Simple as that, the other threads are system/mechanics focused, this is about the other stuff. What settings/milieus/genres did you initially like, but found over time you grew to dislike?
Was there a cause or specific event you can identify that brought about this change (new book coming out, comment from a developer, mainstreaming of a fad/trend, etc)?
Interesting distinction... I generally don't use established settings, with a few exceptions.
One of them, that helped sour me on a game, was Feng Shui.
I started working out the details of the Architect 2056 juncture, about how people lived and civilization and so on.
I ended up so fucking depressed about it that, combined with other dissatisfaction, killed my interest in the game.
FORGOTTEN REALMS
When I first got the grey campaign box, I was in love. As time went by, I began to severely dislike the realms.
Fantasy, as in loose, Tolkieneque wizards, elfs and orc as well as any all other magical per-industrial settings are dead to me. It never was my favourite genre but it didn't use to be an issue. I played it plenty, even enjoyed it. But at some point something just snapped and I just can't bring myself to play in a fantasy game any more. I just can't. I'd blame it on over-exposure.
I've been detoxing for a good few years now, seems like it may take a few more. But I'd like to think I'll get over this hang up as in practical terms fantasy games are by far the most popular.
Oh, in a general sense, high fantasy.
I've always preferred what I call 'typical book fantasy,' which is the somewhat grubby magic as amazing occasional bits in an otherwise adventure novel. Fafhyrd and the Grey Mouser, classic Sword and Sorcery.
And, well, most of the folks I've gamed with prefer D&D to the gills. meh.
"oh, ok, let's scry-teleport ambush the beholder lord in that flying castle."
Ravenloft for me. I think most of the TSR books I ever bought/owned are Ravenloft related but we used CoC to play in it. I loved the idea but less and less the execution... the creeping D&D flavor. I kept wanting to make it weirder and official products seemed to get less weird as time went on.
I still like the concept/theme though... the whole gothic horror thing, just not so much the official incarnation.
Quote from: Will;803199"oh, ok, let's scry-teleport ambush the beholder lord in that flying castle."
Oh yeah, ick! But that never was my taste in fantasy.
I found it amusing in small doses.
Not 15+ years of play. bah
(Of course, I showed them! Now I'm barely playing anything)
Forgotten realms for reason listed above. Give me the grey box and ignore everything else afterward.
Glorantha. I loved it starting when White Bear Red Moon came out in 1975. I played and GMed the heck out of Runequest 2 and 3 in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Then Hero Wars /Hero Quest came out and I found those systems utterly useless and opaque to me. And the volume of new information coming out was overwhelming and seemed intended to overturn much of what was known previously. That and the whole attitude of nothing is really known about Glorantha because everything is subjective but despite everything being subjective we'll present it from the perspective of multiple erroneously objective single culture viewpoints combined with a certain cliquish hero worship just leaves me wanting to stab someone in the eye. Fortunately I have all the RQ2 and RQ3 material I would ever need to run a Gloranthan setting that would interest me for 20 years or more of weekly play. So I have what I need. But the new stuff just leaves me totally underwhelmed.
Dragonlance - when I first read the original 3 books (at the age of 12) I thought it was the bee's knees. By about the time DL: Saga came out I thouught it was a pile of horse manure.
Ravenloft - good initial concept, but just too wildly inconsistent. I don't think it ever knew what it wanted to be, so tried to be everything over the years.
World of Darkness - Anyone part of the hobby in the 90s knows why.
Warhammer Fantasy - I loved (and still love) the world presented in the 1st edition/Hogshead RPG and 3rd edition of the Wargame. What its become since is a fanfic/special snowflake/'extended universe' nightmare of retardation.
Star Wars - not the RPG's fault. I hear people talk about the new trailer these days and...nothing. What love I once had for the setting has long since been flogged to death.
Star Trek - just bores me to death these days, and I don't like the Federation as an adult. A bunch of paramilitary facists.
I'm trying to think of an ongoing commercial setting that hasn't at some point moved on from what attracted me to it initially... Dr. Who maybe? Not that I've been watching to see if it still appeals to me (too many friends yammering about it has kept me off).
I can happily ignore the changes to WFRP and 40K settings... holding them in stasis near their original incarnations (same with World of Warcraft if I ever run a game in that setting).
I don't really see Call of Cthulhu as a setting... but given the omnipresence of the Mythos these days I'd be loathe to name-drop any of those entities. Try to keep the mood/flavor without the brand names.
The same goes for Star Wars/Trek... I want that mood/theme/style without the baggage of canon and fanboys and OOC chat about the show/movie/books.
I never liked Forgotten Realms from nearly the start. It just felt like an ersatz Known World/The Realm that just got more and more absurd and overblown over time. Early stuff is ok though.
Came close with Dragonlance. I had enough good sense to stick to the RPG book and the first 6 novels and have only strayed into the mess that was later only once. Friend of mine got into Dragonlance at the later retelling version and it totally ruined him on the setting.
Came close with BXs Karameikos/Known World. Was lucky enough to miss the gradual bloat that would become Mystara. I just treat the two as seperate settings.
3rd ed Gamma Worlds setting was one that eventually turned me off. The whole crystal tech and gradual slapstick leanings.
4th ed Gamma World eventually turned me off with the naming convention of all things. They took the odd names of 1st and 2nd and turned it into a language and then started applying it to EVERYTHING! Every time I see Meriga, for example I just walk away and go back to 2nd ed.
Came close with Star Frontiers. Luckily I missed the whole Zebulons Guide mess and so dodged the bullet. Treat them as two seperate settings and systems.
