Which Campaign Setting has the best fluff? Why?

[tetsujin28]

I'm only going to talk about D&D settings, to avoid this becoming a big muddle. I'm a big fan of the 2e settings: Ravenloft, Al-Qadim, Dark Sun, Planescape. The bang for the buck contained in those lines has yet to be equalled. Plus, most of the stuff is now available as either incredibly cheap or free PDFs.

 

[tetsujin28]

I'm with Psion, DiTerlizzi never did it for me either.

That's just crazy talk. Diterlizzi is Planescape.

 

[Razz0putin]

Even though everybody else seems to have already chimed in on this one I'll be one more in the din

All time (so far) I've got to give it to planescape

for modern I like diamond throne and Scarred lands. I can't believe how little Scarred lands has come up. It's one of few settings that has cool things like a city of necromancers and background reason why dwarves are so difficult.
P.S. Eberron is kinda cool but it gave me the vibe of "if it's cool it's in there" which seem like it's just not defined to me. It looks like it took a lot of the best ideas that a lot of aftermarket companies were doing and put them all in one. Don't get me wrong it took the best and made them work but it's not exactly originall.

 

[Gez]

Hi Gez!

In fact, I come from metropolitan France. I just happen to live in British Columbia.

Mystery solved!

 

[Testament]

That's just crazy talk. Diterlizzi is Planescape.

Fine then, link me to his art. I've only seen a few products (like Dead Gods) and played Torment right through 3 times, so my exposure to printed Planescape is limited.

Prove to me that DiTerlizzi is anything other than yet another overrated old school artist.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

It has come to my attention that I have made a terrible error.

In my original post, I listed (in order) Planescape, Dragonstar, and Eberron.

Because it was not D&D, I forgot a very important setting: Star*Drive.

The best aliens I have seen in any game setting or even any non-gaming science-fiction-- fleshed out in novels, Dragon articles, and numerous supplements. Each of them is clearly alien and distinct from humanity, but they are also each understandable and accessible as player characters.

Intrigue between the Stellar Nations. You have the Concord, which tries to keep the peace, but even their enormous resources can be stretched thin at times. You have ruthless corporatists, an empire of eugenicists, religious fanatics, digital spiritualists, and cyber-communists. Any and all of these nations may switch allegiances at any time, to further their own diverse, compelling, and dramatic goals.

Endless adventure opportunities in the Verge. Colonizing new worlds, resisting the influence of the Stellar Nations, avoiding (or embracing) the criminal syndicates... and living in fear of the constant threat presented by the Externals.

With precious few exceptions, the Campaign Setting book itself and nearly all of the supplements where wholly fluff, detailing new locations, new personalities, new facets of the setting... truly incredible.

So... I have to reorder my list:
1) Planescape.
2) Star*Drive.
3) Tie: Dragonstar and Eberron.

 

[tetsujin28]

Fine then, link me to his art. I've only seen a few products (like Dead Gods) and played Torment right through 3 times, so my exposure to printed Planescape is limited.

http://www.diterlizzi.com/

Prove to me that DiTerlizzi is anything other than yet another overrated old school artist.

I'd say he's more 'middle school'. Old school is Trampier.

 

[Ravellion]

Personally I gave up on Dragonlance when, somewhere in the first three books or so, the author got confused between the terms "halberd" and "hauberk" with the result that the guards in one town started pointing their mailshirts at people in a threatening way. This was certainly a remarkable image but it was also the point at which I realised the authors weren't even bothering to proofread.

I think you are doing yourself an injustice if such mistakes ruin novels for you. Even Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby", one of the most canonical works of American literature, has several errors in the first chapter alone.

I am an English lit student, and the original Weis and Hickman novels (the Chronicles and Legends trilogies) are decent enough works of fiction in my opinion. I even wrote an essay on the significane of the racial relations in these works. But I digress. All I really would like to say is that I can wholeheartedly recommend the original two trilogies, despite this one error. Especially since I suspect you might own a few WotC D&D supplements .

Rav

 

[Kanegrundar]

The thing that soured me on Dragonlance was the frequency of earth-shattering events. How many times can a world be pretty much destroyed? It got old really quick.

Kane

 

[Seeten]

I'm with Psion, DiTerlizzi never did it for me either. What Planescape I've seen (remember, I'm a child of 3rd Edition) was usually done by rk post, and yes, there was some Brom work as well. Thing is, to me, Brom means Dark Sun, while rk's strange visions are Planescape.

That is crazy talk. DiTerlizzi *IS* Planescape.