D&D 5E What is your definition of a Vanilla setting

[FXR]

Obviously, this guy's homebrew setting.

 

[not-so-newguy]

Obivously, this guy's homebrew setting.

Spoiler

View attachment NOTSUREIF.jpg

 

[doctorbadwolf]

This is like asking which is the "most vanilla" ice-cream when your choices are (using British examples:

Haagen-Dazs Vanilla
Walls Soft Scoop Vanilla
Mackie's Traditional Vanilla

It's like they're all vanilla ice-cream mate. Dragonlance is very slightly less vanilla in that it tweaks some setting elements more and has fewer races and so on, but it's almost more vanilla because it's got a whole bonus level of vanilla-ness due to being basically about a bunch of white people.

The DL novels may be about a bunch of white people, but the setting isn’t. And it’s definitely not a vanilla setting. Closest I could agree with is soemthing like chocolate chip, where it’s mostly vanilla+a thing, but even that fails to capture that it’s cosmology is different, it’s use of familiar elements is different, etc.

There’s a lot going on beyond the base ice cream in DL.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Anyway, I’d say none of the above, but I guess Greyhawk is the closest.

FR has the Chosen, Lantan, history of stuff like gods fist-fighting eachother as giant avatars across the world, etc.

DL I already spoke on.

Greyhawk...is probably closest to the pastiche of a LOTR meets 20th century fantasy adventure stories inspired “kinda pseudo-medieval” world that is “Vanilla D&D”.

 

[Blue Orange]

Obviously, this guy's homebrew setting.

I must respectfully disagree.

'Turn off the lights and I'll glow' is achievable in any standard edition through a light spell, which bards (Mr. Ice's presumable character class) usually are able to cast since I believe 2nd ed. Similarly, 'deadly, when I play a dope melody' implies the use of at least some attack-oriented bard spell effects, again compatible with vanilla--bards get power word kill as a class spell as of 5e, though I am not sure Mr. Ice's lack of popularity or critical acclaim is congruent with his having reached such a high level of skill. (One hopes he has not in fact used this spell on listeners' mothers.)

'Slice like a ninja', however, implies the presence of a ninja character class, which is not in the standard game, though it have been in every Asian-themed expansion (again, not vanilla-green tea perhaps). 'DJ revolves it', 'go rush a speaker', and 'rock a mic like a vandal' imply the presence of record players/turntables, speakers, and microphones, all of which indicate a technological level significantly above that of a standard D&D game.

Besides, we've seen him collaborate with tortle monks. Not vanilla!

 

[not-so-newguy]

I must respectfully disagree.

'Turn off the lights and I'll glow' is achievable in any standard edition through a light spell, which bards (Mr. Ice's presumable character class) usually are able to cast since I believe 2nd ed. Similarly, 'deadly, when I play a dope melody' implies the use of at least some attack-oriented bard spell effects, again compatible with vanilla--bards get power word kill as a class spell as of 5e, though I am not sure Mr. Ice's lack of popularity or critical acclaim is congruent with his having reached such a high level of skill. (One hopes he has not in fact used this spell on listeners' mothers.)

'Slice like a ninja', however, implies the presence of a ninja character class, which is not in the standard game, though it have been in every Asian-themed expansion (again, not vanilla-green tea perhaps). 'DJ revolves it', 'go rush a speaker', and 'rock a mic like a vandal' imply the presence of record players/turntables, speakers, and microphones, all of which indicate a technological level significantly above that of a standard D&D game.

Besides, we've seen him collaborate with tortle monks. Not vanilla!

Spoiler

 

[Maxperson]

I would not call Eberron vanilla D&D.

It has all the D&D elements but it twists lots of them. Elves with the Deathless. Halflings ride Dinosaurs. Gods are a step removed and possibly not there. It adds in its own stuff of elemental ships and trains, Dragonmarks, Dragon shards, artificers and warforged, a psionic continent and player race, different cosmology. Its default tone is magical noir post WWI instead of high magic ren faire.