About everything from Games Workshop. By 2000 the settings were becoming less and less interesting. As it got more grim and ugly it lost its original charm. Especially 40k. That on top of the unpleasantness of the company, their store managers, and the cultist fans.
Recently lost any interest in Car Wars and Gurps due to ongoing problems with SJGs attitude problems and some of the stunts theyve pulled. And I was never a big fan of Gurps anyhow. (Well ok. Gurps doesnt really have a setting.)
And that is a recurring theme for me. Loosing interest in a setting due to the decay of the parent company.
A recent irk, though so far a minor one is the proliferation and over-emphasis on demonic elements in the 5e DMG. I dont mind them on their own. I DO mind them overwriting several creatures now to be created by demons/devils/whatevers. Its needlessly intrusive. Luckily its just meaningless fluff text so easy to jettison.
Maybee some day will return to some of those.
Which brings up the question. Any settings youve soured on that you think might get back to eventually?
Dragonlance. I too thought it was the coolest thing when I read TSR was producing a huge campaign to run on a unique world. No clerics with spells! Dragons in every module! Halflings with personality! Different as hell. The first adventure was pretty good too. Then the cleric angle was dropped, the adventures became a strict railroad, if you dared to kill any character the campaign was disrupted, pages were wasted with junk like songs, repetitive character sheets, pictures that didn't really help. One adventure had big maps of a Dwarven city but then you didn't really do anything with it, so why include it? One module was nothing but a recap of the previous 6. Huge disappointment overall.
Star Frontiers. I still like the game and the original setting wasn't terrible. But like everyone else I wonder where the homeworlds are. I would like to see someone put out a whole new environment for that game.
This is the second time I've heard this obliquely referenced, but what exactly did SJG do recently? All I hear is "attitude" and "stunts pulled", but outside of this forum I've never seen anything from them since GURPs 4th limpdicked onto the scene then disappeared, taking with it 3rd's exceptional library of supplements.
Dragonlance ... but not for the typical reasons. I actually love the Fifth Age and the SAGA Rules System; it was the War of Souls and the aftermath, combined with delving into the setting's philosophical and religious foundations and finding them wanting, that burnt me out.
Quote from: RunningLaser;803182FORGOTTEN REALMS
When I first got the grey campaign box, I was in love. As time went by, I began to severely dislike the realms.
Yep. Me too :) Possibly Dragonlance for the same reasons.
Forgotten Realms for being the dullest dull setting that ever dulled its way into Dulltown. Even thinking about the setting anymore makes me feel like I'm losing creative ideas to the black hole of its horribly uninspired cliche-ridden existence.
Also Dragonlance. Like others, I thought it was awesome when I first read the books. When I was 14.
I suppose both of the above still work well enough for what they are, I just no longer want anything to do with them.
It's not out yet, but I'm apprehensive about the new setting stuff for Earthdawn 4e. I haven't kept up with the metaplot progression at all, and looking at summaries and such I've pretty well come to the conclusion I don't really want to. Assuming I can ever find another group to play with I'm thinking we'll just ignore all the Theran War and Cathay stuff and rewind everything to the freshly-ravaged world of 1e.
Quote from: TristramEvans;803228[BWorld of Darkness[/B] - Anyone part of the hobby in the 90s knows why.
Except for me. Actually curious, what didn't you like? What is this well known failing of which I know not.
To be clear, I haven't ever played or read World of Darkness so I am honestly ignorant.
Eclipse Phase.
Quote from: Doughdee222;803295pages were wasted with junk like songs
Yep. Never did join in and sing those round the table. Does that make me a Roll-player, not a Roleplayer?? :D
Quote from: BarefootGaijin;803398Yep. Never did join in and sing those round the table. Does that make me a Roll-player, not a Roleplayer?? :D
It depends. Did they include music or just the lyrics? Because just providing the lyrics and expecting the GM to write a tune sounds like lazy game design that no one should pay for. ;)
Dragonlance. The setting seemed cool when I was 14-ish. I now loathe it.
Mystara. The introduction of Alphatia marked the beginning of the decline. The Wrath of the Immortals finished the setting.
Forgotten Realms. The Time of Troubles was annoying, the Spell Plague and the 100-year jump … just horrible. (Confession: I still like 1e FR, and think that some of the 5e stuff is okay.)
Greyhawk. The (little) post-Gygax stuff of which I'm aware seemed to suck the flavour out of the setting.
Quote from: Skywalker;803311Yep. Me too :)
Yet you're running
Legacy of the Crystal Shard? :confused:
Quote from: Akrasia;803403Yet you're running Legacy of the Crystal Shard? :confused:
The adventure is great, and FR is so bland a setting its only a very small part of the adventure.
Quote from: Doughdee222;803295Star Frontiers. I still like the game and the original setting wasn't terrible. But like everyone else I wonder where the homeworlds are. I would like to see someone put out a whole new environment for that game.
Dont have the books handy but I believe either Knight Hawks or a Dragon article explained a few of the homeworlds. There were also hints that possibly the whole area was seeded by some Precursor race. I thought White Light was the human homeworld.
I'll have to dig my stuff out and see.
Quote from: Bren;803397Except for me. Actually curious, what didn't you like? What is this well known failing of which I know not.
To be clear, I haven't ever played or read World of Darkness so I am honestly ignorant.
METAPLOT. OWoD are the ones that made that a dirty word. Google "Sam Haite" some time if you're in the mood for a groan-laugh.
