Standard Introduction
I have been
writing about Dungeons and Dragons semi-regularly this year and in the course
of writing those I found a 30-day blog challenge. As I have done those a couple times before it
seemed remiss not to jump on this one.
Day 3- Favorite Game World
Not to
sound too much like an egotistical madman, but the answer is “My own”. I like being the GG rather than player by a
wide margin for just this reason. I know
that I have a lot of derivative ideas, I borrow/steal stuff from other
settings, and I make strange pop culture references because I think that having
humor to latch onto allows people to remember what the hell is happening. I still like it.
I like
writing and playing to an audience. When
I have players feeding me ideas I can then build them into the world in
interesting ways. Throwing their
concepts into my concepts creates something unique. But, just banging on about my own world for
however many words (and I have a lot of words on that setting, so many that I
thought of doing a 30-day blog challenge where I just post stuff from my game
world) I feel it is also fun to look at the most common and popular settings
and give a bit of a rundown on what I think about them.
I went a
bit nuts with this and ended up making this a long rundown. This will probably be the longest entry for
the entire month. That being said, feel
free to post about your own favorite setting in the comments, post a link to
your own blog/website/kickstarter because I like the idea of someone getting a
kick out of making a fantasy world.
The Rundown and the “Imaginatives”
I think a
good place to start would be those worlds mentioned in the 5e Dungeon Master’s
Guide on page 68 “Known Worlds of the Material Plane”. These are (by implication) the default
settings when they crafted the 5e material and I think that judging them will
give everyone a good idea of where I am coming from.
This
section about the Material Planes also have a mention of “Heroic Fantasy”, “Sword
and Sorcery”, and “Epic Fantasy” which are subgenres in the worlds and I think
the distinction might be too subtle for people to pick up on in most
cases. Let me take a swing at that
before we get going.
The best
line I can draw between these subgenres (based on looking at which ones get
each designation) is to say “Heroic Fantasy” puts its emphasis on powerful
individuals, like certain gods, warriors, and wizards that seem to be the crux
the whole world moves on.
“Sword and
Sorcery” seems to be more about the world with the characters being smaller
moving parts in the greater whole, whenever you would describe a particular
dungeon, adventure, or kingdom it would feel more like an “S&S”.
“Epic
Fantasy” is about events, the gods/titans are returning, the Ring of Power has
been found, or the Dragonborn has appeared. The worlds of “Epic Fantasy” are still fun
places to explore and the heroes still go on adventures but when you talk about
the world you talk about the BIG THING that happened.
Toril is
the world of the
Forgotten Realms. It is
classified in the book as “Heroic Fantasy” and I can see why. When you talk about the Realms you talk about
the heroes that at this point are so popular they are almost Fantasy icons
beyond being Dungeons and Dragons icons.
Drizzt Do’Urden novels were read by some of my friends before they even
knew what DnD was.
I
personally am not a fan of the Realms,
I have mentioned that before when I
talked about setting. I get the appeal,
I just personally don’t care for it. To
me the Lore is simultaneously as derivative as a line of best fit and dense as
neutron star. Again, I do see the appeal
for those of you who like it (Kind of like yesterday’s discussion of “Simple
versus Complex”, Realms is too complex for me).
Oerth is
the world of
Greyhawk. It is a “Sword
and Sorcery” setting and kind of the default setting of 3e. Greyhawk is pretty good, it is rather down to
Earth, there are some key locations, some important NPC’s, some ongoing events,
but really it is the sort of setting that provides what you would expect in
order to run a fun game without getting bogged down in too many details. You are heroes and you go on adventures.
If there is
a complaint to have about this setting is that the world is kind of same-same. There is no Asian influence at all, there are
no conflicting religions (that is to say, all the gods are known and fighting
for power, but everyone acknowledges the existence of all the gods and
conceptualize their struggles in similar fashion). Nothing that says you can’t add your own, but
I would argue the point of running a default world is that you shouldn’t have
to add your own continent worth of material.
This is an ideal campaign world to start with.
Krynn is
the world of
Dragonlance. It is an “Epic
Fantasy” setting. With the Dragons
coming back and being a bother as the core defining event that shaped the
world. This is another series that has
transitioned from DnD fantasy to just fantasy in a good chunk of the popular consciousness. My Aunt read these novels but until I mentioned
playing Dungeons and Dragons at a family get together, I don’t think she knew
the connection between the two.
As far as I
can tell the setting is kind of up my alley.
I like big events and do suggest having a singular big event like a
world war or cataclysm being a strong starting point or background for a
campaign. I don’t know if I like how prevalent
Dragons are in this (I tend to put more emphasis on the first D in DnD), but
again I understand the appeal of this more than the Realms even if it is not
exactly my thing.
Athas is
the world of
Dark Sun. This is a “Sword
and Sorcery” setting that asks, “Do you like “Mad Max” movies? Cause this is it.” A desert world full of gangs, god kings
ruling city states, and a general theme of misery as the world is drained of
its natural resources to become a husk. This
thing was re-released for 4e and I feel that was a sad, too quick on the draw
move for Wizards, if they had the luck to release it alongside “Mad Max: Fury
Road” it probably would have captured the nerd passions that (I think) inspired
it to begin with. (
I have mentioned this setting before.)
