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

[PowerWordDumb]

Don't think I was singling you out, I was really just looking for an example without searching far and wide. But dammit I don't care who has to die so I can prove a point! j/k

No worries - no insult taken or inferred. Just wanted to be clear since my statement was used that nobody *else* thought I was trashing on Kalamar. I want to love it, I really do!

 

[Brennin Magalus]

Oh, and glaciers next to deserts are not realistic in the real world? Isn't that exactly what Antartica is right now in the real world?

The word desert can generally denote a desolate land, but it also functions as a specific scientific designation (if I recall my geoscience correctly) that would rule out Antartica. I believe Antartica is considered a tundra, but I would have to check to make certain.

 

[MerakSpielman]

The official definition of a desert is any land where more water evaporates than is acquired through precipitation. Antrarctica qualifies. There is very little precipitation down there.

the Desert biome.

Tundra seems to be a pretty limited biome type...

 

[RenoOfTheTurks]

Elminster is a meddling, over-powerful, ubiquitous force in everything that happens in Faerun. His actions weave through many plots.

So not true. He tries to right the few wrongs that he can ("meddling"?... that's what evil characters say...they really *need* others to dislike Elminster like they do) though the many good forces in the Realms can be no means annihilate the many evil forces. He's powerful certainly, but there is a huge backstory fleshing that out and you simply reveal your tastes if you call it "over-powerful". As for a "ubiquitous force in everything that happens", it's nowhere NEAR true and there is a sidebar in the FRCS explaining why it isn't true (WotC knew of this popular untrue sentiment, methinks). His actions do weave through many plots. So do Szass Tam's and Fzoul Chembryl's. Love it. I love that there are forces in the world greater than low-level PCs, and a tier of movers and shakers that PCs can become involved with at higher levels. Our group has had several campaigns in which this has happened.

I am sick of setting wars too, and I don't want to engage in them, except to reject specifically the attacks continually brought against the Realms. IMO the attacks are always based on the same set of uninformed statements about the Realms blended with matters of taste. Who am I to dispute matters of taste? Well, when you can't extricate the matters of taste interwoven with the uninformed statements, the matters of taste are immediately suspect.

I have all these theories about the demographic that attacks the Realms like this, involving their age, their links to First Edition and Greyhawk, but I can never understand how they can systematically be so wrong in their statements about what the Realms is and isn't. There is something historical/emotional driving the vitriolic, wrong-headed attacks, but I'm a younger gamer and I can't quite put my finger on what it is.

 

[Desdichado]

The word desert can generally denote a desolate land, but it also functions as a specific scientific designation (if I recall my geoscience correctly) that would rule out Antartica. I believe Antartica is considered a tundra, but I would have to check to make certain.

Actually, I'm quite sure that I recall my geoscience correctly, and I was asking that question rhetorically. Antarctica quite definately is a desert; a desert that is largely covered by a glacier currently.

 

[Desdichado]

The statements aren't so much ignorant or untrue as they are exaggerated to the point of hyperbole.

I think most people who don't like the Realms don't like them for quite concrete reasons that have to do with their experiences with the Realms, not because of some self-perpetuating rumors on the Internet.

Me? I'm indifferent to the Realms. It's quintessentially D&D in most regards, and I'm not real big into that aspect of it, but (at least in the 3e incarnation) it is otherwise quite well done.

 

[RenoOfTheTurks]

The statements aren't so much ignorant or untrue as they are exaggerated to the point of hyperbole

Right, I'd say that "exaggeration to the point of hyperbole" is a good characterization of why many of the statements end up not ringing true. Nonetheless.

I think most people who don't like the Realms don't like them for quite concrete reasons that have to do with their experiences with the Realms, not because of some self-perpetuating rumors on the Internet.

Yeah, maybe their DMs just didn't do well with high magic and powerful organizations in bids for influence. They let it all overshadow the PCs, which would be a mistake, but not one that I've ever experienced in any game, ever. The 3E FRCS took pains to say to these folks, "It's your game, and the PCs are the center of it." Unnecessarily, I think, but perhaps I've just had the good experiences.

 

[Brennin Magalus]

The official definition of a desert is any land where more water evaporates than is acquired through precipitation. Antrarctica qualifies. There is very little precipitation down there.

the Desert biome.

Tundra seems to be a pretty limited biome type...

Thanks for the information. I guess I should have paid more attention in my geoscience class. In any event, I think everyone knew what I meant when I said desert (i.e., a "hot and dry" desert according to the page you linked) and I still assert that scorched sand dunes coterminous with a bitterly cold chunk of permafrost is asinine.

 

[Dark Jezter]

I have all these theories about the demographic that attacks the Realms like this, involving their age, their links to First Edition and Greyhawk, but I can never understand how they can systematically be so wrong in their statements about what the Realms is and isn't. There is something historical/emotional driving the vitriolic, wrong-headed attacks, but I'm a younger gamer and I can't quite put my finger on what it is.

I've observed that most of the most fanatical Realms-bashing, Greyhawk-advocating people out there have a strong sense of nostalgia. They played 1st edition AD&D Greyhawk back in the 1980s, and they have grown bitter watching Greyhawk decline in popularity over the last 20 years while the Forgotten Realms grows more and more popular. So, they take little nitpicks about the Forgotten Realms (like the fact that the geography of Faerun isn't totally realistic) and blow them way out of proportion.

Note that this dosen't decribe everyone who prefers Greyhawk over Forgotten Realms. I'm only referring to the people who constantly need to tell everyone how great Greyhawk is and how much FR sucks.

 

[RenoOfTheTurks]

scorched sand dunes coterminous with a bitterly cold chunk of permafrost is asinine.

Has it been said yet that the scorched sands and heat are only present due to the machinations and spells of the Pharimm, powerful beings living beneath Anauroch? If so, sorry to repeat.