I think WW discovered that the majority of their audience were buying and reading their games rather than playing them, so the entire world became an ongoing fanfic collective story that made less and less sense as each splatbook had to make every single supernatural person into a special snowflake, and pretty soon about 50% of the population of the earth was some sort of supernatural creature. Just about every historical person you can think of was revealed to be a vampire of some sort, and then there were the intergalactic space-monsters that the Sabbat were secretly fighting, because every group had to have its own Secret War, and...well, it just got really really silly, but it being 90s gothic angst, it took itself so seriously, so there wasnt the black humour that tied together other kitchen-sink settings like, say, WH40k. WW online games were notorious for instantly devolving into giant flame wars over continuity (as were the LARPS, but from what I heard they had bigger problems).
Quote from: TristramEvans;803414METAPLOT. OWoD are the ones that made that a dirty word. Google "Sam Haite" some time if you're in the mood for a groan-laugh.
I had to look him up, having been knee-deep in the 90s angsty goth phase of WoD.
His actual name was
Sam Haight and supposedly he was a joke by the designers. Whether that's true or not, he apparently got soul-forged into an ashtray in the Wraith world. Ha Ha!
http://whitewolf.wikia.com/wiki/Samuel_Haight (http://whitewolf.wikia.com/wiki/Samuel_Haight)
EDIT: his description pretty much reminds me of 80% of the WoD player characters that I met out there from various player groups. People sure LOVED their super-rich 7th generation vampire-mage-vagabonds with dual silver katanas and magical uzis. I gave up that setting when I figured out that it wasn't at all about introspective personal horror but who was the fastest killing machine.
Quote from: Necrozius;803421I had to look him up, having been knee-deep in the 90s angsty goth phase of WoD.
His actual name was Sam Haight and supposedly he was a joke by the designers. Whether that's true or not, he apparently got soul-forged into an ashtray in the Wraith world. Ha Ha!
http://whitewolf.wikia.com/wiki/Samuel_Haight (http://whitewolf.wikia.com/wiki/Samuel_Haight)
EDIT: his description pretty much reminds me of 80% of the WoD player characters that I met out there from various player groups. People sure LOVED their super-rich 7th generation vampire-mage-vagabonds with dual silver katanas and magical uzis. I gave up that setting when I figured out that it wasn't at all about introspective personal horror but who was the fastest killing machine.
The designers were very bad at telling jokes, in that "we take ourselves incredibly seriously and so should you. Oh look, we made a little funny. See how awesome we are? NO! NO HUMOUR FROM YOU, ONLY WE THE SETTING GODS CAN JOKE!!!!"
That wiki entry also seems to gloss over the many years that he haunted the supplements of multiple gamelines. I swear I remember him being bit by a vampire at some point too.
Quote from: TristramEvans;803414METAPLOT. OWoD are the ones that made that a dirty word. Google "Sam Haite" some time if you're in the mood for a groan-laugh.
Thanks for the explanation. Sam Haite appeared about half way down page two of my search. So maybe his infamy is fading. He sounds like a caricature of the a friendless, orphan loner uber-PC.
Re: Metaplot
Metaplot seems like something that can only work at the micro level not the macro level. By that I mean, you might create a metaplot for one person's campaign (micro level) with some hope of it being useful after the players get involved, but trying to create a metaplot that will be useful for everyone's campaign (macro level) is doomed to failure. The only way it can succeed is to keep the metaplot at a level too high for the PCs to affect it, in which case it may be part of the setting but it isn't all that useful for the PCs since they can't actually interact with it. The pitfalls seem like something any GM who had ever run two different groups of players through the same scenario or even the same dungeon should have been able to anticipate from experience.
EDIT: Scooped. Also I'm not alone in my impression of Sam Haight as a PC caricature.
Quote from: TristramEvans;803296This is the second time I've heard this obliquely referenced, but what exactly did SJG do recently? All I hear is "attitude" and "stunts pulled", but outside of this forum I've never seen anything from them since GURPs 4th limpdicked onto the scene then disappeared, taking with it 3rd's exceptional library of supplements.
Oh I'be bitched about SJG more than twice. You must have been lucky and missed the others... :o
They have gotten gradually more strict over the years and they have in the past policed and interfered in other folks IP by threatening fan sites. Which was where I first ran into this mess as they indirectly caused some material I and others had released with permission to a fan site to be deleted. Material that was in no way SJGs at all. That set the tone thereafter to adversarial.
I dont mind when they are policing their own stuff. I do mind when they stick their noses in matters not theirs. And even with their own IP they can be a bit heavy handed. Though in one case I have to agree that acting was justified. But they went a bit overboard. Which is the recurring theme now.
So that gradually wears down my interest in any of their product.
Back on topic.
White Wolfs Werewolf setting. Guess I am the only one who got sick and tired of the Nuwisha coyotes trumping about every single other race whos book they make a cameo in. They even pop up in the Hengyokai book.
But overall the shifts in tone of the series turned me off the setting. Too abrupt? Too broad? Maybee I was just unlucky in what points I hit it at.
Not sure if Trinity counts? For me the transition from Aberrant to Trinity was a low point as Trinity reveals that the novas apparently went nuts and then left the Earth. Otherwise was interesting. Convoluted, but interesting. But then one expects convoluted from WW. Id still rather play Aberrant if given the choice.
Quote from: Akrasia;803402Greyhawk. The (little) post-Gygax stuff of which I'm aware seemed to suck the flavour out of the setting.
That was my feeling too. Same for Mystarra. The Gazetteers.
Quote from: Bren;803425Thanks for the explanation. Sam Haite appeared about half way down page two of my search. So maybe his infamy is fading. He sounds like a caricature of the a friendless, orphan loner uber-PC.
