I started a thread in the DDI forums complaining about it community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...
So whos with me!? ANd yeah I realize that many of you do not have DDI subs, but that shouldnt stop you from bitching about it, right!?
I said then and I'll say it again.
I do NOT forsee me purchasing DDI when the majority of ALL of the articles would NOT be anything I wanted to read.
that said....
I'm done bitching, especially about a product I don't really care about these days.
But you must care, a little at least anyway, I mean you still hang around here from time to time, and I guess its a little funny that with all these gods getting offed, and the whole spellplague thing, and the 100 year time jump, and them messin the map up even more, and etc, that Im gettin all bent out of shape over this, ya know? Hahahaha I dunno all that other stuff I could deal with, but this, not suporting it like they said they would, it just really ****** me off. I mean you cant just go and change everything and then just leave us hangin. The Realms used to be the most detailed setting ever! And theyve gone and destroyed that. They did to give us updated maps, info on rulers who trades with who, all that stuff. They expect us just to make all that stuff up!? I think theyre just getting lazy.
I guess I just feel like the Realms is just dead in the water, knowhatimean? I know many of you felt like that long before now, Im starting to come around. Maybe this Neverwinter book will save the day, I dunno.
A regular Laurel and Hardy, you two. :p
You know, I was thinking...if WotC can't be bothered to produce more then a handful of sourcebooks for the Realms and prints two Eberron articles for every one Realms article on DDI, then why don't we write our own write-ups for the Realms here?
WotC ends up owning every word we write anyway (if I've read the user agreement correctly), we stand no chance of getting paid, can't know if anyone's used what we wrote (unless they thank us on the forums), but have the wider Realms to play with since we're under no threat from WotC ever getting around to detailing more then one half of one percent of the post-Spellplague Realms.
Seems like a free pass to run wild down the school hallway, you ask me.
[goes back to thinking about War Wizards...]
By the by, where've you been hiding lately? I almost miss those flames that used to ignite whenever you showed up.
As to your question: the Candlekeep.com forums, until I ragequit the other day. Big surprise, eh?
Enjoying the rain in the Bay Area, Stigger? I'm not, as I lack umbrella and coat.
As to the rain, it's actually kinda pleasant up here in Sonoma County, so yeah, I actually am.
A regular Laurel and Hardy, you two. :p
You know, I was thinking...if WotC can't be bothered to produce more then a handful of sourcebooks for the Realms and prints two Eberron articles for every one Realms article on DDI, then why don't we write our own write-ups for the Realms here?
WotC ends up owning every word we write anyway (if I've read the user agreement correctly), we stand no chance of getting paid, can't know if anyone's used what we wrote (unless they thank us on the forums), but have the wider Realms to play with since we're under no threat from WotC ever getting around to detailing more then one half of one percent of the post-Spellplague Realms.
Seems like a free pass to run wild down the school hallway, you ask me.
[goes back to thinking about War Wizards...]
Good point, and yeah we can pretty much do whatever we want without worrying about breaking canon (not that I ever did). And while that does offer alot of freedom, and does have its advantages, Id still love to see some "official" lore and some nice lookin maps, regional and city, done my professionals, IM just not that good with Campaign Cartographer 3.
I saw in a different thread that you mentioned believing WotC had promised Realms support via Dragon. I was also under the same impression. My initial reaction to the FRCG was that it looked more like a children's book than a FR source book. It had wide margins, large text and vague explanations. I was not much reassured by the hope that Dragon would fill in all the gaps.
I searched through several pages of the FR General board from around the release of the FRCG. Unfortunately I did not find the evidence I was looking for. A few people mentioned what we both believe, but no conclusive company statement. It may be out there, but I have not found it yet.
The interesting thing that I did find was more people than I would have thought praising the changes. Many called it the salvation of the Realms. It's shocking, since I felt the exact opposite way.
Sitting here today, 3 years later, I can not help but know it was largely the death of the Realms. Just search the net for information on the Spellplague or post-Spellplague Realms. You won't even find a map. All the old Realms wikis and websites have not been updated in years. They may as well be archived pages for old research only. The novel publishing schedule has slowed to a crawl.
I do not know what the best thing to do for the Realms is. Frankly I am afraid it is not the same place that I used to love. Just try to imagine a spell battle between two great wizards now. Completely dull isn't it?
I have to disagree with Silver_Sword...I think it is a good thing they are not putting more about the Realms anymore. Seeing how they...messed it up in the first place....I really don't want them too. I think I would perfer to see it disappear from their product line than see it continue in the shape it is now.
Maybe Greenwood would getthe rights back...and go to a company who actualy cares about their fans....yeah I know that is a dream...but it is either that or I would just like it stop. I still got all of my old books...+ notes on what the PCs did in my campaign to shape it...so I am good.
ANd dont burn your books!!
Silversword,
I saw in a different thread that you mentioned believing WotC had promised Realms support via Dragon. I was also under the same impression. My initial reaction to the FRCG was that it looked more like a children's book than a FR source book. It had wide margins, large text and vague explanations. I was not much reassured by the hope that Dragon would fill in all the gaps.
I searched through several pages of the FR General board from around the release of the FRCG. Unfortunately I did not find the evidence I was looking for. A few people mentioned what we both believe, but no conclusive company statement. It may be out there, but I have not found it yet.
The interesting thing that I did find was more people than I would have thought praising the changes. Many called it the salvation of the Realms. It's shocking, since I felt the exact opposite way.
Sitting here today, 3 years later, I can not help but know it was largely the death of the Realms. Just search the net for information on the Spellplague or post-Spellplague Realms. You won't even find a map. All the old Realms wikis and websites have not been updated in years. They may as well be archived pages for old research only. The novel publishing schedule has slowed to a crawl.
I do not know what the best thing to do for the Realms is. Frankly I am afraid it is not the same place that I used to love. Just try to imagine a spell battle between two great wizards now. Completely dull isn't it?
Yeah I coulda sworn that there was something official stating that they would support the settings via Dragon and Dungeon, but I cant find it either.
And yeah, I was just thinking about spellduels and trying to figure out how that would work out in 4e.
I don't say it often, since I don't like igniting flame wars, but I really worry about the future of DnD (in the near future, at the very least). WotC destroyed the Realms. I play in the "new Realms", from time to time, but it's not as good as the old days. Most significantly, they alienated 99% of gaming's greatest fanbase. (I'm an Eberron fan first and foremost, by the way, so I speak with no FR bias). That was really, really stupid.
Some of their players decided to stay with 3E/head over to Pathfinder, and others moved forward with WotC and 4E. Those of us who initially loved 4E now have to decide how we feel about 4E Essentials. (Essentials bore the hell out of me, if you care to know). Content of any sort has slowed to a crawl, WotC is mute, and the economy is still crap. It all makes me uneasy. I worry that they alienated too many in those early days of the transition, and now don't know what the hell to do to make it right.
Some of it is me...I'm a lot older than my 1st edition D&D days. I'm not the same guy who ran Middle-earth or Forgotten Realms or Dark Sun in my youth.
A large part of my lack of enthusiasm is WOTC's stewardship of D&D. Especially in 4.
There may be more Eberron articles, but those are hardly plentiful, either. No one's getting the support they'd hoped.
I don't say it often, since I don't like igniting flame wars, but I really worry about the future of DnD (in the near future, at the very least). WotC destroyed the Realms. I play in the "new Realms", from time to time, but it's not as good as the old days. Most significantly, they alienated 99% of gaming's greatest fanbase. (I'm an Eberron fan first and foremost, by the way, so I speak with no FR bias). That was really, really stupid.
Some of their players decided to stay with 3E/head over to Pathfinder, and others moved forward with WotC and 4E. Those of us who initially loved 4E now have to decide how we feel about 4E Essentials. (Essentials bore the hell out of me, if you care to know). Content of any sort has slowed to a crawl, WotC is mute, and the economy is still crap. It all makes me uneasy. I worry that they alienated too many in those early days of the transition, and now don't know what the hell to do to make it right.
Yeah I hear ya on the Essentials thing, I dont much like it either, it seems to me that theyve taken alot of the choices out, like instead of picking your powers, its like at this level you get this power, at that level you that ability. I was ok with it at first, they did say it was aimed at newer players, but it seems like everything is Essentials now, I cant think of a single nonessentials product theyve put out since Dark Sun, and that was like what a year ago? I mean I understand that theyre a business and need to make money, I just cant believe that theyre making more money off the Essentials than they did with the standard 4e stuff.
It's really hard to get jazzed about either the Realms or Dungeons and Dragons anymore.
Some of it is me...I'm a lot older than my 1st edition D&D days. I'm not the same guy who ran Middle-earth or Forgotten Realms or Dark Sun in my youth.
A large part of my lack of enthusiasm is WOTC's stewardship of D&D. Especially in 4.
Well I could easily get jazzed, if there was something to get jazzed about! Id be jazzed if they kept up those backdrop articles on the Realms, those were great, and the maps looked nice too, more city maps would be nice too, id get jazzed about that!
BUt yeah, I can understand your lack of enthusiasm with WotC's stewardship. My biggest problem with them is they need to make up their damn minds already! Pick a system and stick with it, ya know? They keep changing things, and oh wait a minute wouldnt it be cooler if we did it this way, and forget that its like this now, I understand the need for corrections,erratta, clarification, and what not, but just outright changing it, it gets hard keepin up sometimes.
I think the Realms (even maybe DnD) are on their last leg. The economy and the lack of quality in WotC products (including Mtg) are responsible that being said. There's always hope. I remember when marvel comics went bankrupt. Now the are atop of their game.
Yeah there is hope, that new Neverwinter book might actually turn out to be pretty good and turn things around, maybe it'll sell well and they be like hey we can make some money off making Realms sourcebooks, and they'll do more, maybe even a 4e atlas, that would be pretty sweet. Well I can dream cant I?
I'm done bitching, especially about a product I don't really care about these days.
But you must care, a little at least anyway, I mean you still hang around here from time to time, and I guess its a little funny that with all these gods getting offed, and the whole spellplague thing, and the 100 year time jump, and them messin the map up even more, and etc, that Im gettin all bent out of shape over this, ya know? Hahahaha I dunno all that other stuff I could deal with, but this, not suporting it like they said they would, it just really ****** me off. I mean you cant just go and change everything and then just leave us hangin. The Realms used to be the most detailed setting ever! And theyve gone and destroyed that. They did to give us updated maps, info on rulers who trades with who, all that stuff. They expect us just to make all that stuff up!? I think theyre just getting lazy.
I guess I just feel like the Realms is just dead in the water, knowhatimean? I know many of you felt like that long before now, Im starting to come around. Maybe this Neverwinter book will save the day, I dunno.
Where were you folks a couple of weeks ago, when I beating these same points to death on this thread: (community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...)
