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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nisarg" data-source="post: 2112587" data-attributes="member: 19893">You know what was great about Watchmen, the comic series? Well, every damn thing about it was great, but what I liked most?It was the first comic series to show what the actual EFFECTS of a super-powered being would be on society. In every other comic, Superman and the Hulk and the gang are running around there causing all sorts of mayhem and neither their effects nor the mere fact of their existence have affected the world at all. The world of Superman or Spiderman is our world, where ABSOLUTELY NOTHING IS DIFFERENT other than the addition of superheros (and a couple of made-up cities).In Watchmen, Alan Moore rightly points out that if even ONE truly superpower being existed, it would throw all of western civilization into an existential crisis the likes of which would make the post-atomic age pale by comparison.Now, what does any of this have to do with Eberron?Simple: you accuse me of having sour grapes? Hell yes, I have sour grapes, but not the way you might think. I didn't submit a setting in the contest or something like that.When I heard about what Eberron would be about, I was filled with hope that it was going to be a setting that had the kind of ubiquitous magic that you see in many fantasy settings, but that it (unlike these other fantasy settings) would actually explore the CONSEQUENCES of that ubiquitous magic.   This is what I mean by socio-political rationality: that a medieval society that suddenly invents a railroad that runs of lightning bolts and has a magic-powered version of New York City (or coruscant) as its capital will not just keep being medieval in EVERY OTHER RESPECT. It will have a massive existencial crisis on par with the crisis that the presence of Dr. Manhattan causes western civilization to have in Watchmen.But instead of watchmen we get comic-standard. So setting wise, Eberron is a flop.And I look at that situation, and ask myself why is that so? And upon examination, you find that everything in the setting is there not for its own sake but to maximize the potential for the crunch.The lightning rail is not there so that we can question what the consequences of the lightning rail would be on society. The lightning rail is there so we can say "TEH LIGHTNING RAIL IS TEH ROXXORS! MY WAREFORGED-JUGGERNAUT RIDES TEH LIGHTNING RAIL! W00T!"And potentially, for the creation of the ultra-powerful new Lightningrail Powermaster prestige class, more powerful than any prestige class before it, coming soon in an upcoming Eberron sourcebook. So yes, I have massive sour grapes. Eberron disappointed me in ways few products have of late.  The other one which disappointed me was Blackmoor, for a somewhat related reason.  Blackmoor had all the potential to be what Eberron didn't measure up to, and examine a fantasy world facing industrialization. Unfortunately, whereas Eberron whitewashed, Blackmoor chickened out, and the technology was shafted for some power crystals.All of which is why I'm very curious about Iron Kingdoms.  I wonder if it will actually do with the industrial what Eberron and Blackmoor failed miserably at; namely look at the industrialization for its fluff potential as a source of social crisis?Nisarg</blockquote>

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