What are the pros and cons of the different campaign settings?

[johnsemlak]

I'm tired of all this pathetic Realms-bashing, so I'll weigh in.

Forgotten Realms
-The Realms is also the best supported D&D setting, with adventures and other supplements cranked out monthly.

Nothing against FR, but, uh, supplements cranked out monthly? Adventures? That sounds like the TSR/2e period, now long gone of course.

Closer to the mark would be one supplement every four months, and the last adventure was City of the Spider Queen (though there are some in Dungeon). WotC has said they will not be doing more adventures for the setting.

 

[Nightfall]

Merek,

Not a problem and while I'd LOVE for you to use Scarred Lands, I won't say you have to. It's your choice. I will say if you DO use one of the cities, either Bluffside or Freeport are my heavy favorites.

 

[Kichwas]

-There is no "metaplot" in FR. I consider this a good thing, since the DM has the ability to run any damn adventure he feels like.

FR Has more metaplot [story or timeline set and moved forward by the publisher] than any published game setting out there, with the possible exception of the World of Darkness...

With every novel the game setting gets altered, sometimes in minor ways, sometimes in radical ones.

These changes then get reflected in future product, so that to be able to get full use of that product you have to both get the novels and keep adjusting your game to match the changes.

BTW, for anyone who claims that the FR geography is nonsensical, why not take a moment to actually read the book before saying so. ... Wow, magic actually plays a role in the geography of worlds.

Every last forest, desert, river, hill, mountain, city, swamp and so on is not where it should be.

Every last one of these needs to be accounted for by magic and the moment that magic failed the whole thing would undergo radical shifting.

 

[Mystery Man]

What the devil is "meta-plot"?

 

[Turjan]

What the devil is "meta-plot"?

A kind of plot you as a GM do not have any influence on. The world is developping without your doing, and you constantly have to adjust your own storyline to the changes originating from other sources, like the novels.

 

[eryndel]

Some quick points.

HarnWorld
Pros: Incredibly detailed, Fixed date (no advancement of timeline), Great Maps, very realistic.
Cons: $pendy: Perhaps highest price per page in the industry, Not ruleset specific (not sure if this is good or bad. You won't find D20 rules in here, just descriptions of people. Statting them out shouldn't be difficult). Low Magic.
Personal notes: Harn is my first love. The initial overhead is impressive but supplements come sporadically so it's easy for me to keep up.

Scarred Lands
Okay, I'm baised on this one since I've done writing for them.
Pros: Sort of a gritty heroic d20 game. There is a lot out there for it, but you needn't get everything. Good implementation of some of the core classes.
Cons: The organization of the line is somewhat haphazard (especially considering that the first book out was a monster book). It's smoothed out some recently however. There's enough supporters around here to tell you what the must have books are.

Forgotten Realms
Pros: The Realms has its detractors but there is a lot of support for this setting. The Realms are big and you can probably find room for any sort of setting somewhere in the realms. It also has some interesting options in the way of magic/dieties/races/ what have you.
Cons: Unless you want to have the metaplot, you have to pick and choose what you want to use. Same with the powerful NPCs. But it's easy to ignore the features you don't want. My realms game only had two NPCs over 10th level and they were sort of distant figures (not much screen time).

Dragonlance
I love Dragonlance, loved it since Dragonlance Adventures (1e). That said, I'm incredibly disappointed with the new 3.5 vesion:
Pros: It's Dragonlance, with all that dragonlancy goodness. Draconians, Dragons, Mysterious moon aspected Wizards, Noble Knights. There is a good breadth to the setting so that you can find a lot of room to game in. The setting has a nice, almost post-apoc feel to it.
Cons: Some of the prestige classes aren't well conceived. I couldn't suspend my disbelief for the timeline past the Age of Despair. I wish tinkers gnomes had rules to actually tinker. Maybe there is errata of another book has fixed it, but since picking up the main book I haven't had the desire to look.

Sovereign Stone
Pros: The magic system seems really cool. They have some new base classes if you're into that.
Cons: The base classes don't seem to add much (mages excluded). The setting itself didn't really appeal to me and I had difficulty suspending by disbelief (ork sailors are cool, orks believe they are descended from orca...well, whatever.) In many cases the descriptions of people, settings, and motivations seem to be very two dimensional. There are supplements to this setting which I don't have which might fix some of this.

I'll reiterate that for the last two, I only have the main book so I'm not an expert on the setting.

Werner

 

[Mystery Man]

A kind of plot you as a GM do not have any influence on. The world is developping without your doing, and you constantly have to adjust your own storyline to the changes originating from other sources, like the novels.

Ah, well from a personal standpoint I hardly ever read them so they have no effect on me at all.I see the development and changing of the Realms as a strength rather than a weakness or a "con" as it were.

Every last forest, desert, river, hill, mountain, city, swamp and so on is not where it should be.

Every last one of these needs to be accounted for by magic and the moment that magic failed the whole thing would undergo radical shifting.

Years ago I went with my family across Nebraska to see Mt. Rushmore one of the stops along the way was to visit this gigantic sand dune out in the middle of nowhere. No desert around it, just a sand dune (huge) that had no business really being there. No "magic" to explain it really, it was just there.

 

[Nightfall]

This is not to make fun or make light of arcady's point for geography.

BUT I always felt that what made sense to US doesn't mean nature will agree. I also still can't understand why in a campaign setting geography has to make "sense" or seem "real". Especially when we base all our own reality on often faulty or inaccurate senses. But I digress. Arcady and the KoK people are allowed to state their case.

(Btw Metaplotting CAN be good IF you and the rest of the people have input. Which is why I like the Scarred Lands. Our metaplots are the ones MOST of us want.)

Btw thanks for showing up Werner! You rule!

 

[Turjan]

Ah, well from a personal standpoint I hardly ever read them so they have no effect on me at all.I see the development and changing of the Realms as a strength rather than a weakness or a "con" as it were.

Some of them are hard to avoid, because the official supplements are based on the novels. Just think of the silence of Lolth. This is now cemented in the official "Underdark" supplement and has a big influence on all campaigns including drow. Of course, you can still ignore that, but this is just one example. If you keep ignoring these changes, your Realms will look much different from the original ones after a few years.
On the other hand, this may not be a bad thing, anyway .

But back to topic .

I won't reiterate anything written about the Scarred Lands. I just like to say that I like them, because they are a setting of many truths, which makes them interesting. The FR are a toolbox for me, and I love the book.

As far as city settings go, I recommend Bluffside, although I'd change the map a bit. Freeport has a good support and an interesting atmosphere, but the map looks more like a modern day American suburb to me - bah. If you don't mind pdf's, have a look at "Visira - City of Sorrows". Not much support, but quite a good starting point.

 

[Nightfall]

Turjan,

Mm interesting, setting of many truths? Not quite sure I understand this...but if you're referring to how there are varying accounts about what occurred in the past in some places, along with some of the propoganda spread by some Calastians about their history, then yes it's a widely taken look at my little corner of the multiverse.