Everyone else seemed to be of the opinion "I'm glad they (overhauled/simplified/blew up) the Forgotten Realms, I never liked them before because of (too much canon to keep track of/too many uber-PCs)." What I didn't hear about from any of these people is how awesome their own 4th edition FR campaigns are as a result, because there probably aren't very many of them actually running Forgotten Realms, or only technically playing in Forgotten Realms with the occasional LFR adventure.
I didn't realize we had more than twice as many Eberron articles as Forgotten Realms articles, though, which shows how woeful the state of Realmslore is. Three-page snippits from EG in Eye on the Realms doesn't cut it, and neither does the release of an occasional Backdrop article or FR adventure in Dungeon (although I love the lore-stuffed Monument of the Ancients.) We're getting Neverwinter as a video-game tie-in only, so while I'm looking forward to it, there is no indication we'll be catching up with the other parts of the New Realms, unless it is mentioned in a novel.
I agree that FR is slowly starving to death after being stripped down in 4th edition. Again, this has nothing to do with 4th edition D&D itself, because it's my favorite edition to DM and play, and it has nothing to do with the actual changes of the Spellplague or the 100-year jump, because these kind of RSEs have happened before and will happen again. It's the lack of continuity combined with very little follow-up that is frustrating.
As I said before, the best evidence is the life of these boards, Candlekeep and the FR wikis. You'll note that all of them have tremendously reduced traffic. None of the wikis even include any of the 4e changes. It's so much more difficult now to pick a spot on the map and start a game there.
This very board was substantially more active before the "improvement".
I agree that FR is slowly starving to death after being stripped down in 4th edition. Again, this has nothing to do with 4th edition D&D itself, because it's my favorite edition to DM and play, and it has nothing to do with [snip] 100-year jump, because these kind of RSEs have happened before and will happen again. It's the lack of continuity combined with very little follow-up that is frustrating.
The 100-year jump just made things much, much worse because now there is need to explain what happened in that timespan.
Much rather prefered they had just jumped some 5 years or so, like other editions; Toril would still be in the aftermath (making the points-of-light scenario they are pushing much more convincing) and there wouldnt be so much to explain)
They may have done it to give room for publishing novels (somewhat clean slate), but even there they are lacking (and now they are focusing on ANOTHER conflict in current time?!)
None of the wikis even include any of the 4e changes.
Not exactly true, FR Wikia has been updating with 4th Ed info.
LFR also fills some spots.
It's so much more difficult now to pick a spot on the map and start a game there.
Yes, particularly because of the radical geographic changes, for which there arent updated maps (other than Faerun).
Where were you folks a couple of weeks ago, when I beating these same points to death on this thread: (community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...)
I must of missed that one, I dont hang out in the 4e general forums all that often.
But yeah I would love to see more Realmslore. The 100 year Time Jump, Half the gods being killed off or revealed to be other gods, the Spellplague, none of that really bothers me, its the low lore that bugs me. I think thats what really made the Realms come to life was all the little details, WotC doesnt seem to understand this.
(snip)It's the lack of continuity combined with very little follow-up that is frustrating.
The 100-year jump just made things much, much worse because now there is need to explain what happened in that timespan.
I think we agree here, because I said it's the lack of continuity that is the problem. That is, what actually happened to various places, people and groups in the 100-year jump leading up to now? This would allow me to make SOME use of the old lore to replace what was pointedly NOT included in the 4th Edition Realms.
Where were you folks a couple of weeks ago, when I beating these same points to death on this thread: (community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...)
I must of missed that one, I dont hang out in the 4e general forums all that often.
But yeah I would love to see more Realmslore. The 100 year Time Jump, Half the gods being killed off or revealed to be other gods, the Spellplague, none of that really bothers me, its the low lore that bugs me. I think thats what really made the Realms come to life was all the little details, WotC doesnt seem to understand this.
Same here- the only people happy with the 4th Edition Realms are people who hated the primary feature of the Realms- the detailed history and lore. Now much of that history and lore is in permanent limbo, appendices in LFR and Dungeon modules, 3-page Eye on the Realms and a handful of Backdrops are just so many bandaids on a quadriplegic amputation.
And to agree with yet one more poster, the easiest measure of the withering away of the Forgotten Realms is the lack of on-line activity by FR fans. I never thought of the WotC boards as the heart of the FR community anyway, but there isn't much going on in the forums or wikis, and that's looking both here and the Living Forgotten Realms forums. The true heart of the FR community, Candlekeep, is ghost town populated by only the diehards who sift through the remaining scraps of (pre-Spellplague) Realmslore and help out with now very-infrequent lore requests.
Maybe it is the bad economy, maybe the FR fans have "grown up" (I always thought of FR as a more 'grown-up' than generic fantasy worlds, though,) but regardless it does feel like the Forgotten Realms is dying a slow death, and that's a little sad. I just don't think a single forum thread is going to fix this, not without some proactive effort by WotC to repair the damage they've done with this wrongheaded approach to shared campaign worlds. They certainly didn't treat Eberron or Dark Sun this way, so maybe they learned something. I would like to see WotC make amends, continuing beyond the Neverwinter Campaign Guide to fill in the massive lore gaps. Continue to hire the people who love the Realms enough that they would do (and have done) it for free: Brian R. James, George Krashos, etc. Start updating regions in the model of the "Backdrop: Cormyr" article, so we have some continuity from the old Realms (and decent maps).
And if you don't like keeping up with all that burdensome history and detailed lore, or you're afraid of all-powerful NPCs who will somehow overrule your DM's will and wreck your games, play the Points of Light "generic" D&D world. There's plenty of published adventures, books and boxed sets all about the Nentir Vale. Unless that's also too much backstory and lore for you, too...
All the settings have suffered. It's really sad.
They completely destroyed the Realms. It's impossible, in my mind, to argue otherwise.
The Eberron Players Guide was a steaming pile that the Campaign Guide writers (Keith Baker and James Wyatt, Eberron's creators) had to explain as "in world misunderstandings". The EPG was written to help me understand the various, and ridiculous, false assumptions of the setting's NPCs? Really? At least the Campaign Guide was great, and the setting survived.
Dark Sun was never my thing, but I like the book, and the longtime fans seem happy.
The real problem with the settings is the "one and done" approach. One sourcebook and one players' book is not enough to keep the community well fed. Everyone likes to discuss, debate and employ new material. We don't get new material. Maybe they intended DDI to fill that void, but no one would argue that it has, these years later.
Even 4E is slowly be abandoned/dismantled around it's supporters. While I have purchased the Essentials products released thus far, I believe Heroes of Shadow will be my last. The devs seem committed to Essentials being the new 4E, whether they call it 4.5 or not. I loved 4E, but I find I don't love Essentials.
These past few years seem to have been filled with one bad choice after another. I have really liked some of those choices (4E), despite early reservations, and have disliked others (the murder of the Realms, the new conservative design paradigm exemplified in Essentials). The overall state of the community, though, seems to suggest that we're well into a downward spiral, and that WotC is unsure how to right the ship.
Same here- the only people happy with the 4th Edition Realms are people who hated the primary feature of the Realms- the detailed history and lore. Now much of that history and lore is in permanent limbo, appendices in LFR and Dungeon modules, 3-page Eye on the Realms and a handful of Backdrops are just so many bandaids on a quadriplegic amputation.
And to agree with yet one more poster, the easiest measure of the withering away of the Forgotten Realms is the lack of on-line activity by FR fans. I never thought of the WotC boards as the heart of the FR community anyway, but there isn't much going on in the forums or wikis, and that's looking both here and the Living Forgotten Realms forums. The true heart of the FR community, Candlekeep, is ghost town populated by only the diehards who sift through the remaining scraps of (pre-Spellplague) Realmslore and help out with now very-infrequent lore requests.
Maybe it is the bad economy, maybe the FR fans have "grown up" (I always thought of FR as a more 'grown-up' than generic fantasy worlds, though,) but regardless it does feel like the Forgotten Realms is dying a slow death, and that's a little sad. I just don't think a single forum thread is going to fix this, not without some proactive effort by WotC to repair the damage they've done with this wrongheaded approach to shared campaign worlds. They certainly didn't treat Eberron or Dark Sun this way, so maybe they learned something. I would like to see WotC make amends, continuing beyond the Neverwinter Campaign Guide to fill in the massive lore gaps. Continue to hire the people who love the Realms enough that they would do (and have done) it for free: Brian R. James, George Krashos, etc. Start updating regions in the model of the "Backdrop: Cormyr" article, so we have some continuity from the old Realms (and decent maps).
And if you don't like keeping up with all that burdensome history and detailed lore, or you're afraid of all-powerful NPCs who will somehow overrule your DM's will and wreck your games, play the Points of Light "generic" D&D world. There's plenty of published adventures, books and boxed sets all about the Nentir Vale. Unless that's also too much backstory and lore for you, too...
So why aren't Realms fans creating things themselves to fill these gaps? On Vaults of Pandius you can download several years of Almanacs or a series of Gazeteers for new regions of the Known World. On Planeswalker there's all sorts of material, from faction descriptions in the 4e planes, fiction, adventures, locations, NPCs. That's just two examples. FR has Candlekeep, claims to have a great numver of fans, has a lot more material published than most other settings. So presumably it's as capable of having creative people produce material as any other setting that isn't currently getting as much support as the fans would like.
I think the majority of people have just moved on. Those really into playing the Realms I'd imagine still do...in whatever rule system they currently like. Those just into Lore and not playing probably just read novels and surf message boards.
I'm not active becuase I don't play much anymore.
I think the majority of people have just moved on. Those really into playing the Realms I'd imagine still do...in whatever rule system they currently like. Those just into Lore and not playing probably just read novels and surf message boards.
I'd agree with HobbitFan here with respect to the final fate of the ex-denizens of these boards. The people who loved the Realms for their detailed, lore-heavy nature probably just found other places (CK, I suspect) where they could feel more at home. One look at the thread mentioned earlier (on 4E General) shows that this may well not be the place for you if you like the Realms as detailed as they were.
As for why they aren't generating Realmslore themselves to fill the gaps, some of them do, the Running the Realms section at CK is not exactly dead, nor is Adventuring. As for why others don't, well, maybe CK is the wrong place to look. After all, it has always seemed to be a home for people to discuss (and enjoy) the Realms as they are written (in many cases to then be changed and used in their own games) as opposed to somewhere created with the explicit desire of encouraging those who use the Realms to fill the gaps.
Wouldn't the Running the Realms on these boards be a better place for doing that? Is it not, in fact, in WotC's own best interests to encourage others to become passionate about the Realms which writing new lore, and in doing so place such material in a place where WotC could harvest and guide it?
* (Sorry Alveric, I would have come in on that one if I had been around at the time, I even read 4E:G even if I rarely post there as FR fans are less than welcome. Sadly I only caught up with it today and it is already 2 weeks old now
)I largely agree with HobbitFan. I think the D&D community became too fragmented as a whole with the introduction of the 4E Rules. Some went to Pathfinder, others stayed with 3.5, and others moved elsewhere entirely (like me). Keeping in mind that we're already a small niche community... well the results are obvious. Add to that the Forgotten Realms itself sustained HUGE changes, and a niche community within a niche community became divided like the rest... and again, the results are obvious.