Base D&D is vanilla, Eberron adds on a lot of toppings to make a sundae.

Vanilla doesn't require that you present things in the default manner. Halflings riding dinosaurs is still vanilla. Halflings are vanilla and dinosaurs are vanilla. Adding vanilla to vanilla doesn't make it a topping. Eberron is just fancy vanilla is all.

 

[Maxperson]

Dragonlance is Neopolitan - with vanilla present, but also strawberry and chocolate.

Pretty sure those are just moons.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The DL novels may be about a bunch of white people, but the setting isn’t. And it’s definitely not a vanilla setting. Closest I could agree with is soemthing like chocolate chip, where it’s mostly vanilla+a thing, but even that fails to capture that it’s cosmology is different, it’s use of familiar elements is different, etc.

There’s a lot going on beyond the base ice cream in DL.

I disagree.

If anything, Dragonlance is close to Vanilla minus. That's why I chose Walls Vanilla, which is significantly different in flavour to normal vanilla (it might even gross people out) but is almost more plain than stuff like Haagen Dazs vanilla. And yeah the setting is absolutely and totally "about a bunch of white people" - sure some of them are white elves or insultingly racist portrayals of faux-Native Americans, but no-one else actually matters in the setting, not on Anaslon at least. None of the added elements actually amount of anything. They're all just flourishes. The Kender are just a slightly naive-racist (don't make me go into it, please) 1970s take on Hobbits. The Tinker Gnomes amount to absolutely nothing. The Irda are basically a minor backstory element. And so on. Maybe they're like those coloured sprinkles which are absolutely flavourless?

The use of familiar elements isn't significantly different, imho. It's mostly just that there's meaningless stuff missing. The cosmology isn't significantly different. It's just that the gods in DL some like to go into a sulk - FR's cosmology is just as "different from Vanilla" as this, I would say.

Taladas is totally different and absolutely isn't a Vanilla setting. However, given that the last time it got any serious coverage was in the 1980s, which is well over thirty years ago, I feel like it's almost cheating to count it as part of DL.

Overall DL is a very Vanilla setting. Sure, there are some minor changes, but this is some basic stuff, and every Vanilla setting has a lot of minor changes. We could pretend it's not, but then we get to the silly-ass place where no settings are Vanilla, they are all Extremely Special and Unique (TM). I see some people in this thread would like to do that.

The difference from say the FR is that it's not both Vanilla and a Kitchen Sink, which the FR is. Eberron is not really Vanilla, but is a Kitchen Sink, likewise Planescape (and arguably Spelljammer).

My personal definition of Vanilla would be any setting that does not, imho, deviate significantly from the basic concepts of D&D, and the presents a temperate faux-medieval/renaissance Western-ish setting as the primary location (anything that's clearly 1700s-ish or later, or the 800s or earlier is probably not Vanilla), wherein the basic expectation is that the PCs are going to be Heroic Adventurers of a straightforward kind. Religion-wise it absolutely must have a totally naughty word ridiculous pantheon that makes ZERO sense which is really loosely conceptually inspired by bad misunderstandings of pre-Christian European paganism meeting designer power-fantasies (and FR, GH, DL, I gotta hand it to you guys, you absolutely nailed this aspect of being vanilla - I am clapping - I couldn't imagine it being nailed harder! Like, randomly including a real-world saint GH? That's some chef's kiss stuff there). There's other stuff too which can really amp-up that Vanilla-ness, like if most of the people in the setting are kind of acting like they're at a ren-faire or cosplaying or something rather than actually espousing any sort of alien medieval attitudes, but I dunno if that's strictly needed.

 

[Maxperson]

Overall DL is a very Vanilla setting. Sure, there are some minor changes, but this is some basic stuff, and every Vanilla setting has a lot of minor changes. We could pretend it's not, but then we get to the silly-ass place where no settings are Vanilla, they are all Extremely Special and Unique (TM). I see some people in this thread would like to do that.

This. That's why I rated Dragonlance and Planescape as vanilla as well. Spelljammer I'm iffy on, but I can see the vanilla argument.