Post/Author/DateTime	Post
The Cosmic Goose 04-14-04, 04:29 AM	So im going to run a Forgotten Realms game soon. i started looking through a friends collection of the FR books (which is like, all of them) and it accured to me that FR really is kinda generic fantasy. but surely it cant be -just- generic swords and sorcery shtiek. so i come to you all. what are some of the more unique aspects of the FR setting? what is the settings personality and what features give it thus? what are some of the core conflicts going on? any help?
Kantor Brightblade 04-14-04, 05:04 AM	First and foremost...the setting as a whole is the deepest and most historically detailed game setting you'll ever find. Bar None. Secondly, the questions you asked are more rethorical than anything. The ONLY thing that gives the realms the personality it has is YOU...as the player or GM. The sourcebooks, the adventures, the characters the empires, the magic...everything this setting has should speak for itself. And personally IMHO the fact that you call this setting generic is missing the point. What other setting can you as a Player/GM interact with the main characters of the books? Where can you decide that the books are wrong and make your own history? You can take the canon of the novels and turn it on it's head....making it your own. That's why FR is the best, because everything that is in the sourcebooks, novels and other supplements can mean everything or nothing in your game. You can use them or you can toss them. Those are the features that make it thus....
Faraer 04-14-04, 09:28 AM	No surprise that the Realms falls in the genre it's helped to shape. What's distinctive about the Realms isn't some gimmick ('No elves! Magic is based on feet!') but the overall spirit and the nuances of how it works. Much of this becomes clear cumulatively rather than at once, but read this (http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Castle/2566/wellmet.htm) and see if you get it. Read the material (Ed Greenwood's especially which is crafted with great love) and see how folk speak, what heroes and villains and ordinary people do, how magic works, noble society, dungeons; feel the rhythm and heartbeat. Some of the core conflicts are mercantile power versus old kingdoms, oppressive wizards against people, reverence for lore versus short-term thinking, human expansion versus demihuman antiquity, brutal government against freedom...
Lashan 04-14-04, 10:53 AM	I agree that it is a bit "generic" in it's fantasy feel, though I don't think it is a bad thing. It allows you to have your standard vision of elves, wizards, and whatnot. There is no "elves are all undead vampires" or other whacked out idea. With that said, I agree with the above people that the sheer amount of detail that has gone into this world setting sets it apart from the others. The level of depth that Ed GReenwood has put into everything turns it into a cohesive game world. There is religion, politics, trade, and history that all mesh together to make a believable game world. THAT'S what I like about the game world. Even in FR, you can always tweak certain aspects to the way you want, but the level of detail is always there. There are other game worlds that have merit, too. I happen to like World of Greyhawk as well, but I prefer FR.
XhaoSuma 04-14-04, 05:40 PM	Two things stick out in my mind that set the Realms apart (I'm rather new to the realms as well). One, the geography, the detail in the lands and regions. Two, the characters. Characters like Elminster and Drizzt (to name two of the more famous) help flesh out the world as not just detailed land, but land filled with interesting and powerful people (and elves, and dwarves...). Want to awe your PCs? Have an NPC bard sing a tale about Drizzt's great battles, or how the city of Shade came back to Faerun. So much goes on in the Realms you'll never be at a loss for ideas and that is why the Realms allow creative minds to shine and why I enjoy them so much! Hope this helps! -XhaoSuma
Bleegh 04-14-04, 06:06 PM	I also agree with who said it is sort of generic, if you take D&D core to be the standard for fantasy and it did grow out of this. As people have said though, what makes it unique is that so much detail has been put into it. There is over 15 years worth of content on it that one reasonable person could not expect to read all of given a few years(maybe a slight exaggeration as I know this guy that spends weekends not playing D&D reading a random sourcebook cover to cover). But for most people the amount of information is great and even intimidating for some new people (I am very new myself, and have not even read the entire FRCS yet). You need to make sure above all that you read all applicable material and please for the sake of your players write your adventure beforehand otherwise you will spend a huge amount of time deciding small things like what the bard is singing in the taproom, details that the sheer amount of in the realms makes it undoubtedly the best setting around.
The_Declaration 04-14-04, 06:13 PM	a few things about the Realms: * Divine is a crucial aspect of this world. In that it is very very close (and even inspired) from the Greek mythology. Gods exist, and they walk or walked among us. That lets little space for Atheists.... Divine is often underestimated in many campaigns i've seen or participated to, probably cause Europeans don't have that much faith anymore. * it's high magic. so what does it mean actually: for sure not that magic is solving day-to-day problems, like water elementals doing the washing up. I see it in an epic way: great and ancient forces are in conflicts, shifting from one state to another. It's just beautiful if you get the right way to exploit it. * Realms are HUGE and described in great details. Fascinating to dig in and to dream about. * The Realms are diverse and classical. Can ben seen as a bad point as lots of people think it's too classical. But it's what i expect from D&D: classical fantasy in an epic tale. It's definitely an opened setting that allows you everything. It's merely the world that fits the best to the spirit and the style of D&D.
