D&D 5E With the release of each new setting book, the SCAG looks worse and worse...

[CapnZapp]

The notion "if only setting X got better support it had done better" contains a large helping of wishful thinking.

When WotC did market research they found (IIRC) that half the player base played homebrew settings, and half of the rest used Forgotten Realms.

Every other setting is left in the dust. And, that a significant share of those homebrewing are open to (re)using Realms material in their own settings.

So it's not at all surprising that The Realms is the only setting getting significant support. It's either that or setting-neutral material. Publishing a Birthright or Mystara supplement today would limit the market to just a few percentage units of the total market possible.

Magic the Gathering is such a huge market that this might change now that WotC is (finally) tapping their cash-cow for D&D. So is online Youtube play.

Expect Greyhawk and the other classic settings to fade even more into the background, since the commercial basis for significant support simply isn't there, and never was. I wager the young fresh gamers of today are much more enthusiastic about Magic or Critical Role anyway. To them, Athas and Eberron are old crusty settings their parents used to play in, if they are aware they exist at all...

 

[gyor]

The "Ravenloft" setting for 5E consists of a single core domain, and not even its entire territory. And it really doesn't use much of any of the material developed during 2nd or 3rd edition at all. From about 2007 onwards, WoTC decided "Ravenloft" was "the original module, with a bit of other stuff".

So Forgotten Realms fans really got off easy.

That is why I don't concider Ravenloft published for 5e, just dabbled in.

 

[gyor]

I understand. And TSR's feud with Gygax probably didn't inspire them to go out of their way to make more products for Greyhawk.

My point is that Greyhawk never had a chance to compete with the Realms on even footing to see which would have been most popular. @gyor is off base with his claims that the only reason the Realms got more 2e support was because it was more popular.

My point was that at one point Greyhawk had an edge because it was older and at the time it had more stuff and the blessing of Gygax, but FR was more popular when it came out and eclipsed Greyhawk and it rode that popularity until it had way, way more material then Greyhawk. They even tried to boost Greyhawks popularity by making it default in 3e, but FR was way more popular.

You don't make something popular just by publishing alot of it, you make it popular first and that popularity drives sales, and sales drives more books being published.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

When WotC did market research they found (IIRC) that half the player base played homebrew settings, and half of the rest used Forgotten Realms.

I would say that quite for a lot of games - especially shorter ones - the correct descriptor for the setting is "none". The DM doesn't bother to choose or create a setting for a one-off adventure, so it defaults to a kind of Generic Fantasy Land where all the familiar tropes apply. Given that FR is pretty much indistinguishable from Genericfantasyland, they may well tick FR if "no setting" isn't an option.

 

[humble minion]

My point was that at one point Greyhawk had an edge because it was older and at the time it had more stuff and the blessing of Gygax, but FR was more popular when it came out and eclipsed Greyhawk and it rode that popularity until it had way, way more material then Greyhawk. They even tried to boost Greyhawks popularity by making it default in 3e, but FR was way more popular.

You don't make something popular just by publishing alot of it, you make it popular first and that popularity drives sales, and sales drives more books being published.

The impression I got (from a long-ago posting by one of the TSR/WotC people who was there towards the end of 2e, but whose name escapes me) was that TSRs bottom line was basically underwritten by Drizzt and friends for quite a while there, and the actual RP products were not even remotely as profitable as the novels (plus novels get bought by people who don't have or even want a gaming group or who don't buy sourcebooks cos they aren't the DM, and novels are cheaper to produce cos they need less in the way of graphic design, art direction, playtesting, big colour maps etc). And bear in mind, this was a time when there basically was no Greyhawk fiction line.

I suspect the proportion of development effort that went into FR was driven by the desire to capitalise on the popularity of the fiction as much as anything. And I think it was through the fiction that FR overtook GH as the 'default' setting.

 

[gyor]

The impression I got (from a long-ago posting by one of the TSR/WotC people who was there towards the end of 2e, but whose name escapes me) was that TSRs bottom line was basically underwritten by Drizzt and friends for quite a while there, and the actual RP products were not even remotely as profitable as the novels (plus novels get bought by people who don't have or even want a gaming group or who don't buy sourcebooks cos they aren't the DM, and novels are cheaper to produce cos they need less in the way of graphic design, art direction, playtesting, big colour maps etc). And bear in mind, this was a time when there basically was no Greyhawk fiction line.

