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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Galethorn" data-source="post: 1814812" data-attributes="member: 7888">1. Enough room for a variety of things to be going on; a small, volcanic island with two major factions, both different yet the same, and in an everlasting war would be on bad footing despite whatever other good features there were, so long as it wasn't just a part of a larger setting.2. A Consistant Theme; A campaign setting needs a theme, and it has to stick to it. The more abstract and vague the theme, the better. A setting with the theme 'Petty Kingdoms Vying for Power' would be good because of its open scope and potential (yet specific enough to potentially give the whole setting a particularly dark-age feel), whereas 'Vikings...But With Katanas!' would be bad because it's too specific, and it doesn't really add much depth beyond the fact that most people in that setting are probably pillaging seafarers, and they use katanas for some reason. That said, a setting can have more than one driving theme, though its best to have them at different levels of abstraction and vagueness(sp?).This is my major problem with FR; it doesn't seem to have an underlying theme. What it really has is too much variety. If it was five or ten smaller settings, I think most would be pretty cool...but no, it's one big 'value pack' where literally everything exists. If The North, The Sword Coast, The Dalelands, The Unapproachable East, The Shining South, and Calimshan were all settings of their own, usable by themselves or together, I think it would be a lot more game-friendly, at least for me personally. It would sure screw up their precious novels through, truth be told...That said, I don't think whole worlds or continents ever make truly great campaign settings, simply because it's so hard to pin a definate theme onto such a large tract of land without making it seem artificially homogenous.3. Internal Consistency/Verisimilitude/Believability/Authenticity; a setting has to make sense. Period.Now, I can suspend my disbelief when a dragon flies, or when an elf lives for a long time, or when there's a metal superior to steel for arms and armor. What I can't help but cringe/scoff/laugh/puzzle at is when people don't act like people in a setting; if magic is common enough for most people to have seen, no ruler would be stupid enough to let his local supply be open to anybody. If magic is powerful and common enough for spellcasters to be a major contributing part of an army, no general would be stupid enough to fight on an open field.4. Realism where it counts; unless there's a very good reason for otherwise, rivers should run down hill, people should die quickly from arterial wounds (and arterial wounds should happen rather easily with almost any sharp weapon that gets past the skin), armor should protect, metals should melt at the right temperatures, and things should fall at 9.78m/s^2, to a terminal velocity approaching 150kph (for suitably flailing and baggy-clothed humanoids). Nuff said.</blockquote>

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