4e screwed up with the realms, it screw up with alot of things( though it did do alot of thigs right too, but hey people remember the bad more than the good things) and one of these things was 3 books, one campaing book, one character guide and one adventure book along with ddi articles.
for the msot part there was not alot of subscribers here to talk about it and all.
failed: took away too much, the fact that they took away our toys was the fail here and violates rule 1 section 3 article 12 of the tyco code, never take away always add.
failed: they shoehorned the phb races into the realms, not that it was bad per say, the shifters and goliaths fit into the realms well enough, ti was however tht it shifted in the eladrin and the phb halflings making hte moon, sun and star elves a separate category from the wood and wild elves. I know players griped about tooo many elven races and all, but those were few oppinions, this wasnt bad per say but nor was ti good, and as for the halflings, this was bad only because it was the only reason why lurien was flooded.
Failed: they remoeved several of the more popular characters becuase they lisened to a few of the gripers who were saying oh there are too many high powerd characters and why can Lord Elminster take care of this with his armies. bad DMs, best way to deal with E is tht he and storm are not iin Shadowdale, they are off somewhere else doing Mystra knows what, same with any of the chosen, or you can say that Elminster Sage of Shadow DAle did take care of it, he manipulated you into doing it.
that said some of the more powerful npcs in the game are not likely to aid in anything until it directly affects them or their home cities and then in the city's defence.
pass: they got rid of LAntan, mulohaund and unther and that other place which I forget its name at the moment, never liked them save the one I cant remember, but others wee the opposite they found the one I liked boring and too much of western mytholgy or something, each ther eown and all.
pass: chult waht they did to chult and its next door countries was passable, though had they made it a swamp area ruled by the lizardmen and scalry kind it would have been better than a chain of islands next to chult.
pass: they left the most popular areas in the realms mostly intact( ie myth drannor, cormyr, waterdeep, baldur's gate)
pass: they made places like NEverwinter into cities from past lore, so now you can consdier Neverwinter the the 4e version of the 2e/3e version of Phlan .
pass: they altered the landscape in areas making other cities ruins ripe with monsters to fight.
I could go on, this my take on it, not the community's take on it and it may not even be accurate.
but as I said there is nothing to talk about until 5e returns the realms with a semi reset button.
I guess we will see what happens (before) after or during The Year of the Awakened Sleepers 1484...
Limbo Time 
While this forum is ostensibly edition neutral, there's not one damn thing being said about the 4E Realms (see sfdragon's list above) that hasn't been said already a thousand times before.
I'm excited to see what happens with the Realms. If the recent artwork samples are any indication, WotC is on the right track.
Now it's a small miracle to see a post made on this forum once every other day.
Chatter in all of the D&D forums has decreased dramatically during the current product lull limbo. But this forum still sees more chatter than many others (even if most of it is whining about 4e Realms ; )
I was a long-time lurker before joining, and the FR forums were some of the most active on the site (at least, they certainly seemed that way to me). There was always a buzz about something or other, and large discussions were commonplace.
Of course, by the time I bothered to create an account, the "beginning of the end" for that golden age was about to take off. It didn't even feel like things were slowing down, as much as they just came to an abrupt stop. Discussion dried up, a lot of the more prominent posters left in one fell swoop, and the place just sat here to gather dust.
I don't really feel hopeful that the dawn of 5E will breathe life back into this place, but you never know.
Im interested in looking at the 5e frcs.....
already sold my 4e one
I hope it does
Im interested in looking at the 5e frcs.....
already sold my 4e one
Lucky. I've been trying to sell mine for the longest time now. At this point I don't think I could give it away.
I have no problems with the 4E Realms in and of itself. Lack of products and lore killed the setting (And the Spellplague). Looking forward to the 5E Realms. Doubt I will mess with 5E, but I will check out the 5E Realms...
Everybody went to candlekeep. Candlekeep is very active.
I remember I created a CK account years ago, and posted all of three or four times. Candlekeep's layout is an eyesore - probably why I never really got into it. That, and when I first started browsing those forums, the "productive discussion" topics had given way to a flood of "4E is the devil and here's why" topics. It seemed... all too familiar. I imagine things are quite different now, obviously.
I have no problems with the 4E Realms in and of itself. Lack of products and lore killed the setting (And the Spellplague). Looking forward to the 5E Realms. Doubt I will mess with 5E, but I will check out the 5E Realms...
And these are pretty much my feelings, too. I definitely want to see what they have lined up for the Realms, but they have yet to sell me on 5E itself.
The funny thing is that I hated both 4E and the new version - or perversion as I probably called it in 2008 - of FR when they were both first released until I read a few actual play discussions on ENWorld and then saw Szass Tam's stat block and realised that this game was going to actually work in play.
Now, I type those two paragraphs without in anyway wanting to argue the points. I don't care. You like X. I like Y. He likes Z. That's life.
But the problem with these forums is that too many people - not so much now, obviously - simply want to go to war over how crappy 4E is and/or how crappy the 4E version of FR is. Look at sfdragon's post above: clearly he's still angry after 5 or so years, angry enough to type out about 300 or so words.
So I'm more than happy to chip in a positive way but people aren't here with positive experiences in the main.
As much as I like 4E and FR4E, it's clear WotC got it wrong - definitely in terms of FR4E; maybe 4E itself did OK but we will never know - but I also wouldn't be surprised if they get the next iteration "wrong" also. You can't please all the people all of the time.
Personally, I'm sticking with what I've got. I'm 44. I'm semi-retired but I have a young family now and I am living in a Third World country. I'm not in the market for the next version of D&D or the next version of the Realms.
But I'm still enjoying what I've got.
Everybody went to candlekeep. Candlekeep is very active.
It is more active than ever!
From the Gen Con 2013 catalog:
Confrontation at Candlekeep
Duration: 2 hours
Candlekeep is under siege, and it needs adventurers to help protect it! Heed the call to defend the legendary monastery and stand against the tide of evil. This adventure offers an interactive experience using the playtest rules, and participants receive the exclusive D&D Gen Con dice set. Optional pre-generated characters are available, and no prior D&D experience is necessary. D&D Next playtest restrictions will apply.
(I know, you meant the Candlekeep web site, but I couldn't resist)
I have no problems with the 4E Realms in and of itself. Lack of products and lore killed the setting (And the Spellplague). Looking forward to the 5E Realms. Doubt I will mess with 5E, but I will check out the 5E Realms...
The D&D Next approach already seems to be very different, and along the lines of what 4E Neverwinter did. 4E Neverwinter was a fantastic product, and we see the experience continued with two D&D Encounters seasons and an MMO.
Candlekeep is a one-time event, but Murder in Baldur's gate has seen enough info to tell us that it is an Encounters season, a gameday/Gen Con event, a setting and adventure product (perhaps similar to Neverwinter, perhaps bigger), and it is part of the Sundering saga introducing everyone to the changes coming to the Realms. The various Gen Con FR events can be seen here.
I'm primarily a Dark Sun and Greyhawk fan, but I'm very jealous of the treatment FR seems to be getting with D&D Next!
the list that of what was said was a bout what everyone said at the time and before and after its release. I sold the camapign book becuase it was taking up space and I no longer wanted it. kept the character guide and the essentials.
but as you pretty much said differetn strokes for different folks......
I have no problems with the 4E Realms in and of itself. Lack of products and lore killed the setting
The setting has actually been surprisingly active:
1) D&D Encounters has been having FR related adventures almost every week at game stores.
2) Bi-weekly FR related Lair assaults have also frequently been occurring in game stores
3) LFR continues to crank out FR adventures
4) Several FR related video games have been released recently
5) Ed Greenwood continues to write weekly FR articles for WotC
6) WotC has been releasing lots of FR novels
7) Almost all of WotC's new material is FR related (check out their releases from 3/12 to 12/13)
etc.
Indeed, with hundreds of LFR adventures, FR seems to have received more material in 4e than ever before
I'm completely in disbelief of the amount of FR setting material we have. While we can of course always dig deeper, there are tons of books, boxed sets, and novels covering the Realms. Books are often reprinted across several editions (and sometimes exist in a very similar form in 1E, 2E, and 3E). I know the hardcore want more (I want more Dark Sun setting material, sure), but it isn't easy to sell it and pay for the cost of printing and writing.
That said, I think the Murder in Baldur's Gate information we've seen is a possible avenue of approach. It seems to build on the Neverwinter concept and include much more to make it very appealing for any kind of fan (though still primarily DMs).
1) I don't play anything at game stores, D&D or otherwise, largely because the chairs used tend to murder my back, and the lack of ability to smoke in them. Not to mention that I don't much care for my LGS in the first place.
2) See above, but toss in that my gaming group tends to participate in very little combat oriented gaming from the word go. And really, there's not much lore you can stick into either 1 or 2 that would merit much discussion, well, around here anyway.
3) For that to be applicable, you'd kinda have to belong to RPGA, and while I appreciate what they do, it's just not my cup of tea. And while those do generate more lore than the previous two things you mentioned, for some reason a lot of folk around here never seem to bring it. I seem to recall a lot of sentiments vaguely hinting at (my impression at least) it not being 'real' lore, though I don't recall that ever being said outright. After having gone through the various Raven's Bluff books... well, I'm somewhat inclined to agree with the sentiment. Don't get me wrong, they were well written and maintained an internal coherency, it just felt like the city was a little alien compared to what we knew about the rest of the world for whatever reason.