That being said, I wholeheartedly endorse Bluenose's and Miscellany's suggestion. There really should be an effort to establish a 'Forgotten Realms Fannon' site, which people could contribute too. Many other roleplaying settings have something similar, from Hârn to Planescape. Even Dark Sun, before its resurrection by WotC, had a fannon site. There is no reason something similar couldn't be done for the Realms, especially if WotC is sticking to their decision that no more products will be released for the settings (the Neverwinter Guide being an obvious exception to the rule).
The only issue I foresee is choosing a system. I'd personally vote for systemless - lore only - with system elements being completely optional and kept separate. Of course, there would also need to be some editorial review of submissions to keep things consistant with established 'fannon'.
So why aren't Realms fans creating things themselves to fill these gaps?
LFR is doing a good job, given the lack of support from Wizards; its just feels too little.
All the settings have suffered. It's really sad.
Except for their default Points of Light setting, its gotten all kinda support and lore, which in my mind goes against their plan of just putting out 3 books per setting, I mean their default setting has support in every non-setting book theyve put out and it gets more support in Dragon/Dungeon, its just not fair I tell you!!! Its like theyre trying to cram the default setting down our throats or something. Its like theyre thinking ok if we screw up the other settings and dont support them then everyone will be forced to use our PoL setting that we basically ripped off of Greyhawk, but we call it our own.
I want my Realms damn it!!!!
So why aren't Realms fans creating things themselves to fill these gaps?
LFR is doing a good job, given the lack of support from Wizards; its just feels too little.
I dont know if theyre doing all the great a job. Now that theyve released the LFR adventures to the general public ive been goin through them, Ive been really focusing on the ones that focus on Myth Drannor, as that is more or less the base of operations in my current game, I was looking through SPEC1-3 Ghosts of the Past - Sirens Lure, and I came across this dungeon map of the crypts of Windsong Tower, well thats kinda cool.
except that if you compare it to the map of the same crypt from the 2e box set the Ruins of Myth Drannor:
I mean what the hell!? They look nothing at all alike, its like some one didnt do their homework or something. I mean I realize that its a 100 years later and the Spellplague and all that, but come on shouldnt a dungeon be pretty much the same? I mean sure there might be different monsters and whatnot but shouldnt the general lay out be pretty much the same?
I dunno maybe its a minor thing to bitch about but I mean come one, surely something had to stay the same, does every little thing have to change!? I dunno, maybe I should read it a little more in depth, maybe theres a perfectly good reason why it looks totally different now, maybe the old on was destroyed and they just built a new one?
I was looking through SPEC1-3 Ghosts of the Past - Sirens Lure, and I came across this dungeon map of the crypts of Windsong Tower, well thats kinda cool.
It IS cool, that is a plus.
except that if you compare it to the map of the same crypt from the 2e box set the Ruins of Myth [...] They look nothing at all alike, its like some one didnt do their homework or something. I mean I realize that its a 100 years later and the Spellplague and all that, but come on shouldnt a dungeon be pretty much the same? I mean sure there might be different monsters and whatnot but shouldnt the general lay out be pretty much the same?
I dunno maybe its a minor thing to bitch about but I mean come one, surely something had to stay the same, does every little thing have to change!? I dunno, maybe I should read it a little more in depth, maybe theres a perfectly good reason why it looks totally different now, maybe the old on was destroyed and they just built a new one?
That is most likely a problem with adapting from diferent editions; encounters in 2nd Edition work quite diferent from 4th Ed, and its a general known rule that, when trying to adapt locations and encounters from previous editions to 4th Ed, significant changes need to be made for them to work.
That is most likely a problem with adapting from diferent editions; encounters in 2nd Edition work quite diferent from 4th Ed, and its a general known rule that, when trying to adapt locations and encounters from previous editions to 4th Ed, significant changes need to be made for them to work.
The question for me, would be whether that module was released during the period when LFR was considered canonical. If it was released after that then no problem, any alterations to the floorplan to facilitate play sound like a fantastic idea...
...but if the reorganisation took place and the module was published while LFR was still considered canonical then I would really like to hear how the writer explains the rather fundamental changes in structure.
1) Maybe the writer didn't care.
2) Maybe this is a different area/level/section beneath the crypt. I haven't seen word from Silversword describing the adventure scenario.
3) LFR's adventures, if I recall correctly, could be submitted by people outside of WotC and the adventures were never rigorously fact checked.
4) Maybe a Lich/Archmage/NPC-Desirous-of-a-New-Floor-Plan changed the layout. Again, 100 years at least have passed and there’s a whole lot I (we?) don’t know about Windsong Tower’s past, much less what the adventure does and doesn’t establish history-wise.
Regardless, This. Is. Not. A. Big. Deal.
And before anyone gets all up in arms: seeming contradictions between Realms products are nothing new. Since the dawn of the Realms this has been true.
Follow the path of those who’ve come before us and patiently fix the contradictions as you find them.
Or continue to sit there, angry, and work on making your headache even worse.
That is most likely a problem with adapting from diferent editions; encounters in 2nd Edition work quite diferent from 4th Ed, and its a general known rule that, when trying to adapt locations and encounters from previous editions to 4th Ed, significant changes need to be made for them to work.
The question for me, would be whether that module was released during the period when LFR was considered canonical. If it was released after that then no problem, any alterations to the floorplan to facilitate play sound like a fantastic idea...
...but if the reorganisation took place and the module was published while LFR was still considered canonical then I would really like to hear how the writer explains the rather fundamental changes in structure.
Plz read my response and the article given.
Maps and encounters from 2nd Ed CANNOT be used as is with the 4th Ed system, they have different dinamics; you are welcome to try to run an 2th adventure as is in 4th ed to check for yourself.
That given, the maps are changed (make your own explanation, several were given) to work with the constraints of 4th ed, and from your own admission, they were good.
Pruano, my reading of Mearls’ article (and my experience playing ([1E], 2E, 3E and 4E) doesn’t lead me to believe 2E maps are 100% (or even 50%) incompatible with the 4E game system. Obviously monster mechanics have changed, but map layouts aren’t by default incompatible.
Mearls’ key point is this: 4E’s encounter system encourages DMs to make single encounters/battles fun instead of using the default/plodding room-by-room system of the classic 2E dungeon crawl.
Map layouts can affect encounter quality, but they don’t define the quality/flavor of a 4E encounter nearly as much as monster choice does.
With regard to Iluvrien’s post: she brings up a good point. If the adventure was going to be considered canon once written, well why not at least check the layout of the adventure against what came before? Even I don’t think that’s asking too much.
My point, and one I hope people REALLY let sink in, is this: what's done is done. Why the map was changed (if in fact it was) is far less important then what we do in response to the change.
We can chew our cudd and gripe, or we can fix what might need fixing. It's fun to do this, believe me it is.
@Silversword: Can you give us a quick rundown of the adventure? Does it give any indication the crypts are new? Or maybe they're below the original crypts, etc...?
Ok I retract my earlier complaint. I did some indepth reading of the adventure, and yes there is an explanation, the heroes are led through a secret stairwell to a lower level, so that makes sense I guess. I guess here latly Ive just been lookin for things to bitch about. So any way I guess it does work out, my appologies to the LFR writers who made this. So maybe I should check more of these LFR adventures out, might have all kindsa usefull post spellplauge lore, or in this case pre-Spellplague.
And for Mr M here is a basic rundown of the adventure:
Each year the Coronal of Myth Drannor, Ilsevele Miritar, hires an adventuring party to clear out on section of Myth Drannor. These yearly cleanup have gone on for nearly a century. This year a call went out to several groups, something big is going down. THe Eladrin of Myth Drannor have discovered fluctuations in the Mythal, this is traced to a malfunctioning portal, which must be destroyed. In order to do this it must be opened, to do that the Mythal need to be suppressed, as it causes all the portal to be shutdown. While the Mythal is shut down a group of young Eladrin from the Iliathor family decided to open a portal to the crypts to retrieve Faervian, one of the six legendary baneblades of Demron. Once there they get waylayed by an insane Baelnorn, so its up to the heroes to enter the crypt and rescue the Eladrin youths, and retrieve the blade as well.
So all in all it sounds pretty cool, and has got some bits of lore in there, and some NPCs usefull for anyone using Myth Drannor in their games. Im gonna have to check more of these out.
Map layouts can affect encounter quality, but they don’t define the quality/flavor of a 4E encounter nearly as much as monster choice does.
While i partially agree with you regarding the monster/layout ratio, i think you are underestimating the layout changes required.
Quoting from the article:
"Encounter Size: 4th Edition's scale of 5 feet to a square can lead to cramped, tiny encounters if you directly convert maps from older editions. Before you run an adventure, sketch out each dungeon or encounter area on graph paper and see how much room is available for maneuvering. Ideally, even when the party and their foes are locked in melee there is still space for creatures to move around the battlefield and threaten either side's back rank."
If you compare both maps, you will see that while all corridors on the 2th Ed map are single squared (and im assuming they are 5 inch), as most all maps of the time had, the 4th Ed one is at least 2 squares (which is still cramped by 4th ed standards, but they ARE corridors); to make things worst, some of the rooms have also at least one dimension with size of 1 square(although not knowing what was in those rooms, it may not matter), which does not happen in the 4th Ed map.
Being 4th Ed a very tactical game this has huge influence in the flow of combat, as well as other aspects of the encounters.
But its good to know that the author has found a way to circunvent such problems.
So all in all it sounds pretty cool, and has got some bits of lore in there, and some NPCs usefull for anyone using Myth Drannor in their games. Im gonna have to check more of these out.
Hey that does sound like a cool adventure.
I'm glad to see the writer for that LFR adventure didn't overwrite anything from the [older] adventure.
I have no idea why that would have to change anything myself... its a less than ideal layout for 4e, but I can't see many adventurers saying that they can't go into that crypt because its too confined a space for them to fight in properly. Sure, they can't use some abilities, but hasn't that always been the case for some classes to one extent or another when faced with close-quarters combat? Seems hard to believe that 4e can't adapt to really tight CQB, presuming that's true. That rather defeats the whole Dungeons part of the game...
You misundertood; its not that it cant be run as is, or that one square corridors cant be used (had some in my last session), its just that they have a different feel in 4th Ed (in my last session, they were tunnels dug by Yuan-ti), and should not be the norm as were in 2th Ed because they constrain too much, taking a lot of options out of encounters, and actually leaving some players without possibility of acting.
Original 2nd Ed adventures can be run with the original layout, they just arent much fun.
