D&D (2024) What older setting do you want to see next?

[Yaarel]

Which one of those links are meant to be representative of society as a whole? There is some Stretch Armstrong level stretching going here.

If you don't want Dark Sun to come back, that's cool. (I honestly have no dog in this fight, beyond sticking up for logic and reason.) But there's no obstacle to bringing it back, especially since WotC has shown no hesitation about changing things they feel ought to be changed. But "oh no, the bad guys are demonstrably bad by their actions, not their ethnicity," is not a compelling argument.

Heh. To be fair, the 5e designers threw Dark Sun into a blackhole and never mentioned slavery.

 

[Alzrius]

Unless they publish stats or, better yet, data from a rigorous survey, there's no way to determine whether it's a fringe belief or not.

So you're admitting that the belief is real, and not "disingenuous" when its existence is acknowledged?

As for how fringe it is, I'm of the opinion that when gaming websites and designers are referencing it, and one company changes their stance on the topic to align with it, that's when it stops being fringe, but YMMV.

 

[Patrick Lewis1]

I don't know. The fact that it's different from its neighbors -- and deeply threatening to them, because the country is basically a bunch of living atomic bombs who can't get along with one another -- is probably fine.

HOT TAKE: If you say that Glantri existed in the First World and that the version on Mystara is just the best-known echo of it, you can make it a standalone thing with the Mystaran elements* sanded down pretty easily. Every fantasy world needs a canal city full of scheming wizards.

* Mysterious magical power sources are a dime a dozen in D&D worlds. Glantri doesn't need the Radiance to work.

You sir are my kind of Gnome! I do kinda like the radiance, rad stuff. And for me its important that the players are the scheming wizards at the school. Glantrian wizards are a far more responsible representation of wizards at school than Hogwarts. Glantri is fundamentalist, racist and cruel setting...much like the Harry Potter setting. It is weird how folks let the representation of Goblins. house elves and Muggles( British white and blue collar workers if you hadn't picked op on it) slide for years. Glantrians banning all religious faiths and clerics, enslaving Halflings and Dwarves for monstorous experiments. I mean half the glantrian princess are undead and the others have a touch of the wolf about em,. Explain it as the players competing to be diabolical in a horror movie kitsch halloween fun way and its a giggle.

 

[Yaarel]

You sir are my kind of Gnome! I do kinda like the radiance, rad stuff. And for me its important that the players are the scheming wizards at the school. Glantrian wizards are a far more responsible representation of wizards at school than Hogwarts. Glantri is fundamentalist, racist and cruel setting...much like the Harry Potter setting. It is weird how folks let the representation of Goblins. house elves and Muggles( British white and blue collar workers if you hadn't picked op on it) slide for years. Glantrians banning all religious faiths and clerics, enslaving Halflings and Dwarves for monstorous experiments. I mean half the glantrian princess are undead and the others have a touch of the wolf about em,. Explain it as the players competing to be diabolical in a horror movie kitsch halloween fun way and its a giggle.

What is the post saying?

Because Potter is classist, it is ok for Glantri to be racist?

 

[Patrick Lewis1]

What is the post saying?

Because Potter is classist, it is ok for Glantri to be racist?

No not at all. Its not OK for Glantri to be racist. ITS NEVER OK TO BE RACIST.

Its not OK at all, thats kinda the point. Players should want to change it....

Glantri is seen as a fundamentally unpleasant nation by most other nations in the Mystara setting in game world, its a place of horror settings. It is overtly racist in setting, seen by other nations a fundamentalist and extremist. And its very classist too, only magic users and elves having political rights to be princes. In the original gazzetter there was a beginners campaign in which students( Magic users) attended the school of magic and could have chosen to subvert the political system of the setting. In fact the mega campaign in Wrath of the Immortals fundamentally alters alot of the power dynamics in Glantri as well as another Lycanthropy supplement in which you could be revolutionary were creatures fighting against tyranny. I think we can still have a laugh whilst playing in that setting. I think characters can play diabolical without being actual bigots.