Re: Metaplot
Metaplot seems like something that can only work at the micro level not the macro level. By that I mean, you might create a metaplot for one person's campaign (micro level) with some hope of it being useful after the players get involved, but trying to create a metaplot that will be useful for everyone's campaign (macro level) is doomed to failure. The only way it can succeed is to keep the metaplot at a level too high for the PCs to affect it, in which case it may be part of the setting but it isn't all that useful for the PCs since they can't actually interact with it. The pitfalls seem like something any GM who had ever run two different groups of players through the same scenario or even the same dungeon should have been able to anticipate from experience.
EDIT: Scooped. Also I'm not alone in my impression of Sam Haight as a PC caricature.
Yeah, I'm inclined to agree with your evaluaation of MEtaplot. Tribe 8 managed it OK, as there was a metaplot that played out over a series of campaigns in the first edition, but in the core rules for the 2nd edition they basically laid it all out in one chapter and said: "there, thats the story as it could have happened. You can go from there or just ignore the whole thing"
As for Sam Haight as a PC charicature, maybe it was the age group at the time I was playing, but he quickly seemed to become more like a PC model.
But this was the age of Highlander: the TV series, when trenchcoat/katana was de riguer for gothic superheroes.
Quote from: TristramEvans;803435But this was the age of Highlander: the TV series, when trenchcoat/katana was de riguer for gothic superheroes.
Ah yes, the trenchcoat of katana holding. That cracked me up every time MacLeod did that. :rolleyes: And let's not forget the duster of two-handed sword holding that some of the villains seemed to wear. I think you are right though, that some things make a different sort of sense at the time than they do in hind sight. That certainly applies to the fashions of every decade I've lived in.
I still like Forgotten Realms a lot. Kept it at 3e and just never adopted the Schizoid Magic Schism Thing where the earth opened up and bad magic popped out and touched everyone in the Forgotten Realms in taboo places.
I still like Eberron. Just haven't had an opportunity to run a game for it since 2012 or so.
Never really liked Greyhawk in the first place, but the maps were totally cool, so I seem to have all of them. Even though I have never run a game there. ever.
I still like Mystara, but no one plays that at all. I mine the Gazeteers for my 0D&D game though, and I like Calidar even better...
I have several home brew settings I run, I like them all, though not all equally well. There is one setting I haven't run a game for, for 15 years. I still crack the binder about once a year and go through it though for ideas.
I like the Wilderlands very much. Can't say I soured on that at all, and ran a couple of one shots earlier this year here.
I still like the Spinward Marches. Am running a Traveller campaign there right now and this game is steadily gaming momentum.
I still like Hârn a lot, just haven't found anyone willing to play in Hârn since about 2004 or so.
Haven't really soured on much.
Quote from: Bren;803442Ah yes, the trenchcoat of katana holding. That cracked me up every time MacLeod did that. :rolleyes: And let's not forget the duster of two-handed sword holding that some of the villains seemed to wear. I think you are right though, that some things make a different sort of sense at the time than they do in hind sight. That certainly applies to the fashions of every decade I've lived in.
It's because of this Dark Era that I get pissed off every time Michonne takes out a bunch of zombies in the Walking Dead with her stupid katana.
Soured on:
Forgotten Realms, after the first gray box set and some of the original area sourcebooks. Way way way overdeveloped to the point of being ludicrous, and Elminster can go slip on a piece of soap in the bathtub and drown. Not too bad if you limit it to the early stuff.
Old World of Darkness, for being too much cooler-than-thou, splatbook railroad, metaplot up the ass, and as Necrozius said, "I gave up that setting when I figured out that it wasn't at all about introspective personal horror but who was the fastest killing machine."
Dark Sun, once the second boxed set was released and explained everything that was happening and updating the world to the post-Tyr-freed milieu of the novels. First boxed set was awesome, fighting to survive in a world that absolutely did not give the least amount of shit about you. Metaplot creep happened early (unfortunately), but there was so much good stuff that could be mined out of it.
I've actually de-soured on Forgotten Realms. For one, I don't mind bland, standart and whatever else in that vein is applied to FR. I've also finally wrapped my head around the concept of taking what I like and leaving things I don't like by the wayside. There's a lot of good gaming material for FR and the canon police won't bust my door because I don't use a bunch of NPCs, depowered others and play in a different era.
If anything, I've soured on non-standart D&D fantasy. Settings like that always try so hard to be special and innovative, but I often find it gimmiky and it runs out of breath to fast. Tried and true "bog standart" makes for good gaming and there's plenty of space for good and creative ideas in the details, where they muck up less and matter to play more, imo.
Dark Sun. Most D&D settings, I can tolerate. There is stuff I like, there are some basic assumptions I find a bit annoying. Not annoying enough to actively avoid them, but for me, the implied D&D setting and its idiosyncracies is definitely not a selling point for a game. Dark Sun was different, and I was genuinely intrigued by it for a time - until I started to read more of the stuff about it, and really didn't like it. The original basic box is quite good, the extended material really is more annoying and I found the various changes really changed the setting for the worse.
Legend of the Five Rings is similar. I want to like the setting. But the metaplot and its cataclisms every other year or so doesn't let me.
Quote from: Beagle;803559The original basic box is quite good, the extended material really is more annoying and I found the various changes really changed the setting for the worse.
Yeah. That seems an unfortunate recurring trend with TSR. It was about 85% likely that any re-release of a setting was going to somehow screw things up somehow. Dragonlance is the posterchild for that.
Quote from: RunningLaser;803182FORGOTTEN REALMS
When I first got the grey campaign box, I was in love. As time went by, I began to severely dislike the realms.
Exactly happened with me. I just loathe the realms now.
Quote from: TristramEvans;803296This is the second time I've heard this obliquely referenced, but what exactly did SJG do recently? All I hear is "attitude" and "stunts pulled", but outside of this forum I've never seen anything from them since GURPs 4th limpdicked onto the scene then disappeared, taking with it 3rd's exceptional library of supplements.