Regarding encounter spaces (2e vs 4e), 4E is a more dynamic tactical combat with combatants moving quite a bit. Freedom to do that is desired and appreciated by many 4e gamers. Yes, we can use more confined spaces; many players will not be happy. I do personally lament that the newest generation of D&D gamers do not seem to buy into the balance that different encounters and adventures will challenge PCs in different ways, but then I am an old fart who started with 1e D&D and whatever the DM dreamed up. (young whippersnappers!)
While not every LFR adventure is rigorously "fact checked" with previous edition Realms Lore (nor did WotC give that instruction), I have been impressed that generally the Writing Directors and Global Admins have tried to draw on past threats and features into new adventures. Many of you have seen Gomez post, and it is my impression he has immersed himself in Realms lore with LFR.
Claire and I are long time Realms fans and have enjoyed the chance for even a small contribution to new lore. Various of the FR novel writers have graciously answered questions to help us improve our consistency with canon and character flavor. For instance, Rosemary Jones was helpful with characters and flavor for the City of the Dead in Waterdeep when an adventure (WATE2-1) crossed into that setting.
Keith
The real problem with the settings is the "one and done" approach. One sourcebook and one players' book is not enough to keep the community well fed. Everyone likes to discuss, debate and employ new material. We don't get new material. Maybe they intended DDI to fill that void, but no one would argue that it has, these years later.
Even 4E is slowly be abandoned/dismantled around it's supporters. While I have purchased the Essentials products released thus far, I believe Heroes of Shadow will be my last. The devs seem committed to Essentials being the new 4E, whether they call it 4.5 or not. I loved 4E, but I find I don't love Essentials.
The one and done approach is being thrown out the window apparently with the release of the Neverwinter Guide coming out this 4Q. And honestly, just because we're not getting "official" Forgotten Realms supplements does not mean all other info about 4E is to be kept clear from FR adventures. There's nothing wrong with Dark Sun ideas, Eberron Paragon Paths, or Essentials classes making it into the Realms. The plug 'n' play approach has worked well IMO as each setting brings it's own essence to the whole game and you can easily adapt specific aspects to fit what you (as the Player or DM) want in their campaign settings. Of course, it's always been this way just not heavily promoted.
These past few years seem to have been filled with one bad choice after another. I have really liked some of those choices (4E), despite early reservations, and have disliked others (the murder of the Realms, the new conservative design paradigm exemplified in Essentials). The overall state of the community, though, seems to suggest that we're well into a downward spiral, and that WotC is unsure how to right the ship.
Well they answered a question this month in Dragon that they'll be publishing pre-Essentials material in future releases. This will probably come in the form of Races, Classes (like we really need more), and Feats/Powers. If anything, they need to start on alternative ideas for non-goody two shoe characters. Mainly, non-good Divine classes. I know there are DDI articles that mention that Radiant damage can be used just as easily by Evil characters and that there isn't an alignment associated with that feature but i'd be nice just to see a few truly evil stuff come out like Drugs and other like-minded things from the Book of Vile Darkness.
The extent that they do care only has to do with the novels.
Individual developers or freelancers might like the Realms but WOTC doesn't care if the Realms is an interesting place to adventure, if you are running games there or not, etc.
only seem to care about Nentir Vale.
and all I care is to get up off my posterior and get me that strawberry fig newton....
With regard to Iluvrien’s post: she brings up a good point. If the adventure was going to be considered canon once written, well why not at least check the layout of the adventure against what came before? Even I don’t think that’s asking too much.
You were right in your earlier post, even if it was an overwrite (which it wasn't) then it wouldn't have been something to get bent out of shape about, just a matter of interest. I wanted to see if the author had addressed the changes and the reasons for them is all.
Oh, and Misc, I am a he not a she. One reason I picked that particular name (from an old campaign character actually) was because it lacks an obvious gender .
I'm glad to see the writer for that LFR adventure didn't overwrite anything from the [older] adventure.
As am I, but honestly I found it curious that they might have. My experience with LFR adventures suggests to me, that as Keith said, they are pretty careful with respect to the information (lore, locations, NPCs) in them... hence the original concern. It seemed out of character.
As for Realms support... more is almost always better as long as they keep the quality up!
I mean what the hell!? They look nothing at all alike, its like some one didnt do their homework or something.
Not everyone has the Myth Drannor boxed set, and most (current) players wouldn't even know that Windsong tower was detailed in there. Even I found out only later, when I was digging for other material, and by then it was too late anyway.
Luckily it is fairly easy to explain, just think of the LFR crypts to be of another level (addendum: apparently it was).
Oh, regarding confinded spaces: I think it is very well possible to do this, provided the dungeon itself is big enough for PCs to move around (many side tunnels and rooms etc). It may add an extra challenge.
You can't do it too often though.
If my next arc(s) are approved, maybe I will give it a spin...
Gomez
If anything, they need to start on alternative ideas for non-goody two shoe characters. Mainly, non-good Divine classes. I know there are DDI articles that mention that Radiant damage can be used just as easily by Evil characters and that there isn't an alignment associated with that feature but i'd be nice just to see a few truly evil stuff come out like Drugs and other like-minded things from the Book of Vile Darkness.
- Heroes of Shadows
- The Shadowfell: Gloomwrought and Beyond
- Book of Vile Darkness
and a few DDi articles on moraly objectionable subjects (im reminded of a recent article on torturing and taunting fallen enemies).
They are doing plenty on that subject, its up to the DM to accept and embrace those.
You misundertood; its not that it cant be run as is, or that one square corridors cant be used (had some in my last session), its just that they have a different feel in 4th Ed (in my last session, they were tunnels dug by Yuan-ti), and should not be the norm as were in 2th Ed because they constrain too much, taking a lot of options out of encounters, and actually leaving some players without possibility of acting.
Original 2nd Ed adventures can be run with the original layout, they just arent much fun.
I understood it pretty well actually. However, not being familiar with 4e combat styles, I couldn't say one way or another. Good to know its possible though, even if not particularly well suited to that style. Would be a little worrying if it weren't.
Having said that though, my own view is that confined spaces tend to favor defenders by limiting the number of opponents (and the options they have) one has to face at any given time, which is rather the point really, and while it might be unpleasant for the players, it would make sense for that to be the norm in underground areas (where engineering ability also comes into play) and in structures intended to be defensible. Kinda why I always loved the idea of Breachgnomes really.
Having said that though, my own view is that confined spaces tend to favor defenders by limiting the number of opponents (and the options they have) one has to face at any given time, which is rather the point really, and while it might be unpleasant for the players, it would make sense for that to be the norm in underground areas (where engineering ability also comes into play) and in structures intended to be defensible. Kinda why I always loved the idea of Breachgnomes really.
They do, even 2 squares corridors do; however, in a 1 square corridor, most strikers (which have a lot of high damaging melee attacks) would be sitting on the sidelines, while the defender blocks the path, does less damage and drags the combat out, by taking one enemy at a time, making the encounter less interesting.
There are reasons for them, and they can give both attackers and defenders tactical advantages (in my session, the tunnels ended in a room with a large creature, among others; when things seemed to go bad for us, we considered a tactical retreat to the tunnels to limit the attacks and escape the beast), but they should be the exception, not the rule, since 2 square corridors already do the trick and limit a lot less.
I suppose, if that's the way you feel about it, then that's the approach your group should use. My usual approach to situations like that was for one party member to hold the line for a while, then retreat past a party member who was moving forward to take their place, while the rest of the party was making use of ranged attacks and the like. Different strokes I guess.
Well I downloaded a whole bunch of LFR adventures, so this may feed my Realms fix, for a minute anyway. I still would like to see some more Realms backdrops in Dragon/Dungeon though. Id love to see more on Kara-Tur, they dont really touch on that hardly at all in the 4e setting book, other than to say that lots of refugees from there have been coming over to Faerun, so obviously some major **** hit the fan there, maybe they merged with parts of Abeir too? Who knows? They probably got something worked up for it im sure, thats the thing that bugs me, I mean sure with this low lore 4e approach it gives us more freedom to make stuff up I guess, but alot of this stuff they got planned out, theyre just not sharing with us, I mean just about any time Rich Baker or Ed, or any one else really, is asked about anything, like say what is Finder Wyvernspur up to these day, we're always given the answer oh sorry thats NDA. They need to get of their butts and do something with all these NDAs!!
...Maybe the Spellplague dropped Rokugan on top of Kozakura, and the ensuing tsunami washed out huge chunks of Shou, which is why there are so many Shou in Faerun right now. (Seriously, check out the DRAG adventures in LFR... Shoutime!)
LFR adventures have been the primary source of Realmslore for some time now, and the SPEC modules have some of the best updated Realmslore. Unfortunately, the LFR release calendar appears to have fallen off a cliff since WotC stopped supporting it and LFR became an all-volunteer organization. So for now, we get three pages a month from EG until Neverwinter. We can only hope that Neverwinter goes beyond the video game/Drizzt tie-in and encourages WotC to produce some 4th edition Sourcebooks that rescue the Realms from being "Points of Light" Lite.
I think it's funny that the low-lore Core setting that is supposed to be generic now has more sourcebooks and support products than the Forgotten Realms. Maybe I can drop the Nentir Vale on top of some part of the Realms I don't like and blame it on the Spellplague- after all, it's all just "Points of Light" anyway...
Keith
Well I downloaded a whole bunch of LFR adventures, so this may feed my Realms fix, for a minute anyway. I still would like to see some more Realms backdrops in Dragon/Dungeon though. Id love to see more on Kara-Tur, they dont really touch on that hardly at all in the 4e setting book, other than to say that lots of refugees from there have been coming over to Faerun, so obviously some major **** hit the fan there, maybe they merged with parts of Abeir too? Who knows? They probably got something worked up for it im sure, thats the thing that bugs me, I mean sure with this low lore 4e approach it gives us more freedom to make stuff up I guess, but alot of this stuff they got planned out, theyre just not sharing with us, I mean just about any time Rich Baker or Ed, or any one else really, is asked about anything, like say what is Finder Wyvernspur up to these day, we're always given the answer oh sorry thats NDA. They need to get of their butts and do something with all these NDAs!!
...Maybe the Spellplague dropped Rokugan on top of Kozakura, and the ensuing tsunami washed out huge chunks of Shou, which is why there are so many Shou in Faerun right now. (Seriously, check out the DRAG adventures in LFR... Shoutime!)
LFR adventures have been the primary source of Realmslore for some time now, and the SPEC modules have some of the best updated Realmslore. Unfortunately, the LFR release calendar appears to have fallen off a cliff since WotC stopped supporting it and LFR became an all-volunteer organization. So for now, we get three pages a month from EG until Neverwinter. We can only hope that Neverwinter goes beyond the video game/Drizzt tie-in and encourages WotC to produce some 4th edition Sourcebooks that rescue the Realms from being "Points of Light" Lite.
