D&D General Settings of Hope vs Settings of Despair

[Hussar]

Perhaps that is so, for some folks. For me, it just...isn't cathartic.

I deal with enough "is there any point to it all?" IRL. I don't need to be reminded of the idea that what you're doing can feel like it's pointless.

Fair enough. Tastes obviously vary.

I talked about the elevator pitch I did for a Despair campaign where the world was dying. That's the point of the campaign. How do you act knowing that at any point in time, everything will die. And, it's not a question of if, it's when. The world is dying. When it will die isn't known, but, it's not a faraway time. It's measured in years or maybe decades.

To me, that's a really interesting setting to start from. You know that there is no future. So, what will you make your present? Do you rage against the dying of the light? That sort of thing.

One of the elements of the Scarred Lands setting that really spoke to me was the Elves. In Scarred Lands, the elven god was killed in the wars with the titans. Because of this, no more elves are born. The current generation of elves is the last. They can have children with other races, but, "elf" will be extinct very soon. I loved the concept. How do you play your character knowing that not only are you the last of your kind, but, when you die, no god will be there to pick up your soul. Death is forever. For an elf, that's a fascinating twist for me.

 

[Brendan Byrd]

EDIT: You can still tell a story about heroes using swords to end tyranny, it's fine and it's a traditional narrative... but don't you dare naughty word call it "hope." You're not selling people hope, you're selling people ideology.

I'm inclined to think that these games "sell" in-game agency.
Hope and dispair are, to me, flavors.