underwhelmed with Neverwinter Campaign Setting

[TwoSix]

Which was my conclusion. I don't need- and thus, don't buy- books that are 85+% fluff unless they are heavily discounted. WotC won't see a dime for NWN from me because it's lack of crunch means I won't buy it until it hits the used book stores.

And this is a valuable data point for them: knowing why a segment of the market doesn't purchase their product is as important as knowing why others did.

I can only imagine that the advent of DDi has seen a drop in the purchases of crunch-heavy books. I know my purchase choices going from 3e to 4e have completely flipped. I bought almost all the crunch heavy (Completes, Heroes of...) books for 3.5. In 4e, I haven't bought a crunch book since Arcane Power. But I did buy all the Planes books, Underdark, Campaign Settings (including Gloomwrought and NWCS).

So there's another data point for the pile.

 

[Dead Scribe]

Yeah, I don't think NWCS is necessarily bad... But I checked the book out and honestly think Hammerfast, at $15, is a much better deal as a sandbox setting, than the NWCS at $40. Just my opinion though.

Hammerfast is a good product, and I'd like to see more along those lines. But Hammerfast is 36 pages--Neverwinter is 223. It has depth and player options that Hammerfast couldn't possibly do. You're getting the density that you paid for.

 

[KarinsDad]

Paragon Paths unique to the setting? Gear? Feats? Powers? Builds?

The game system already has:

550 Paragon Paths

132 Pieces of Gear

3078 Feats

8441 Powers

Builds are up to the players and each should be individualized.

Personally, I don't want any more of this stuff. I'm already overly overly flooded with too much of it. In a campaign setting, I want stuff that's going to help me as a DM. I don't want the pages to be wasted with "yet another Paragon Path that my players probably won't take anyway because there are already too many to choose from".

It would have been nice if WotC would have supplied more maps, but even a small dungeon is really a waste of space. Even if my group plays that dungeon, in a few weeks it becomes obsolete pages in the book. I want pages in the book that I can use over and over and can reference for a long time.

I'm not too bothered by the Themes being there (although I am not a fan of themes, they are just the "bigger, better, badder" aspect of PC power creep under the fake umbrella of character concept), but only because there are not a lot of sources for themes yet.

But, the Bladesinger is a waste of pages for me. There are already 40 classes and 25 Hybrid classes. I really don't need yet another.

I need well written campaign material and ideas, and that's what NCS does. It's not an adventure or a player PC source book, it's a campaign setting. The fact that Themes and the Bladesinger gives players an incentive to buy it (marketing ploy), but it's really a campaign setting for DMs. Players really shouldn't be looking in it. IMO. Obviously, WotC marketing thinks differently (and should, they need to make money).

I consider it a solid campaign setting book. Not great, but very good and I'm far from underwhelmed. I think people who want more more more stuff for their PCs and want it to be a player PC sourcebook or an adventure book would be underwhelmed. By putting the Character Options chapter in the book, I think it confused the audience a bit.

 

[DM Howard]

I thought the book was just fine. I didn't expect to be full of crunch, and frankly there is enough crunch within the edition as it is IMO. I'd like to see something along these lines for the Nerath core setting.

 

[Imaro]

Hammerfast is a good product, and I'd like to see more along those lines. But Hammerfast is 36 pages--Neverwinter is 223. It has depth and player options that Hammerfast couldn't possibly do. You're getting the density that you paid for.

Ok, I'm going to disagree here. I didn't find NWCS anymore in depth than Hammerfast... Covering a larger area than Hammerfast? Definitely. But I'm not sure if that's necessarily a good thing for most beginning DM's as that means there's alot more to read and process (which you probably won't use... at least initially) to get started playing. Again it boils down to opinion but I think for Heroic Tier Hammerfast is the better sandbox... especially for new DM's or those who want to get started quickly.

 

[Dead Scribe]

Ok, I'm going to disagree here. I didn't find NWCS anymore in depth than Hammerfast... Covering a larger area than Hammerfast? Definitely. But I'm not sure if that's necessarily a good thing for most beginning DM's as that means there's alot more to read and process (which you probably won't use... at least initially) to get started playing. Again it boils down to opinion but I think for Heroic Tier Hammerfast is the better sandbox... especially for new DM's or those who want to get started quickly.

De gustibus non est disputandum, but I don't think you can really dispute that the Neverwinter book goes into more depth. There are more factions and locales, yes, but there is also more information on the factions and locales that exist. Hammerfast itself is described in about 15 pages; Neverwinter covers the city itself in nearly twice as many pages, not counting 50 pages devoted to various allied and villainous factions. And each of major factions has several times over more detail than the Hammerfast book can allocate to its three major villains.

Neverwinter is a broader book, but also denser. I don't see the book billing itself as anything other than what it is.

 

[Imaro]

De gustibus non est disputandum, but I don't think you can really dispute that the Neverwinter book goes into more depth. There are more factions and locales, yes, but there is also more information on the factions and locales that exist. Hammerfast itself is described in about 15 pages; Neverwinter covers the city itself in nearly twice as many pages, not counting 50 pages devoted to various allied and villainous factions. And each of major factions has several times over more detail than the Hammerfast book can allocate to its three major villains.

Again, I disagree... most of the locale write-ups in Neverwinter, just like in Hammerfast are a paragraph long, there's just more of them. As to the factions... I guess the "relationships" section is more in-depth than the Hammerfast factions, but the goals for the Hammerfast factions are present as well as the resources and sample monsters for encounters... it's just a smaller number. I still stand by my original statement, for the price, I think Hammerfast is a better deal than Neverwinter... especially for a new DM or DM who doesn't want to read through a ton of pages.

Neverwinter is a broader book, but also denser. I don't see the book billing itself as anything other than what it is.

Oh, I definitely agree it is a broader book (especially with themes, a new class, etc.)... but outside of that broadness I'm not seeing a major difference in depth. I also never said it was anything besides what it is billing itself as... just pricewise I felt Hammerfast was a better deal.

 

[Dead Scribe]

Again, I disagree... most of the locale write-ups in Neverwinter, just like in Hammerfast are a paragraph long, there's just more of them.

I'm afraid you're mistaken--this is not true. Most of the location writeups are significantly longer than a paragraph. A few are that short, but most are closer to a page or a page and a half. Some are a few pages long. They almost all have a lot more detail than any given feature in Hammerfast.

It doesn't appear that you purchased the book, so it's understandable that you probably haven't done much more than skim it. But your representation of the book isn't accurate.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The game system already has:

550 Paragon Paths

132 Pieces of Gear

3078 Feats

8441 Powers

An interesting set of facts that in no way affects my opinion of what I would be willing to pay for what was in the book in question.

You may feel that's enough, and you have every right to feel that way. But I'm not shelling out more than $10 for what I saw. It just won't happen.

Builds are up to the players...

You misunderstood what I was referencing. A Starlock, Feylock, Hell-lock, Hexblade and the rest are "builds" within the Warlock class, each with unique mechanics. Sure, there's crossover, but they all have variances from the root of the class that differentiate them from each other.

 

[Kzach]

Yeah, I don't think NWCS is necessarily bad... But I checked the book out and honestly think Hammerfast, at $15, is a much better deal as a sandbox setting, than the NWCS at $40. Just my opinion though.

$40?

It's $25 on Amazon and you lucky Americanos get free shipping. Just count yourself lucky you don't live on the arse-end of the earth and have to pay $62 RRP for it ($35 shipped from Amazon).