I suspect the proportion of development effort that went into FR was driven by the desire to capitalise on the popularity of the fiction as much as anything. And I think it was through the fiction that FR overtook GH as the 'default' setting.

Oh the novels absolutely drove FRs popularity, but Dragonlance also has a lot of novels. But the novels are nothing without the setting behind them.

Btw this partly why IMHO cutting the novel line for FR was a giant mistake that needs to be rectified.

 

[teitan]

. To them, Athas and Eberron are old crusty settings their parents used to play in, if they are aware they exist at all...

except Eberron 5e sold extremely well and continues to sell well. As a setting it was both of its time, the Oughties, and ahead of its time in that much like FR did for the Oughties, it continues to reflect today’s sensibilities and tastes. The visuals appeal to steampunkers and pulp fans. It is high adventure and intrigue. Two fisted action and not fantasy Europe. It didn’t require reinvention to be repackaged and sold. It remains unchanged from its 3.5 iteration and presentation. Wayne Reynolds more than anyone defined Eberron’s look and continues to make a hard stamp on it. It’s Final Fantasy, still a top dog video game franchise for RPG players.

 

[CapnZapp]

I would say that quite for a lot of games - especially shorter ones - the correct descriptor for the setting is "none". The DM doesn't bother to choose or create a setting for a one-off adventure, so it defaults to a kind of Generic Fantasy Land where all the familiar tropes apply. Given that FR is pretty much indistinguishable from Genericfantasyland, they may well tick FR if "no setting" isn't an option.

As a random guess, I would think "undefined" setting is included in "home setting", not any name brand setting.

 

[dave2008]

Wrong.

Well, to be honest we have no way of knowing if you or Parmandur is correct on what the "average joe" wants.

 

[teitan]

My point was that at one point Greyhawk had an edge because it was older and at the time it had more stuff and the blessing of Gygax, but FR was more popular when it came out and eclipsed Greyhawk and it rode that popularity until it had way, way more material then Greyhawk. They even tried to boost Greyhawks popularity by making it default in 3e, but FR was way more popular.

You don't make something popular just by publishing alot of it, you make it popular first and that popularity drives sales, and sales drives more books being published.

Greyhawk’s edge in the 80s was that until Dragonlance it was the only official AD&D setting and even then had minimal support. The folio and then the boxed Set with the adventures “tacked in” as an afterthought when they published the boxed set. Sure it could be argued the demihuman deities were GH specific but I think they were meant to be more generic to those races.

with Dragonlance TSR saw that settings could be a big draw because the novels and adventures sold well so they bought FR from Ed based on his articles in Dragon. It sold like gangbusters because the production values were amazing. Putting it in a boxed set like Greyhawk plus the gorgeous maps and overlays to accomodate overland travel? The Moonshaes novels were great. The video games were good and that Ed could write like Jack Kirby could draw? He just cranked that stuff out! That faux parchment paper was very nice as well!

Greyhawk got dumped like a bad prom date. It couldn’t keep up because up to that point it was a DM’s setting. With little development after its release DMs had built their own Greyhawk stories. It had nothing to do with production values and everything to do with “dragonlancing” and “realmsifying” Greyhawk when they tried to do similar support and introduce meta plot. Greyhawk was very much a DMs setting. Metaplot doesn’t work for Greyhawk.

back to the Realms though, that metaplot is what kicked it up a notch. The backbone was the novels from Driz’zt to the Avatar trilogy. It was like a comic book with ongoing, in depth stories and continuing characters in a living world that evolved with the novels, supplements and video games. The same model is why Vampire the Masquerade thrived in the late 90s and early 2000s before they Dragonlanced it and blew that WoD up in the Last Nights sourcebooks. That lack of development is why FR is not the cash cow it once was. Yeah the novels died off. 4e nWoDed the Realms. Changed way too much and now, like Vampire, which was largely supported through pdf publishing picked up a few years after the end of the original line, it needs a revival to get back to glory. WOtC needs to call Ed and put out a book with ED’s name on it. Not Green Ronin. Ed. Not a region guide. Ed. And not a POD book with Ed’s name on it. A bookshelf stocked, brick and mortar store book.