Setting philosophies

[Wippit Guud]

Damnation for Call of Cthulhu?

 

[NiTessine]

Dark Sun: Waste. The planet's destroyed state is due to the wasted potential that the people and the Sorcerer Kings pursued.

I think 'survival' would be a better one. Heroism is all good and well, but heroes' life spans are even shorter than your average adventurer's. The desert is unforgiving, the powers that be are all evil, and to most other inhabitants of the world you are food.

 

[Mystery Man]

FR for its wonder and magic.
I really like although it's seldom if ever mentioned here on this board Erde, the creation story is unique and the history is very well done.

Ok so I do the math and come up with more that one word, sorry.

 

[Henry]

I think 'survival' would be a better one. Heroism is all good and well, but heroes' life spans are even shorter than your average adventurer's. The desert is unforgiving, the powers that be are all evil, and to most other inhabitants of the world you are food.

However, given that according to a Dragon Magazine article some years back Troy Denning proposed the setting as kind of an "ecological cautionary tale", it seemed that the wasted potential was the originating theme here, as recent developments (Prism Pentad and others) showed a return of some life to the world, and some other unusual developments of slightly more hope.

Edited because I misremembered the author.

 

[Voadam]

Ravenloft is pretty easy, too. It's 'despair'. You can never, ever defeat the BBEG. The best you can do is prevent him from killing all the villagers, who will then form a mob and chase you out of the town, because one of your number is a hated elf.

Huh, I always went for "Horror" instead of "Despair" with Ravenloft. My players faced awful things but had definite triumphs, even though it all went to hell in the end for one of the groups. Despair is numbing, horror is evocative. Similar but distinctive tones for running a campaign. Horror is more fun I'd think.

 

[Rhialto]

I suppose what Tur An Tiel's theme is--aside from being the place where I stick everything I think is cool, then try to make it all fit together--is the Past and it's effect on things. The successes and (more often) failures of people, nations, and gods still let themselves be felt to the present day. Some try to learn from the past. Some try to live in it. Some try to recapture their vision of it, and force it on everyone else...

 

[Rel]

For my homebrew campaign, at least after last night's session, I think I'd use the word "Screwed".

 

[Dogbrain]

I really think the word for FR should be "everything"... and I'm not trying to be funny.

The word you are looking for is "Gallimaufry".

 

[Remathilis]

Hmm... OA/Rokugan seems to be honor as the philosophy.

Ebberron's appears to be excitement. Or perhaps Extreme!

My campaign's is duality. Everything has a mirror, or a reflection. Choices affect the reflection.

 

[Desdichado]

So I found myself in a discussion on the basic philosophy behind the various DnD settings and a thought occurred to me: would it be possible to use a single word to describe them?

Now Planescape and Dragonlance are the fairly obvious ones.
Planescape is quite simply Belief, and the power it holds over everything.
Dragonlance is all about Balance. Whether talking about order vs chaos, good vs evil, devastation vs survival, or neutrality vs everything else, all of Krynn is a balancing act.

But what about the other settings?

I'm not sure there's a lot of value in trying to synthesize a setting down to a single word. A small paragraph or two, maybe even just a sentence or two, I can see, but a single word? What does that do for you?