I am not
much of a fan of Dark Sun, but have stolen elements from it. I feel the need to endorse it in theory
though. Dark Sun is part of a collection
of Settings that I refer to as the “Imaginatives”. Those settings that take the freedom provided
by the rules to create worlds that break the mold of typical fantasy. This is Post-Apocalyptic fantasy something
you do not see a lot of (unless you look at how many ruined castles and
dungeons that imply the fall of a once Great Empire which led to the current age
which is a theme present in basically all DnD).
Eberron is
the world of…
Eberron. To speak of the “Imaginatives”
here is another one. A “Sword and Sorcery”
setting that puts the emphasis on Pulp Action.
Akin to old adventure serials this at times feels like a World War II,
Noir Espionage, Indiana Jones, and Doc Savage mashed up and spread on a magical
cracker. There is a race of sentient
robots that I love (and
have talked about before), there are magical trains,
there is a lost continent full of ruins to explore. It has it all.
I kind of
love Eberron because it is not the typical fantasy adventure, but at the same
time you can see how it would be the future of any world like Oerth or Krynn as
magic became technology and the massive earth shattering events that shaped
those worlds cooled. It feels like an
evolution of the genre rather than a clean break like the other 4 “Imaginatives”
but the new elements it brings are so cool that I see it as distinct and worthy
of consideration for anyone who wants to move in a more exotic direction for
their world.
Aebrynis is
the world of the
Birthright setting. This
is a “Heroic Fantasy” fantasy setting and I am shocked they even bothered to
mention it. Birthright feels like they
reverse engineered the rules for a Turn Based Strategy Computer Game into a
tabletop roleplaying game (at least, from what I can read on Wikipedia). I can see why it won awards, and the
mechanics sound interesting, the idea of playing a line of heroes fighting a
war is pretty cool, but and this is going to sound dismissive, “It seems like a
game different from DnD”.
Let’s
ignore the rules for a second though, and just focus on the world, it is kind
of bland. Which makes sense, when you
are introducing new rules you need to keep the other aspects simple so that
players can focus on the new rules rather than the exotic lore. So, what we have is a world that is kind of
flat so as not to pull focus from the cool rules system, a rules system that I
feel is kind of outside what DnD’s core appeal is. If you like this setting regardless of the
rules that is cool, but I don’t see the appeal from what I can glean online.
Mystara is
the world of Classic Dungeons and Dragons. This is a “Heroic Fantasy” fantasy setting as
many of the movers and shakers seem to be the immortal heroes that ascended in
the distant past. That being said
Mystara has cool elements, even if it has the ugliest logo in the history of
DnD.
This world
has plenty of stuff to lift out, like the Hollow World and the Savage Coast,
but that is also kind of why it isn’t great.
Mystara is a patchwork of ideas, and that is by design, but as a result
it feels less cohesive.
If Mystara
had been built with all of its good ideas there from the start and everything
mixed together to create a greater whole I would perhaps love this setting for
all of the weirdness, but in its current state it feels more like a typical
setting with weird elements in it, rather than a cool setting. The Hollow World concept is so interesting
that had that concept been its own thing, I would have made my “Imaginatives” a
list of 5 rather than 4.
 |
Look at how much better this logo is.
Can you believe they ever when with that ugly looking "M"? |
Surprisingly
there are several settings I would consider much more iconic to Dungeons and
Dragons than Birthright that were not mentioned in the 5e Dungeon Master’s
Guide, I am going to talk about them too just to emphasize that I kind of like
them a bit MORE than the ones they did mention.
The Wild Space
of the
Spelljammer setting. This is a “Sword
and Sorcery” setting, but in the most fantastic place possible, space. There are spaceships in this and all of them
look and feel different from one another in ways that make them feel magical.
The idea
behind how the spaceships move, the nature of solar systems, and worlds that
turn within them is described as Ptolemaic.
And that shit is a trip. I
actually love the idea of this setting and was shocked to learn it is not more
well regarded as one of the most extreme settings when it comes to creativity and
exploration. The emphasis in on the
world(s) rather than on specific characters and events and just the idea of
there being world(S) is fascinating.
You can
probably guess that this is another “Imaginative”. It is so exotic, so expansive, and allows for
the integration of ideas so outside the genre that it feels leaps apart from the
other settings in terms of look and feel when played properly. When they announced 5e I was surprised this
was not announced as one of the first big settings to be published. Illustrating how different they wanted to
make 5e from 4e (which I remind, HAD NO SETTING to go with its release).
The City of
Sigil home base for the
Planescape setting.
This is setting has more or less been upgraded to default, but in such a
way that it is always in the background.
Sigil is such a cool and strange set piece by itself and I like that
they established it as a major stopping point in any given multi-verse trip. It is a city that lines the inside of a ring
that floats at the top of an infinitely high tower in the Outlands of
reality. That sentence sounds like
something out of aphasic poetry.
