D&D 5E Why FR Is "Hated"

[Mecheon]

For me, I don't hate the Realms. But, that being said, I'll never actually use them either. There's just too much stuff. THousands and thousands of pages of material. To me, the setting completely jumped the shark when Ed Greenwood in one of the Realms articles he used to do on the WotC site, detailed the shape of windows in houses.

Bingo

There's just too much stuff about FR. See, a fantasy kitchen sink can work, FR's problem is that it has mind-numbing details about everything and it hurts the setting

I mean, if I want to just shove a village somewhere random into most settings and its fine. But oh no, not Forgotten Realms. FR will tell you no, that village doesn't exist, but here's these 205 other random villages, how many buildings are in each one, the name of every inn, their best and worst selling drinks, the exact vintage of random wine they've got out in the back that the barkeep's saving for his kid's engagement party, and the exact details of their yearly crop harvest down to the individual stands of hay

I'm not sure how its possible to suck "Fantasy" out of "Fantasy Kitchen Sink" but Forgotten Realms manages it.

 

[cbwjm]

Do people really feel that they can't just add and alter forgotten realms? If you want a random village somewhere then you add it.

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[Hussar]

Do people really feel that they can't just add and alter forgotten realms? If you want a random village somewhere then you add it.

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That's the thing though. If I'm just going to add my own stuff anyway, why am I using a setting with an Encyclopedia Britannica level of detail?

I'd rather use a general level setting and add my own stuff. Afaic even Eberron is too bloody big. All these different continents with material? No thanks.

Give me a setting that is about the size of... I dunno... France. And I'm perfectly happy. I'm using Primeval Thule right now and I'm barely going to scratch the surface in the campaign despite trying to make exploration a major element of the game.

And Thule is smaller than the Sword Coast. And it's still too big.

 

[Aldarc]

That's the thing though. If I'm just going to add my own stuff anyway, why am I using a setting with an Encyclopedia Britannica level of detail?

I'd rather use a general level setting and add my own stuff. Afaic even Eberron is too bloody big. All these different continents with material? No thanks.

Give me a setting that is about the size of... I dunno... France. And I'm perfectly happy. I'm using Primeval Thule right now and I'm barely going to scratch the surface in the campaign despite trying to make exploration a major element of the game.

And Thule is smaller than the Sword Coast. And it's still too big.

You can pick your "France" in Eberron.

 

[Zardnaar]

Way I look at it is no one is forcing you to use all the FR stuff its there if you want it. Last time I ran a sandbox FR game (vs an AP) I just used the 1990 FR Adventures book.

I have used Elminster once (the 1994 boxed set adventre in the 90's) and I name dropped Drizzt the other day in PotA (Some goody two shoe elf named Drizzt something or other hah!).

 

[Hussar]

Way I look at it is no one is forcing you to use all the FR stuff its there if you want it. Last time I ran a sandbox FR game (vs an AP) I just used the 1990 FR Adventures book.

I have used Elminster once (the 1994 boxed set adventre in the 90's) and I name dropped Drizzt the other day in PotA (Some goody two shoe elf named Drizzt something or other hah!).

And that's absolutely true. But, if I'm going to use a published setting and then eject 99% of the material for that setting, what makes FR a better choice than any other setting? It is a kitchen sink setting and isn't all that unique.

So if I'm paring down to a book or two of setting material, what puts FR ahead? Why would I choose it? Why would I not instead choose a setting that fits with the tropes and themes of my campaign?

Isn't the primary draw of FR the mountain of material you have to pull from?

 

[Zardnaar]

And that's absolutely true. But, if I'm going to use a published setting and then eject 99% of the material for that setting, what makes FR a better choice than any other setting? It is a kitchen sink setting and isn't all that unique.

So if I'm paring down to a book or two of setting material, what puts FR ahead? Why would I choose it? Why would I not instead choose a setting that fits with the tropes and themes of my campaign?

Isn't the primary draw of FR the mountain of material you have to pull from?

No I would argue its the quality of the material like the 3.0 FRCS and its easy to approach.

Try comparing it with words in Greyhawk for example and things like "Iggwilv" and Dragonlance was better as a novel line than a campaign setting. The Greybox is also well regarded. They spammed material for FR because they couldand it was popular, its not required at all IMHO. There have been plenty of bad decisions in FRs product cycle though (crap novels, ToT, Spellpague etc).Even Drizzt was interesting early on or even up to 1999 or so.

 

[JeffB]

Hmm..

I find FR naming conventions pretty generic blah, compared to settings like GH (though GH has a few that are tough to take, they are/were made as a nod to Gary's family, friends and players and not meant to be so "real" and "serious" as FR is.)

That said, sounds like a 8 year old kid came up with alot of the names in FR...Eveningstar, Waterdeep,Unermountain, Shadowdale, Storm Silverhand, Florin Falconhand, Darkhold, Neverwinter, Moonbeam Fancypants,etc..

 

[Mecheon]

That said, sounds like a 8 year old kid came up with alot of the names in FR...Eveningstar, Waterdeep,Unermountain, Shadowdale, Storm Silverhand, Florin Falconhand, Darkhold, Neverwinter, Moonbeam Fancypants,etc..

My favourite random Warcraft thing is there's a city there called Silvermoon

Which rolls off the tongue so much better than Silverymoon that FR has

 

[Maxperson]

Same here, I hate the Forgotten Realms (if it needs to be tracked somewhere).

It is. It's tracked by WotC who determined that it was simply a numbers thing. So many hate it because so many MORE love it. Love it or hate it, it's the main campaign and isn't likely to change.