White Raven Onslaught Revision

[Hussar]

Such as?

Apart from spells named after wizards, and some artifacts, I can't think of much...
/snip.

Hrm, how about the entire cosmology? Every proper noun? Demogorgon? Fraz-Urb-Lu (sp)? Magic items. Shoes of Fflagngngng (sp). Racial relations in the PHB. EVERY module produced by TSR for 1e, other than Dragonlance was specifically set in Greyhawk.

That's off the top of my head.

So, you have pretty much every supplement for several years specifically placed in one campaign setting, the cosmology of the game and pretty much all the monsters associated with that cosmology linked directly to Greyhawk. Even books like Oriental Adventures were linked to Greyhawk.

But, there were no ties to GH in 1e? Are you kidding?

Hussar, can I ask for some clarification? What it is specifically do you have against worldbuilding. Given that we may very well have different definitions of the word, can you explain what it is you don't like doing, what about being a DM and crafting campaigns and adventures that you do like, and why you think "worldbuilding" is even necessary if you don't like it?

My issue with world building is that it becomes a process for its own sake. If you look at all those world building columns and whatnot, the basic idea of world building is that you either from top down or bottom up, design a world independent of the campaign you are going to run in that world. So, you work out the races, and the history, and the geography and the NPC's and this and that, and THEN you finally get to start making adventures.

If you were to follow those DungeonCraft articles in Dragon (and Dungeon) from beginning to end, you're looking at tens, if not hundreds, of hours of work before you even begin to start developing a campaign.

If I have a core setting, I can skip that part and get right to developing a campaign.

Now, I do agree 100% that the core setting should not be rock solid tied to the mechanics to the point where it becomes more or less unthinkable to play that game in any other setting. Star Wars, in its various iterations, is an example of a game where the mechanics are locked to the setting. I wouldn't use the Star Wars system to do a Farscape style campaign, or a Battlestar Galactica, or a Dune or a Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. There are much better systems for that. Star Wars does Star Wars. That's fine.

D&D should be able to do a broader range of settings. So, you cannot make the mechanics TOO strongly tied to the core setting. OTOH, you need enough material so that the core setting actually hangs together. 3e failed in this. The core setting material in the 3e books wasn't enough to make a campaign setting out of. 2e didn't even give you that much. It flat out tried not to have a campaign setting at all. It also failed because it carried too much baggage over from 1e, which was very closely tied to a specific campaign setting.

1e, and better yet, B/E/C/M/I D&D did it right. They gave you a pretty solid core setting with all sorts of tidbits and whatnot that you could play right out of the box.

That's what I want in 4e. I want to be able to read the books, smack together a campaign outline and a first adventure and start play. I don't want to spend hours and hours detailing a fantasy setting. I have zero interest in doing so. If someone else wants to, more power to them. But, why should I be forced to do the work so that they don't have to, when they are going to do the work anyway?

 

[Lizard]

Hrm, how about the entire cosmology? Every proper noun? Demogorgon? Fraz-Urb-Lu (sp)? Magic items. Shoes of Fflagngngng (sp). Racial relations in the PHB. EVERY module produced by TSR for 1e, other than Dragonlance was specifically set in Greyhawk.

Modules -- by definition setting material -- don't count.

How were the racial relations specfic to Greyhawk?

How is the name of a demon (drawn from medieval demonology, BTW) specific to Greyhawk?

What did these things tell you about the setting? Did they give history? Geography? Culture? Cities? Anything?

No.

If your idea of 'setting' is 'the name of a demon', we have vastly different notions of setting.

As for the cosmology...that was the cosmology for D&D, one which all published settings used for quite a while. The "prime material plane" contained infinite worlds. I used the "Great wheel" but never used Greyhawk. How is that possible, if it was "part of greyhawk"?

Sorry, you're really grasping at straws here.

OA contained a setting, because it was a setting book. It was "linked to Greyhawk" in only the vaguest way; it was later transported to the Forgotten Realms and no one noticed. Even so, one could trivially ignore the Kara-Tur material in OA; it was cordoned off from the rules proper. (Compare and contrast the 3e OA, which explicity used the LO5R setting and which could not easily be severed from it, replacing "Generic oriental" of 1e with a very specific and focused setting.)

(BTW..."tens or hundreds of hours" to build a world? Check out my worldbuilding blog, linked in my .sig...I think I put about 10 hours of work in before I was ready for my first adventure. Worldbuilding is not all that difficult, and it's the most rewarding part of DMing. (I've kept running the campaign, but haven't had time to update the blog in a while since other writing projects have kept me busy...)

 

[Hussar]

Modules -- by definition setting material -- don't count.

Huh? There is no such thing as generic modules? News to me. Several years of Dungeon magazine would disagree with you. Yet, despite the existence of generic modules - Judges Guild for example - every TSR 1e module was rock solid locked into Greyhawk.

