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Message: <blockquote data-quote="TwinBahamut" data-source="post: 3793525" data-attributes="member: 32536">I'll post, I guess...Actually, I agree. I think re-imagination is better than timeline advancement.Timeline advancement does two things that are problematic. First, it by necessity creates a small change to the feel of the setting. Even if it is a small one, it is a change none-the-less. So long as the paradigm of thought is that setting should move forward, each change will add on to the last, until there is a significant change to the feel of the setting. Since this is an additive process over a long time, it can get... murky. It lacks the coherence of something which has been imagined (or reimagined) as a complete whole.The second problem is that timeline advancement does not clear away any problematic material created in the past. By enacting change through forward movement, everything that happened before the latest edition is crystallized. It remains part of the canon, and has to be taken into account. Inevitably, bad material gets written for a setting, and unless the setting gets reimagined or rebuilt, it is impossible to clear away that bad material.Long-term fans might not notice the problem as it builds up, but it makes things difficult for newer audiences. If you ask me, even 3E Forgotten Realms has far passed over the line in which a total re-imagination is necessary, simply because of too much stuff being embedded over the years.I started with 3E, and the FRCS was a fairly visible product when I started, so of course I bought it. However, no matter how many times I read it, I found the book completely unapproachable. It was filled with so much detail, covering all the world-changing events across Realms history and all the characters and places that have been created for that setting over the years, that I didn't know where to start. I know that many Realms fans praise that book, but for a newbie to the Realms like me, I just didn't even know what to do with it all. So, I returned the book to the bookstore, bought a different D&D book instead, and never looked back.A reimagining of the Realms, in which things are re-examined, and unnecessary elements are removed and cleaned up, would probably help it a lot. As it stands, the Realms is simply too detailed and messy to be easily approachable. My worst fear is that the next batch of setting books simply adds complexities and detail onto the existing setting books, and do nothing to maintain a clear and coherent feel and story (as in "what stories the DM will tell") of a setting.</blockquote>

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