4) Seriously? Given how much most games have gotten wrong, lore-wise, since the BG series, that's not saying a whole hell of a lot. Don't even get me started on the NWN series... you could sail a pirate fleet through the holes in lore that game has, much less what has come after. Mask of the Betrayer was the only one of them that was worth much, lore wise, though they all were pretty fun to play.
5) Sure, but if you've been paying attention, the discussion threads don't seem to attract much interest for whatever reason, though I couldn't say why, despite Plaguescarred's valiant efforts. Maybe they're discussed over on Candlekeep, couldn't say, that place hurts my eyes so I don't go, but they aren't around here, not much anyway.
6) Speaking solely for myself, I know I'm in the minority here on this, I don't read many of the novels, for this or any other setting, except for the occassional EG novel, and never have, so... besides that, those that remember the old fiascos concerning novels seem to avoid discussing them anyway. Edition wars are bad enough, no need to make things even worse I guess.
7) That mattering would require an active interest in 4e, which a lot of the folk around this board don't seem to have. I know I certainly don't have one, in either the ruleset which I find utterly inadequate to my particular needs, or the setting, which just isn't to my tastes in its current incarnation. Yet I still find myself coming to these boards... force of habit, hoping beyond hope, subconscious masochism... call it what you will, but I do.
And as GreenKnight pointed out, in terms of Lore, I doubt it amounts to much more than a couple of the old 3e sourcebooks, which were fairly lore-light compared to the 2e versions. Now don't take this post as an attack, it certainly isn't, I'm simply presenting my perspective to compare to yours. No idea if others share that opinion with me, beyond vague generalities based on personal observation, but there it is.
And as GreenKnight pointed out, in terms of Lore, I doubt it amounts to much more than a couple of the old 3e sourcebooks, which were fairly lore-light compared to the 2e versions.
I get a pretty good picture of what you don't like. ;) (I truly am just kidding here)
Seriously, what would you like to see? I'm especially asking that with the context that 2E setting books seemed to fare very poorly saleswise. They were expensive to write and had very limited appeal.
At a GameStorm convention early in 4E, Rob Heinsoo and Jonathan Tweet and Andy Collins were sharing how they didn't think the company could go deep into a particular setting. They said that if an undead book was published, it wouldn't be one for FR and one for Greyhawk, but rather one that would be of interest to all DMs and at times speak to individual setting differences. We saw that in 4E, though we did see a few concentrated Realms books (Neverwinter, Ed's book, etc.).
I think the reality is that a book on (insert a part of the FR setting here) isn't going to sell well. It never did sell well. With that in mind, what is it you want Wizards to create? What would keep you happy as a lore-hungry customer?
3) For that to be applicable, you'd kinda have to belong to RPGA
Actually no. Since over a year (maybe even two) ago everybody can just go to the website and download any adventure. No membership required, no reporting required, no checks at all
@Alphastream1 - Well, honestly what I'd like to see is the whole 2e catalogue being available as .pdfs, rather than whole new sourcebooks just rehashing the same old thing. I know that a selected few are available, but most of those I already have, at least last I looked.
As to setting specific books on undead and the like, I wouldn't want to see that at all, as I agree it's just a stupid idea from the start. It was one of the better things about 3e, though I couldn't speak to 4e, as I've never invested in it.
5e though... what I want out of it? Well, what I actually want is something I know I won't ever get out of it, that being a non-level based, largely classless system that one could mix and match as they see fit, sort of like Storyteller or M&M's 3e, where you just have a character concept and build up from there. But, that's never going to happen, especially with the focus of late on stuff like Encounters and Lairs, which really don't lend themselves to that sort of system, and that rely on characters being relatively balanced against each other. So realistically, I don't expect to invest in 5e as a system, but more as a source of inspiration. Ideally, under those circumstances, I'd want something that was slanted towards fluff, rather than crunch, at least where settings were concerned. Yeah, leave crunch to core, leave fluff to settings would sum up my hopes I guess. Doubt I'll get it, but it would be nice.
Otherwise, I'm in agreement with both mvincent and alphastream1; there's a tonne of FR material for 4E even if it is not as lore-heavy as 2E was. However, 2E lost tonnes of money. TSR was essentially a charity for FR fans.
The claim was made that "FR seems to have received more material in 4e than ever before", which is obviously wrong. Whatever you may think of TSR's business practices, the fact remains that no such thing is true as TSR produced an incredible amount of material for 2E. And even if we just talk 3E, there's no way anything produced during 4E can outweigh the 4,542 pages or so of Forgotten Realms lore published during that time, and I'm not counting Living City adventures in that. That's in contrast to the 768 pages of lore in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide, Forgotten Realms Player's Guide, Scepter Tower of Spellgard, and Neverwinter Campaign Setting (I have the feeling I'm missing a book, but for the life of me I can't remember what it might be). And those 768 pages are generous given how big the font is in the 4E books in comparison to that of the 3E supplements and how much empty white space you'll find (One of the first things I noticed about the 3E Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting was just how dense it was).
And personally I think it's pretty silly to count LFR adventures. How many of them offer any actual meaningful bits of FR lore versus a sourcebook? How much of that lore constitutes anything more than a handful of sentences? How much of it is something which will be recognized as canon later on, or ignored by designers who never read any of the LFR adventures or, if they did, they forgot all about what was in them? And how many of those adventures are so generic that you can copy/paste names and locations from some other campaign setting into the text and change absolutely nothing? It's silly to point to LFR adventures and say "Look, the 4E Realms has received a ton of lore because of them." Whatever small tidbits of lore they may have here and there, that doesn't compare to what's found in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, Magic of Faerun, Lords of Darkness, Monster Compendium: Monsters of Faerun, Faiths & Pantheons, Silver Marches, City of the Spider Queen, Races of Faerun, Unapproachable East, Underdark, Player's Guide to Faerun, Serpent Kingdoms, Shining South, Lost Empires of Faerun, Champions of Ruin, City of Splendors: Waterdeep, Champions of Valor, Sons of Gruumsh, Power of Faerun, Mysteries of the Moonsea, Dragons of Faerun, The Twilight Tomb, Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land, Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave, Expedition to Undermountain, Anauroch: The Empire of Shade, Grand History of the Realms, Into the Dragon's Lair, and whatever else I might be missing.
Living City was larger than LFR but covers several editions. Living City was often focused on one geographical area, while LFR covered the breadth of the setting. I never wrote for LC, but with LFR I did a lot of research into various areas. I was often surprised how little there was at a specific level, so I did add some (not a lot, I'm mindful of setting canon) as part of my writings.
Still, I think it is easy to overestimate the lore in products, especially 3E sourcebooks. I've read over many of them as I worked on writing assignments and been surprised by how little is actually said. Novels are the same way. There are at least 4 novels that cover Candlekeep, but they added virtually no lore to what was already stated (and what was in sourcebooks was surprisingly brief too).
But, I get it. What you are really saying is that you want to crack open a book and be filled with wonder about places, people, history, etc. within the setting. The challenge for all gaming companies is to avoid the situation where only a tiny number of your customers actually want a product. When you stamp "FR" on the cover, you've turned away everyone that doesn't prioritize (or like) FR. When you further make it an FR Underdark book, you've narrowed things down to the DMs that want to run an Underdark campaign (and arguably, those that don't look at the 3+ FR Underdark books on their shelf and scream "Enough already!").
It will be interesting to see what Next will attempt as a strategy. Murder in Baldur's Gate looks like a good start to me.
3) For that to be applicable, you'd kinda have to belong to RPGA
Actually no. Since over a year (maybe even two) ago everybody can just go to the website and download any adventure. No membership required, no reporting required, no checks at all
The problem with adventures is that they're not all that fun to read if you're into the Realms for the living story.
Has the RPGA (or whatever it's calling itself nowadays) or anyone else ever set down a summary of events regarding these adventures? Something a little more magazine article-like or bookish, and a lot less adventure?
Some sort of interface for those not interested in the RPGA that details what's going on in the Realms would be nice. That's where the disconnect is at, methinks.
On the subject of LFR, I really wish they'd done what Living Greyhawk did and made it so everyone in a specific region was adventuring in a particular region in the Realms. LFR sort of had that, as the Southeast US for instance was Aglarond, so technically I was in Aglarond, but it was pretty meaningless as you could play wherever you liked and didn't actually have to adventure in the region that corresponded to the area you lived in. For instance, I'm in Florida, so whenever I played a LG game I was in the Principality of Ulek, unless I left the state and played somewhere else, in which case I was now in the geographic region on the Living Greyhawk map that corresponded to the place I'd travelled to (I.E. If I visited my friend who moved to LA a few years back and played there my character would now be in Nyrond, while if I visited my cousin in New York and played there my character would now be adventuring in Keoland). If there's an RPGA campaign for 5E I hope that they take a page from Living Greyhawk and tie regions to corresponding areas in the setting and anyone in that region plays in that particular part of the setting. I don't know about anyone else, but it really did a lot to encourage RPGA play down here as everyone was invested in the Principality of Ulek. We'd probably have a ton of diehard Aglarondan patriots down here if LFR had been handled the same... well, that's also assuming that 4E wasn't as thoroughly unpopular down here as it is, too. That certainly also did a good job of putting a crimp in the RPGA spirit here.
