Why *Dont* you like Forgotten Realms?

[JohnRTroy]

Maybe I haven't sufficiently clarified what my objection here is. It's not that there are sexual aspects to the setting (for sufficiently mature audiences), but that little things like this come across as Ed's way of using authorial authority to insert himself in conjured sexual boasts via uber-GMPC, and I find it extremely cheesy in a "nobody over 15 should be doing this" way. Not only does Ed find it convenient and amusing to introduce us to Elminster from poolside with his nubile drow babe, but he's friends with all the hawt sorceresses of the realm. Oh yeah, and he had a fling with the goddess of magic.

See, I still have a concern about that. You're making the following assumptions.

• Elminster is a direct wish-fullfilment persona for Ed Greenwood.
• The character of Elmister gives you psychological insight into the mind of Mr Greenwood.
• A lot of commentary seems to come from the over-use of Elminster. Do people look at Volo the same way? I see a lot of people making comments based on minor appearances of the character but not based on some of the more interesting novels.
• It seems people are judging this from the stereotypical "nerd" view that all DMs and Players are just engaing in power-fantasies and don't get laid in real life. I don't think we'd be judging Ed Greenwood as much if he wasn't writing for games, as I've seen more pruient content in a Piers Anthony novel than I ever saw in any of Ed's fiction.

 

[AllisterH]

Pantheon:

Very interesting discussion about the pantheon....and I should admit outright that I've not a fan of EITHER GH or FR.

However, I do take issue with the idea that the gods of magic and adventuring aren't front and center.

Magic in the typical fantasy work is akin to the weather and pretty much all nature deities were damn important in their respective mythologies in the real world.

Gods of agic being front and center? Don't have a problem with that....

 

[Set]

My rabid enthusiasm for the Realms pretty much dragged my friends (who were into Greyhawk or Dragonlance, mostly) kicking and screaming into this setting for years.

And then the Time of Troubles came around and, for me, pretty much kicked my enthusiasm right in the jiblets. (One player was heavily invested into his Cleric of Lleira, and I could house-rule that his goddess hadn't been dragged into a van by the god of lies and murder with an offer of yummy candy and then ganked, but my attempts at house-ruling an updated 2nd edition version with spheres and whatnot didn't really do anything other than cause everyone else to want house-ruled customized stuff, and house-rule-creep set in...)

By then, consensus had settled on Greyhawk as being strongly preferred over Dragonlance, and so we went back to Greyhawk, with the Greyhawk fans among my gaming group graciously conceding that my Realms games had been fun, but the official setting had been dragged off-course by the novels and meta-events.

Reading about the Spellplague / Abeir thing, I just get a wistful smile. Ah, sweet Realms, still doing your best to make it *your* world, and not *our* world. I like a lot of the mechanical and fiddly thought that went into 4th edition (even if I prefer what it replaced), but wow, the FR update was right up there with the 'New WoD' and Star Wars Galaxies 'New Game Experience' for 'updates' that made a game smaller and less compelling.

Still, Kara-Tur and Zakhara remains two of my favorite (sub)settings for D&D of all time (with the Scarred Lands and Freeport coming up behind), so there are at least *parts* of the Realms I still would play in, had the owners of those settings ever bothered to update them to 3rd edition.

 

[Psion]

See, I still have a concern about that. You're making the following assumptions.
(...)

• The character of Elmister gives you psychological insight into the mind of Mr Greenwood.

No, I have more true to life anecdotes to base that on. This really has little to do with my acceptance of the Realms, however.

• A lot of commentary seems to come from the over-use of Elminster. Do people look at Volo the same way? I see a lot of people making comments based on minor appearances of the character but not based on some of the more interesting novels.

Is this still a response to me? Volo really doesn't bug me, but maybe I don't recall the cheesy author insertion ego-wank in Volo writings the way I do Elminster.

• It seems people are judging this from the stereotypical "nerd" view that all DMs and Players are just engaing in power-fantasies and don't get laid in real life. I don't think we'd be judging Ed Greenwood as much if he wasn't writing for games, as I've seen more pruient content in a Piers Anthony novel than I ever saw in any of Ed's fiction.

I just got done saying it wasn't the content itself that bugged me, it was the ego-stroking. When a character in a fantasy novel "gets some", it's okay, because the novel is about the character.

A roleplaying game in the Realms shouldn't be about Elminster. It should be about the PCs. So I find pap like the aforementioned "Elminster is a stag" stories obnoxious.

 

[Diamond Cross]

Since a real drow maiden is probably concealing a dagger of venom or a horde of water spiders or something under the surface, scary might be a better term.

In Ed's fantasy, drow maidens aren't scary, but horny. It's the fact that you are in Ed's fantasy that's creepy.

Psst, stop winking at me.

when a guy winks at another guy that's creeeeeeeeeepy.

 

[Primal]

Maybe I haven't sufficiently clarified what my objection here is. It's not that there are sexual aspects to the setting (for sufficiently mature audiences), but that little things like this come across as Ed's way of using authorial authority to insert himself in conjured sexual boasts via uber-GMPC, and I find it extremely cheesy in a "nobody over 15 should be doing this" way. Not only does Ed find it convenient and amusing to introduce us to Elminster from poolside with his nubile drow babe, but he's friends with all the hawt sorceresses of the realm. Oh yeah, and he had a fling with the goddess of magic.

