It absolutely does. It's simply not what they say that matters, but what they do
Which doesn'T change what is actually happening.
Yes, officially the setting is the multiverse. Yes, there have been reference to it everywhere. But that's all there is. WotC has in practice done 87% FR, 13% Ravenloft and that's it. If we're generous we could count the smatterings of mentionings of other settings as another 1%, then we're at 86% FR, 13% RL, 1% others
But there is nothing else. That's his point.
In practice it is, because almost everything that WotC releases is FR. They say that the mutliverse is the default, but theyre all but exclusively use the FR corner of it.
And I ask, how does that affect the default? Even if nothing but the 3 core books made any reference to anything outside of Faerun, it still would not meet the definition of default unless it, you know, met the definition of default. I didn't give the definition, I'm just agreeing with it.
The PHB provides examples of character creation that are from campaign settings other than the multiverse. If someone only had only read and been exposed to the core game books, and you told them that the Forgotten Realms were the default setting, they would ask how in the world you got that, since the books quite clearly disagree.
Fact is, if you aren't stating a particular setting, WotC (and by extension, any reasonable person playing 5E) can safely assume you're in the Forgotten Realms/Sword Coast.
If you aren't stating a particular setting in what context? A group of new D&D players who just picked up the PHB, DMG, and MM and are starting a game? Because that is the default of D&D.
Forgotten Realms, whether we like it or not, IS the default D&D setting when it comes to WotC published products. It's where they game, it's where every adventure they publish at least starts, it is the focus of every single example used (even when the "multiverse" is mentioned).
It's the setting they publish most supplements in, so I suppose you could say it's the default supplement setting. But that doesn't make it the default D&D setting. And as far as the designers at WotC...you'd probably be surprised what they use for their home games.
It's also factually incorrect to say that it is the focus of every example used. Here is what is in the books:
"Orb of Dragonkind, wondrous item, artifact (requires attunement): Ages past, on the world of Krynn..." -DMG p.225
It goes on to fill over a columns worth of text on a Dragonlance item with no mention of the Forgotten Realms anywhere. I just picked that one because its the first that came to mind. And of course there is Tika and Artemis in the Backgrounds chapter in the PHB, where Tika (Dragonlance) gets just as much focus as Artemis (Forgotten Realms).
The sky is blue, water is wet, FR is D&D's current default setting, d10 is not a polyhedron, liquids and cats change shape to fill their containers... These are things only the mentally ill argue against.
I ain't even mad that that is the case, I just hate seeing the company constantly denying something any sane person can see with their own eyes.
I'm sorry, but there's no way you can convince me otherwise but if you feel like beating the corpse of this horse than by all means, have your last word and enjoy
I've made a factual argument, using an agreed upon definition of the term default. I've provide the actual text in question. And what I'm seeing in response are a shifting the goalpost fallacy.
Since we all seem to be reasonable people, perhaps we are arguing from a different set of assumptions.
Would you disagree that the core rulebooks set the D&D defaults?