I agree. When I started LG I knew nothing about our particular region, but since I was "stuck there for good or ill" I perceived everthing going on around there in a completly different light than I do LFR events. So what if we fail to save Cormyr? We can just move to the other side of the continent and pretend we had nothing to do with Cormyr's downfall. ;)
I really hope we'll see living campaigns in Next, but I fear all we'll get will be Lair Assault mayflies (where your'e character is a throw-away made for a single round and that's it) or Encounters nine days wonder (where your character lives for a couple of adventures but at the end is still supposed to be thrown away once the next season starts)
And I do agree that 3e was much lighter in lore than 2e was, and in terms of the Realms, it was very crunchy in comparison to comparable books in 2e. That 3e did away with the unreliable narrator approach was also something that bothered me, since that removed a lot of wriggle room for DMs. My biggest issue with the omniscient 3rd person used in 3e is that a lot of players developed this notion that this was the way it was in the Realms, and that if a DM changed things, they were getting it wrong somehow. To me, that was 3e's greatest vice, no matter how much the system improved upon 2e's mechanics. It was a very dry, terse description that offered little in the way of potential story hooks that was to be found in virtually every paragraph in 2e method (an exaggeration to be sure, but 2e allowed a lot of reading between the lines by comparison).
Honestly, with the benefit of hindsight, 3e was setting the Realms up for 4e, that there was some overwhelming darkness looming on the horizon, but despite all the signs leading to the obvious conclusion that we got, it never occurred that WotC would actually plunge the world into such a dark place. A darker place than I care to adventure in at least, so 4e lost my interest. Hopefully Next/5e will make it a bit more palatable to me.
Actually Misc, that was covered in point 5 up there in mvincent's post. Just sayin'...
Hrm...I looked but couldn't find what I was looking for.
And I do agree that 3e was much lighter in lore than 2e was, and in terms of the Realms, it was very crunchy in comparison to comparable books in 2e.
Depends on the 2E book.
If we're talking 2E Volo's Guides, there was no comparable book in 3E. Too bad, that.
If we're talking 2E's Faiths & Avatars or Powers & Pantheons, well those two books were the poster children for the majority of the 3E Realms hardbacks: packed with rules and dry information presented by an omniscient narrator.
And if you go by what the fly-in-and-out trolls believe, 3E was just a bunch of 2E reprinted anyway. Not that I do, mind. Those trolls are wrong because 3E expanded on much of what 2E introduced, by advancing the timeline and giving us updated information (sometimes by the same writers).
The advantage 2E has over 3E is that it came first. Thus it got to put the "this is new" stamp on a lot of things Realmsian. I think the attitude of "this is what's in the Realms, period" actually came about in 2E, not 3E, and 3E missed a chance to dial that back by keeping an unreliable narrator around.
In my opinion, 3E carried that omniscient view forward, it didn't introduce it.
This is one more reason why I like 4E's Eye on the Realms articles, because they bring back the unreliable narrator (narrators, actually). Those articles are like slices right out of a Volo's Guide.
I loved that aged parchment look.
To be fair though, there was quite a bit of lifting from 2e into 3e, but I don't really see that as a problem, since there are only so many ways to say things about the more obscure bits of Realmslore, that it made sense to do so. As I hinted above, my issue wasn't really with what was said, so much as it was with how it was said. Thinking about it though, 2e did introduce that omniscient narrator at the tail end of its run, and 3e did carry it forward as you said, but I suspect that was largely WotCs doing once it took over things.
I couldn't speak to the articles though, they aren't something I've ever read, since I've never subscribed to DDI. My loss perhaps, but given my lack of interest in 4e in general, and the 4e Realms in particular... hopefully 5e will change that and I can go back to giving money to WotC for a product I actually like, even if I doubt the ruleset will appeal much. But I can look past the crunch if the fluff is good enough.
I was pretty active on these forums for a few years, some of you may remember me. I left after 4th edition and the Spellplague, but what really drove me off was the new forum. It was nothing like what I was used to, the controls were weird, and I just could not be inspired to post. Given that most everyone else left and post rates dropped to a crawl, there wasn't much to post about either.
I tried Candlekeep for a while, but the forum set up there was even worse, and I just couldn't get into the community.
So I concentrated on work and study and my own games and play-by-post community at Role-Play onLine. Later I got into Wikia editing, and for over a year I've worked at the Forgotten Realms Wiki (speaking of which...).
I popped in here every few months or so, skimmed a little, but it seemed like nothing had changed. Really, all the same threads were up.
BadCatMan
And hey Catman, yeah I remeber you howz it goin? I personally dont mind onesite all in all, I like it better than gleemax, thats for sure, haha.
LFR adventures are hardly equivalent to setting material.
That might depend on one's definition, but it's still 'material'.
And I very much doubt everything you've listed equates to the dozens of books, hardcover books, and boxed sets released for the Realms in prior editions.
I actually meant 'greater than any other edition' (rather than all editions combined). But just the LFR adventures alone equate to over 70k of pages. Together with everything else, 4e has been the most prolific edition for FR.
Actually Misc, that was covered in point 5 up there in mvincent's post. Just sayin'...
Hrm...I looked but couldn't find what I was looking for.
I believe he meant that your statement of:
"Folks seem to be overlooking the Eye on the Realms articles. 43 of them (counting this month) and they're jam packed with informaiton. "
was countered by my earlier list containing:
"5) Ed Greenwood continues to write weekly FR articles for WotC"
To address that activity on a personal basis-
1) I don't play anything at game stores, D&D or otherwise, largely because the chairs used tend to murder my back, and the lack of ability to smoke in them. Not to mention that I don't much care for my LGS in the first place.
2) See above, but toss in that my gaming group tends to participate in very little combat oriented gaming from the word go. And really, there's not much lore you can stick into either 1 or 2 that would merit much discussion, well, around here anyway.
3) For that to be applicable, you'd kinda have to belong to RPGA, and while I appreciate what they do, it's just not my cup of tea. And while those do generate more lore than the previous two things you mentioned, for some reason a lot of folk around here never seem to bring it. I seem to recall a lot of sentiments vaguely hinting at (my impression at least) it not being 'real' lore, though I don't recall that ever being said outright. After having gone through the various Raven's Bluff books... well, I'm somewhat inclined to agree with the sentiment. Don't get me wrong, they were well written and maintained an internal coherency, it just felt like the city was a little alien compared to what we knew about the rest of the world for whatever reason.
4) Seriously? Given how much most games have gotten wrong, lore-wise, since the BG series, that's not saying a whole hell of a lot. Don't even get me started on the NWN series... you could sail a pirate fleet through the holes in lore that game has, much less what has come after. Mask of the Betrayer was the only one of them that was worth much, lore wise, though they all were pretty fun to play.
5) Sure, but if you've been paying attention, the discussion threads don't seem to attract much interest for whatever reason, though I couldn't say why, despite Plaguescarred's valiant efforts. Maybe they're discussed over on Candlekeep, couldn't say, that place hurts my eyes so I don't go, but they aren't around here, not much anyway.
6) Speaking solely for myself, I know I'm in the minority here on this, I don't read many of the novels, for this or any other setting, except for the occassional EG novel, and never have, so... besides that, those that remember the old fiascos concerning novels seem to avoid discussing them anyway. Edition wars are bad enough, no need to make things even worse I guess.
7) That mattering would require an active interest in 4e, which a lot of the folk around this board don't seem to have. I know I certainly don't have one, in either the ruleset which I find utterly inadequate to my particular needs, or the setting, which just isn't to my tastes in its current incarnation. Yet I still find myself coming to these boards... force of habit, hoping beyond hope, subconscious masochism... call it what you will, but I do.
And as GreenKnight pointed out, in terms of Lore, I doubt it amounts to much .
Thank you for digesting my earlier list!
(and yes, I understand you're not trying to 'debate'):1) After runnin them at game stores, I often run these adventures for my homes groups. They can also be obtained on ebay (for huge prices), but chances are good that WotC will eventually release them in Dungeon magazine (as they've already started to do so).
2) It's not lore that I want (earlier books provided plenty of that), so much as awesome material for running a top-notch game. And lair assaults have provided some of the most incredible play-aids I've ever encountered.
3) As others mentioned: LFR adventures are available free here. Initially there were all very 'official' (i.e. any new stats in them were even incorporated into the online compendium). But Ed Greenwood seems to be ignoring any lore from them, so I guess that's going to make their lore portions unofficial.
4) Video game products aren't for introducing lore so much as indicating that a setting is still alive and being used (which is what my list was intented to indicate).
5) Ed Greenwood material is tl:dr for many players (self included). The setting has long drawn text oriented players, but now it's drawing a different crowd.
6) I don't read the novels either, but their sheer numbers again go to show how active the setting is.
7) Actually, much of the new new material from 3/12 to 12/13 (beside being all FR) is edition neutral.
Again, I completely agree that most of this is not lore-related (which is probably what you prefer), but that's not what I was trying to list (plus, non-lore stuff is exactly what I want
). Indeed (given the contention of the changes) it's seems like a good thing that 4e material did not focus much on lore.Open access to play random dungeons, or, a DM could moderate the game while you play, or, you could play a pre generated module with your friends, and Im thinking 6 to a group for softwarw management reasons and game flow with the game engine. It seems like these guys got everything they need right here in front of them to me. So why not use it all, and make a random engine using all this great information.......????????