I think it's funny that the low-lore Core setting that is supposed to be generic now has more sourcebooks and support products than the Forgotten Realms. Maybe I can drop the Nentir Vale on top of some part of the Realms I don't like and blame it on the Spellplague- after all, it's all just "Points of Light" anyway...
I hear ya man, and I mostly agree with everything you said, except the Nentir Vale thing, for the love of the gods, dont put that in the Realms!! Thats just wrong on so many levels!
I am hoping that in May, LFR WATE2-4 is released. It has lots of flavor on the social scene, mainly theater, in Waterdeep.
Keith
That sounds pretty cool! I love stuff like that, little bits of lore like that really make the setting come to life i think. Keep us posted on that!
What the hell an Ody sighting?;)
Yeah I post at candlekeep now. If I post at all...
Yeah I post at candlekeep now. If I post at all...
Which explains why we are just as surprised, if pleased, to see you Delta.
And I could have sworn that LK posted here recently too. Any chance we might get some of you people back? It really hasn't been the same without you ;).
Candlekeep is pretty lively these days.
LK has been a busy fella at the Keep recently.
Candlekeep is pretty lively these days.
And thus am I shamed ;).
I lost track of CK and these boards at about the same time (getting my degree out of the way), but came back here first, oddly, because it means less to me. Easier to dip in and out of the conversations, CK feels like it needs to be done properly if at all (so as not to disrespect those hallowed halls, that I have become so fond of, or the denizens within).
I shall endeavour to return this very evening! Thanks for the heads up!
So you never went to Korea, Ody? I guess you are stoked that Bin Laden got what was coming to him...
Don't mind me. Just popping in for a quick look around. Don't remember there being such a layer of dust on the tomes back when I was on these forums every day, but it's easy enough to brush off when the need arises.
Funny thing is, I do keep an eye on these boards, and every once in a blue moon, especially where the novels are concerned, things'll pique my interest enough for me open my trap. It's not that I've lost interest in FR or the like; just the past months haven't really allowed me to take a plunge into the lore like they once did.
It's actually funny - I kinda forgot about Candlekeep. (I know, I know - what heresy). It was always in the back of my mind, but I never really did anything over there. I remember joining up on CK back when the forums here had that week or so of solid downtime (which must've been a year-and-a-half ago at this point). Might need a shovel to shift the dust on that one.
Long story short - I'm still around, even if it's impossible to tell nowadays. ;)
I've only been back on the forums about 2 weeks and I was frankly surprised by how dead the place is. Aside from fighting about Essentials there doesn't seem to be that much discussion going on.
Hey do you guys know where one can talk about FR books? I don't see a subforum here for it.
Hey do you guys know where one can talk about FR books? I don't see a subforum here for it.
It is usually picked up in FR:General or FR:Realmslore depending on the slant you want to take with the discussion. LK's book review threads have always been a good place to start. But if you want to discuss a novel or series then please start a thread! At least the novels have always lead to discussion, both good and bad... but at least it will be active! ;).
Hey do you guys know where one can talk about FR books? I don't see a subforum here for it.
Go to the bookclub: community.wizards.com/bookclub
We will be tallking about Sword of the Gods soon.
Gomez
Any way, I think we can all agree that 4e Realms is... well lets face it, it blows!!! The question is what do we do about it? I know we all have different reasons for disliking the current Realms, some peolpe hate that they changed everything with the Spellplague, some people hate the 100 year time jump, alot of people really seem to hate that map! My main beef is theres not enough lore, I think we need more support in DDI and whatnot, those Backdrop articles that they was doing was great, but those seem to have gone the way of the dodo, I think if they brought some more of those back, and filled in a little more of the blanks that we would really have something, maybe not as good as the Realms in its heyday, but itll be a start any way. This Neverwinter book might go along way in righting what I see wrong with the Realms these days, time will tell I guess.
So what do you all think needs to be done to "fix" the Realms? Can it be fixxed? Or is it a lost cause?
Its great seeing some of you "old timers" posting again! Hopefully more will come.
Any way, I think we can all agree that 4e Realms is... well lets face it, it blows!!! The question is what do we do about it? I know we all have different reasons for disliking the current Realms, some peolpe hate that they changed everything with the Spellplague, some people hate the 100 year time jump, alot of people really seem to hate that map! My main beef is theres not enough lore, I think we need more support in DDI and whatnot, those Backdrop articles that they was doing was great, but those seem to have gone the way of the dodo, I think if they brought some more of those back, and filled in a little more of the blanks that we would really have something, maybe not as good as the Realms in its heyday, but itll be a start any way. This Neverwinter book might go along way in righting what I see wrong with the Realms these days, time will tell I guess.
So what do you all think needs to be done to "fix" the Realms? Can it be fixxed? Or is it a lost cause?
I honestly don't think the 4E Realms "blow" but that there is little printed/subscription material on the Realms to produce lively debate or discussions. But nothing is stopping people from talking about the same stuff from older editions that we previously were 2-1/2 years ago.
Couple things can be done such as converting old stuff to new stuff (Silversword and I worked on a few things in the day). You can also convert existing ideas from other settings INTO the Realms such as the Vyrloka (Heroes of Shadow) or that weird dwarven race from Dark Sun.
But yes, I do believe that it can be "Fixed" but we to start supplying the questions, discussions, and ideas to re-vamp it.
P.S.- Good to see LK and LordManshoon still come around every so often.
I’d suggest writing a snail mail letter to WotC.
Don’t rant at them, yell at them, berate them or accuse them of anything. That's the quickest way to encourage someone at WotC to throw your letter in the trash (where it belongs).
If you’re concerned about the Realms dying off, say as much, but no more.
Then, state what Realms product(s) from prior editions of the game you liked, how you wish they’d make something similar for 4E and include an idea or two of how to fit such a product into the 4E game system.
Keep it simple and thank them for their time. Don’t expect a response.
As for me: more Bane please. Long overdue.
Though, as much as I'd like to see more DDI stuff (more Dragon articles espically) on the Forgotten Realms, I don't think it's within their schedule to write more. This is why I highly recommend doing it with Homebrew stuff. Sure, it's not official but we, as a community, could probably bang out more un-official lore, mechanics, and ideas about the Realms we love than WotC could produce in a year or two of DDI articles.
But we should do so as a community, collectively thinking about what the Realms are lacking and addressing those items on a point-by-point basis. For example, if we say...."need more Backround options for other parts of Faerûn" then we gain a list of which areas need freshing up and start from there.
I don't think we need that many more mechanics such as Paragon Paths, Epic Destinies since their a dime a dozen now but what of the non-discussed races of Faerûn such as Sea Elves, Tanarruk(sp?), the Grey Orcs (can't remember their offical name), Star Elves (something I really need to get started on), etc..... All of those need addressing too.
Not to mention specific, Realms-ish weapons and organizations to boot.
One of the stated goals of the 4E version was to reshape the Realms so non-fans and new people can get into it.
Ok, if someone new gets into it....now what?
The only support WOTC provides is in the form of DDI content, which is few and far between and novels.
Smae question, if I'm new, now what? Since they went with a lore-light, less-is-more approach with their campaign guide it looks like the answer is make it up at which the point the new player or DM would rightly say WTF.
LFR has lost support from WOTC so that's not an option either.
If the point was to make new Realms so more people would want to play, fine, now what?
You could have done the same amount of nothing by just doing an update book that addressed changes necessitated by 4E and not disenfranchising the older fans.
Years after the fact it still makes no sense.
to many high powered npcs and tales of players being chastized for nopt knowing the realms history.
it did no good, we stil have occasionally a new person come in and ask a question about the history of such and such.
but its still not a whole lot.
did no good.
Stigger is right that WotC has basically dropped the Realms in our laps and said, 'Make of this what you will.' There is of course a negative aspect to that, but I also believe there is a strong positive aspect as well. As a result, I do not understand why we have to wait for WotC to do anything as ultimately they're a business and they're going to do what makes money. The Realms, I'm sure for many of us, is a labor of love - regardless of our points of view - all of us care deeply for the setting. If that were not the case, none of us would be here talking about it as frequently as we do.
It then stands to reason that we should take the setting into our own hands, collaboratively, and create a "fanon" Realms. In such a setting, we'd ignore canon, and work together to build up the lore. The Forgotten Realms, since the moment of its first publication, has always been a shared setting.
Here is my proposal: Create a wiki that will operate similar to the FR wiki; which would allow all members of the community to submit their homebrew works for appraisal by the community. Those works which are deemed the best the community has to offer would be added to a "fanon" Realms - an alternative and unofficial timeline.
Submissions would be judged based on a number of factors, that could range from how closely something links itself to the "fanon", all the way to presentation, and how "inspirational" something is which encourages people to want to play a game in the Realms. Based on these factors or others, submissions would be ranked on these individual factors from 0 to 10. The average rating would then be totaled, and those submissions that earn an especially high rating would be added to the "fanon". Submissions that don't meet the community threshold for one reason or another could be resubmitted in an altered and improved form at a later date.
Furthermore, we could establish a fanonical event which unifies everything together such as the following... let's say a powerful ancient elven baelnorn High Mage that worshiped Labelas Enoreth has been slumbering for many centuries. Since Labelas is the elven god of time, he obviously has some minor ability to see the future. As the time of the Spellplague and Mystra's death approached, Labelas began to sense something wrong with the flow of time. Something devastating was about to happen, but he did not have the ability to foresee it. Armed with the sense of impending catastrophe he awoke his most trusted and powerful servant from his slumber and sent him forth to help prepare for whatever was about to happen. His servant failed to unravel the plans of Shar and Cyric until they were too late.
In her original incarnation Mystryl was the goddess of time and was a close ally to Labelas, and that alliance carried over throughout her numerous incarnations. However, as time passed Mystra ceased to be venerated as a goddess of time, but the very fact that she had such a strong impact on Toril via the Weave tied her to both space and time inexplicably. Thus, when she was murdered by Cyric and Shar, it threatened to rip apart the cosmos itself - destroying time once and for all - and achieving the ultimate aim of Shar (the destruction of everything).
At the very moment Labelas felt that time itself had unraveled his greatest servant was faced with a critical choice. He decided that action was essential and gathered together roughly a hundred other high mages, and preformed a High Magic Ritual so powerful that it would rival the Sundering. They uttered the last words just as the Spellplague took place, but because of their actions time itself was preserved... though, not without consequence.
They effectively wove a magical net around time and space in an attempt to literally hold everything together. Yet, the event that took place was so catastrophic that it could not be fully contained. Time itself fragmented into 'shards' - alternative timelines. Naturally, all High Mages involved died.
From time to time "fissures" in space and time open up, similar to spontaneous portals, linking together to separate shards. Fissures are literal wounds in time itself.
Each shard is an alternate timeline, which takes place in its own self-contained version of the Realms.
