ) background involves the lost empire of Bael Turath, but that empire won't suddenly appear in Ebberon or FR. Also, (again, presuming that my memory isn't distorted by the ambrosia known to man as Guinness) it was stated categorically that there would be no "PoL Campaign Setting".

 

[Mercurius]

That's too bad. Not that I think they should develop that particular setting, just that I'd like to see these put these new ideas into a new form rather than endlessly updating previous settings.

 

[The Ubbergeek]

It's always possible someone later coalizes all fluff as a coherent setting.... If at least a fanwork.

 

[~Johnny~]

The idea is to have a lot of loosely connected locations that could fit into any setting. I'm currently running a sort of 4e preview game in the "Points of Light setting," though, and it works surprisingly well. The information given in the preview books forms a nice framework, and I can use my imagination to fill in the gaps.

I also find that Paizo's "Pathfinder" setting of Varisia is highly compatible with the PoL concept, so I've been adapting Pathfinder stuff quite a bit.

 

[FabioMilitoPagliara]

I hope that they never develop the PoL, anyway if a PoL setting book should come out I would leave it on the shelves

why?

because as it is the PoL is a nice framework and idea bag from where I can chose what to use and how

to know that somewhere there is an Isle of Dread is ok and very useful

to know that the Isle of Dread is exactly at 137 miles from the town of Salernum where my campaign started is a bad idea

why?

because with the loose setting I can chose how much time I need to study the setting before setting up my hometown/campaign, with a much detailed setting I can just feel the weight of it all to be too much

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

That's too bad. Not that I think they should develop that particular setting, just that I'd like to see these put these new ideas into a new form rather than endlessly updating previous settings.

Well, there was the setting search that resulted in Eberron. If I am not mistaken, there are also another top three settings that are still "owned" by WotC, and it's possible that they will develop one of the settings targetted for 4E. (Though the old premise was that everything from the 3.x core rulebooks should have a place in the new setting, meaning the settings will require some reworking).

Alternatively, they might make a new setting search, though I doubt that.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

I hope they never develop it as a published setting. I like it better as a framework for generic adventures and supplements.

 

[Goblyns Hoard]

The only thing they could do to publish PoL setting books and stay true to the fundamental design is to publish individual points. Developing the city of Bob, which happens to be in the PoL setting, and then detailing the complex workings of Bob is fine. As long as they don't then go into detail about how Bob interacts with other locations, how near/far it is from them. Just make sure everything they write is about HERE, and not about What's over there. Make a group of individual cities/locations, then give the individual DM the ability to line them up as they want. There is the potential for this to be slippery slope so I think they'd have to be careful, but there's no reason they couldn't do it successfully.

 

[Khuxan]

I think the way Terry Pratchett discusses countries and locations in the Discworld novels is a good start for a POI campaign - a vague idea of how everything interacts, but nothing specific. You know it takes a while to get to Uberwald - but you don't get told every country that you pass through to get there.