Autosponge 04-14-04, 06:19 PM	From the mind of Ed Greenwood to your living room, cramped basement, local gaming hangout--whatever... Wizards of the Coast brings you the Forgotten Realms (echo) (echo) (echo)... Simply put, the setting has more written about it than any other. Therefore, its immersiveness, scope, depth, and history offers more than you can possibly imagine. It's the longest running and most loved setting in any gaming platform (I'm making that up, but please tell me if I'm wrong).
The Cosmic Goose 04-18-04, 03:55 AM	okay, so the only unique thing Forgotten realms has going for it is its sheer size. other then this, it realy is quite generic. which is exactly what its supposed to be.
Cunning Linguist 04-18-04, 08:07 AM	Originally posted by The Cosmic Goose okay, so the only unique thing Forgotten realms has going for it is its sheer size. other then this, it realy is quite generic. which is exactly what its supposed to be. First off, you need to tell us what you think is generic. Is it the fact that elves live in the forest? Or that elves also live in cities? Do you think that it's the general Good VS Evil part thats generic, or the Red Wizards VS Harpers thats generic? The fact is that FR supports every idea you can have about a fantasy realm. You want Red Elves that eat small children? Then make The Eldreth Veluuthra paint there faces before going into combat. Want a golem run city? Place it on one of the islands of the Moonshea. Want a undead city? Use the Boneyard. Every generic idea exists in FR, but there is also a whole bunch of other non-generic ideas that exists in FR. Creatures like the Phaerimm and the Sharn are not like any mythos I know about. (they both look like some Chutulu mythos monsters anyways) People like the Deep Imaskari, or the Chitine race do no appear in any other Fantasy book I'w read.
Lashan 04-18-04, 08:14 AM	It's not the size of the Forgotten Realms, but the level of detail that it goes into. As the DM, you don't just say "Umm....there's a valley with a village in it here". You can say, "Welcome to Tasseldale, a vibrant community of workers. You have a choice of inns to stay at, all fully detailed in this handy-dandy supplement and several mysteries going on."
Autosponge 04-18-04, 01:33 PM	Aye, with the help of the supplements going back to the first printing of FRC Boxed Set, I have about 35 major plots, another 30 sub-plots, 5 strong over-arching plots, and close to 100 NPCs JUST IN ONE REGION! My players are never bored. If they want to know more about an area, place, or person, I probably have the details already written for me. It makes the DM's job quite easy. But nothing about a campaign world is "generic". I think that's a troll's word and shows your lack of intelligence. A lot of what the FR is was written by Greenwood (or just in his head) prior to you being born, so what you think is generic is actually original creative work that is so old and now common-place that you think it's stale. It's not the Realms, it's your perspective. But if you're trying to break the mold, look at Ebberon, apparently they have robots and stuff--you'd like that, it's not "generic".
protonik 04-19-04, 12:12 AM	Ok, calling him ignorant or stupid is just crass, some people come off as obnoxious sometimes so let that be until he shows he is a real troll by bashing and bragging about his roleplaying pedigree... until then... For me, the Realms is a very unique place but at the same time standard fantasy. See, the Forgotten Realms IS Dungeons & Dragons and defines D&D more so than Greyhawk has since the Old Grey Box originally debuted in 1986 and Lorraine Williams buried Greyhawk... Not trolling, just the facts. When I play in the Forgotten Realms I feel like I am playing D&D. I don't get that feeling when I play Dragonlance or Darksun, or Planescape etc. Those settings are more of themselves than of D&D and heck, Dragonlance is its own institution, almost wholly independent of D&D. With FR, I can emulate the best aspects of those settings and have the same righteous time of it. If I want a brutal wasteland struggle for survival why should I buy Dark Sun when I have Anauroch or Thay? If I want to tell novel-like adventures that focus on epic heroism in the face of seemingly overwhelming evil, I can do that anywhere on Faerun and not face the kinds of restrictions I might see in a Dragonlance campaign. If I want to do horror ala Ravenloft, well, there is a town in Sembia that has problems with Vampiric clones of Manshoon... I could even use that for a Buffy like campaign if I wanted. See it isn't the size of FR that sets it apart, it is the DIVERSITY of the Realms that sets it apart from the rest of the flock. The majority of settings are limited in scope (Greyhawk has similar strengths to FR) and usually to Western Europen medieval archetypes. FR has struggled to be inclusive as opposed to exclusive(ala Dragonlance)... SO that is another strength of FR... it is INCLUSIVE of any concept you can imagine, even Sci-fi concepts through the portals etc. and Stardock in Undermountain. Settings like Dragonlance are more known for what they exclude in order to maintain their flavours. As a setting, a lot of concepts in FR are far from original but that isn't what makes it original, it is the history, the events that have shaped the world that set it apart. More so than Middle Earth, the Forgotten Realms have more pages devoted to them than just about any fantasy setting ever next to the Bible (not saying the Bible is fantasy, but the stories are the basis of many fantasy tropes and if taken from a more legend concept as opposed to real history, the very model of a fantasy setting with its passion plays and intrigues etc.). Investing into the Realms is investing into a world that is developed for you as opposed to you having to develop for it ala Greyhawk (another all inclusive setting). Lastly, to summarice, The Forgotten Realms is probably the most open campaign setting available, if you can imagine it, you can find a place in the Realms to put it. Jason