How were the racial relations specfic to Greyhawk?

Why do elves and dwarves not get along in a generic setting?

How is the name of a demon (drawn from medieval demonology, BTW) specific to Greyhawk?

Find me a reference to Demogorgon or Fraz-Urb-Luu in medieval demonology please. Considering both Demonomicon articles in Dragon specifically point out that these demons were created whole cloth for the D&D game and Fraz was specifically created by EGG to screw over one of his players.

What did these things tell you about the setting? Did they give history? Geography? Culture? Cities? Anything?

No.

If your idea of 'setting' is 'the name of a demon', we have vastly different notions of setting.

Kind of like White Raven Onslaught isn't it?

As for the cosmology...that was the cosmology for D&D, one which all published settings used for quite a while. The "prime material plane" contained infinite worlds. I used the "Great wheel" but never used Greyhawk. How is that possible, if it was "part of greyhawk"?

Umm, no, it wasn't. That's why every other setting DOESN'T use the Great Wheel or radically alters it. If the Great Wheel was the cosmology of D&D, it should feature in every D&D setting shouldn't it?

Sorry, you're really grasping at straws here.

OA contained a setting, because it was a setting book. It was "linked to Greyhawk" in only the vaguest way; it was later transported to the Forgotten Realms and no one noticed. Even so, one could trivially ignore the Kara-Tur material in OA; it was cordoned off from the rules proper. (Compare and contrast the 3e OA, which explicity used the LO5R setting and which could not easily be severed from it, replacing "Generic oriental" of 1e with a very specific and focused setting.)

(BTW..."tens or hundreds of hours" to build a world? Check out my worldbuilding blog, linked in my .sig...I think I put about 10 hours of work in before I was ready for my first adventure. Worldbuilding is not all that difficult, and it's the most rewarding part of DMing. (I've kept running the campaign, but haven't had time to update the blog in a while since other writing projects have kept me busy...)

See, this is the problem. It's the most rewarding part of Dming FOR YOU. And that's groovy. I'm happy for you. But, why is it so hard to believe that some people think world building is a boring chore? But, even taking you at your word, you still had to do TEN HOURS of work before you even started to write your first adventure. And, I think you'll agree that your campagin setting was a bare skeleton in 10 hours. It wasn't even a skeleton. It was a femur and a couple of phalanges.

Give me a game where I don't have to do that. You're still going to spend that time doing it, regardless. You had no problems doing it in 1e when the setting material was right in the core rules, so I doubt you'll have trouble now. But, for the rest of us, let us just be able to play.

I found a pertinent quote from Ray Winneger, from the first Dungeon Craft article in Dragon, way back in 2e days:

1. Should I DM?
Running your own AD&D campaign can be incredibly rewarding. In essence, you get to create an entire world, write its history, populate it as you see fit, and craft your own legends. What's more, if your campaign is effective, you might experience the unique satisfaction of creating something that eventually attains a depth and a life of its own. Some AD&D campaigns have run for twenty years or more and have generated enough tales to fill several volumes. On the other hand, you should recognize that DMing isn't a responsibility to be assumed lightly. Before you begin, you should take some time to make sure that you're ready to start a game.

Look at the order he places that in. Create a world, write its history, populate it as you see fit and then, and only then, do you start creating adventures.

This has been the mindset that has been driven into the game for years and I hate it. There's no need. Gimme a basic campaign setting, right in the core books and let me get on with my game.

Why is that such a difficult thing to ask for?

 

[Lizard]

This has been the mindset that has been driven into the game for years and I hate it. There's no need. Gimme a basic campaign setting, right in the core books and let me get on with my game.

Why is that such a difficult thing to ask for?

Since there was as much -- or more -- "Greyhawk" in 2e than in 1e, if that's your example of the "change"...well...I don't know. We are so talking past each other that communication is pointless.

Fact: I started playing D&D in 1978.
Fact: I never used Greyhawk, was barely aware of it other than the name of an OD&D supplement.
Fact: No one I knew back then used Greyhawk.
Fact: No one perceived the material in the 1e DMG/PHB/MM to be part of a "world" or "setting"; it was "the rules for D&D". Saying "EGG made it up" does not make it "setting material" -- he made almost ALL of it up, from Beholders to Xorns, and that doesn't mean their inclusion meant "you were playing in Greyhawk".
(Elves and Dwarves hating each other was Tolkein, not Greyhawk, IAE)

As for Demogorgon:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demogorgon. Fraz might have been made up by EGG, but again -- how does that make it Greyhawk?

Why is White Raven Onslaught different? Because it isn't the name of a monster or a demon; it's the name of a technique people learn, and the name (being non-descriptive), is intended to represent some organization, entity, or factor in the world.