HINT HINT HINT.....Design Team where are you at now ????
Troy Denning as an author?
I liked his first Dark Sun book & that campaign was just wicked bleak. I had the boxed set & intended to do grand things with it but ended up selling it along with some other RPG stuff years ago when I was really low on cash.
However, as a Realms author, his work just left me cold.
Douglas Niles? Moonshae was neat but......
Maztica? Really? Conquistadors & the whole thing? Blech.
David Cook? Garbage.
The Tuigan? Do we really need to revisit the Mongolian Horde invasions in a FANTASY campaign?
Even the Moonshaes were not part of Greenwood's FR concept. (Although I like the Moonshae Isles myself.)
But it seems that few authors, other than Greenwood who crafted the FR long ago, could seem to grasp a story that wasn't some retelling of our own world's history. Sadly, all his bosses ever seemed to want was more and more Elminster. Now I enjoy Elminster, don't get me wrong. But he should be a remote figure that MIGHT be consulted as a SAGE and not be influencing my FR world as much as he does in the books.
So when all this turned into a huge mess leaving so many fans like myself turned off, they threw in things like the Spellplague and other catastrophes so they could do away with it all & start fresh.
(This has been done by both Marvel and DC comics when they wanted to essentially start over.)
Mulhorand? Chessenta?
Why do these places have to look SO much like Egypt & Rome?
Why do authors feel the need to write stories which reflect upon real world occurences consisting of the Spanish exploration and conquest of South America, the Mongolian invasion of Europe and Asia and other things that (IMHO) can crush the fantasy right out of a Fantasy RPG world as brilliant as the FR?
One, is a singular lack of imagination to come up with an original concept.
Two is marketing. There will always be players who want their barbarian to resemble a Mongolian or have their characters explore a stepped pyramid in a steaming, tropical jungle.
I take no issue with a player that wants a character he can relate to like that. But to give the idea it's own supplement or boxed set? (Why in the world did the Horselords warrant an ENTIRE boxed set? WHY?) At least Tolkien's Riders of Rohan resembled Vikings who rode horses instead of sailed in long ships. Nice twist there if you ask me.
Just about any writer will at some point have an idea that is heavily influenced by their knowledge of real world history. It's inevitable.
What we all look for is that cool, jaw-dropping, original idea that leaves us wanting more & more.
The FR Grey Box did that from page one! Face it. It was (and still is) AMAZING stuff!
Simply incredible!
Netheril? A lost world where magic was so commonplace that the miraculous became mundane?
Imagine the possibilities!
Lantan? A land populated by a race of people who embrace incredible technology. (Kinda makes me think of what is hinted at in Blackmoor so long ago but it's still an idea with endless possibilities.)
These are places that are only hinted at in the Grey Box and it left you just wanting to DO something with it!
Why weren't these concepts taken to the next level early on instead of flooding the market with books written by authors who IMHO were less than capable of the task?
(My honest feeling is that we saw a bunch of no-talent hacks getting books published and it left me wondering why I even bothered to read that trash. There's about 18 hours of my life in reading that crap that I will never get back.)
Granted, there have been some pretty dramatic changes in the game system and here we are, looking at D&DN and a whole bunch of people are gonna be expected to by all the books, supplements and what have you, only to find within a few years, those rules aren't working anymore & it's time yet again for another change.)
Balderdash!
I cry foul and I refuse to spend another dime on any of this new drivel. I've been left disappointed for far too long and even when 2E came along & I bought all the stuff, the material, artwork and general presentation was already killing the D&D "feel" for me & my friends.
The coolest thing WotC did so far was reprint all the old books. (I bought the PHB, DMG, MM and UA in one trip to Columbus & a visit to two stores.) Kudos!
Why can't someone get back into the Grey Box, perhaps sort through the cooler supplements such as The Savage Frontier (EXCELLENT supplement & one of the best for the FR) and start building again from that?
I run a Realms campaign and I mostly use the Grey Box, Waterdeep and the North, Dwarves Deep, Savage Frontier and of course, the first Undermountain boxed set. (I also cheat a little and use Greenwood's "The Five Shires" which was written of regular D&D. If you haven't read this, I HIGHLY reccommend it, if you want to see just how cool Halflings can get!)
What else do you need for a game?
You know what campaign gives me the most grief though?
Oriental Adventures.
The lands in that part of the FR so closely resemble the various countries and cultures of our real world Asia that it hardly looks like fantasy anymore.
Koryo? Korea.
Wa? Okinawa.
Tabot? Tibet.
I had to do some serious revamping and even pretty much dismantled some of the traditional religious concepts such as Buddhism & Shintoism in favor of an actual OA pantheon with the Gods of the FR (Grey Box) given homage (along with different names and symbols) versus a Celestial Bureaucracy.
It works better for us.
Certainly we have Samurai & Ninja but my Kozakura looks more like Ninja Scroll than it does Feudal Japan.
Take movies like "36th Chamber of Shaolin" "Kung-Fu Hustle" "Kid with the Golden Arm" and of course "Five Deadly Venoms"give it a dash of the Mortal Kombat idea of Martial Arts used as Dark Sorcery, a pinch of "Big Trouble in Little China" and out of that mess, you see my idea for the lands of Shou Lung and Tu Lung.
Life is cheap. Brutal death by plague, sorcery and sword is commonplace.
A world that desperately needs heroes.
I'm only bringing this up because I still use the FR & OA trail maps (as beat up as they are now) for my FR world. The two connect and it's just a MASSIVE place.
Of course you're gonna see some influences of real world experiences and ideas & that can hardly be avoided but it's our job as DM's & Players to create OUR worlds through playing the game.
Hopefully, there are enough good DMs out there who are willing to put in the work and offer their friends something new and exciting as well as challenging.
Despite whatever the corporation is doing to the game.
Don't let anything published, novel or game supplement, rulebook or manual, take away from your D&D!
Just keep on playing!
Dungeonmaster314
Recently though, we've made a retun to FR, we wanted to stay true to canon so we jumped timelines to the present and what I found is that there just isn't enough material out there to compensate the 100 year gap. Literraly everything is gone or changed, and all you are left with is a limited source of material provided by 4E. Not to mention 90% of NPCs are now dead with the passage of time.
I mean if you are going to destroy xyz lore , then you need to replace it with something. If I have to make up everything then I may as well create my own world, it will be just as labour intensive.
I'm also not a fan of the new fantastical aspects (dragonborn and tieflings being common, motes, feywild and shadowfell and so on..) but I really think that is a matter of taste.
Personally, my group stopped playing Forgotten Realms because our DMs got more creative over time and started to build their own worlds. The d20 open gaming license also aloud us to explore new lines such as Star Wars, Conan, A Game of Thrones and so on.
Recently though, we've made a retun to FR, we wanted to stay true to canon so we jumped timelines to the present and what I found is that there just isn't enough material out there to compensate the 100 year gap. Literraly everything is gone or changed, and all you are left with is a limited source of material provided by 4E. Not to mention 90% of NPCs are now dead with the passage of time.
I mean if you are going to destroy xyz lore , then you need to replace it with something. If I have to make up everything then I may as well create my own world, it will be just as labour intensive.
I'm also not a fan of the new fantastical aspects (dragonborn and tieflings being common, motes, feywild and shadowfell and so on..) but I really think that is a matter of taste.
Glad to see you're back in the Realms.
Even I had to take a break from it and my one critique of the Grey Box (and it's not really a critique) is that there is SO much information there, what with Red Wizards, Zhentarim, Dragon Cult, Myth Drannor, Waterdeep, Cormyr, The Dalelands and on and on that it's like having everything you ever want in a buffet but only having a tiny saucer upon which to put your food.
You want to use it ALL!
So now I'm back to running Greyhawk & I haven't used Greyhawk in years! Great campagin world, very open-ended with plenty of room for DM development and creativity!
I am in TOTAL agreement with you on the more exotic stuff.
Dragonborn, Tieflings, Feystepping Feyfolk all totally unnecessary and just not fitting with our gaming style & spirit when it comes to D&D.
It's more like World of Warcraft: The Analog Version.
I love me some WoW but as I've said in another post somewhere on here, I haven't played in MONTHS which shows how little interest it holds for me since I enjoy creating adventures & characters for my dice rolling RPGs.
We do a lot of "roleplaying" as well as "roll playing" here too.
I think we found the balance for our game long ago since D&D isn't a "story" driven by the DM but at it's heart, a game where at some point, talk becomes cheap and you just gotta bounce some dice & see how well you do.
Sometimes you're lucky & sometimes you're not. You gotta love/hate the dice.
I only wonder, do the corporate entities at WotC listen to their fans? I have some hope since they reprinted the 1E books. There has been a HUGE online, resurgence of Old School players banding together to discuss, debate and bounce ideas around about the game.
More blogs & forums than I care to even think about!
Hopefully, WotC got their idea for reprinting the old books from seeing all this.
(There was even an article in some magazine like US Today or some such about 4 years ago, I forget which title, which talked about all these middle aged guys, digging into their closets & attics and breaking out all their old D&D books and playing again! Basically, it talked about how this has become one of the latest forms of mid-life crisis but it was written so that it wasn't insulting and was actually very endearing.)
I know many people wouls say, "We want our D&D back!" and I get why they say it.
I say our D&D (THANKFULLY) never left and we keep doing what we do as long as we have notebooks, dice and pencils!
