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WotC's Spellplague Rollback?

Started by jeff37923, August 06, 2013, 02:06:25 PM

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Haffrung

#45
August 07, 2013, 09:48:08 AM Last Edit: August 07, 2013, 09:50:22 AM by Haffrung
Quote from: BedrockBrendan;678315It is prefence of course, butI grew tired of the constant shake ups back in the 90s. They did it a lot with the Ravenloft setting, and while I loved the line, I felt those constant developments to the setting didn't add anything of value for a GM like me (who had been along from the beginning) and created a higher barrier of entry for the new GM just encountering Ravenloft. I think you also ended up with something quite convoluted and inelegant.

This. I bought the Neverwinter Nights Campaign Setting (4E) to use for my Next playtest (the first FR book I'd looked at since the Grey Box), and while it's an otherwise excellent setting book, the meta back story has gotten ridiculous. There are so many layers of cataclysmic events, deities, and history that it's really off-putting to new players to the setting.

If WotC really wants to Next to be accessible to new or lapsed gamers, and it wants FR to be a core setting, they need to hack back the cosmology and history into something far more accessible.
 

mhensley

#46
August 07, 2013, 05:59:01 PM
Quote from: Haffrung;678344This. I bought the Neverwinter Nights Campaign Setting (4E) to use for my Next playtest (the first FR book I'd looked at since the Grey Box), and while it's an otherwise excellent setting book, the meta back story has gotten ridiculous. There are so many layers of cataclysmic events, deities, and history that it's really off-putting to new players to the setting.

If WotC really wants to Next to be accessible to new or lapsed gamers, and it wants FR to be a core setting, they need to hack back the cosmology and history into something far more accessible.

This.  I've been trying to read up on FR lately and I'll be damned if I can follow which gods are alive or dead or whatever at the current FR date.  The biggest problem I have with FR is how in your face all the gods are and this sundering event sounds kind of like they're making that even worse.  I don't want to fight for ANY damn god or run games that involve such plotlines.

Akrasia

#47
August 07, 2013, 06:39:19 PM
Quote from: Haffrung;678344If WotC really wants to Next to be accessible to new or lapsed gamers, and it wants FR to be a core setting, they need to hack back the cosmology and history into something far more accessible.

WotC doesn't need to actually eliminate any cosmology and history, they just need to realize what parts are relevant for the game, and include just those elements in any future core campaign book.  

(Just as one doesn't need to know all the details of the First Age of Middle-earth in order to run a campaign set at the time of the Hobbit; just the main points will suffice.)
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Akrasia

#48
August 07, 2013, 06:41:08 PM
Quote from: JonWake;678216I don't know if anyone has seen this interview with RA Salvatore. It's pretty interesting, specifically about the difference between how 4e addressed the Realms and how 5e is different.
RA Salvatore Interview

Short version: when he and Ed Greenwood got out of the meeting with Wizards back in 2006, they felt gutted. Management told these two guys who have been working in the Realms longer than anyone that they were going to do this fast forward, and they could get in line.  Bob told Ed to not worry, because in five years when they realized how badly they screwed up, Ed and Bob would have a game plan.

Fast forward to a couple years ago, when just that happened. He talks about how James Wyatt was telling them how badly 4e had gone off the rails (his words, not mine), and Bob Salvatore just says, 'it's cool, I got this.'

That was an interesting interview.  Salvatore seems like a decent chap.  And yet more evidence that WotC was completely oblivious in the planning and production of 4e.
RPG Blog: Akratic Wizardry (covering Cthulhu Mythos RPGs, TSR/OSR D&D, Mythras (RuneQuest 6), Crypts & Things, etc., as well as fantasy fiction, films, and the like).
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Bedrockbrendan

#49
August 07, 2013, 06:42:51 PM
Quote from: Akrasia;678603That was an interesting interview.  Salvatore seems like a decent chap.  And yet more evidence that WotC was completely oblivious in the planning and production of 4e.

Salvatore always comes across as a down-to-earth, likeable guy.

RPGPundit

#50
August 08, 2013, 02:39:43 AM
The best thing they could do is a reboot-from-scratch, like what they did with the recent Star Trek films.
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JeremyR

#51
August 08, 2013, 02:43:37 AM
Quote from: RPGPundit;678750The best thing they could do is a reboot-from-scratch, like what they did with the recent Star Trek films.

That might have a wide appeal, but a lot of Star Trek fans hate it and pretend it doesn't exist.

