Will there ever be a book for the default setting?

[SpiderMonkey]

I really like the Nentir Vale snippet in the 4e DMG. I'm hoping they expand it a little. I think I can fit it into FR, but I'd rather have it as part of something larger that incorporates the default pantheon and all that.

I used to be an incessant homebrewer, but that was before grad school. Now I want to be spoonfed, but I want it to taste good, too.

Any word?

 

[Shroomy]

I don't think we'll necessarily ever see a Campaign Guide/Player's Guide combo like WotC is using for the Realms and Eberron. However, they will detail the implied setting in Dragon, Dungeon, sourcebooks, and published adventures. They've already started.

 

[Rechan]

I am 99% sure that various WotC guys have answered this question in interviews, and they have all said that it's not planned.

Even if it was planned, I think the "Default Setting Book" is so low on their priority list right now. Especially in the scheme of "settings we're putting out".

 

[ExploderWizard]

I am 99% sure that various WotC guys have answered this question in interviews, and they have all said that it's not planned.

Even if it was planned, I think the "Default Setting Book" is so low on their priority list right now. Especially in the scheme of "settings we're putting out".

Its kind of sad that they tease players with a a snippet of a nice little beginning of a setting that isn't going to be supported. Perhaps if there is enough demand from fans they will do something. It doesn't have to be a huge 2 book project with new feats, powers, races,ect. Perhaps a mega-module sized book with mostly fluff and adventure hooks?

It took TSR quite a while to put out setting books for the "Known World" .

 

[Rechan]

Its kind of sad that they tease players with a a snippet of a nice little beginning of a setting that isn't going to be supported.

Because it's not a "setting" in the general sense.

It's just "Here's a place with a name, and here's what's happening there. Where is the place in relation to everything else? Well, you put it where you want it. Do with it what fits your world."

It is, for lack of a better term, a coloring book. You get some lines drawn on a page, but it's up to you how you make them come alive in the color of your world-making.

The Setting as it is will be continued, because it's just being used in every adventure and book that comes out. So it is being supported, just not as a cohesive product, but a collage of ideas.

I don't understand why people are clamoring so hard for a "Drag and drop" setting.

 

[darjr]

Count me in as one who would buy such a thing.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Because it's not a "setting" in the general sense.

It's just "Here's a place with a name, and here's what's happening there. Where is the place in relation to everything else? Well, you put it where you want it. Do with it what fits your world."

It is, for lack of a better term, a coloring book. You get some lines drawn on a page, but it's up to you how you make them come alive in the color of your world-making.

The Setting as it is will be continued, because it's just being used in every adventure and book that comes out. So it is being supported, just not as a cohesive product, but a collage of ideas.

I don't understand why people are clamoring so hard for a "Drag and drop" setting.

Thats true I suppose but Mystara started out as just map with some names in a rulebook too. There are of course marketing concerns with a product that doesn't have a brand name attached to it.

 

[vagabundo]

Thats true I suppose but Mystara started out as just map with some names in a rulebook too. There are of course marketing concerns with a product that doesn't have a brand name attached to it.

Call it something like "Dungeons and Dragons: Worlds" and keep the loose feel of the setting; have a number of areas spelt out in some detail, some evil/good organisations, outline some of the default churches and make it modular and easy to insert into any homebrew standard fantasy world.

 

[Engilbrand]

I'm using the idea for my game. The nice thing about it not having a book is that it holds anything that I want it to. The current adventure is based around a reimagining of Mordain the Fleshweaver. Spellplagued areas exist where the players are. Every new thing can just be, as another poster put it, dragged and dropped into the setting. With complete settings, you have to find a place for everything new and ask "Why wasn't this here before?" For this, though, you just need it to pop up. "Where did that thing come from?" "Somewhere else." If you name it, you can control it. And who really wants to control a beast like this?

 

[radferth]

I thought they were specifically having the default setting be no larger than it was needed for the current adventure, so you could plop it in an existing world, or build around it. That is how they suggest doing it in the DMG, and immediately ignoring there own advice to expand it into a new game world sort of send the message "that whole build the world out from your player's prospective idea is for chumps." Plus, I'm sure they think they can sell more copies of existing settings with less work writing the books.