Game on!
Dingeonmaster314
Actually Misc, that was covered in point 5 up there in mvincent's post. Just sayin'...
Hrm...I looked but couldn't find what I was looking for.
I believe he meant that your statement of:
"Folks seem to be overlooking the Eye on the Realms articles. 43 of them (counting this month) and they're jam packed with informaiton. "
was countered by my earlier list containing:
"5) Ed Greenwood continues to write weekly FR articles for WotC"
Ed writes two kinds of articles (currently).
1) Eye on the Realms articles, which are monthly, in Dragon Magazine. That's what I was talking about.
2) Forging the Realms articles, which are weekly, posted on the Wotc site for free. Those are what you were talking about.
********************
Forgive me for being a little curmudgeonly, but I think the people who say "there's just not that much 4E lore" don't want to bother looking for it before they level that statement.
There's not as much lore as before, sure, but that's because the setting hasn't had another twenty years to grow.
The lore that's out there, such as in the Eye artices, is good. The equal of anything that's come before.
I don't know why people seem to need an entire encyclopedia filling their shelves before they can be bothered to read a new piece of information. The information's still just as good, either way.
The Realms started dying when the whole Time of Troubles trilogy hit the shelves.
Troy Denning as an author?
I liked his first Dark Sun book & that campaign was just wicked bleak. I had the boxed set & intended to do grand things with it but ended up selling it along with some other RPG stuff years ago when I was really low on cash.
However, as a Realms author, his work just left me cold.
Douglas Niles? Moonshae was neat but......
Maztica? Really? Conquistadors & the whole thing? Blech.
David Cook? Garbage.
The Tuigan? Do we really need to revisit the Mongolian Horde invasions in a FANTASY campaign?
Even the Moonshaes were not part of Greenwood's FR concept. (Although I like the Moonshae Isles myself.)
But it seems that few authors, other than Greenwood who crafted the FR long ago, could seem to grasp a story that wasn't some retelling of our own world's history. Sadly, all his bosses ever seemed to want was more and more Elminster. Now I enjoy Elminster, don't get me wrong. But he should be a remote figure that MIGHT be consulted as a SAGE and not be influencing my FR world as much as he does in the books.
So when all this turned into a huge mess leaving so many fans like myself turned off, they threw in things like the Spellplague and other catastrophes so they could do away with it all & start fresh.
(This has been done by both Marvel and DC comics when they wanted to essentially start over.)
Mulhorand? Chessenta?
Why do these places have to look SO much like Egypt & Rome?
Why do authors feel the need to write stories which reflect upon real world occurences consisting of the Spanish exploration and conquest of South America, the Mongolian invasion of Europe and Asia and other things that (IMHO) can crush the fantasy right out of a Fantasy RPG world as brilliant as the FR?
One, is a singular lack of imagination to come up with an original concept.
Two is marketing. There will always be players who want their barbarian to resemble a Mongolian or have their characters explore a stepped pyramid in a steaming, tropical jungle.
I take no issue with a player that wants a character he can relate to like that. But to give the idea it's own supplement or boxed set? (Why in the world did the Horselords warrant an ENTIRE boxed set? WHY?) At least Tolkien's Riders of Rohan resembled Vikings who rode horses instead of sailed in long ships. Nice twist there if you ask me.
Just about any writer will at some point have an idea that is heavily influenced by their knowledge of real world history. It's inevitable.
What we all look for is that cool, jaw-dropping, original idea that leaves us wanting more & more.
The FR Grey Box did that from page one! Face it. It was (and still is) AMAZING stuff!
Simply incredible!
Netheril? A lost world where magic was so commonplace that the miraculous became mundane?
Imagine the possibilities!
Lantan? A land populated by a race of people who embrace incredible technology. (Kinda makes me think of what is hinted at in Blackmoor so long ago but it's still an idea with endless possibilities.)
These are places that are only hinted at in the Grey Box and it left you just wanting to DO something with it!
Why weren't these concepts taken to the next level early on instead of flooding the market with books written by authors who IMHO were less than capable of the task?
(My honest feeling is that we saw a bunch of no-talent hacks getting books published and it left me wondering why I even bothered to read that trash. There's about 18 hours of my life in reading that crap that I will never get back.)
Granted, there have been some pretty dramatic changes in the game system and here we are, looking at D&DN and a whole bunch of people are gonna be expected to by all the books, supplements and what have you, only to find within a few years, those rules aren't working anymore & it's time yet again for another change.)
Balderdash!
I cry foul and I refuse to spend another dime on any of this new drivel. I've been left disappointed for far too long and even when 2E came along & I bought all the stuff, the material, artwork and general presentation was already killing the D&D "feel" for me & my friends.
The coolest thing WotC did so far was reprint all the old books. (I bought the PHB, DMG, MM and UA in one trip to Columbus & a visit to two stores.) Kudos!
Why can't someone get back into the Grey Box, perhaps sort through the cooler supplements such as The Savage Frontier (EXCELLENT supplement & one of the best for the FR) and start building again from that?
I run a Realms campaign and I mostly use the Grey Box, Waterdeep and the North, Dwarves Deep, Savage Frontier and of course, the first Undermountain boxed set. (I also cheat a little and use Greenwood's "The Five Shires" which was written of regular D&D. If you haven't read this, I HIGHLY reccommend it, if you want to see just how cool Halflings can get!)
What else do you need for a game?
You know what campaign gives me the most grief though?
Oriental Adventures.
The lands in that part of the FR so closely resemble the various countries and cultures of our real world Asia that it hardly looks like fantasy anymore.
Koryo? Korea.
Wa? Okinawa.
Tabot? Tibet.
I had to do some serious revamping and even pretty much dismantled some of the traditional religious concepts such as Buddhism & Shintoism in favor of an actual OA pantheon with the Gods of the FR (Grey Box) given homage (along with different names and symbols) versus a Celestial Bureaucracy.
It works better for us.
Certainly we have Samurai & Ninja but my Kozakura looks more like Ninja Scroll than it does Feudal Japan.
Take movies like "36th Chamber of Shaolin" "Kung-Fu Hustle" "Kid with the Golden Arm" and of course "Five Deadly Venoms"give it a dash of the Mortal Kombat idea of Martial Arts used as Dark Sorcery, a pinch of "Big Trouble in Little China" and out of that mess, you see my idea for the lands of Shou Lung and Tu Lung.
Life is cheap. Brutal death by plague, sorcery and sword is commonplace.
A world that desperately needs heroes.
I'm only bringing this up because I still use the FR & OA trail maps (as beat up as they are now) for my FR world. The two connect and it's just a MASSIVE place.
Of course you're gonna see some influences of real world experiences and ideas & that can hardly be avoided but it's our job as DM's & Players to create OUR worlds through playing the game.
Hopefully, there are enough good DMs out there who are willing to put in the work and offer their friends something new and exciting as well as challenging.
Despite whatever the corporation is doing to the game.
Don't let anything published, novel or game supplement, rulebook or manual, take away from your D&D!
Just keep on playing!
Dungeonmaster314
DM3.14
if i could playtest id know what im talking about. im buying a new laptop tomorrow.
Actually Misc, that was covered in point 5 up there in mvincent's post. Just sayin'...
Hrm...I looked but couldn't find what I was looking for.
I believe he meant that your statement of:
"Folks seem to be overlooking the Eye on the Realms articles. 43 of them (counting this month) and they're jam packed with informaiton. "
was countered by my earlier list containing:
"5) Ed Greenwood continues to write weekly FR articles for WotC"
Ed writes two kinds of articles (currently).
1) Eye on the Realms articles, which are monthly, in Dragon Magazine. That's what I was talking about.
2) Forging the Realms articles, which are weekly, posted on the Wotc site for free. Those are what you were talking about.
********************
Forgive me for being a little curmudgeonly, but I think the people who say "there's just not that much 4E lore" don't want to bother looking for it before they level that statement.
There's not as much lore as before, sure, but that's because the setting hasn't had another twenty years to grow.
The lore that's out there, such as in the Eye artices, is good. The equal of anything that's come before.
I don't know why people seem to need an entire encyclopedia filling their shelves before they can be bothered to read a new piece of information. The information's still just as good, either way.
I understand where you are coming from but here is my argument.
Its no secret that the spellplague and 100 year gap changed everything. Take the Cult of the Dragon or any 'organization' for instance. You will find plenty of information on these products throughout the years especially in books such as Cult of the Dragon (2E) Lords of Darkness (3.5), Dragons of Faerun (3.5).
In 4E, you get a few paragraphs here in there.
My argument is, if you are going to wipe out the entire world with a cataclysm and huge time gap, then you had better replace all the information. What happened to the cult after Sammaster's death and the spellplague? Who are the rulers? etc.
And that's the problem... we have no idea who the new monarchs, rulers and major NPCs are (they are all DEAD!)... were essentially starting over and that's very frustrating when you have all this amazing material from 2E/3E that you essentially can't use without breaking canon.
Ed writes two kinds of articles (currently).
1) Eye on the Realms articles, which are monthly, in Dragon Magazine. That's what I was talking about.
2) Forging the Realms articles, which are weekly, posted on the Wotc site for free. Those are what you were talking about.