Having such an event allows us the following benefits: It allows us to easily divide fanon from canon. We can have the 4E Realms exist, as well as the fanon Realms. It also allows each campaign that takes place to happen independently on its own "shard", and adds to the feeling that you're gaming in a living, breathing, and evolving setting with people beyond just those currently playing the game with you. It also allows DM's an easy way to say, "No, no, no! The Time of Troubles never happened on this shard." or "Sorry, but on this shard Elminster was never born." or "On this shard Mystra isn't dead and the Spellplague never happened." or "On this shard, the current year is 1984 - hundreds and hundreds of years in the future." And so on and so forth.
In a nutshell, it gives DM's and their groups the ultimate sense of authority over their Realms, even more so than 4E. It does that and has the added benefit of feeling that you're still playing in a shared setting with others, just on an alternate shard... and of course, at any moment should the group desire, a fissure could open up and they could travel to an entirely new shard.
How many DM's have experienced this problem: Your group is playing in an ultra high powered campaign where they are at the center of a world shattering event. If they fail, all is lost - literally. They are screwing up - horrifically. The world appears to be doomed. Yet, you don't want your Realms to implode, so you feel the urge to pull the punches - to cheapen things to save the Realms.
You'd be freed from such a problem. Let them fail. If you want to "save" the characters, a fissure could open up at just the right dramatic moment as the world is literally crumbling all around them, allowing them to escape to an alternative shard... with the knowledge that all that their characters once loved is destroyed and gone.
Or alternatively, they escape into the future and get to witness first hand the consequences of their failure.
Or alternatively, if you're a nice DM, you allow them to escape into the past which would allow them a second chance to save another shard.
(Or you could just kill them all, forcing them to start fresh on a new shard.
)It also opens up entirely new possibilities: Don't want to dramatically change the Realms in a permanent way, but want something REALLY big to happen? Have your players "start" in a Realm shard that is familiar to them, but have them encounter someone from another shard who just stepped through a fissure. They could then learn of a horrific alternate shard that is ruled by *insert great evil here*. Will the heroes leave behind their own shard to save another, potentially trapping themselves in this alternate universe? Or, perhaps even worse, *insert great evil here* has found a way to open fissures and keep them open for extended periods of time. This *insert great evil here* is invading and taking over other shards, and now the players have a multi-shard war on their hands...
An idea such as this should encourage:
* Those who game in the Realms to submit the details of their campaigns, sharing them with the community as a whole. This is advantageous to everyone as it allows us to draw inspiration from those events and ideas. Things that the community as a whole agrees are flat out awesome could be written up separately and submitted to become part of the fanon.
* Those who desire to write short story fan fiction in the Realms should be encouraged to share it for the same reason as the above. Like the campaigns, awesome fan fiction could be submitted for community approval and then potentially be added to the fanon.
The over all intent of such a project is to share in a common love of the setting, spread ideas, and hopefully revitalize the community by keeping it vibrant and strong. As a WotC independent project such an endeavor would be freed from whatever events or decisions that impact the future of the Realms, placing it ultimately in the hands of the community.
These are my thoughts and suggestions, which build upon the original suggestion by Mr. Miscellany.
1. I think for the sake of continuity, a fanon Realm's should adopt the Grand History of the Realms as the primary source of canon recognized by the project.
A. As a result of this, events that take place in the Grand History of the Realms, but not detailed in the official canon can be expanded upon in the fanon Realms.
B. Although such a thing should be subjected to the highest scrutiny by the community, adding events to the past should also be accepted, so long as such events do not have an overt impact on canonical or fanonical events previously established.
C. As a result of 1385 DR being the last canonical year recognized, it means Mystra is dead and the events taking place during and after the Spellplague are left entirely up to the fanon community to decide. (I'll give my personal opinion further down.)
2. In order to give such a project the broadest appeal possible, I believe the fanon Realms should be system neutral. This allows people who want to game in the Realms to use whatever system suits their fancy. It could be Pathfinder, 3E D&D, 4E D&D, GURPS, Rollmaster, AD&D, Burning Wheel, whatever strikes your fancy.
A. As a result, NPC's that are stated up can be submitted for any system. Including, but not limited to some version of D&D or a derivative such as Pathfinder.
3. To give the project some breathing space I'd encourage increasing the fanon timeline by five to ten years (1390 DR - 1395 DR). That gives enough time to settle some major disputes that would arise as a result of the Spellplague.
Now... when it comes to dealing with Mystra, the Spellplague, and the whole other mess... Well here is my opinion. It is already established that Mystra is dead by the Grand History. However, if we give ourselves a five to ten year window we could easily bring her back, in one incarnation or another.
Seeing as how Mystra is not an idiot, and that Savaras most likely would have foreseen something bad happening - Mystra may have had some forewarning, just not the how, who, and what. Furthermore, it's virtually impossible to conceive of Mystra not having a backup plan when it comes to the Weave in case of her death. This is not an impossible to imagine scenario considering that the two previous holders of her office ended up dead.
On top of that, if I am not mistaken, the main point for Mystra having so many Chosen was to allow her to divest some of her power to deal with a scenario which she did in fact experience.
So, I imagine that Mystra died, but thanks to the existence of her Chosen the Weave continued to function, though wild magic was rampant throughout Toril. Wizards found magic highly unpredictable and dangerous to use. Ultimately the Chosen received help from Larloch (didn't Mystra make some secret deal with him which in turn allowed him to use spells above 9th level?). Together, the Chosen and Larloch worked together to resurrect Mystryl (the original incarnation).
In any event Mystryl is revived roughly six months after the Spellplague first hit, and ascends into the heavens to become an intermediate deity of magic. She REFUSES to accept the Weave as part of herself once again to avoid future complications, and instead chooses merely to act as its guardian, defender, and administrator.
The Weave then becomes a wholly independent construct - separate from Mystryl, and not dependent upon her for survival. Much like how Talos has power and control over storms, but destroying him would not cease the workings of the weather - storms would continue. Likewise, while Umberlee has dominion over the oceans and seas, killing her will not put an end to sailors dying at sea or cause the Waves to stop moving. Therefore, the similar would then be said for Mystryl - you may kill her again, but the Weave would continue on independently of her - perhaps to be claimed as a prize but forever unable to "merge" with another deity. The Weave would require a lot of maintenance and upkeep or wild magic and dead magic zones would begin to appear.
This is my suggestion on how to deal with the Mystra / Weave issue.
Mystryl
Intermediate Power (CN)
Portfolio: Magic, spells, Guardian of the Weave
Since the Grand History is clear that Dweomerheart "disintegrated at once" it leaves Mystryl without a home. I suggest she shack up with Selûne in the Gates of the Moon, and that Selûne be elevated over time to a Greater Deity. Also, I'd give Selûne many of Savaras former portfolio's, since it explicitly states that he is dead (though the fates of Azuth and Velsharoon are left up to a fanon community).
Appenser spirit could be trapped in the staff that Cyric smote Mystra's form with and she is coming out of slumber in a new body...;)
The DDI articles don’t hold up against a steady supply of 160 page books. The DDI articles come about as often and hold about as much content as what we got for free on the Wizards site in the 3e days. Now that articles of similar length and schedule are locked behind a pay wall the content open for discussion amongst the community has diminished to near nothing. This problem can be partially alleviated by offering a year’s worth of Realms articles for purchase separately in a gazetteer format. Hopefully the arrival of the Neverwinter expansion will help stir some discussions, we’ll see. The only steady stream of Realms products remains the novels. Formerly by strict policy novel discussions don’t occur here. Even then, novels are not good resources for games. They may be good flavor, but are less useful as game supplements.
Also, on occasion these boards would host an anti-Realms poster who would bring up the usual beating horse topics (Mystra/Elminster/the Chosen/Drizzt, the pantheon drama, incompetent evil, etc.). That bit of conflict often started up a decent variety of discussion even if it got heated. After the storm of negative criticism following the 4e Realms, anti-Realms discussions don’t progress like they used to.
People who dislike the New Realms lost, all their arguments to defend the old Realms no matter how true, now ring hollow because in the end the company sided with the detractors of the Old Realms. It is evident that many people still dislike the Realms, any version of the Realms. Even people who agree with the changes to the New Realms may only feel neutral at best towards the setting. They may use the setting by default from LFR or convenience, or maybe venture to try the freshly nuked setting to see what the fuss is all about. They may not stick around or recommend the Realms to others, at least not over some other settings.
You can still find abundant anti-Realms people on the boards, especially in the other or general forums. Whenever a discussion about the Realms shows up, or maybe a question about a choice of settings for a group, they would show up, often in good number. They would note the reasons for the 4E changes (as supported by statements from Wizards representatives and designers), then recommend other settings. The image of the Realms they paint for the other forum members doesn’t help the setting. It becomes impossible to put in a good word for the setting (even the New Realms) because even the designers felt the problems of the Realms were significant enough to address with drastic action.
Even the New Realms faces an uphill battle at times. The two characters that made the anti-FR crowds foam still roam the setting. They are still the feature characters of FR 4E novels. Some claim the Plague-wrought Lands are a clone of the Mournlands, a strike against what the New Realms is supposed to offer. People still level the usual problems with the old setting against the New Realms. How come Drizzt doesn’t handle it? There are still no competent villains. Magic makes no sense in the medieval, dirt-farming society of the Realms. The new books still make too many references to history and lore the player and DM are supposed to know about the setting before running it. The books don’t tell me what makes the setting tick or different from every other setting out there. I still have to look at a history book to get a clue about what’s going one. People still feel too daunted to jump into the new setting. Don’t believe me? Just search for these discussion and read through them.
I’ve kept an eye on these “Which setting to play” or “Realms vs Setting X” discussions out of curiosity and I guess loyalty. I don’t see many Realms fan showing up to help counter the anti-Realms posters. Showing support for the Realms in such discussions is often done defensively, with lots of “If you fudge this, disregard what he said, or those faults ARE its strengths”. Sometimes it is in support of the Old Realms over the New. I don’t see how the Realms as a game setting can put up a good face against such sustained and company-supported negative criticism.
The selling point of the Realms has become: “This setting was so notoriously bad and unplayable, but hyped up by novel characters who rule the lime-light, we had to blow it to bits with an apocalypse to fix it. Play it to see how much we changed, but you will need the entire Realms library to cross-references said changes and read the novels to learn about the characters we killed.” *
* “Oh, but some novel characters some people hated but some people liked that made us boatloads of money, yeah, they’re still around. By the way, the Realms is now more points-of-light (sort of, really, but not really) like that generic fantasy, non-setting, pseudo-medieval setting from core that you don’t need to buy two hardcovers to play. It’s like that but not like that, full of generic fantasy struggles and D&D magic not governed by the Weave that we got rid of that didn’t really matter for the rules. We killed the goddess of magic who died twice or thrice that no one liked, but she doesn’t matter because she didn’t affect play before or now. The Realms! It’s full of Realmslore, all this history on places, events, and characters who are mostly dead and now we’re 100 years beyond all that history that you don’t have to know but maybe you should know just in case ‘cause we made lots of references to what we changed for the old fans, but didn’t include the details in the book so the new fans don’t get scared and bugger off to that core non-setting setting.”