Umm. 4th's limp dick is rolling along nicely (almost as if perhaps the dick was not limp at all...), with PILES of PDF releases including Pyramid. Also, an enormous number of 3e books are now available in PDF with more released regularly. Horror was recently released in hard cover as was the delicious Zombies.
On Subject:
Beside FR, I ditched the meta plot in oWoD from the beginning, I felt it was kitschy. Also, I like making my own shit up. :-) When nWOD was released I thought the absence of a meta plot was awesome. But I seemed to be in the minority on that. BRP can easily handle a good modern horror. :-)
I'm not a big fan of Pendragon (And, to a lesser extent, Yggdrasil); it's the names. They don't stick in my head well, and of course, you can't play Pendragon with knights called Bob, Jeff, Lewis, Kerry and Duncan, that would be stupid.
Other than that, I tend to be willing to just go with the flow of a setting, and accept it for what it is.
Quote from: Will;803179One of them, that helped sour me on a game, was Feng Shui.
I started working out the details of the Architect 2056 juncture, about how people lived and civilization and so on.
I ended up so fucking depressed about it that, combined with other dissatisfaction, killed my interest in the game.
2056 is hell. I always read it as a "failure state" for something going deeply wrong.
I played a con game as a character who was from then; his wife had disappeared under "mysterious circumstances", so he go recruited into the time-traveling cyborg assassin project. His target for this game was a young boy in the modern-day juncture, whose mum
looked like his wife.
Basically, I was playing the Terminator, and that was the exact way I handled it... right up to him walking into a hospital... making his way to the children's ward... looking through the glass and seeing the boy, and his mother... bursting through the door... bringing up his weapon for the kill...
...and then having a breakdown, because this time, he couldn't do it.
The woman wasn't his wife, but he wound up smashing his time travel device and staying in the modern day with her. I kinda imagine him having to fight off other future assassins every so often, and them going on to have an okay-ish relationship that never quite works because he can't get rid of all of his programming.
I might have enjoyed it more if the game was essentially a self-examination personal horror game.
But given it's mostly pitched as a high flying chop socky goofy action game, contemplating actual dystopias are best done lightly.
Quote from: Ladybird;803587I'm not a big fan of Pendragon (And, to a lesser extent, Yggdrasil); it's the names. They don't stick in my head well, and of course, you can't play Pendragon with knights called Bob, Jeff, Lewis, Kerry and Duncan, that would be stupid.
I think you can get away with Duncan. If it's good enough for Macbeth (Duncan is actually the King) it should be good enough for an rpg!
Also turn Bob into Robert or Jeff into Geoffrey and your set.
Even though I still run the Forgotten Realms I think this latest direction has me quite soured on the setting as a whole. I'll be the first to admit that I LOVE the Spellplague, the 100 year jump, the death of so many redundant, moronic, and ill-conceived deities, and the removal of both Mexico and Egypt that 4E's era really captured for me what was "fantastic" about the setting. It really did dump all the garbage I felt was cluttering up the Realms and replaced it with actually original ideas.
And now they're bring all that shit back. Yea I'll keep Mexico and Egypt back on Earth, where they belong WotC. Thanks.
Another setting that I started to read and wanted to play adventures in, but ultimately decided it wouldn't work based on what the books did was Dragonlance. I think the meta-plot of the entire setting sort of ruins any sort of independent adventures that could be had. Not to mention that they started changing things with the War of Souls trilogy and from there.......it sort of went downhill.
Quote from: Omega;803427Not sure if Trinity counts? For me the transition from Aberrant to Trinity was a low point as Trinity reveals that the novas apparently went nuts and then left the Earth.
Given the nature of taint, that's inevitable. I'm not sure why superheroes need CoC like insanity.
Quote from: Necrozius;803421I had to look him up, having been knee-deep in the 90s angsty goth phase of WoD.
His actual name was Sam Haight and supposedly he was a joke by the designers. Whether that's true or not, he apparently got soul-forged into an ashtray in the Wraith world. Ha Ha!
Sam Haight was a notorious character. I don't think anyone likes him. He is mostly known for being every splat at the same time and very overpowered. So they turned him into an ashtray to get rid of him. Nobody likes him, not even oWoD fans. He is hated. The worst of the metaplot.
Settings I don't like anymore are generic fantasy settings. For not doing anything new and being very black and white. And new WoD. For not appealing to me, while it technically should. I mean no metaplot, much more options. There is nothing in there that grabs me.
Forgotten Realms gray box was pretty decent in my opinion, but most of the stuff that came later was just not to my liking. A little too far afield for my tastes. Dark Sun kinda got old for me too. Yes, it's a dry dusty corner of hell, I get it. Cool initial idea and some interesting variations on races, but it kinda always stuck in my mind as a "Roman Empire at it's worst on the Sun's Anvil" sorta place. I like some trees and green shit on occasion!
Ravenloft. Boring. If I want horror in my fantasy - this ain't it.
Ravenloft as well...loved the concept of Gothic horror and got a lot of inspiration while reading through the books. Bought the first adventure Feast of Goblyns as well...and that was kind of a let down...too much hack&slash for my taste...I ran it and we had fun with it, but as an example of Gothic horror it was quite the disappointment IMO.
I know that there is a lot of love for this module among some forum members, but I just gotta disagree...
Due to Feast of Goblyns my interest in Ravenloft dwindled away to nothing...alas...
Quote from: Kiero;803177Simple as that, the other threads are system/mechanics focused, this is about the other stuff. What settings/milieus/genres did you initially like, but found over time you grew to dislike?