The similarities with the attending a magical school were what made me think of potter. Although I would argue that actually perhaps the setting will increasingly be seen as problematic, Its kids fighting a resurgent Evil yes. But the secret wizarding world has quite alot of unpleseant elements too and in an RPG campaign they'd be interesting to take on. There wider societal villany in Potter thats kinda ignored, wizards secretly ruling muggles and having slaves etc. I think playing in the Potterverse as is maybe more insensative than Glantri in flux. Potterverse with social/political change could be really interesting.

Settings where goverments are despotic and laws are unjust seem pretty normal in fantasy, i've run alot of rebellion vs empire star wars redressed in medieval fantasy. Lots of Robin Hood stuff.

Apolgies if I took us off the thread...sorry Mystara lead to Glantri which made me think Hogwarts.

And to be clear having bigots as bad guys in your game does not make your game bigotted. Having morally dubious characters does not make the players morally dubious. And having a setting with evil in it does not make you supportive of evil ideas.

 

[Remathilis]

Glantri has been done using WotC's current design paradigm. It's called Strixhaven.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

So you're admitting that the belief is real, and not "disingenuous" when its existence is acknowledged?

As for how fringe it is, I'm of the opinion that when gaming websites and designers are referencing it, and one company changes their stance on the topic to align with it, that's when it stops being fringe, but YMMV.

If I previously denied that any people anywhere thought this was an issue, I misspoke, as that's not ever something I ever believe.

However, I don't think proving that at least a handful of people on the vast internet believe a thing means it's particularly meaningful. I am confident we can find people who think that WotC's actions should be dictated by the wishes of the secretly living Elvis Presley; that doesn't mean their numbers are meaningful or that the industry is going to bow to their wishes.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

You sir are my kind of Gnome! I do kinda like the radiance, rad stuff. And for me its important that the players are the scheming wizards at the school. Glantrian wizards are a far more responsible representation of wizards at school than Hogwarts. Glantri is fundamentalist, racist and cruel setting...much like the Harry Potter setting. It is weird how folks let the representation of Goblins. house elves and Muggles( British white and blue collar workers if you hadn't picked op on it) slide for years. Glantrians banning all religious faiths and clerics, enslaving Halflings and Dwarves for monstorous experiments. I mean half the glantrian princess are undead and the others have a touch of the wolf about em,. Explain it as the players competing to be diabolical in a horror movie kitsch halloween fun way and its a giggle.

Yeah, Glantri is a great example of how a campaign can be based in an evil setting without it devolving into (IMO) ridiculousness like Menzoberranzan, where it strains credulity that the whole place hasn't been destroyed by civil war.

The Glantrian ruling class is definitely -- as a group -- evil, but many NPCs and probably most PCs will find ways to justify turning a blind eye to it all, especially for the promise of magical power. But it's also a setting where heroic characters can and should be working to overthrow the magocracy as it's currently constructed, against some long odds. That's a pretty compelling setting, right there.

Plus, as has been mentioned, canal cities are rad. (But not necessarily Rad.)

 

[Micah Sweet]

If I previously denied that any people anywhere thought this was an issue, I misspoke, as that's not ever something I ever believe.

However, I don't think proving that at least a handful of people on the vast internet believe a thing means it's particularly meaningful. I am confident we can find people who think that WotC's actions should be dictated by the wishes of the secretly living Elvis Presley; that doesn't mean their numbers are meaningful or that the industry is going to bow to their wishes.

Are you truly operating under the assumption that, because  you don't think it's an issue, there can't possibly be enough people out there who do for it to make a difference?

 

[Micah Sweet]

Glantri has been done using WotC's current design paradigm. It's called Strixhaven.

If Strixhaven is WotC's version of that kind of society, that book is even worse than I thought it was.