@ MysteriousMask: What restrictions are you referring to for the old Realms? I'm not sure if your talking about allowing certain aspects such as other races (like Warforged or Shifters), Classes (like Artificers) or what?
As for what Stigger was talking about, "They're just supplying us with a few ideas, the rest we're supposed to come up with on our own, at least that was the impression I was left with. I almost get the feeling that we're supposed to take their bare-bones approach as a source of inspiration and set the boards afire with brainstorming... don't think it worked too well as an approach though, in general, not just for the Realms."
I think this is a good thing actually. Maybe not from a forum standpoint, but I enjoy freedom to do what I want without restrictions to Canon or that approach being so prolific with the setting as a whole. The main problem is for the past 4 decades 'Realms fans have been spoon fed with absoutley no reason to deviate from established lore/canon. Sure, they could if they wanted to but there was often information for practically every part of the Realms. Now, this isn't necessarily a bad thing if you want something done completely for you but I felt it stifled fan-based growth.
What I find funny is that those who were perfectly fine with the way the Realms were 3e and prior told people who weren't to either A.) make the changes yourself or B.) play in a different setting. But now that the roles are reversed, older fans can't comprehend that turn-about if fair play. I didn't have too much animosity towards the Realms pre-spellplague and I just ignored the areas of Faerûn that I thought were shabby or not to my liking and that went for annoying NPCs too.
What became a problem is published adventures where epic NPCs had to be written out to shine the spot-light on the Players. The whole reason why Elminster's tower was destroyed in the Shadowdale: Scouring of the Land adventure is because an army of Zhentarim wouldn't put up too much a fight against the Old Sage. Lets face it, Elminster could repel even a force of that size with help from Silverhand and possibly the Witch Queen of Aglarond who I'm sure he would've called for support if it needed it. So when they blew up his tower, fans got mad and angered at the way it was done (*sigh* another Shar plot). So basically, you can't really run a mid to high level campaign in areas with Epic-NPC and NOT have them show up and when you write them out, fans get mad. So......the answer is to just stay away from them??! Yea, thats probably the worst answer IMO.
So the changes were made, the Chosen were diminished, the future increased 100 years for people who don't won't to incorporate the history of the Realms. If you want to, well the information is always still there. It's not like all those books are gone or can't be accessed (amazon, e-bay, and other less legitimate means are available) and it's even encouraged to use previous aids to make it a more Realms-ish game.
As to Elminster and company in regards to modules/adventures... What I recall quite vividly from 2e's sourcebooks was that Elminster was only home if the DM wanted him to be home, otherwise he was off on some other plane doing this or that. Could be that influenced me to think that NPCs like him weren't much of an issue and could be easily avoided just by putting them somewhere else, like having tea with Mordenkainen or dining with some hin in Corm Orp, preferably something horribly mundane like that, maybe having him show up and pat the party on the shoulder, thanking them for looking after things so capably, since he's not as young as he used to be blah, blah, blah. Though to be honest, I never much liked using the Dalelands as anything other than a place to be passed through on your way to somewhere else more interesting...
@ Meldread, its an interesting idea, though not one I'm likely to participate in, actively anyway. Stuff like that just makes me cringe and gets my teeth hurting for some reason... probably too much of a control freak to ever be comfortable with others riffing off of ideas I come up with, and me knowing about it, really. A little part of my brain just starts screaming "they're wrong, omg what idiots, beat them to death!!!" sort of thing.
Stigger... that is an odd homicidal reaction to have. 
I guess people skipped over Mister Miscellany's earlier suggestion because they weren't interested either. I brought it up previously in the thread, it was ignored again, and I decided to give it a third go with some detail - and was pretty much ignored once more. I'll probably take that as a statement of disinterest.
It's somewhat sad, because I don't really see much of a future for the Realms outside of the fan community. I see WotC continuing the novel line so long as it continues to make money, but like most businesses even if it's making money - if the profit margins begin to drop off... well... they'll give it the axe eventually.
...and if we want to take a walk on the morbid side, Ed Greenwood isn't getting any younger. So, unless the community intends to do something to keep the Forgotten Realms alive, I don't foresee much of a future for the setting. Which is sad because, despite my own personal issues with certain aspects, I do have a rather soft spot in my heart for it.
I think if we did do a fan project it would depend a great deal upon who does it. Candelkeep is kinda the place people go anyway so I'm not sure starting something new would accomplish much unless you have a specific vision. You would definately need some of the regulars from there. I remember one of the major reasons Dragonlance Nexus took off was that the guy organizing that got Tracy Hickman involved. So that sponsoship helped and several of the guys over there have game or novel credits in DL to their name.
@Diffan. I can't speak for anyone other than my little group but the FR guys in my group had more problems with how the changes were implemented and what WOTC and designers said than having any real problems with the idea of change. Some specific changes rankled for some but overall it wasn't the change that bothered us. The PR was terrible and some of the WOTC guys said some pretty insulting things about the realms and the fanbase.
@MysteriousMask. I think the problem was they took a hatchet to the realms in 4E when they could just as well used a scalpel and affected the change.
I certainly have the willpower to create new lore as a community project. It's just a matter of free time. I can certainly do my best to contribute; I just don't know what kind of a schedule I would have with which to work.
So, yeah. The project has my support, and I'll make as great an effort as I can. I'm not going anywhere.
Stigger... that is an odd homicidal reaction to have.
Well, I'm an odd kind of guy, so I guess it fits...
With regard to a Fanon Wiki—including community management of submissions and content, selection of information to add, etc…great ideas! Meldread has set forth a bold vision and the impetus from which we all could operate (i.e. fissures—aka shards—in time that form into their own alternate timelines).
The idea of divergent timelines existing in parallel: it’s powerful! I really like it.
Now in all honesty, to me the Fanon Wiki project idea seems like a lot of work. And personally I don’t like the idea of a submissions process. It just rubs me the wrong way and I think it could potentially discourage people from posting given the current state of the Realms forums.
That doesn’t mean people shouldn’t try. If they like the idea then go for it I say!
I understand the idea is to collaborate, but we’re nowhere near any sort of collaborative critical mass yet; hardly anyone posts new material of their own making and the Realms Forums Community—such as it is—hardly exists.
I don’t see a wiki project getting very far if there isn’t already a minimum level of participation on these forums.
Instead I’d prefer to find ways to get people to start sharing lots of their Realms content and ideas on these forums first.
Again, I want to reiterate: I’m not saying “No, don’t do the Wiki Project.” I’m just saying we should think big, but start small.
So, how do we get people talking about their Realms campaigns again, regardless of edition?
How do we draw the LFR people over to these forums to talk about their LFR Realms experiences?
How do we encourage people to share their custom Realms material (adventure ideas, NPCs, location write-ups, etc…)?
How do we convince people that their home Realms campaigns, as well as anything Realms related they think up, can be thought of as existing on a “shard” of alternate time, and therefore is just as legitimate as the [prime] shard that all the Realms sourcebooks and novels describe?
Part of what inspired me was the hope of leveraging passion for the setting and the various talents in the community. I thought of people such as Markustay, whose done maps, and various people who do fantasy based artwork (some of which is centered on the Realms). I also thought of those who write fan fiction, DM's and players who game in the setting, as well as those who just read the novels.
My hope and intention is to see something grow that can be self-sustaining, fueled by the passion and ideas of the community, that is wholly independent of Wizards of the Coast. As a result, it'd nominally solve the problem brought up in this thread - the lack of lore for the setting, but it does so in a way that empowers everyone in the community.
I'm not really sure how to get people involved. It's one reason I brought up your idea - multiple times, even fleshing it out with some of my own thoughts. I was hoping it would spark interest, but this may simply be a situation in which we have to lead by example.
So, here are my thoughts. We create a "master thread" on these forums. The intention of that thread is to explain our objectives, and serve as a place where everything related to the project can be organized. We give the project a name, create an image, and paste it along with a link in our signatures. Then as we notice relevant threads (where people are sharing their campaign ideas and stuff like that) on these forums, over at Candlekeep, or even on various blogs - we evangelize. We tell them about the project and encourage them to participate.
The key to success will just have to be spreading it by word of mouth. Whenever we encounter someone unfamiliar with the forums who is a fan of the Realms, we should find some way to get them here and interested in the project. Even if they don't participate if they find it useful they may tell others who WILL become active participants.
Those are my thoughts regarding how we'd proceed from here.
If you want to, well the information is always still there. It's not like all those books are gone or can't be accessed (amazon, e-bay, and other less legitimate means are available) and it's even encouraged to use previous aids to make it a more Realms-ish game.
Which is an absolutely superb and wonderful view and plan that I wholeheartedly support (no sarcasm here)... right up to the point where you introduce the novel readers who have no personal control of the setting the way the DMs do and, as such, are purely passive recipients of the changes that they could not reverse even if they wanted to.
I've created the Master Thread I suggested in my previous post. All discussion regarding this topic can now be diverted here to this thread.
Iluvrien - I encourage you to go over to the Fanon Realms Project thread. I've had non-FR gamers like you in the forefront of my mind. I think you'd have a lot to contribute to the project.
If anything, it can be argued that fan-based growth under the Old Realms completely and utterly overshadowed apparent fan-production under the 4E Realms. Recall these boards were the home of the comprehensive Elven net-book, a nascent Dwarven net-book, the massive Kara-Tur Redux thread, an impressive and far-reaching 3e Stat page for Realms NPCs of all types and levels, a chosen template thread, countless threads about magic weapons with histories or threads on prestige classes.
Also remember Candlekeep had their Candlekeep Compendium. In a two year period from 2005 to 2007, Candlekeep produced nice compendiums each one professionally put together, of sufficient quality both in content and in layout design to rival most third party company products (and probably some first party material). Don’t neglect the Northern Journey’s campaign, I believe it is now available/hosted on Candlekeep, but originated from another group.
There is also the Realms Bestiary and the Prestige in the Realms put together by Eric L. Boyd and/or Thomas M. Costa and Scott Bennie’s 2003 (early 2000s) elaboration of his work on the Old Empires supplement (he wrote the Old Empires back in 1990). Then there is Bryan R James’ Grand History of the Realms, a fan-product that Wizards adopted for their own product schedule.
On top of this are all the other fan works and notes, many can be found at Candlekeep or elsewhere. There are also compilations of official lore that fans have put together such as Kuje’s NPCs list and Sage’s archive of Ed’s answers to questions. As far as I know, all these people, including the freelancers, did all of this work without the backing of an organization like LFR which originally had the official support of WotC.
As for the reversal of roles for old fans with the new setting. Why should that sit well with them? They were fans of the setting first. The setting was changed from something they liked to something they didn’t. New fans had nothing to lose but could potentially gained something. Old fans had something and now they don’t. There is no role reversal. People who didn’t like the old Realms never had anything to lose, at least nothing relatable to the loss of official support the old fans once had. The two roles were not equal to begin with.
