After the resounding success of this thread in RPG.net's d20 forum, I thought I'd try it here.

What are the three things you like most about your three favourite settings?

Here are mine:

Eberron

1. How D&D tropes (especially magic) are logically integrated into the world (at least to a much greater extent than your typical D&D setting).
2. The foregrounding of the tension between major nations. 'There's a war coming Ned. I don't know when, I don't know who we'll be fighting, but it's coming.'
3. You get to play Indiana Jones in D&D land.

The Known World

1. That odd mix of faux-medievalism and S&S that so defines my nostalgic image of 'what D&D is.'
2. In the main area, Karameikos, the setting is a wilderness full of nasty beasts, raiders, mysterious ruins and ancient evils—all just waiting to be conquered by the forces of civilisation.
3. [?]

Dark Sun
(Don't remeber how much of this was Dark Sun as actually written and how much was our extensive house-ruling)

1. The post-apocalyptic resource-poor feel.
2. City states with personality are the main political players.
3. Nasty, colourful competing merchant organisations create a lot of  adventure & intrigue possibilities, and provide plenty of well-paid caravan-guard work.

Forgotten Realms
1. The Zhentarim. Evil, magic-using merchants was a new concept for me back then. I've always loved these guys as villains (and all the ridiculousness of 2e and 3e never happened!).
2. Waterdeep. I have every book published for this city, and it's still my go-to city for gaming.
3. Rashemen and Thay. I love this area! Both groups are distinct, and they hate each other!


Ravenloft
1. I loved the default older areas, with pistols and greatcoats being standard fare.
2. The Vistani were just plain cool.
3. The various Van Richten books about werewolves, vampires, etc., just made these monsters so much better.

Birthright
1. Anuire. A high medieval setting done well. Fact is, if the whole setting was like this and Khinasi, it would have been perfect. The other regions were a bit too anachronistic.
2. The kingdom modules were great. Roesone and Medoere together was fantastic, since they bordered each other.
3. Bloodlines were a good idea. Not perfectly implemented, but a fun thing to mess around with.

Grayhawk:  Able to plunk down pretty much any adventure anywhere.  Didn't have to worry about reading and memorizing hundreds of pages of history, lore, politics, etc in order to have an epic campaign as I created all that myself.

Forgotten Realms: Inspiring.  Easy to play in.  New mythos for clerics and druids

There isn't a 3rd, I'm afraid.

Quote from: danbuter;6309012. Waterdeep. I have every book published for this city, and it's still my go-to city for gaming.

Although I've gamed in the Realms,  I never got to game in Waterdeep. Can you tell me a bit more about what makes it a cool place to adventure in?

Quote from: loseth;630908Although I've gamed in the Realms,  I never got to game in Waterdeep. Can you tell me a bit more about what makes it a cool place to adventure in?

I like the details. Cool stuff like the Blackstaff, the cemetary, Undermountain, etc. I even like the boat city in the harbor from 4e. It just seems to fit together very well for a city I'd play in.

Drangonlance -

1. Post-apoc ruined world feel, no gods.
2. Lots of PC and NPC Organizations.
3. Draconians.

Bear in mind I also hate everything about Dragonlance.

We have a complicated relationship

Thunder Rift
1. Small scale, ready to use.
2. Classic or "family friendly" feel.
3. Not detailed by a 10,000 book conga line of "support"

Dark Sun

1)Everything in the world, living or otherwise, wants to kill you.

2)Interesting races and twists of standard races.

3)Defilers and Preservers.


Ravenloft

1)No detect evil.

2)Interesting realms.

3)Any setting that has imprisoned Lord Soth, AND Vecna, simply rules.


Birthright

1) Vos barbarians are coming for you. Run.

2) Interesting 'deities'

3) Focus on holdings.

Forgotten Realms

1. Love its inclusiveness for all sorts of characters, countries, and tropes.

2. I like it's high fantasy feel, where magic is a pervasive, if feared, part of the world.  I find the multiple unique magic types (Elven High Magic, Runecasting, Spellfire, etc) flavorful fodder for many character types.

3. I also enjoy the iconic locales, such as Waterdeep, the Silver Marches, and the Dalelands.  Waterdeep for its cosmopolitan city feel, the Silver Marches for its "Northern frontier" theme, and the Dalelands for its environs and power players (Zhentil Keep and Cormanthor are close by, and the relationships between the Dales is neat too).

Eberron

1. Its pulp action feel meshes well with the archetypal "traveling dungeon crawlers" parties.

2. I like it's low-power, gods are vague set-up.  Only the PCs stand a chance against the BBEGs and their machinations, and the lack of evidence for the existence of deities makes religions and Clerics more "faith-based" and open to corruption.

3. Sharn.  Just Sharn.

Greyhawk

1. Classic dungeons, classic characters, classic feel.

2. Some of the best adventures I played in (Living Greyhawk, Dungeon Magazine's Adventure Paths) were set in this world.

3. Iuz is a cool villain.

Birthright
1) It does the Middle Ages fantasy thing near perfectly. It has loads of setting that are spot on to doing what everyone SAYS D&D was supposed to do

2) Monsters. The fact that there is A Gorgon, A Banshee. Not only were they MONSTERS, but they were THE monster and could be the focus of a whole campaign.