Was there a cause or specific event you can identify that brought about this change (new book coming out, comment from a developer, mainstreaming of a fad/trend, etc)?
Probably The Morrow Project or SPI's Universe. Their settings wore off kinda quick.
Politics of game writers will turn me off of their game setting for sure.
Quote from: Shawn Driscoll;804420Probably The Morrow Project or SPI's Universe. Their settings wore off kinda quick.
Politics of game writers will turn me off of their game setting for sure.
Much as I like Universe... er... WHAT setting?
As for Morrow Project. The base setting is interesting if spartan. It really comes alive with the modules though. Those flesh out the areas.
For some that sort of super blank slate is a boon rather than a hinderance. One of the reasons I like BX D&D so much. Like a few others posting, it was the filling in of the blanks that cause the problem.
Though yes. Universe could have done with at least a little fleshing out. We learn more of the setting from the two Pandora games than the RPG!
Quote from: Omega;804445Much as I like Universe... er... WHAT setting?
The ARES Magazine setting. I kid.
It was the psionic navigators. The gravity web implants. The stutter warp drives. The science of the setting.
Quote from: Omega;804445As for Morrow Project. The base setting is interesting if spartan. It really comes alive with the modules though. Those flesh out the areas.
True.
I still have both games from the '80s. And look through them once in a blue moon.
Unfortunately I'll have to say that about Shadowrun. The initial setting back when I read it in the 1990's was uber-cool. But being cyberpunk, it relied on 1980's trends and technologies, which haven't aged well, and which would be problematic unless you want a vintage/retro-future 1980's, especially with younger players. The attempt to update the technological and cultural assumptions in SR 4E made a lot of things bland IMHO, not to mention all the cool metaplot being finished up and the newer metaplot not being as fun.
I think the best way to run it is as intentional retro-future, unabashed 1980's vintage game using the SR2 2050's setting and metaplot and maybe even the SR2 ruleset. Otherwise you either lose the flavour or end up needing to justify 1980's cyberpunk tech expectations to people accustomed to smartphones, Google and wikipedia and who have never used a BBS.
I can't say that there's any setting I initially liked that I've completely soured upon. I would say that there were a few settings that I got disillusioned with: The FR during all the setting-bloat of 2e, Dark Sun being somewhat ruined by the metaplot, etc.
But in their original formats I still like these.
Quote from: Akrasia;803402Greyhawk. The (little) post-Gygax stuff of which I'm aware seemed to suck the flavour out of the setting.
As I've admitted before, I actually like the "From the Ashes" version of Greyhawk more than the Gygax version.
Quote from: Vonn;804395Ravenloft as well...loved the concept of Gothic horror and got a lot of inspiration while reading through the books. Bought the first adventure Feast of Goblyns as well...and that was kind of a let down...too much hack&slash for my taste...I ran it and we had fun with it, but as an example of Gothic horror it was quite the disappointment IMO.
Ravenloft is more an urban fantasy setting than a horror one. Yes it has all the horror trappings, vampires and so on. But the supernatural mystery investigation element and the idea of a hidden world in plain sight aren't the focus of that setting.
Quote from: Bren;803216Glorantha. I loved it starting when White Bear Red Moon came out in 1975. I played and GMed the heck out of Runequest 2 and 3 in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Then Hero Wars /Hero Quest came out and I found those systems utterly useless and opaque to me. And the volume of new information coming out was overwhelming and seemed intended to overturn much of what was known previously. That and the whole attitude of nothing is really known about Glorantha because everything is subjective but despite everything being subjective we'll present it from the perspective of multiple erroneously objective single culture viewpoints combined with a certain cliquish hero worship just leaves me wanting to stab someone in the eye. Fortunately I have all the RQ2 and RQ3 material I would ever need to run a Gloranthan setting that would interest me for 20 years or more of weekly play. So I have what I need. But the new stuff just leaves me totally underwhelmed.
That didn't turn me off Glorantha, just the Hero Wars line. I'm happiest letting my own imagination run wild on Bill Church's maps, drawing from old material whatever bits suit me and ignoring the rest. (A lot of the AH ed. stuff in Genertela, Gods, Elder Secrets, etc., ended up gathering dust, too.)
Also, Unhallowed Metropolis. Weird-science Victoriana during an undead apocalypse sounded interesting but somehow the whole alternate future "Neo-Victorian" goth fetish angle turned me off of the setting even before I ever got to run or play the game.
Quote from: golan2072;804474Unfortunately I'll have to say that about Shadowrun. The initial setting back when I read it in the 1990's was uber-cool. But being cyberpunk, it relied on 1980's trends and technologies, which haven't aged well, and which would be problematic unless you want a vintage/retro-future 1980's, especially with younger players. The attempt to update the technological and cultural assumptions in SR 4E made a lot of things bland IMHO, not to mention all the cool metaplot being finished up and the newer metaplot not being as fun.
I think the best way to run it is as intentional retro-future, unabashed 1980's vintage game using the SR2 2050's setting and metaplot and maybe even the SR2 ruleset. Otherwise you either lose the flavour or end up needing to justify 1980's cyberpunk tech expectations to people accustomed to smartphones, Google and wikipedia and who have never used a BBS.
Not that I recall the details, but it seems to me that SR (like CP, except as applied to the Hardwired world) assumed a 'cyberspace' that was far more of a virtual reality than the present one. Unless I am mistaken on that point, I don't see how current gadgets change anything significant. Surely the futuristic stuff is about as fantastic as ever - never mind the unabashedly magical?