A demon called "The White Raven" is generic. It's no different from a fighter called Joe.

"White Raven School Of War" is not. It's something which the book forces into your world, and you either have to work to make it fit or work to excise it; it cannot be simply ignored, because it is integrated into the rules in the way the name of a demon lord is not. A demon lord may never come into play if you don't want him to (and changing his name is easy enough), but if your players learn powers from a specific fighting school, that school must *exist*, and the symbolism of the 'white raven' must be explained, and the history of it and how it interacts with the rest of the setting must be specified, and so on.

The distinction is pretty clear to me. I am free, as a DM, to ignore anything in the Monster Manual I don't like; I am much less free (if I respect my players) to deny them access to rules because the rules are burdened with setting I don't need or want.

Finally, if the 1e "Greyhawk information" is a "setting" for you, then, well, you don't need ten hours. You don't need one hour. Your "setting" is the City Of Townsville, located by the Big River and two miles from the Dungeon Of Certain Doom. "Elves hate dwarves", "At some point, there was some dude name 'Vecna'", and "Here's how the planes you won't see for 10 or more levels are laid out" isn't something you need ten hours to come up with, by a long shot, so if that's all you need from a setting before you get to work on writing an adventure, I don't see your issue.

(On the module issue...I rarely, if ever, used them, but I always recall the setting information as being there primarily as boilerplate text; it was trivial to dump the early modules into any game world, since they were basically plotless slaughterfests.)

 

[small pumpkin man]

Why is White Raven Onslaught different? Because it isn't the name of a monster or a demon; it's the name of a technique people learn, and the name (being non-descriptive), is intended to represent some organization, entity, or factor in the world.

A demon called "The White Raven" is generic. It's no different from a fighter called Joe.

"White Raven School Of War" is not. It's something which the book forces into your world, and you either have to work to make it fit or work to excise it; it cannot be simply ignored, because it is integrated into the rules in the way the name of a demon lord is not. A demon lord may never come into play if you don't want him to (and changing his name is easy enough), but if your players learn powers from a specific fighting school, that school must *exist*, and the symbolism of the 'white raven' must be explained, and the history of it and how it interacts with the rest of the setting must be specified, and so on.

The distinction is pretty clear to me. I am free, as a DM, to ignore anything in the Monster Manual I don't like; I am much less free (if I respect my players) to deny them access to rules because the rules are burdened with setting I don't need or want.

No, It's the name of a power in a rulebook, the PC may not know it by that name, the PC may not even consider it a particular technique, in can be the name of an organisation, but the decision to make it part of the world or not is one you or your players make, not something forced onto you.

 

[Mistwell]

Such as?

Apart from spells named after wizards, and some artifacts, I can't think of much...

Most of the monster manual.

Much of Deities and Demigods.

Uhm...'githyanki' is a name. I was unaware that all names had to be descriptive. By this logic, 'orc', 'gnoll', and 'sahuagin' are flavor text, because the names are non-descriptive.

Yes, they are all flavor text. Just like White Raven. What about White Raven is anything other than a name? It's a designation of a group of things. The name of a race, a monster, a type of power, it's all just a name.

I didn't say names had to be descriptive, YOU did when you claimed power names should be descriptive. I'm the one who says they do not have to be descriptive, remember? I prefer "Gnoll" to "Dog-Faced Warrior". They could have gone with "Dog-Faced Warrior", and it might have more utility (like "Smart Hero"), but it would have been boring and bland. How is "Gnoll" instead of "Dog-Faced Warrior" different than preferring "White Raven Tactics" to "Grant Extra Action" (which is what White Raven Tactics did in Bo9S)?

And, yeah, it is a pretty lame name, but I don't recall ever saying nothing had lame names prior to 4e.

I'm saying you get used to it, just like we all got used to (and perhaps even like) Githyanki, and we will get used to White Raven (and perhaps even like it).

If the name of a thing is what a character in the setting calls it, it should make sense within the setting -- if something is called 'White Raven Onslaught', there should be meaning behind the 'white raven' part, and that in turn creates/defines the flavor of the setting. If the name of a thing is intended primarily as a rules label, it should be as neutral and descriptive as possible.

So are you saying you WOULD prefer all monsters and races to have descriptive names rather than flavorful ones?

You sound like you are advocating some sort of generic universal role playing system that is turned into a setting by the GM or additional books...hmmm, where have I heard of such a thing before?

 

[Hussar]

Ok, yes, Lizard this is why we are talking past eachother. What you see as "generic D&D" I see as Greyhawk. I suggest you read up on Fraz-Urb-Luu before you dismiss it as not GH.

I think, and I've been accused of misrepresenting people before, so I want to be absolutely sure, that you are claiming that 1e was a generic system completely divorced from setting.