3) The blood abilities. You gave the characters superpowers, and did it in such a way that A) They Work for fantasy. and B) They feel gritty and dangerous.


Dark Sun
1) Sword and Sorcery for AD&D.

2) You gave us a setting that used psionics, and made them work without being "weird" (as in NOT new agey/crystal blah blah.)

3) There aren't familiar animals, you made the world alien, and that makes it WORK.


Planescape
1) Urban Fantasy, Urban HIGH Fantasy, and you gave it flavor, grit, and crammed it into a wild ride.

2) A use for planar critters and spells, that ties into 1.

3) Flavorful art, and writing.


Honorable Mention: Thunder Rift. Small setting area, with a LOT of fun packed into the area, and lots of room for more.

I've only got one...

PLANESCAPE

1) The Aesthetics - DiTerlizzi's art perfectly evoked its unique style and mood. A unique blend of steampunk with mythological overtones.

2) The Setting - Open-ended interdimensional playground grounded in Sigil, a wonderfully evocative city ruled over by the mysterious god-entity The Lady of Pain. Its the only setting where D&D's Alignment system was given any kind of in-game rational, and the Factions took a cue from White Wolf to provide identifiable cliques for characters to help define how they interact with and view the setting as a whole.

3) The System -AD&D 2nd edition, pre- "Player's Option" wankery. the last time D&D was D&D.


Havent really been thrilled by any other D&D setting. Kudos to Forgotten Realms for incorporating the characters from the D&D cartoon, but on the whole its a little generic "D&d fantasy world" for me. Never played Dark Sun, but the art looked neat. Ravenloft was a horror setting for a system that really isn't the greatest for horror games. Dragonlance was everything that was wrong with post-gygax D&D solidified in one "setting" dictated more by the second rate fantasy novels than any considerations towards roleplaying.

EBERRON:

In no particular order...

- You could run James Bond style adventures in the setting just as easily as Indiana Jones thanks to all the various interlocking secret organizations and groundbreaking gizmos.

- Artificiers as a concept are important to me. They haven't really been done to my satisfaction yet, but it was halfway there.

- The encouragement to play monstrous races that was implicit in the setting. Had a party with twin kobolds and a plant monster in it, and that was a blast.

Quote from: TristramEvans;631370I've only got one...

PLANESCAPE

1) The Aesthetics - DiTerlizzi's art perfectly evoked its unique style and mood. A unique blend of steampunk with mythological overtones.

2)The Setting - Open-ended interdimensional playground grounded in Sigil, a wonderfully evocative city ruled over by the mysterious god-entity The Lady of Pain. Its the only setting where D&D's Alignment system was given any kind of in-game rational, and the Factions took a cue from White Wolf to provide identifiable cliques for characters to help define how they interact with and view the setting as a whole.

3) The System - AD&D 2nd edition, pre- "Player's Option" wankery. the last time D&D was D&D.

While Im a fan of Planescape myself, I think D&D is a disservice to the setting.

Quote from: silva;631459While Im a fan of Planescape myself, I think D&D is a disservice to the setting.

Yeah, I've been running it with other systems for a while, most recently the Tribe 8 system by DP9. That said, its the game that got me playing AD&D 2nd again for the first time in years back in the late 90s. Maybe not the best system for it, but I do have fond memories of that system, especially when compared to WoTC's offerings in that regard thus far.

Quote from: Silverlion;631141Birthright
1) It does the Middle Ages fantasy thing near perfectly. It has loads of setting that are spot on to doing what everyone SAYS D&D was supposed to do

2) Monsters. The fact that there is A Gorgon, A Banshee. Not only were they MONSTERS, but they were THE monster and could be the focus of a whole campaign.

3) The blood abilities. You gave the characters superpowers, and did it in such a way that A) They Work for fantasy. and B) They feel gritty and dangerous.


Dark Sun
1) Sword and Sorcery for AD&D.

2) You gave us a setting that used psionics, and made them work without being "weird" (as in NOT new agey/crystal blah blah.)

3) There aren't familiar animals, you made the world alien, and that makes it WORK.

Couldn't have said it better myself, but my #3 would be Mystara a.k.a. The Known World:

• Countries based on historical cultures or fantasy tropes that are easy to grasp. Alfheim is the big elf forest kingdom; Thyatis is Imperial Rome and/or Byzantium; Karameikos is Medieval Eastern Europe; Ethengar is Temujin's Mongolia; Atruaghin is Pre-Columbian North America; etc.


• Unabashedly gonzo. Romans share a border with hobbits and Arabs, and the latter border on Vikings. Not a lot of attention to physical geography, but makes for good gaming. There's also a defective nuclear reactor from a crashed spaceship that's eating away magic from the world, and two surviving crewmen ascended to godhood are fighting over it. And an addictive magical metal that gives people superpowers.


• The Gazetteers are some of the best setting supplements out there, from Darokin's Traveller-like system for arbitrage trading to Orcs of Thar's humorous look into humanoid culture and mini-games.

The Wilderlands:

• open-ended wilderness exploration in a cultural mosaic
• Tolkien vs. Conan vs. lasers
• moral ambiguity

Dark Sun:

• an original S&S world ruled by genuine evil
• decadence vs. barbarism!
• survival focus

Lankhmar:

• a sinful city done right, with a strong hint of strangeness
• rats and various rat-like things/people/gods
• the best way to make sense of 1st edition AD&D