underwhelmed with Neverwinter Campaign Setting

[GregoryOatmeal]

Who cares what 4e-haters think? Seriously, it's a 4e book. Obviously the haters gonna hate and since they're not going to buy it anyway, why does their opinion matter?

I quit 4E but was very happy to pick up the Dark Sun books. I also got MM3 before I quit - very cool book. All sorts of ideas from 4E creep into my C&C game from those books. I still may get Demonomicon and The Plane Above. WOTC makes really cool materials I consider buying for a system I'm not into.

I was hoping the annual campaign would be a revival of one of the old settings or something totally new. I looked at the previews and just couldn't get into Neverwinter. I asked people to explain the appeal to me and I still don't "get" the allure of Neverwinter. I played the original game and don't recall anything about the setting. I played the Neverwinter gameday and an Encounter session and neither left a mark. So no, I haven't read the book but I gave it a chance.

It seems like WOTC/TSR printed a half dozen or so books like this yearly for the various regions of FR/DL/Eberron in 2E/3E and hardly thought twice about it. For example this [ame="http://www.amazon.com/City-Splendors-Waterdeep-Roleplaying-Supplement/dp/0786936932/ref=pd_sim_b_7"]Amazon.com: City of Splendors: Waterdeep (Dungeons & Dragons d20 3.5 Fantasy Roleplaying, Forgotten Realms Supplement) (9780786936939): Eric L. Boyd: Books[/ame] book links to 20 whole 3/3.5 FR books. To me it resembles the Neverwinter book (City setting, prestige class/themes, feats, etc.) and it totally flew under my radar. Now the city book with plot hooks and NPCs and player options is this big iconic flagship brand and it just seems to lack a really compelling idea.

 

[S'mon]

I wouldn't go so far as to say it's useless, particularly since Loudwater isn't that far from Neverwinter and probably shares similar enemies.

Yes, I've been looking at the Netherese and the Gray Wolf Uthgardt especially as possible adversaries within the Gray Vale setting. I tend to build my campaign around the adventures, though. Eg I'm looking at running 'Heathen' from Dungeon 155, which puts the Church of Bane as a likely foe, Sceptre Tower of Spellguard, where I'm looking at making the BBEG a Shadovar agent of returned Netheril, and one or two of the Goodman Games 'Mountain King' adventures, featuring evil dwarves. I'm pretty good at linking in adventures - eg we're playing The Slaying Stone and I made the Stone an artifact of Netheril, while the rival faction seeking it are from the Banite Hand of Naarash. We played 'Menace of the Icy Spire' and I linked the dwarf warlock's tower to the Mountain King; one player even played one of the Mountain King's other Warlocks seeking the secrets of the tower.

I tend to find that concrete, nitty-gritty stuff like published adventures (esp shorter ones) sparks my imagination as I work on tying it all together, whereas creating my own adventures/encounters is often hard work and I get annoyed if it's wasted.

 

[Dice4Hire]

I think maybe the Themes are the key. I bought it thinking of adding Neverwinter to an ongoing campaign, but the discussion of Themes upthread makes clear that they are the intended starting point - you create fresh 1st level PCs for your Neverwinter campaign, each PC picks a theme, and the campaign generates from there. The DM is still doing lots of work to flesh out the city, create adventures & encounters, but everyone has direction & motivation from this starting point. It's not a bad idea, but it's not what I expected, it means I can't get value from the product simply by adding it to an ongoing campaign, and since I'm loving my existing Loudwater campaign and don't want to drop it, that means I basically can't use this.

Why not spend a few levels in Loudwater developing (or getting characters to develop) connections to Everwinter similar to the themes, whether you give them the themes or not. Or jsut look at how the characters see themselves nad assing them themes (if only in your mind) and then send them in. I do not think Neverwinter will only work if you start at 1st level.

 

[S'mon]

Why not spend a few levels in Loudwater developing (or getting characters to develop) connections to Everwinter similar to the themes, whether you give them the themes or not. Or jsut look at how the characters see themselves nad assing them themes (if only in your mind) and then send them in. I do not think Neverwinter will only work if you start at 1st level.

That was my original plan, but since Neverwinter is not actually the detailed adventure site I was expecting, I don't see the payoff. I originally thought maybe Loudwater would occupy low Heroic 1-5 and Neverwinter sounded great for high-Heroic 6-10, but there doesn't seem to be enough in the book to make the transition worthwhile for me.