Highlander is probably the best rebooting job. Not the movies, but the TV show. Take the same basic idea, most of the names (Duncan MacLeod instead of Connor), and forget (mostly) about the movies.

James Gillen

#52
August 08, 2013, 03:25:17 AM
Quote from: JeremyR;678753That might have a wide appeal, but a lot of Star Trek fans hate it and pretend it doesn't exist.

Yeah my ex-roommate who's an even bigger Trek fan than I am was bitching about how Warp Factor in nuTrek was ridiculous compared to previous Trek given that it took the Enterprise only a few minutes to hit Vulcan from Earth when it "should have" taken days or weeks.

And I'm thinking, "This is a movie, and they have to compress events into a single narrative, man," not to mention "Until we can actually break the lightspeed barrier and test with our own equipment, Earth to 40 Eridani in minutes is no less scriptwriter-magical-handwaving than Earth to 40 Eridani in days, BECAUSE FASTER THAN LIGHT DOESN'T EXIST."

Which I guess is slightly relevant to the question of how FR the game should line up with FR the fiction line.

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Bill

#53
August 08, 2013, 09:20:17 AM
Quote from: JeremyR;678753That might have a wide appeal, but a lot of Star Trek fans hate it and pretend it doesn't exist.

Highlander is probably the best rebooting job. Not the movies, but the TV show. Take the same basic idea, most of the names (Duncan MacLeod instead of Connor), and forget (mostly) about the movies.

I am a huge Highlander fan; loved the first movie, watched all the series and spinoff series.

But man, the sequel movies....*shudder*

Exploderwizard

#54
August 08, 2013, 09:34:54 AM
I still have a button from a con I attended over 20 years ago.

It read simply:

Highlander. There should be only one.

Couldn't agree more. Same applies here.
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#55
August 08, 2013, 05:15:04 PM
Quote from: James Gillen;678774Yeah my ex-roommate who's an even bigger Trek fan than I am was bitching about how Warp Factor in nuTrek was ridiculous compared to previous Trek given that it took the Enterprise only a few minutes to hit Vulcan from Earth when it "should have" taken days or weeks.

It's the internal continuity of the movies themselves that bugs me on this point: Having everything move at the speed of plot (it's a 15 minute trip from Earth-to-Vulcan in one direction, but it's a 3 days trip going the other way) is really lazy scriptwriting.

On a wider thematic level, when you can get from Earth to the Klingon Empire in 5-6 minutes it takes a really big bite out of the whole "exploration" thing that I think is an important part of the Star Trek Mythos.
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Haffrung

#56
August 08, 2013, 07:23:41 PM
Quote from: Justin Alexander;679109On a wider thematic level, when you can get from Earth to the Klingon Empire in 5-6 minutes it takes a really big bite out of the whole "exploration" thing that I think is an important part of the Star Trek Mythos.

Yeah, it seems that four-year mission involved circumnavigating the galaxy a few dozen times.

But then, the movies have a completely different premise and mythos than the TV shows altogether. They're straight-out action movies featuring characters from the TV shows.
 

Votan

#57
August 09, 2013, 12:55:08 AM
Quote from: RPGPundit;678750The best thing they could do is a reboot-from-scratch, like what they did with the recent Star Trek films.

Or go back in time and shift to focus to a completely different part of the Realms.  It's much larger than the United States and there are a lot of underdeveloped areas that could be done.  

That said, the Spellplague made for some very bad novels . . .

Jaeger

#58
August 09, 2013, 04:08:08 PM
Quote from: Justin Alexander;679109It's the internal continuity of the movies themselves that bugs me on this point: Having everything move at the speed of plot (it's a 15 minute trip from Earth-to-Vulcan in one direction, but it's a 3 days trip going the other way) is really lazy scriptwriting.

On a wider thematic level, when you can get from Earth to the Klingon Empire in 5-6 minutes it takes a really big bite out of the whole "exploration" thing that I think is an important part of the Star Trek Mythos.

Very lazy scriptwriting. All it would of taken would have been a 1 minute scene with some lines about how it took a few weeks each way.

Nothing breaks my suspension of disbelief more than when the 'setting rules' are inconsistent.


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elfandghost

#59
August 09, 2013, 05:50:40 PM
Quote from: RPGPundit;678750The best thing they could do is a reboot-from-scratch, like what they did with the recent Star Trek films.

How do we know that isn't what is happening? Could Drizzt be the older Spock...?
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