Sweet. Thanks for the information!
the free ones are pretty good.
there is new lore yeah, but not a whole lot ofi t
it had 20 years to grow in the past, it did not have 20 years to grow on the 4e stuff.
this is also true, but say in another 20 years it grows and then the players who liked it then start holding it in disdain... and then it would be a 20 year old flop.(and dont even go that in another 20 years it could be the bang ofr my buck, yeah I already know that)
but I so a gree with who said they needed to replace what they took out with stuff.
My definition of continueity is and will always be never remove always add. the old lore would have still mattered even with the time jump it would have still mattered, this would have made the grand history of the realms and lost empires of the realms and other older materials quite valuable.
sure many of the npcs would ahve been dead, this wouldn't have been a problem, we'd have new ones to love to hate and love and all, even with a few old ones still around.
and the axing off of the deities was a waist of ink and a waist of paper.
That would require a DDI subscription silly Misc!
I wouldnt say its required, but it certainly helps!
That would require a DDI subscription silly Misc!
I wouldnt say its required, but it certainly helps!
Leeching off friends helps too... But, you didn't hear that from me
Anyway, the Eye On articles have been fun reads to say the least. Plus, there's always something I can borrow for a Realms game! (The Haunted Tower of Calimshan from several months ago got utilized for a game)
Haunted Tower of Calimshan? Sounds interesting, I think I may have missed that one somehow.
It's from September! Enjoy
The Realms started dying when the whole Time of Troubles trilogy hit the shelves.
Troy Denning as an author?
I liked his first Dark Sun book & that campaign was just wicked bleak. I had the boxed set & intended to do grand things with it but ended up selling it along with some other RPG stuff years ago when I was really low on cash.
However, as a Realms author, his work just left me cold.
Douglas Niles? Moonshae was neat but......
Maztica? Really? Conquistadors & the whole thing? Blech.
David Cook? Garbage.
The Tuigan? Do we really need to revisit the Mongolian Horde invasions in a FANTASY campaign?
Even the Moonshaes were not part of Greenwood's FR concept. (Although I like the Moonshae Isles myself.)
But it seems that few authors, other than Greenwood who crafted the FR long ago, could seem to grasp a story that wasn't some retelling of our own world's history. Sadly, all his bosses ever seemed to want was more and more Elminster. Now I enjoy Elminster, don't get me wrong. But he should be a remote figure that MIGHT be consulted as a SAGE and not be influencing my FR world as much as he does in the books.
So when all this turned into a huge mess leaving so many fans like myself turned off, they threw in things like the Spellplague and other catastrophes so they could do away with it all & start fresh.
(This has been done by both Marvel and DC comics when they wanted to essentially start over.)
Mulhorand? Chessenta?
Why do these places have to look SO much like Egypt & Rome?
Why do authors feel the need to write stories which reflect upon real world occurences consisting of the Spanish exploration and conquest of South America, the Mongolian invasion of Europe and Asia and other things that (IMHO) can crush the fantasy right out of a Fantasy RPG world as brilliant as the FR?
One, is a singular lack of imagination to come up with an original concept.
Two is marketing. There will always be players who want their barbarian to resemble a Mongolian or have their characters explore a stepped pyramid in a steaming, tropical jungle.
I take no issue with a player that wants a character he can relate to like that. But to give the idea it's own supplement or boxed set? (Why in the world did the Horselords warrant an ENTIRE boxed set? WHY?) At least Tolkien's Riders of Rohan resembled Vikings who rode horses instead of sailed in long ships. Nice twist there if you ask me.
Just about any writer will at some point have an idea that is heavily influenced by their knowledge of real world history. It's inevitable.
What we all look for is that cool, jaw-dropping, original idea that leaves us wanting more & more.
The FR Grey Box did that from page one! Face it. It was (and still is) AMAZING stuff!
Simply incredible!
Netheril? A lost world where magic was so commonplace that the miraculous became mundane?
Imagine the possibilities!
Lantan? A land populated by a race of people who embrace incredible technology. (Kinda makes me think of what is hinted at in Blackmoor so long ago but it's still an idea with endless possibilities.)
These are places that are only hinted at in the Grey Box and it left you just wanting to DO something with it!
Why weren't these concepts taken to the next level early on instead of flooding the market with books written by authors who IMHO were less than capable of the task?
(My honest feeling is that we saw a bunch of no-talent hacks getting books published and it left me wondering why I even bothered to read that trash. There's about 18 hours of my life in reading that crap that I will never get back.)
Granted, there have been some pretty dramatic changes in the game system and here we are, looking at D&DN and a whole bunch of people are gonna be expected to by all the books, supplements and what have you, only to find within a few years, those rules aren't working anymore & it's time yet again for another change.)
Balderdash!
I cry foul and I refuse to spend another dime on any of this new drivel. I've been left disappointed for far too long and even when 2E came along & I bought all the stuff, the material, artwork and general presentation was already killing the D&D "feel" for me & my friends.
The coolest thing WotC did so far was reprint all the old books. (I bought the PHB, DMG, MM and UA in one trip to Columbus & a visit to two stores.) Kudos!
Why can't someone get back into the Grey Box, perhaps sort through the cooler supplements such as The Savage Frontier (EXCELLENT supplement & one of the best for the FR) and start building again from that?
I run a Realms campaign and I mostly use the Grey Box, Waterdeep and the North, Dwarves Deep, Savage Frontier and of course, the first Undermountain boxed set. (I also cheat a little and use Greenwood's "The Five Shires" which was written of regular D&D. If you haven't read this, I HIGHLY reccommend it, if you want to see just how cool Halflings can get!)
What else do you need for a game?
You know what campaign gives me the most grief though?
Oriental Adventures.
The lands in that part of the FR so closely resemble the various countries and cultures of our real world Asia that it hardly looks like fantasy anymore.
Koryo? Korea.
Wa? Okinawa.
Tabot? Tibet.
I had to do some serious revamping and even pretty much dismantled some of the traditional religious concepts such as Buddhism & Shintoism in favor of an actual OA pantheon with the Gods of the FR (Grey Box) given homage (along with different names and symbols) versus a Celestial Bureaucracy.
It works better for us.
Certainly we have Samurai & Ninja but my Kozakura looks more like Ninja Scroll than it does Feudal Japan.
Take movies like "36th Chamber of Shaolin" "Kung-Fu Hustle" "Kid with the Golden Arm" and of course "Five Deadly Venoms"give it a dash of the Mortal Kombat idea of Martial Arts used as Dark Sorcery, a pinch of "Big Trouble in Little China" and out of that mess, you see my idea for the lands of Shou Lung and Tu Lung.
Life is cheap. Brutal death by plague, sorcery and sword is commonplace.
A world that desperately needs heroes.
I'm only bringing this up because I still use the FR & OA trail maps (as beat up as they are now) for my FR world. The two connect and it's just a MASSIVE place.
Of course you're gonna see some influences of real world experiences and ideas & that can hardly be avoided but it's our job as DM's & Players to create OUR worlds through playing the game.
Hopefully, there are enough good DMs out there who are willing to put in the work and offer their friends something new and exciting as well as challenging.
Despite whatever the corporation is doing to the game.
Don't let anything published, novel or game supplement, rulebook or manual, take away from your D&D!
Just keep on playing!
Dungeonmaster314
DM3.14
if i could playtest id know what im talking about. im buying a new laptop tomorrow.
Soulstorm,
I'm not sure what you mean by "playtest" and if you mean playtest in our campaign, sadly, I'm not running an online game or PBM (play by mail) ].
When my joined the military and went off to Japan, we continued our game PBM. It was a LOT of work and of course we did mostly "roleplaying" since dice bouncing was SO impractical.
(We didn't have much internet then.)
I have heard of people playing via Skype or some other chat format using webcams & the whole deal but we haven't tried that here.
Our game is a good, old-fashioned, sit around the table & eat tons of food/snacks and make fun of people who drop their dice on the floor.
If you're anywhere close to Ohio, you would be more than welcome to sit for a session.
If I ever decide to set something up for playing by chat or email, you'll be the first to know.
Best of luck with the new laptop!
Dungeonmaster314
My argument is, if you are going to wipe out the entire world with a cataclysm and huge time gap, then you had better replace all the information. What happened to the cult after Sammaster's death and the spellplague? Who are the rulers? etc.
This doesn't read to me as an argument so much as an expectation. I can see where you're coming from, but have you considered what it would take to get a perfect summary of events covering a 100 year period for every major organization that's ever seen print?
I don't think most Realms fans (or casual gamers) are willing to pay $100+ for a Ptolus-sized sourcebook. And make no mistake, that's the minimum you'd need just to get started on replacing all the information from the pre-Spellplague Realms.
And that's the problem... we have no idea who the new monarchs, rulers and major NPCs are (they are all DEAD!)... were essentially starting over and that's very frustrating when you have all this amazing material from 2E/3E that you essentially can't use without breaking canon.
Reading the FRCG, I see that quite a few monarchs and rulers are listed, for every major nation or city state the book covers. The Backdrop articles in Dragon and Dungeon have done a good job of filling in the gaps too.
But I see where you're coming from: they (WotC) did hit the reset button and make it so we're all starting over again. If you're into the details and/or aren't the sort of DM that likes to do the heavy lifing, it's like being left out in the cold if your favorite area or aspect of the Realms isn't getting any attention.
I don't agree with your position that breaking canon is a problem, because I don't know that many DMs or players who are all so well versed in the lore that the only option open to them is to play a close-to-Canon-as-possible, living story type of Realms campaign.