It's almost as if "Joey Fusco Jr." from While You Were Sleeping took up running and writing RPGs and randomly inserted in his cliche accent "You meet this hot sorceress. By the way, yeah, I'm doin' her!"

As John already said, it'd better not to presume to know a man's mind based on fantasy fiction he wrote; I know some authors whose books include a lot of sexual perversions and pretty icky characters, and still they're normal and nice people. I also thought it was pretty much common knowledge that if Ed had had his way, Elminster would not have been as prominent in Realmslore or FR fiction. Ed has himself repeatedly said that Elminster is not his fantasy Alter Ego or anything.

Sheesh. We don't make prejudiced and insulting presumptions about each other's personal lives based on what we post -- let's not do so to authors or designers we don't personally know, either.

 

[JohnRTroy]

A roleplaying game in the Realms shouldn't be about Elminster. It should be about the PCs. So I find pap like the aforementioned "Elminster is a stag" stories obnoxious.

Part of the problem is the double-standard RPGs have over fiction. The way TSR treated the realms, it was both a game and novel experience. Also, Greenwood has stated he used it as a world to write stories in before adding an RPG campaign to it.

I sometimes think people judge the RPG setting harsher than fiction. If we replaced Elminster with either Gandalf or Merlin, nobody bats an eye, but if a standard trope of a really powerful and charismatic wizard is used in a RPG, it's like "ZOMG, he's more powerful than our characters, the writer must be living out his fantasies and forcing his ego upon us.

Now, it's okay to debate that the RPG campaign shouldn't be overshadowed by fiction and metaplot, and I understand the excesses of the past. But I really draw the line at stating that the realms are flaws because Mr. Greenwood has character flaws or anything like that, or the same thing of R.A. Salvatore and Drizz't.

One thing that really bugs me about this is that perception sort of becomes reality. All the people who said stuff about "Scrappy Doo ruined Scooby Doo" did never really study the history of the character or the provable fact (due to ratings) that the character contributed to the popularity of the show and helped keep the show on the air--yet because of a vocal minority, they did things like make him the villain in the live action movie.

Anyway, I don't mind criticism, just as long as it stops short of making inferences to the motivations or psychology of the people doing the writing.

 

[AllisterH]

One thing that really bugs me about this is that perception sort of becomes reality. All the people who said stuff about "Scrappy Doo ruined Scooby Doo" did never really study the history of the character or the provable fact (due to ratings) that the character contributed to the popularity of the show and helped keep the show on the air--yet because of a vocal minority, they did things like make him the villain in the live action movie.

.

I think you might like this page.

Mark Evanier's Scrappy days

A Defense of Scrappy

 

[Afrodyte]

I'll be honest and say that my reasons for disliking Forgotten Realms are not at all logical or rational. They don't make sense. If Chewbacca lives on Endor, I don't like Forgotten Realms.

Personally, I'm just bored with it. It's become too familiar, too quantified, and this doesn't evoke wonder or mystery. There's so much information out there that there are too many ways to do the Realms "wrong," but few to do them "right" in a way I enjoy.

Generally, I prefer campaign setting concepts over fully detailed settings. This is why I love 4e's Points of Light concept so much. There are a variety of ways to do it "right" that don't require me to memorize minutiae that I probably won't be interested in, let alone use.

 

[Psion]

Part of the problem is the double-standard RPGs have over fiction. The way TSR treated the realms, it was both a game and novel experience. Also, Greenwood has stated he used it as a world to write stories in before adding an RPG campaign to it.

That may well be the source of the problem as I perceive it. It wouldn't be the only RPG line, in my estimation, to be made lesser by pairing it with a novel property. I still weep over major conflicts of the Dark Sun being resolved in one novel series.

I sometimes think people judge the RPG setting harsher than fiction. If we replaced Elminster with either Gandalf or Merlin, nobody bats an eye, but if a standard trope of a really powerful and charismatic wizard is used in a RPG, it's like "ZOMG, he's more powerful than our characters, the writer must be living out his fantasies and forcing his ego upon us.

Hmmm. Interesting claim to examine in retrospect. I think if you go back and look at my review of "Legends of Excalibur", you'll find one of my specific criticisms was that the author set the level of central characters from the legends (like Merlin) way into the epic levels, whereas I felt that players play a game based on fiction or legend want to emulate characters like those in the legend/fiction.

In a similar vein, if you have search capability (or a long memory), you might recall some criticism over the Star Wars RPG ad campaign where it points at a guy in the Hoth lineup saying "what's his story?"

I think it's natural for RPG designers and players to equate RPG conventions to literary ones. But I think that one of the major differences is the portrayal of the protagonists in the respective mediums, and this gets missed by a lot of designers, to the detriment of their games.

As a side note, the author-insertion character in LotR was typically identified as Tom Bombadil, not Gandalf.

Now, it's okay to debate that the RPG campaign shouldn't be overshadowed by fiction and metaplot, and I understand the excesses of the past. But I really draw the line at stating that the realms are flaws because Mr. Greenwood has character flaws or anything like that, or the same thing of R.A. Salvatore and Drizz't.

And I, for one, am not saying that. Whether he says something shameless and blush-inducing to young ladies at a convention is one thing, which really doesn't impact the quality of the line.

But the presentation of Elminster in FR RPG products does, for me, impact the quality of the line. As I said, I find it obnoxious and childish.