I also think that the rest of the world thinks that Greyhawk was the default setting for 1e and that you are going simply by what memories you have of twenty years ago. The fact that you would claim that 2e has more Greyhawk ties than 1e pretty much proves that since, after the departure of Gygax from TSR, TSR made every effort possible to remove Greyhawk from the game.

On Demogorgon - sure, the reference is there in earlier works. But, a two headed tentacled lord over all of the Abyss? That's Greyhawk mythology.

 

[Hussar]

Finally, if the 1e "Greyhawk information" is a "setting" for you, then, well, you don't need ten hours. You don't need one hour. Your "setting" is the City Of Townsville, located by the Big River and two miles from the Dungeon Of Certain Doom. "Elves hate dwarves", "At some point, there was some dude name 'Vecna'", and "Here's how the planes you won't see for 10 or more levels are laid out" isn't something you need ten hours to come up with, by a long shot, so if that's all you need from a setting before you get to work on writing an adventure, I don't see your issue.

Again, I would like to thank Lizard for giving me such excellent examples of what I'm talking about. The world builders out there raise this point as if it were self evident - if you don't world build, then all your campaigns are mindless hack fests with no plot or characterization. As if, through some magical process, detailing trivia regarding events that have no direct link to the campaign or the players somehow imparts depth and great role play.

I've never quite understood how detailing the shape of windows in Forgotten Realms makes me a better role player or makes my game better.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Again, I would like to thank Lizard for giving me such excellent examples of what I'm talking about. The world builders out there raise this point as if it were self evident - if you don't world build, then all your campaigns are mindless hack fests with no plot or characterization. As if, through some magical process, detailing trivia regarding events that have no direct link to the campaign or the players somehow imparts depth and great role play.

I've never quite understood how detailing the shape of windows in Forgotten Realms makes me a better role player or makes my game better.

Wow... Your posts are really starting to have a negative tone that is making even me feel uncomforatable and insulted, even though I don't agree with Lizard at all in his bigger points... Maybe it would help if you stopped trying to sweep so many negative and flawed generalizations under the terms "worldbuilding" and "worldbuilders". I don't think lizard was even being rude or dismissive at all there...

Anyways, regarding the post you made in response to my question...

I admit that I still don't particularly understand your viewpoint, especially when you condemn things like "bottom-up design" and the Dungeoncraft articles as bad exercises that lead to hundreds of hours before you can even start a campaign. The very point of bottom-up design is to avoid that situation, and just about every Dungeoncraft article I have ever read uses "don't create more than you need at the moment" as a core guiding principle.

The bottom-up method of worldbuilding is based on the idea that you create just enough setting to run the next session's game. You make a town with a few people, an adventure hook, and an adventure, call it a day, and run the D&D session. After that session, you expand the setting a little, add a few more story hooks, add in another adventure, and then run the next session. If the PCs move on from the starting town, you make up another one, fill it with some details, and add more story hooks and adventures. It is worldbuilding that can be done completely independent of an existing setting (and in fact, even existing settings require that you do this kind of building), but it is directly linked to the process of running a campaign. It has none of the flaws that you complain about in your post.

Unless you can claim that you don't create any original towns, adventure sites, or characters of any kind while DMing, then you worldbuild as part of DMing. If you find creating anything of that sort to be fun, then you have fun worldbuilding. At least, that is the definition I use for the term, and is the definition most other people seem to use.

I love worldbuilding. I will admit that, along with my brother, I created a fairly complex and detailed setting using the top-down approach, with a lot of detailed history, many unique characters, and many nations, cultures, and religions. At the same time, I am looking forward to 4E as a great chance to just make up a whole setting as I go along, with only a little bit of preparation (and more of the preparation is focused on laying down plot hooks than detailing setting elements). If I can make up a setting entirely from on-the-fly decisions made in the middle of game sessions, and have a lot of fun doing so, I don't think I agree that worldbuilding is this terrible hundred-hour chore inflicted upon DMs by the game. It is only a chore if you enjoy the task and volunteer for it, since there are many alternatives, even without a default setting or buying a setting book.

 

[Lizard]

Again, I would like to thank Lizard for giving me such excellent examples of what I'm talking about. The world builders out there raise this point as if it were self evident - if you don't world build, then all your campaigns are mindless hack fests with no plot or characterization. As if, through some magical process, detailing trivia regarding events that have no direct link to the campaign or the players somehow imparts depth and great role play.

I've never quite understood how detailing the shape of windows in Forgotten Realms makes me a better role player or makes my game better.

Uhm...no.

My point was that if the you think the 1e books contained a "setting", and that was "enough to get started", you really DON'T need much of a setting. A handful of names<>setting. Otherwise, I could take a baby name book, put a dragon on the cover, and all it a hot new campaign world.