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What do you want from a campaign setting?
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<blockquote data-quote="rounser" data-source="post: 2773088" data-attributes="member: 1106"><p>I don't think it can be done on a large scale without an insane amount of work being involved. The Dragonlance "Chronicles" series of adventures are a globetrotting example of what you're describing; they're also one big railroad with regards to where the PCs must go next, and which NPCs cannot die because it would ruin the plot. I think that this is inevitable if the adventure spans a continent, and a campaign arc of epic scope. To allow unrailroaded player choices that the module was prepared for would probably run into the thousands of pages....some computer game FRPGs manage it, but for a P&P RPG this level of development isn't really on the cards for reasons of page count alone.</p><p></p><p>Even leaving the dungeon can present too much player choice for designers and DMs, which is why wildernesses are largely just treated as places to roll on wandering encounter tables rather than true adventuring environments. Cities are also difficult in this respect. Even though they have walls, they also have thousands of NPCs, making them perhaps even worse than wilderness in terms of representing them without extensive improvisation. D&D's game design technology doesn't even extend far enough to confront the problem of the PCs running into status quo or wandering stuff far out of their league in a wilderness or urban area - a problem solved in the dungeon by the concept of a "dungeon level". For reasons of verisimilitude, dragons shouldn't start popping up instead of kobolds in the same area of wilderness simply because the PCs have reached the appropriate level...computer games such as Everquest have dealt with this problem by making different areas palpably more dangerous, but the issue is largely skirted entirely in D&D.</p><p></p><p>The other approach is to create a limited-scope "DM's playground". Ruins of Adventure (aka Pool of Radiance) presents a ruined city and surrounding countryside. There is no particular order in which the PCs need to explore the wilderness or parts of the ruins, resulting in (gasp!) meaningful player choice. The other module which is a good model for this is The Secret of Bone Hill, which presents a town and surrounding countryside which is full of interesting stuff to discover, so PCs can go exploring and find something other than on-the-fly DM improvisation (how novel!). Both modules avoid the abovementioned "out-of-your-league" problem by being relatively low level modules, so even the greatest challenges can be recognised as such and avoided...which leads us to another blind spot for D&D - no provision for recognising the challenge of an encounter "in character". The metagame knowledge of the CR difference between a troll and a kobold is a murky area, because there's no "monsterology" skill (or other rule) to deal with the issue of a character knowing the difference in challenge "in game".</p><p></p><p>But then, few players can roleplay the genius of a 25 intelligence wizard, so such hiccups are assumed into the D&D experience. (I'm of the opinion that the three "mental" stats would be better done away with and replaced with something like Magical Affinity, Divine Affinity and Karma Affinity for Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma respectively, but removing these mental associations "breaks" the skill system).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="rounser, post: 2773088, member: 1106"] I don't think it can be done on a large scale without an insane amount of work being involved. The Dragonlance "Chronicles" series of adventures are a globetrotting example of what you're describing; they're also one big railroad with regards to where the PCs must go next, and which NPCs cannot die because it would ruin the plot. I think that this is inevitable if the adventure spans a continent, and a campaign arc of epic scope. To allow unrailroaded player choices that the module was prepared for would probably run into the thousands of pages....some computer game FRPGs manage it, but for a P&P RPG this level of development isn't really on the cards for reasons of page count alone. Even leaving the dungeon can present too much player choice for designers and DMs, which is why wildernesses are largely just treated as places to roll on wandering encounter tables rather than true adventuring environments. Cities are also difficult in this respect. Even though they have walls, they also have thousands of NPCs, making them perhaps even worse than wilderness in terms of representing them without extensive improvisation. D&D's game design technology doesn't even extend far enough to confront the problem of the PCs running into status quo or wandering stuff far out of their league in a wilderness or urban area - a problem solved in the dungeon by the concept of a "dungeon level". For reasons of verisimilitude, dragons shouldn't start popping up instead of kobolds in the same area of wilderness simply because the PCs have reached the appropriate level...computer games such as Everquest have dealt with this problem by making different areas palpably more dangerous, but the issue is largely skirted entirely in D&D. The other approach is to create a limited-scope "DM's playground". Ruins of Adventure (aka Pool of Radiance) presents a ruined city and surrounding countryside. There is no particular order in which the PCs need to explore the wilderness or parts of the ruins, resulting in (gasp!) meaningful player choice. The other module which is a good model for this is The Secret of Bone Hill, which presents a town and surrounding countryside which is full of interesting stuff to discover, so PCs can go exploring and find something other than on-the-fly DM improvisation (how novel!). Both modules avoid the abovementioned "out-of-your-league" problem by being relatively low level modules, so even the greatest challenges can be recognised as such and avoided...which leads us to another blind spot for D&D - no provision for recognising the challenge of an encounter "in character". The metagame knowledge of the CR difference between a troll and a kobold is a murky area, because there's no "monsterology" skill (or other rule) to deal with the issue of a character knowing the difference in challenge "in game". But then, few players can roleplay the genius of a 25 intelligence wizard, so such hiccups are assumed into the D&D experience. (I'm of the opinion that the three "mental" stats would be better done away with and replaced with something like Magical Affinity, Divine Affinity and Karma Affinity for Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma respectively, but removing these mental associations "breaks" the skill system). [/QUOTE]
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