 

[generalchaos34]

What a load of rubbish.


Your price expectation is ridiculous and it's absurd to expect something of this size and composition to be sold for such a low amount.

You don't subscribe to DDI and you refuse to pay a reasonable price for a book. Answer honestly now, do you use CBLoader and download PDF's? Do you feel WotC owes you? Have you actually paid for anything WotC has produced in the last twelve months? I'd be willing to be the real answer is no.

Im gonna have to agree with this, regardless of what you think may or may not be a good deal, you simply cant put out a hard cover book with all color pages and expect for turn a profit for anything less than $20, like any business, they have employees, overhead, etc, and the cost of production is always increasing. Most places sell this stuff for cheaper because they are selling items at greater quantities, like amazon, or small stores charge book price because they wont make many sales, few players outside of DMs will use this book, so its sales are already limited. I buy the books because I enjoy reading them, I dont go into a store, read the out of their books and leave, I pay for it. its just the way things work, I expect people to pay me a fair price for the products I sell, so I will do them the same and buy their products at price. Now I wont argue that $40 is a bit pricey, but you are getting it at the "convenience" price of being able to walk in the store, look at it, and take it home with you that day, when you want to save you get the inconvenience of waiting a couple of days for something youve never seen to come in the mail, something im willing to do to get some extra cash, but I also frequent the local store and drop some cash for the pricier items because 1. I wanted it now and 2. I like to support local businesses if i can, although their inventory sucks.

And to the actual point at hand, I love this book, its lots of great ideas that can bee used just about anywhere! Dark sorcerers raising a crashed sky city? check. An undead acropolis with a giant dragon skeleton and living walls? check! A secret aberrant group hiding in plain sight and driving people insane while pretending to help them? Check! A lost dwarven city inhabited by the Duregar, Illithid AND insane elemental beings? CHECK! Sure theres not alot of detail, but the overreaching idea is what I need, then if im being lazy i plunder DDI for similarly leveled encounters in other adventures, reskin the monsters and BLAMO, instant dungeon but with my own flavor and a better story arc.

I can't see what there isnt to love about this book as a DM, plus theres some sexy themes that can be easily refluffed as needed, but as written are excellent for lazy PCs who hate to RP, and it keeps me from forcing them create a backstory for Conan Von Hugedong the Ranger.

PS: Also loved Hammerfast and Vor Rukoth, great books that I have plundered ruthlessly for their vague and extremely excellent ideas.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

What a load of rubbish.

Not at all. If your primary or sole internet access is too slow, through a group that bars access to shopping sites (schools, libraries, many businesses, the US military), or you don't have access to an online payment method, Amazon is simply not an option.

And that's just a sampling of involuntary reasons people don't use Amazon or other online retailers.

Your price expectation is ridiculous and it's absurd to expect something of this size and composition to be sold for such a low amount.

My price expectation is a measure of how little I think of the product: it is not something I would purchase new. It is something I may purchase at a later date, used or on deep discount.

You don't subscribe to DDI and you refuse to pay a reasonable price for a book.

I pay reasonable prices on books all the time. Hell, since I buy my books in FLGs as opposed to online, I probably pay more than you do.

Answer honestly now, do you use CBLoader and download PDF's? Do you feel WotC owes you? Have you actually paid for anything WotC has produced in the last twelve months? I'd be willing to be the real answer is no.

I do not use CBLoader, and have never even looked for it. Does it even run on Macs?

And have you noticed the number of books I listed (you know, in your other recent thread) as having purchased?

Without going into the timeline, my 4Ed purchases are:

1. DMG
2. MM
3. PHB1
4. PHB2
5. PHB3
6. PHR: Dragonborn
7. PHR: Tieflings
8. MP1
9. MP2
10. AP
11. DP
12. PsyP
13. PriP
14. AV1
15. AV2
16. FRPG
17. EPG
18. DSPG
19. HoS
20. HotFK
21. HotFL
22. RC

Of those, only the initial Core 3 were not purchased in the last 12mo...and ALL were bought in FLGSs.

The reason all but the DMG1, MM and PHB1 were the only ones not purchased in 2010-2011 is because I had no reason to. Up until that point, nobody in our group was interested in running 4Ed. Then, early last year, a new guy joined the group and asked if he could run a 4Ed game.

As self-appointed "group librarian", I bought those books that had the most use to players (as opposed to being needed to run a game). The DM, however, uses DDI.