Quote from: KrakaJak;2930474e is not a "Pulp" like game at all.

My problem with Eberron is that how to achieve a pulp feel, a noir feel, or a pulp noir feel isn't really discussed in the books. It can be done without such advice, but, to my mind, such genre incursions are the raison d'etre and sine qua non for Eberron.

Seanchai

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;292966How does FR fit into that, considering that it was thought up by a 13-16 yo. who inserted all sorts of "Magical Toronto" content? And has been worked over for nearly 20 years by corp execs who wanted to sell fake-cool? I know it's one of your favourite settings, but it seems like the principles you're setting up for Greyhawk here would lump FR together with Eberron.

I have always been firmly of the opinion that the FR that I love, the one that is awesome, the one that blew everyone away, was ED GREENWOOD'S 1e AD&D FR.

The thing that utterly ruined FR was a bunch of TSR (and later WoTC) suits and idiots filling in the empty spaces in FR with a bunch of pre-fab crap.

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Quote from: jgants;292967I agree that one way is more likely to end up with a more interesting campaign world to game in than the other way.

My point is just that in the end, all that matters is how fun the world is to play in.  I really don't care about intellectual "depth" or whatever.  I mean, Tekumel is the most meticulously designed and intellectual setting ever made, and I wouldn't touch it with a 15 foot pole.

The point here isn't that it be "intellectual"; its that it have a feeling of being real, "lived in", not "pre-fabricated" and "unplayed in".

Its a about the IMMERSION.

Tekumel is a real lived in campaign world, sure; but its problem is that it isn't even human.  Its so alien that no one can relate to it.

Quotewell-liked settings like Ravenloft,

The 2e version mostly sucked.

QuoteDark Sun,

Which they had the record speed of ruining by the end of the very first novel series.

QuoteAl-Qadim,

Never lived up to its potential because it got tacked on as part of the Extravaganza of Filling FR With Shit That Didn't Belong There.

Quoteand Birthright (admittedly, we also got a couple of clunkers like Maztica and Spelljammer).

Crap, crap, and crap, all three. Planescape too. All crap.

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Pundit, before you say that it is all crap, crap, crap, have you taken a look at some of the Dungeon and Dragon magazine 3E versions of the settings?

I agree, the original Spelljammer setting was utter crap and makes me wince to think about it, but the 3E version which showed up as a d20 mini-game in Dungeon/Polyhedron #92 made it pretty cool and feasable extension of "magic as technology". The d20 mini-game of Omega World which appeared in Dungeon/Polyhedron #93 was a version of Gamma World second only to the original Gamma World (and a shitload better than the Bruce Baugh piece of crap that was produced). Then there are the Dark Sun setting articles for 3E, all of the craptasticness that was infused into the novels has been rendered mostly moot by placing the setting 100 years in the future - but it still retains the feral beauty of the setting in 3E.

Not all of the next generation setting stuff sucks ass. A lot depends on who does it.

Heh. Spelljammer is among my favorite settings!

I really like the AD&D Ravenloft, Birthright and Planescape too. These settings certainly don't embody what I see as the basic outlook or assumptions of the base game, but they're a nice departure from them. I certainly don't think they're utter crap at all.

Quote from: RPGPundit;293112I have always been firmly of the opinion that the FR that I love, the one that is awesome, the one that blew everyone away, was ED GREENWOOD'S 1e AD&D FR.

This is my favorite version as well, and I've been running FR in each edition of AD&D/D&D and each edition of the FR setting.

Quote from: RPGPundit;293112I have always been firmly of the opinion that the FR that I love, the one that is awesome, the one that blew everyone away, was ED GREENWOOD'S 1e AD&D FR.

The thing that utterly ruined FR was a bunch of TSR (and later WoTC) suits and idiots filling in the empty spaces in FR with a bunch of pre-fab crap.

Agreed that the original gray box for FR was the best version.

I didn't see it so much as a problem with pre-fab crap added by suits as it was a problem with metaplot constantly changing everything (the same issues I quickly had with Ravenloft and Dark Sun).  But, metaplot was popular in the 90s, by pretty much every RPG company, for some reason.

My ideal version of FR would be to take the 1e box set and then expand it to include blurbs on every area named on the map.  One of my pet peeves, with nearly every RPG setting ever produced, is that there's all these cool sounding places named on campaign maps that never get a mention in the fucking book (yes, I know it's a combination of wanting to sell future supplements + leaving areas open for the DMs to develop on their own, but it still annoys the shit out of me).

Quote from: RPGPundit;293113The point here isn't that it be "intellectual"; its that it have a feeling of being real, "lived in", not "pre-fabricated" and "unplayed in".

Its a about the IMMERSION.

OK, got ya.

I don't really have an issue with immersion in pre-fab worlds, myself.  Seems like a problem with over-thinking it, really.  If I didn't know which campaign worlds were developed organically and which were pre-fab, I doubt I could tell the difference.

Quote from: RPGPundit;293113The 2e version mostly sucked.

I'd have to disagree with you there (at least in the beginning before the metaplot explosion).  But then I'm a big horror fan.

Quote from: RPGPundit;293113Which they had the record speed of ruining by the end of the very first novel series.

I agree completely.  Dark Sun was a spectacular example of the stupidity of metaplot.

Quote from: RPGPundit;293113Never lived up to its potential because it got tacked on as part of the Extravaganza of Filling FR With Shit That Didn't Belong There.

To be fair, that started well back in 1e with Kara-Tur and the Hordelands.

Quote from: RPGPundit;293113Crap, crap, and crap, all three. Planescape too. All crap.

I would have thought you would have been a bigger fan of Birthright, since it was the first D&D world that actually tried to be a bit more historical / mythology oriented (with focuses on wars and battles between nations, different ethnicities of humans, and monsters being legendary and relatively unique).

Quote from: jeff37923;293115Pundit, before you say that it is all crap, crap, crap, have you taken a look at some of the Dungeon and Dragon magazine 3E versions of the settings?

I was only talking about the 2e versions produced by TSR.

QuoteI agree, the original Spelljammer setting was utter crap and makes me wince to think about it, but the 3E version which showed up as a d20 mini-game in Dungeon/Polyhedron #92 made it pretty cool and feasable extension of "magic as technology". The d20 mini-game of Omega World which appeared in Dungeon/Polyhedron #93 was a version of Gamma World second only to the original Gamma World (and a shitload better than the Bruce Baugh piece of crap that was produced). Then there are the Dark Sun setting articles for 3E, all of the craptasticness that was infused into the novels has been rendered mostly moot by placing the setting 100 years in the future - but it still retains the feral beauty of the setting in 3E.

Not all of the next generation setting stuff sucks ass. A lot depends on who does it.

The Polyhedron stuff was mostly excellent, what I read of it. Omega World is without a doubt one of the best version of Gamma World ever.

RPGPundit

Quote from: jgants;293140Agreed that the original gray box for FR was the best version.

I didn't see it so much as a problem with pre-fab crap added by suits as it was a problem with metaplot constantly changing everything (the same issues I quickly had with Ravenloft and Dark Sun).  But, metaplot was popular in the 90s, by pretty much every RPG company, for some reason.

In the context of this discussion, there's no difference. The novels/metaplot were very much a product of corporate thinking.


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