Quote from: Phillip;805104Not that I recall the details, but it seems to me that SR (like CP, except as applied to the Hardwired world) assumed a 'cyberspace' that was far more of a virtual reality than the present one. Unless I am mistaken on that point, I don't see how current gadgets change anything significant. Surely the futuristic stuff is about as fantastic as ever - never mind the unabashedly magical?
Exactly. Google Glass and Twitter...who cares? In Shadowrun my Street Samurai has a cellular phone/wireless connection in his head controlled by mental command or voice activation that can show anything on the Matrix in my cybereyes - audio, video, live news/cable shows, anything I want. If I'm stuck in traffic on the I-5, I just have the autonav and GridGuide control the car while I hook up to a porn simsense feed and get a Full Sensory blowjob from my starlet of choice streamed directly into my nervous system. BBS? Shadowland looks more like a G+ hangout crossed with wikipedia then a BBS (minus the stupid picture icons which no real runner is going to post anyway). If a couple gangs start a dustup on I-5, no worries, my internal combat system makes the one Arnie had in the Terminator look like cartoon hour. Neo? Too slow. Who needs a vehicle rig when you have a combat computer in your brain making the calculated angles and targets from Robocop look like an Atari 2600.
This is all with Shadowrun Second Edition technology. The only thing evolved or modern about the later editions was the higher art budget.
Shadowrun being "quaint 80's futuretech" is one of those "common wisdom facts" that's really unanalyzed bullshit put forward by the colored hair transhumanist crowd.
Even then their consumer-oriented "advanced tech" world is just AR overlay bullshit. Window Dressing. You try and hack Mitsuhama with that crap, your brain is Ragu running out of your ears. You're hacking it the way your grandpappy did, with a datajack and full Virtual Reality.
Quote from: Phillip;805095That didn't turn me off Glorantha, just the Hero Wars line. I'm happiest letting my own imagination run wild on Bill Church's maps, drawing from old material whatever bits suit me and ignoring the rest. (A lot of the AH ed. stuff in Genertela, Gods, Elder Secrets, etc., ended up gathering dust, too.)
I think that is by far the best approach.
I didn't answer my own thread. For me the biggie is Star Wars. I didn't "grow up" with Star Wars, I wasn't there at the beginning, it isn't a cherished part of my childhood or identity. But it was a setting I liked, largely because it wasn't hard sci-fi (which does nothing for me), but had spaceships and the Force and such.
However, it is an inconsistent, incoherent clusterfuck plagued by weak editorial policy and too many sources. Not only that, but the supposed primary sources, the two trilogies are full of problems. And they contradict each other in places. Plus the Force basically makes no fucking sense whatsoever, in terms of the morality attached to it.
For a long time my interest waxed and waned, I'd go through phases of being really into it, then losing interest again. I still think the KotOR comics and video games are brilliant. But I just found the incoherence too much to bear in an RPG.
Fortunately, I discovered Mass Effect, which does space opera in a much more coherent fashion (barring ME3's "space magic" endings).
I think Star Wars suffers from the same problem as Lord of the Rings. It's very black and white. You have the good guys and the bad guys. The main difference is the stereotypes. In one it's the ranger, the fighter, the mage and the thief in the other it's the jedi, the scoundrel, the wookie and the soldier. It's for little children. It doesn't have any depth whatsoever. That's why I always preffered Star Gate or Star Trek over Star Wars and Song of Ice and Fire over Lord of the Rings. Even though those franchises aren't perfect.
This will probably ignite a flame war. Bring it! :D
Quote from: jan paparazzi;805199I think Star Wars suffers from the same problem as Lord of the Rings. It's very black and white. You have the good guys and the bad guys. The main difference is the stereotypes. In one it's the ranger, the fighter, the mage and the thief in the other it's the jedi, the scoundrel, the wookie and the soldier. It's for little children. It doesn't have any depth whatsoever. That's why I always preffered Star Gate or Star Trek over Star Wars and Song of Ice and Fire over Lord of the Rings. Even though those franchises aren't perfect.
This will probably ignite a flame war. Bring it! :D
I've never found Lord of the Rings to be completely black and white. Denethor was a tragic character and deserved a better treatment in the movies. Good or evil did not drive him to madness, but the loss of everything he held dear. Even Sauron was not evil, but a force of nature, which deserved pity. He never had the choice to be the terrible, he was formed into the world with no capacity of choice.
What makes the worlds less playable is the setting designed to tell a single story, but was branched out to encompass a larger franchise over time.
Quote from: Crabbyapples;805201Even Sauron was not evil, but a force of nature, which deserved pity. He never had the choice to be the terrible, he was formed into the world with no capacity of choice.
No, Sauron had a choice. He chose to follow Melkor in his opposition to the Music and Plan of Eru Iluvatar, and thus followed in Melkor's downfall.
Some entities in Tolkien are debatable when it comes to free will--orcs, dragons, Ungoliant and her brood--but Melkor, Sauron and the Balrogs are not among them.
Your not the only one that question the morality of the force bit. I guess in any Star Wars RPG game I play I always go force user instead of jedi because frankly I don't care much about the morality of the force. Also if the force came from microscopic bacteria, then why is there morality at all. Your simply using their excess power to pull of capabilities. A force lightning is more likely to do good (recharge a battery for a dying droid) as well as evil (torture a innocent person).
Edit: My apologies for not sticking with the topic. The setting that soured on me is nWoD. Talk about having your cake and trying to eat it too. You go for sand box game, but then you try to shove down some canon for each splat. No wonder people get into a pissy fit in online chats because they are too busy trying to stick to canon when no one knows what is canon.