@Meldread and Mr. Miscellany:
I first heard an idea similar to the fanon concept casually tossed around right during the 4E transition. Nothing much became of it. I think everyone was still dealing with the influx of 4E changes and some real life stuff such as the economic downturn. I think people also wanted to give the new direction a chance to gain momentum before taking any action. Now is probably as good a time to try this as any.
Creating a shared fanon is ambitious. One of the pitfalls of fan projects is the inability to settle on a decision. Fans often come from disparate backgrounds and perspectives. They will come with many, many ideas some of them great, some of them bad. They will bring everything to the table including the kitchen sink and it will be filled with fruit and bologna jello. Some method will have to be devised to eventually determine the agreed upon fanon path. Even Wikipedia has moderators and they still have problems with drive-by machine gun edits for controversial topics, so much so certain pages are locked. The moderators will have to walk a fine line between encouraging fan participation, keep the project from getting bogged down and being neutral enough in their own contributions to prevent this from becoming the Moderator’s Realms.
The idea is a good one. It’s about time we saw some fan material on these boards again, especially if the eventual goal is a major fan-inclusive work that complements and augments the official Realms.
And I still think we should continue to harass WotC for more official Realmslore, well maybe harass is too strong a word, like Mr M said a snail mail letter thats polite and to the point might get the message across, especialy if a bunch of us write in, continue to support the Realms on these boards, and maybe some PMs to Rich Baker and others thrown in for good measure. What irks me is that they leave the "new" Realms knida vague and say its your Realms do what you want, but anytime you ask a specific question about it its always NDA, so they obviously have things worked out for this that and the other but theyre holding out on us. The amount of materil that Ed has sent TSR and WotC that they never used is staggering, and chances are they never will use it. Id love to see a "real" Cormyrean Adventurer's Charter, but unfortunatly thats NDA. If they're not going to use this stuff then they should get rid of these NDAs and let Ed spill the beans on what ever he wants, ya know?
@ Diffan: Fans of a setting naturally want to learn more about the setting. They naturally want designers of a setting to keep producing material for their consumption and thereby supporting the setting. “Spoon-fed” is a heavily loaded term. Fans who want more material don’t necessarily want everything done for them, that is not the main point. They like the material and want more, they are simply curious about it. That the designers are allowed to be prolific via this fan-driven economy, and the work of FR DMs and players is lessened, is merely aspect or byproduct of fan-based demand.
I hear that. I'm not totally happy with the little content we've got. I can understand the 4E designer's reason behind the way they've done it (to a point) but I agree that details make the setting more real. But in the Hey-Day of 3e, I feel it got a little too contrived. I felt that they were detailing these things to take up space and the content was poor towards the end. As a player and DM, I really don't need someone to say "Hey, the tavern-wench is actually a N Chondathan human commoner 3/rogue 1/fighter 3" unless those are specifically going to affect WHY that wench is there in the first place. I felt it started to infringe on artistic license of the DM/Player as everything was considered Canon. This was also a problem on my part when I actually gave a rat's behind about adhering to Canon as much as possible.
If anything, it can be argued that fan-based growth under the Old Realms completely and utterly overshadowed apparent fan-production under the 4E Realms. Recall these boards were the home of the comprehensive Elven net-book, a nascent Dwarven net-book, the massive Kara-Tur Redux thread, an impressive and far-reaching 3e Stat page for Realms NPCs of all types and levels, a chosen template thread, countless threads about magic weapons with histories or threads on prestige classes.
Also remember Candlekeep had their Candlekeep Compendium. In a two year period from 2005 to 2007, Candlekeep produced nice compendiums each one professionally put together, of sufficient quality both in content and in layout design to rival most third party company products (and probably some first party material). Don’t neglect the Northern Journey’s campaign, I believe it is now available/hosted on Candlekeep, but originated from another group.
There is also the Realms Bestiary and the Prestige in the Realms put together by Eric L. Boyd and/or Thomas M. Costa and Scott Bennie’s 2003 (early 2000s) elaboration of his work on the Old Empires supplement (he wrote the Old Empires back in 1990). Then there is Bryan R James’ Grand History of the Realms, a fan-product that Wizards adopted for their own product schedule.
On top of this are all the other fan works and notes, many can be found at Candlekeep or elsewhere. There are also compilations of official lore that fans have put together such as Kuje’s NPCs list and Sage’s archive of Ed’s answers to questions. As far as I know, all these people, including the freelancers, did all of this work without the backing of an organization like LFR which originally had the official support of WotC.
Honestly, two reasons why this was stifled (espically here at Wiz-bro boards). The first being the huge backlash to anyone accepting the changes and trying to build a bridge between pre- and post-spellplague Realms. Great ideas have come up in that time, but were heavily bombarded by thread-crapping people and a disinterest in the Rules of 4E. People don't, won't, or can't express interest in somthing their not invested in. This is more largely due to the fact of how D&D came out with 4E than I think a Forgotten Realms problem.
Second was the evacuation of the boards. It's gotten a little better around here but that was a time of great up-heval from the forums being shut down, Gleemax's small take-over, and the transition of editions. It just turned people off so much that they stopped coming by. Yet, another reason for a huge chunk of posters leaving and nothing to do with the Forgotten Realms. Yea, they may have made a greater effort to come back and start anew but by then, for them they probably asked "is it worth it?".
So yes, back in the day when the forums didn't go crazy and the edition was enjoyed by the majority of FR fans it created a well-spring of individual talent and collobrative efforts to make it better. But those fans (for one reason or another) abandoned the Realms for Greener Pastures. I don't blame them and I think those people are probably better off for it, but it left a gaping whole for a few people to fill. That's a tall order IMO.
As for the reversal of roles for old fans with the new setting. Why should that sit well with them? They were fans of the setting first. The setting was changed from something they liked to something they didn’t. New fans had nothing to lose but could potentially gained something. Old fans had something and now they don’t. There is no role reversal. People who didn’t like the old Realms never had anything to lose, at least nothing relatable to the loss of official support the old fans once had. The two roles were not equal to begin with.
There will always be haves and have-nots in this world. You really can't please everybody. It'd be silly for me to say the pre-spellplague Realms were flawless or that there wasn't issues that needed addressing (some legit, some not). But I think it really comes down to how the older fans look upon the post-spellplague Realms. They disregarded pretty much everything save Returned Abier (because that's Ed's personal work) and I felt didn't even give it a try or look for the good spots.
Yet there I was, taking what I loved about the Realms (3e and prior) and made it work with everything I had. I was expected to cut the parts out I didn't want, cut the deities out that I didn't like, re-change or re-flavor the aspects of the Realms I considered flawed. And when something came out that I really had no need for (Serpent Kingdoms for example) I was left with a big ol' *sigh* because that was a rule-book I really had no purpose or interest in buying. But now that the Realms resemble something more to my flavor, with room to breathe, and places that are now unexplored it's scrapped by the more vocal populace and considred rubbish. Sorry, but I can't really feel all that bad when things are now swinging in a way that I fancy. I did my best with what was produced, and made it work for me and I felt asking others to do the same was asking too much. As if the very thought of touching the 4E product would sully their elitist entitlement of what a True Realms fan was.
The last bit was something that had been bothering me for quite some time and it's not directed to anyone in particular, just sorta throwing it out there as an exasperated cry for a clensing. Sorry if I've offended anyone with my mini-rant as that wasn't my intent.
I’m coming from this via the other side with all my biases, but I definitely see why fans of the old Realms would react the way they did. It wasn’t so much the 4E rules (though that was part of it as with any edition change), but the significant changes to the Realms that mattered. What added fuel to the fire was the method of reveal and the comments of the designers who did not handle the situation as diplomatically as they should have. I actually don’t think it was a mistake of the designers themselves, but rather a mishap of over-enthusiastic marketing over common sense and community building (customer retention).
Again, perhaps the old fans learned their lessons too well from the original anti-fans. For years fans of the old Realms were faced with having to justify the setting to detractors. The forum-crapping became a regular enough occurrence that at times people did get snappy having to repeat the same old arguments. The old fans provided solid support for the Realms when hating the old Realms hadn’t become the official in-vogue thing to do. I don’t recall old fans here being too exclusive. Sure, as always, there were a few extreme outliers, but many engaging in all those discussions and arguments were not just doing so to defend the old setting. They were hoping to change the detractor’s views, if even a little, to make them see the old Realms the way we see it. They were trying to explain why we liked the Realms and help grow its fan base.
Old fans would be the first to point out problems with the setting even as we defended parts of it. They stuck with the setting even through the existing rubbish because some parts of it are just that awesome. For years old fans have been picking and choosing pieces of official lore to incorporate into their games. As Realms fan-zero, Ed Greenwood chose not to progress or include the Time of Troubles into his own game. Most of the threads I mentioned above were fans working with what was provided in official lore and working with it. It is no different than what you feel you’re doing. Except when 4E came, WotC’s language indicated that wasn’t enough. All that effort wasn’t enough to shift the tide over to the side who didn’t like the Realms as they were.
I find it ironic that you used the same lines used back then. “I was left with a big ol' *sigh* because that was a rule-book I really had no purpose or interest in buying” and “…it's scrapped by the more vocal populace and considred rubbish.” There were always books old fans didn’t like, adventures confusingly titled similar to regional books being one variety and mishmash compilations of crunch with some Realmslore attached to it being another sort. Before we though the Realms detractors where the vocal populace (assumed minority at the time, maybe they still are). I can say I didn’t feel sorry for seeing the troubles of the 4E transitions, WotC knew that would be the case but persisted on their course in perhaps the most caustic manner possible. The new fans got to feel what the old fans felt like and vice versa. All I can say is wait in line, old fans were in this position first with arguably more invested in the pot. Schadenfreude! :D
I don’t think any side won or faired better. If anything the Realms were the only losers. Things have settled down, it’s been three years, but I only see a handful of the same old names and few if any new faces. The activity hasn’t returned to even a fraction of what it once was. Discussion of fan material has halted here and Candlekeep is not much better. The LFR threads look sluggish as well. Not sure where the overall community went. At least this community is doing something about it and that’s a start.
Iluvrien - I encourage you to go over to the Fanon Realms Project thread. I've had non-FR gamers like you in the forefront of my mind. I think you'd have a lot to contribute to the project.
I have been haunting that thread over the last couple of days and it does indeed look like it is going to be a useful resource for those running the Realms. I am just unsure of what I might contribute, considering that my driving factors would be to construct interesting situations that do involve places and people that have already been mentioned before (possibly at length). This is because those are the ones that I have been most enticed by through the novel lines that have been my primary link to the Realms, yet in the FRP discussion thread there is talk of such subjects having to be handled very carefully indeed.
[EDIT: Such as one I suggested in This post a couple of years ago]