The last three campaigns I've been a part of included at most one Realms expert, one person who'd read a novel or three and thre rest either hadn't heard of the setting or only knew it as a place you could play D&D in.
If all or most of your players aren't well versed in the Realms, that old material (such as on the Cult of the Dragon) is absolutely, positively still useful in the post-Spellplague Realms. It's practically a crime not to use it.
Likewise it's easy to backport new lore into games set in the Realms of the 1300s.
For example: I've taken liberally from the latest trio of Elminster novels for my last campaign set in Cormyr. Three books worth of noble family names, Royal Palace room names, plots, character descriptions...really, those 4E-era books are just packed and all the little plots and subplots work great in a campaign set in the pre-Spellplague Realms.
Currently I view the Realms now much as I did when we had the Grey Box and not much else: everything is up for grabs and we have a free pass to do what we want with it. It's way more friendly to DMs who like to flext their muscles and work within a framework that they can fill in, in any number of ways.
It took some getting used to, but I like that the Realms is being filled in at a slower pace.
...but sadly Mulhorand got vacuumed off the map, replaced with Tymanther or Akanul or whatever, and Thay was totally wrecked by Szass Tam's ritual and became a nation of undead. So much for that plot thread.
So for me the Spellplague and 4th edition, even the last years of Grand History, everything published after, is good place to draw the line. Before that is everything I want to work with. After that is everything I'm not interested in and can't be bothered following. Even if some great stuff is turned out now, even if Ed Greenwood or someone with talent is writing it, I'm just not interested.
The biggest missed opportunity with Mulhorand and Unther was to see the religiously inspired grand empire and allies bogged down in a bloody war with a much weaker, broken eastern country recently freed of tyranny but fractured between rival factions, tribes, and religious fanatics, and battling guerilla fighters, insurgents, and terrorists and foreign interference, while refugees flee to neighbouring lands, and all the problems and crimes of both sides. You know what I'm getting at.
It would have been a great opportunity for the setting to step up, mature, and explore real issues, rather than stuffing around with RSEs, generic fantasy, and repeating ancient history. The Realms could have kicked Eberron and its Last War to the curb. There are so many wasted opportunities to do so many amazing things.
I currently have my PCs hunting for Untheric Tiamatan terrorists at the Thulbanian Games in Chessenta. Bluespawn monsters burst out of the road to blow people up indiscriminately as they slaughtered Mulhorandi soldiers, while an assassin tried to slay a Mulhorandi general (then I mismanaged the adventure and got bogged down in waiting for PCs and need to kick it into action again, sigh). I've described Sharran cultists in Cormyr in similar terms. I've also used lycanthropy as a metaphor for paedophilia. I see no reason why a D&D game or setting can't deal with serious issues and operate as proper fiction.
I already took the decision to use pre spellplague FR in combination with Pathfinder rules
I doubt I will buy any of the new FR books. I feel my existing collection is good enough to last a lifetime and I already took the decision to make non canon campaigns by ignoring the spellplague + timejump, that is, it is no longer critical for me to make sure I get all the new books in case there was some lore affecting the part of the timeline I use for campaigns
In the old days, that is, prior to the spellplague did i of course buy every new and old FR product I could find for sale since I wanted a complete edition.
Last time i was in a roleplaying shop (a few days ago) did i notice there was some new 4e FR roleplaying books i did not have. I took a look at them, decided they did not contain anything worth buying and then I went over to the desk in order to pick up a pathfinder book i had ordered.
It is fine with me if WOTC wants to make campaign books for the new 4E fans because it is unlikely they could make anything there would convince me to buy it.
so you too joined the pathfinder side........ just like silversword.
Well, i actually brough a few Golarion books for some of the traits when making pathfinder characters but I have already concluded that I do not want to make campaigns in Golarion. Pre spellplague FR and good old birthright are more interesting for me and especially if I use pathfinder rules. Seems to be a much improved version of 3.5
Even though pathfinder and prespellplague FR rules would i be willing to play in other campaigns and rulesystems if one of my old friends suddenly called and said "we have not talked for some years but would you be interested to play in this new campaign I am going to make"
so you too joined the pathfinder side........ just like silversword.
What!? Just because I said I played it a couple times doesnt mean I joined any sides!!! Fly skill is stupid btw.
But yeah, enough about Pathfinder, unless of course we want to discuss how the ruleset could relate to the Realms. Which I'm not really inclined to do, since I can't stand level-based systems anymore.
I feel my existing collection is good enough to last a lifetime
This sounds like a perfectly fine decision. Indeed: I view your post as a success story. Thank you for sharing! I hope for similar happiness for players of all editions (previous and future).
Are you honestly going to tell me that you think that every character needs a Fly skill!?
FWIW, I think the Fly skill is really stupid too.
Also, I don't understand the "switch" to Pathfinder that people make. I mean, I look at their OGL and I see a HUGE extensive list of their product and 3PP products so why would I buy any of their books outside Adventures? My group plays PF on occasion but I don't think we've ever bought anything besides the APs (which were great, don't get me wrong) but shelling out $30 - 50 a book when I can get the majority of content from their site rather......well silly.
community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...
Might be worth posting to drum up some support and to remind others of how important The Realms are to us.
Are you honestly going to tell me that you think that every character needs a Fly skill!?
FWIW, I think the Fly skill is really stupid too.
Also, I don't understand the "switch" to Pathfinder that people make. I mean, I look at their OGL and I see a HUGE extensive list of their product and 3PP products so why would I buy any of their books outside Adventures? My group plays PF on occasion but I don't think we've ever bought anything besides the APs (which were great, don't get me wrong) but shelling out $30 - 50 a book when I can get the majority of content from their site rather......well silly.
The thing about Pathfinder is its still in print, so you don't pay 'rare' prices and the books are readily available. Also, most of the rules are in a single book with just a few supplements while the 3.5 library is just rediculously huge, its easy to get lost in it.
Also Pathfinder actually playtested their material so its less likely that you will find a broken feat/class combination. They also cleaned up a few rules and simplified maneuvers.
But honestly, if you like 3.5 and have most of the 3.5 books ... I really don't think its worth converting. And although both editions are similar enough, why bother converting all your 3.5 material if you don't have to? Also note that there is no Forgotten Realms material for Pathfinder so allot of 3.5 Prestige Classes, Monsters, Feats etc. have to be manually converted by the DM. In my opinion its just more work then worth it in the end. It just all depends how much your in bed with Pathfinder.
Realms died in 2008/1375 RIP Realms. Started buying Golarion and have not bought a Realms product since. The height of these boards was about 10 years ago. I bought a defective book and I got a signed copy by Elaine Cunningham as a free replacement.
Huh, I had a similar story on another board. I was collecting Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and accidentally bought TWO copies of Sigmar's Heirs and moped about it on the official board, wishing that I'd realized my mistake so I could've gotten Realms of Sorcery instead. The author of the book saw my post so he offered me a trade. I sent him my copy of Sigmar's Heirs and he sent me an autographed copy of Realms of Sorcery. Pretty neat.
Realms died in 2008/1375 RIP Realms. Started buying Golarion and have not bought a Realms product since. The height of these boards was about 10 years ago. I bought a defective book and I got a signed copy by Elaine Cunningham as a free replacement.
I tried to get into Golarion but its not my cup of tea, I'll always be an FR fan. 4E really did screw it up (even the authors admitted it)... that 100 year gab of 'nothing' is the bane of my existence.
Anyway, the Sundering looks promising enough and I'm very exited for the 5E Campaign Setting (whenever it comes out)
Realms died in 2008/1375 RIP Realms. Started buying Golarion and have not bought a Realms product since. The height of these boards was about 10 years ago. I bought a defective book and I got a signed copy by Elaine Cunningham as a free replacement.
I tried to get into Golarion but its not my cup of tea, I'll always be an FR fan. 4E really did screw it up (even the authors admitted it)...
4e didnt screw up the Realms anymore than 3e did. Gah! dont get me started on 3e Realms.
Yeah, I can see how someone could consider those changes to be comparable...
Realms died in 2008/1375 RIP Realms. Started buying Golarion and have not bought a Realms product since. The height of these boards was about 10 years ago. I bought a defective book and I got a signed copy by Elaine Cunningham as a free replacement.
I tried to get into Golarion but its not my cup of tea, I'll always be an FR fan. 4E really did screw it up (even the authors admitted it)...
4e didnt screw up the Realms anymore than 3e did. Gah! dont get me started on 3e Realms.
5 years after the spellplague look at how dead these forums are. 2006 it was not like this with 3rd ed FR.
The fact RA Salavatore in a video interview more or less admitted there were plans to save FR as early as 2007 and they are trying to undo much of the 4E changes via the sundering should speak volumes. They basically killed their flagship product.
I think it was this one.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLf1hBUr9M4
Starts at 11:46.
So, the level of screwup is the same because the 3E Realms map shrunk the Shaar and elves used a new font... while 4E saw over a dozen countries outright destroyed or disappeared and a couple new ones practically falling out of the sky, had a 100 year time jump, and saw the systematic death and destruction of numerous NPC's and gods?
Yeah, I can see how someone could consider those changes to be comparable...
It wasnt just the Sharr that shrunk, entire cities moved. Look at a 2e or 1e map and calculate the distance between Waterdeep, and, lets say Silverymoon, I mean if it takes x amount of days to travel between those two points in 1-2e, well then wouldnt it make sense that it would take the same amount of time in 3e? Id certainly think so.