People got angry at me because I had other shape shifters for a werewolf game. Funny thing is they were in the War Against the Pure supplement for Werewolf: The Forsaken. They all had excellent histories their own and how they came to be. Still it didn't sit well with other people because it didn't fit in "canon" even though it is written into the very books they own.
Just either go full out sandbox, or just stick with a defined setting white wolf writers. You could save everyone from a life time of arguments if you just pick which one you wanted. I am not even joking about that.
Quote from: jan paparazzi;805094Ravenloft is more an urban fantasy setting than a horror one. Yes it has all the horror trappings, vampires and so on. But the supernatural mystery investigation element and the idea of a hidden world in plain sight aren't the focus of that setting.
Well, it was clearly set out to be a gothic horror setting by TSR...and the extra rules and information they gave were certainly helpful in that regard. But when the first modules came out, it was more of a slice & dice thing I guess (ie. modern horror as it's called in the Boxed Set).
I expected something like Cthulhu, but in the end I got fantasy adventures with a veneer of gothic horror.
I still have a soft spot for the setting and it certainly has potential, but the adventures were a disappointment (at least the ones I played or took a look at).
Maybe urban fantasy would be a better definition of the setting, I don't know. I'm not that knowledgeable about all the sorts of (literary) genres and what they mean...;)
Quote from: Snowman0147;805208Your not the only one that question the morality of the force bit.
I think Star Wars and LotR are really good for action focused games. But they are a bit one-dimensional. I am more than happy to play a game like that, no problem.
Quote from: Snowman0147;805208Just either go full out sandbox, or just stick with a defined setting white wolf writers. You could save everyone from a life time of arguments if you just pick which one you wanted. I am not even joking about that.
My argument exactly. I said this for years. Usually got myself flamed for it. New WoD is nor flesh neither fish. It has not enough canon to be a really cool well established setting. And it isn't open enough for a sandbox. Try suggesting a setting to a vampire player with none of the covenants present and see what I mean. Even though it's supposed to be toolkit, everyone plays the same five covenant setup with some mild variation. Maybe an additional bloodline.
Legend of the Five Rings.
I still love the setting. But the card game driven metaplot, and the fact that its one of the hardest games to come up with a conceit for the players to group together (other than "all same clan" and "magistrates"), and it just is a pain pain to play.
When I do play it I usually set it in the perid that 1e presents, but there are still a huge pain in getting a party to be "together" in it.
Didn't 4th edition of the role playing books cut itself out from the card game? As in role players do their own thing while card gamers do their own thing so the two don't share the canon.
Quote from: Snowman0147;805323Didn't 4th edition of the role playing books cut itself out from the card game? As in role players do their own thing while card gamers do their own thing so the two don't share the canon.
They don't explicitly call out the metaplot as much anymore, but its still there in the background. I mean its hard to write the game without a bit of it considering that what schools would be available depends on which era you set it in.
I mean, I still have all the 4e books. I think there was a lot going right for the way they managed the RPG, I just think its one of the more difficult games to bring to a table because of the level of baggage and how to bring together a group without the magistrate conceit.
I still like the setting a lot, its just find it a a terrible setting to PLAY in.
Quote from: 3rik;805099Also, Unhallowed Metropolis. Weird-science Victoriana during an undead apocalypse sounded interesting but somehow the whole alternate future "Neo-Victorian" goth fetish angle turned me off of the setting even before I ever got to run or play the game.
Yeah, I agree with this. Its got lots of neat little bits, but the neo future thing ultimately kills it for me as well.
Quote from: CRKrueger;805126Exactly. Google Glass and Twitter...who cares? In Shadowrun my Street Samurai has a cellular phone/wireless connection in his head controlled by mental command or voice activation that can show anything on the Matrix in my cybereyes - audio, video, live news/cable shows, anything I want. If I'm stuck in traffic on the I-5, I just have the autonav and GridGuide control the car while I hook up to a porn simsense feed and get a Full Sensory blowjob from my starlet of choice streamed directly into my nervous system. BBS? Shadowland looks more like a G+ hangout crossed with wikipedia then a BBS (minus the stupid picture icons which no real runner is going to post anyway). If a couple gangs start a dustup on I-5, no worries, my internal combat system makes the one Arnie had in the Terminator look like cartoon hour. Neo? Too slow. Who needs a vehicle rig when you have a combat computer in your brain making the calculated angles and targets from Robocop look like an Atari 2600.
This is all with Shadowrun Second Edition technology. The only thing evolved or modern about the later editions was the higher art budget.
Shadowrun being "quaint 80's futuretech" is one of those "common wisdom facts" that's really unanalyzed bullshit put forward by the colored hair transhumanist crowd.
Even then their consumer-oriented "advanced tech" world is just AR overlay bullshit. Window Dressing. You try and hack Mitsuhama with that crap, your brain is Ragu running out of your ears. You're hacking it the way your grandpappy did, with a datajack and full Virtual Reality.
Im pretty sure that I want to play in your Shadow Run game:)
Quote from: Vonn;805210Well, it was clearly set out to be a gothic horror setting by TSR...and the extra rules and information they gave were certainly helpful in that regard. But when the first modules came out, it was more of a slice & dice thing I guess (ie. modern horror as it's called in the Boxed Set).
I expected something like Cthulhu, but in the end I got fantasy adventures with a veneer of gothic horror.
I still have a soft spot for the setting and it certainly has potential, but the adventures were a disappointment (at least the ones I played or took a look at).
Maybe urban fantasy would be a better definition of the setting, I don't know. I'm not that knowledgeable about all the sorts of (literary) genres and what they mean...;)
The genre/time/era how ever you want to put it is what kills it for me. I much prefer Masque of the Red Death for Ravenloft. The Victorian era just clicks with me. Personal preference I suppose.