The premise
of the game was to allow players to travel between dimensions “Sliders” style
to have adventures in many different worlds.
I have used this concept in a “Mutants and Masterminds” game back in the
day because I thought players would like to meet and fight with various known
superhero properties, and the idea makes sense for DnD, you could even say it
is the logical setting with which to push an integration of DnD with the worlds
of Magic the Gathering (settings that go inexplicably unmentioned in the books).
You would
figure that this would be the other “Imaginative” but oddly no. Sigil and Planescape are basically every
setting, which is big, but elements like the multiverse and portals to other
worlds exist all over DnD; Planescape is imaginative in that it connects
everything else, and has a cool set piece, but is not in and of itself super
exotic in the context of DnD. When Planescape
is its most imaginative is when it is visiting individual worlds that feel cool
by themselves (I may not be making much sense, apologies if I am being unclear). Much like the Hollow World of Mystara it has
cool things, but they are too disparate.
The Demi-Plane
of Dread home to the
Ravenloft setting.
This is more of a “Gothic Horror” type setting which distinguishes it
from the other worlds a great deal, mostly because it is the only setting that
has that designation. I think Ravenloft
gets a short shift. While they do love
the main villain, Strahd Von Zarovich, and Wizards of the Coast keep releasing
the one iconic adventure from the setting in each edition, the full-on setting
doesn’t seem to get the limelight.
Doubly weird because of how many people were brought into fantasy by
Vampire fiction, I guess they figured not to bother competing with White Wolf
Gaming for all horror RPG business.
Maybe if
Universal’s new Tom Cruise’s “The Mummy” had been a real success and it looked
like the Dark Universe was going to be a pop culture thing, Ravenloft would be
getting more love, as is I think it will remain the moody standoffish child of
the DnD franchise.
Ravenloft
is the last my “Imaginatives”. Gothic
Horror is such a break from everything else, especially when the look and feel
of a world cloaked in mist that it is an example of what can be done by pulling
the rules out of their comfort zone. Even
though Magic the Gathering has Innistrad as a sister setting, nothing else in
DnD has the look and feel of Ravenloft.
 |
Are you telling me this wouldn't be at all enticing to all the Vampire Gamers?
It looks so cool. |
Lastly,
what is not really talked about are the numerous different worlds of popular
fantasy not owned by Dungeons and Dragons.
There is no Middle Earth, Hogwarts, or Pern. No Wheel of Time or Discworld. No Elder Scrolls. No Britannia from “Ultima” or Albion from “Fable”.
There are
no mentions of “Warcraft’s” Azeroth or the Known World of “Game of Thrones”. No mention of Pathfinder (their setting is a
lot of fun). No Hyborian Age of Conan. No Narnia.
No Barsoom (though Dark Sun might have taken some notes). No Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. No Hyrule or Mushroom Kingdom. No Equestria (another oversight as it is
owned by Hasbro and has some crossover appeal).
No Romance
of the Three Kingdoms. No Oriental
Adventures at all. No world of Norse or
Greek myth. Nothing based on Native
American, Indian, African or other real life mythology outside of the West
unless you dig into something like the Realms and even then, THOSE AREN’T AT
ALL DISCUSSED.
Most
glaringly there is no discussion of the Multiverse of Magic the Gathering even
though many are awesome sauce, and I must reiterate ARE OWNED BY THE SAME
COMPANY.
I mean, if
you don’t have room for Ravenloft I can see not talking about properties owned
by someone else, that would seem like an unwise move to draw comparisons
between your product and those of the “competition”. Conversely, if you have room for Birthright,
you can make room for Ravenloft… you know, by cutting Birthright.
Need for a New World
Let me talk
about one last thing, there has been too long a break since the last new campaign
setting. In many ways 5e was an attempt
to strip down the game to be simpler, but I think that they are now falling
into the same trap that Hollywood is in that they are trying to rehash their
older IP instead of making new stuff. Let
me just show you a timeline. (For this purposes
we are counting Mystara from 1981, even though it goes back before that kind
of).
(Click on the image for Full Size)
As you can
see from the chart is has been a while since the last new campaign setting (let’s
not kick Wizards of the Coast in the nuts by pointing out Pathfinder
again). This is kind of shameful all the
more so because the open casting call that got them Eberron also netted them
several finalists that they still own but haven’t used. Why in heaven’s name are they not massaging
those things into workable product. Rich
Baker still writes a DnD themed comic online (Order of the Stick) are you
telling me he wouldn’t want the setting he submitted to head to the
printers? This is the longest dry spell
for new IP in the history of the franchise at 13 years it is closing in on
doubling the previous record of 8 between Birthright and Eberron. NOT GOOD.
I keep
hounding doing a full release of a Magic the Gathering setting in conjunction
with a set of Magic cards, the crossover would lead to cross pollination of the
franchise, it would also double the market for novels, comics, posters and
other merch. It just seems like a good
idea.
Coming Tomorrow
My favorite
god in the game. Which I already
wrote about a couple years ago, so that shouldn’t be too much work. Unlike this entry, which kind of got out of
hand.
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