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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 8099452" data-attributes="member: 6785785">Doskvol (also called Duskwall, Duskvol, The Dusk, and other slight variations) is kind of an interesting example because I think it could fit both extremes. There are certainly strong similarities to the real world.....the city is kind of Victorian overall and there are things like trains, firearms, uniformed police, class struggles, labor unions, street gangs, large ships, ghettos, industry, farming, a prison....and so on. But there are also ghosts and demons, spectrological powers, eternal night, and the city is fueled by the blood of giant demons found in the void sea. So yeah.....pretty bonkers.I suppose the question is do the familiar elements help ground and offset the unfamiliar, and therefore make the setting work? Is it the right balance of mundane and strange? I suppose everyone would have a different answer for this, a different balance that would work for them.But I can see someone looking at the setting and not being interested because it's too similar to the real world, and also someone looking at the setting and not being interested because it's so strange. I think one key piece, although I'm not sure exactly what impact this may have, is that some of the more outlandish elements are designed with play in mind. They have a fictional purpose, but also a gameplay purpose. So, the fact that killing a person will result in the creation of a ghost and also alert the Spirit Wardens to the killing is a setting element that is evocative, but also designed around the idea that killing is something that needs to be considered because it has ramifications on play. The lightning barrier that surrounds the city is there fictionally to keep the unquiet ghosts and other horrors of the deathlands from getting into the city.....but from a play perspective, it also makes the city inescapable for the PCs; they can't get out of Dodge when things get dicey, and instead have to stay and face the fallout of whatever crimes they get up to. Such a marriage of fiction and function, if noticed, will influence how the setting is perceived. I think this also hints at differing priorities when it comes to [USER=5142]@Aldarc[/USER]'s OP; for some, verisimilitude of the fictional world may be the goal, regardless of how outlandish. For others, a setting that promotes a certain play experience may be more important.</blockquote>

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