And anyways, I think youre missing my point, the changes in 4e had an "in-game" explanation, im not saying that the explanations made much sense, but they at least tried to have an explanation as to why the changes happened, instead of just saying "ok screw it Elves have a new alphabet now and we're just going to pretend that its always been that way", and then theres infravision, ever read the Drow of the Underdark sourcebook? interesting stuff in there, theres a section on Drow art, it was meant to be viewed with Infravision ,someone with out infravision just wouldnt get it, then along comes 3e and hey, you know what? Drow dont have Infravision no more, they got black and white Darksight or whatever, so that completly invalidates all that lore about Drow art.
So yeah thats my problem with 3e, it invalidated alot of the Lore that came before it, whereas 4e DID NOT.
The fact RA Salavatore in a video interview more or less admitted there were plans to save FR as early as 2007
Yes, the 2007 plans to "save" the realms resulted in the 4e realms, in 2008.
really???? old news dudes
So yeah thats my problem with 3e, it invalidated alot of the Lore that came before it, whereas 4e DID NOT.
Lol? 4e did retcon stuff: the divine aspect thingy extended to so many gods, genasi's appearence, elves-eladrin, the cosmology and all that it entails -like no blood war, succubus/erinyes matter etc- (3e did alter that, but it was Realms-specific, AFAIK) and I believe I could find more if I was better informed about 4e. Also the story behind many changes in the 4e FR (deletion of so many gods -some of them were Spellplague'd, Helm, Mystra the drow deities got a story which makes very little sense-, destruction of lands, etc..) was really cheesy and it is not better than no explanation at all (at least in the latter case you're being honest about your intentions, instead of saying 'the Spellplague did it').
I'm not questioning the enjoyability of 4e (that is up to personal taste), but saying that it didn't retcon anything is laughable.
And where does it say that Tieflings/Genasi all look like core Tieflings/Genasi in the Realms?
And what did 4e Realms retcon about the Blood War? Sure the Abyss was knocked into the Elemental planes or whatever, but no where does it say, "Remember all that Blood War stuff from previous editions? well It never happened". So yeah I dont see no retconns there either.
IM not saying I love the changes in the Realms, im just saying they had an in-game explanation for most of the changes, and yeah I agree that most of those changes werent really needed (there was already Dragonborn in the Realms), but the point is there WAS an "in-game" explanation there. Whereas in 3e Realms they just changed stuff and pretended that they was always like that.
Dont get me wrong though, Im not saying 3e Realms sucked, the Campign Guide was laid out very nicely, I liked the aged parchment look, and it was crammed with lore and maps (unlike the 4e variant), but things like Espruar suddenly looking completly different really irk me, I mean they at least said something about it being a Sun Elven variant or something?
), and we all know 3e sucks too ( ), so let's just agree that the Realms currently suck and that 1e, and to a lesser extent 2e, were the Golden Age of the Realms, and everything coming out since has only diluted it's greatness!Though as to 3e's map shrinking, just chalk it up to previously inaccurate cartography and call it done. Not like that never happened in the real world... ;)
As to the elven language, who cares, they're just elves, and are the truest incarnation of evil any reality has ever known, so how does it matter?
the divine aspect thingy extended to so many gods,
It's skirting the line between retcon and new relevation
like no blood war, succubus/erinyes matter
Actually these were not retconed but rather new devlopments that got explained (although one of the explanations is rubbish)
Do we really need to rehash the edition war stuff?
Sorry, sorry, you know how I get when people go on about how 4e destroyed the Realms. My point is it didnt destroy the Realms anymore than 3e, or even 2e for that matter, although the Time of Troubles never really bothered me, I kinda liked Cyric and was rootin for him through the novels, and he did it, hesa god!! I guess thats why it didnt bother me as much cause I read the novels, so its like I was there, I survived the Time of Troubles! So its like I witnessed those changes first-hand, so it wasnt like, hey when did the Elves get a new alphabet? Or, Say what? a 100 years has past!?
OK, whatever, but youve yet to name a single retcon done in 4e, the thing with the gods was a revelation, not a retcon, its doesnt invalidate any previous editions, those aspects still existed, and still exist, it doesnt matter that theyre both aspects of the same god/goddess.
And where does it say that Tieflings/Genasi all look like core Tieflings/Genasi in the Realms?
And what did 4e Realms retcon about the Blood War? Sure the Abyss was knocked into the Elemental planes or whatever, but no where does it say, "Remember all that Blood War stuff from previous editions? well It never happened". So yeah I dont see no retconns there either.
IM not saying I love the changes in the Realms, im just saying they had an in-game explanation for most of the changes, and yeah I agree that most of those changes werent really needed (there was already Dragonborn in the Realms), but the point is there WAS an "in-game" explanation there. Whereas in 3e Realms they just changed stuff and pretended that they was always like that.
Dont get me wrong though, Im not saying 3e Realms sucked, the Campign Guide was laid out very nicely, I liked the aged parchment look, and it was crammed with lore and maps (unlike the 4e variant), but things like Espruar suddenly looking completly different really irk me, I mean they at least said something about it being a Sun Elven variant or something?
Look, I'm not even talking about how good or bad 4e Realms are. I?m just saying that the explanations for the new stuff were a cheesy way to justify design changes. Honestly, ridiculous explanation or no explanation at all is basically the same to me: even if the former is not a retcon, its purpose is to get an easy way to introduce something equivalent to it. Also infravison/espruar hardly have the same impact as many of the 4e changes.
And again, I'm not saying that 4e objectively ruined the Realms (It totally did for me, but I specifically said that it is up to tastes), but cheesy changes are just that (even if they were good, ''the Spellplague did it'' is total cheese. Don't tell me that 4e was all right and fair about introducing stuff).
you know taht guyu that's favorite line Mystra's lost spells?
ever wonder if he's Azuth in disguise and not dead as we are lead to believe?
OK, whatever, but youve yet to name a single retcon done in 4e, the thing with the gods was a revelation, not a retcon, its doesnt invalidate any previous editions, those aspects still existed, and still exist, it doesnt matter that theyre both aspects of the same god/goddess.
And where does it say that Tieflings/Genasi all look like core Tieflings/Genasi in the Realms?
And what did 4e Realms retcon about the Blood War? Sure the Abyss was knocked into the Elemental planes or whatever, but no where does it say, "Remember all that Blood War stuff from previous editions? well It never happened". So yeah I dont see no retconns there either.
IM not saying I love the changes in the Realms, im just saying they had an in-game explanation for most of the changes, and yeah I agree that most of those changes werent really needed (there was already Dragonborn in the Realms), but the point is there WAS an "in-game" explanation there. Whereas in 3e Realms they just changed stuff and pretended that they was always like that.
Dont get me wrong though, Im not saying 3e Realms sucked, the Campign Guide was laid out very nicely, I liked the aged parchment look, and it was crammed with lore and maps (unlike the 4e variant), but things like Espruar suddenly looking completly different really irk me, I mean they at least said something about it being a Sun Elven variant or something?
Look, I'm not even talking about how good or bad 4e Realms are. I?m just saying that the explanations for the new stuff were a cheesy way to justify design changes. Honestly, ridiculous explanation or no explanation at all is basically the same to me: even if the former is not a retcon, its purpose is to get an easy way to introduce something equivalent to it. Also infravison/espruar hardly have the same impact as many of the 4e changes.
And again, I'm not saying that 4e objectively ruined the Realms (It totally did for me, but I specifically said that it is up to tastes), but cheesy changes are just that (even if they were good, ''the Spellplague did it'' is total cheese. Don't tell me that 4e was all right and fair about introducing stuff).
Well, im not trying to say 4e Realms was good either, Im just saying that they get extra points from me cause of the "in-game" explanations, but yeah I agree, most of those explantions were cheezy, and in alot of cases totally unnecessary, but at least they tried damnit!
ssshhhhh.
you know taht guyu that's favorite line Mystra's lost spells?
ever wonder if he's Azuth in disguise and not dead as we are lead to believe?
You mean that wizard npc in Loudwater? Nah I dont think hes Azuth, Azuth was most definitely dead in 4e, cause thats how Asmodeus became a god, so if Azuth was still alive, I dont think Asmodeus would be a god, but I have a feeling that that will all change with the Sundering, IM looking foward to see how they pull it off, Im hoping they dont use a bunch of retconns, I hate retconns btw, have I mentioned that?
born: before time can mention
died 2004
cause of death: human stupid( someone cast karsus's avatar)
KArus thought he could save his empire and he failed making the fall much faster
someone thought they could fix the realms by clearing the plate and fa iled becuase it alienated half the fanbase.
thus someone cast Karsus' Avatar
Here Lies the Forgotten Realms Forums
born: before time can mention
died 2004
cause of death: human stupid( someone cast karsus's avatar)
What happened in 2004?
Here Lies the Forgotten Realms Forums
born: before time can mention
died 2004
cause of death: human stupid( someone cast karsus's avatar)
What happened in 2004?
Thats when sfdragon started hanging around.
or was it 2002.... or wahtever year the onset of 4e realms came about.....
4e Realms came out in 2008. I started hanging out regularly here in 2009, and it was still a pretty happenin place.
before the onset of 4e
before the cormyran empire
That was truly awesome!