While I don't disagree with you about D&D not needing a base setting, every edition has had a base setting, and behind the base setting has always been the cosmology of D&D which has always been included into a few different settings.
Greyhawk- was the original base setting, and where the basic framework of the cosmology was first worked out.
Spelljammer - Framework setting, based strongly on the background and structure of all worlds.
Planescape - the other main framework setting
Forgotten Realms - Primary setting post Gary Gygax. As Ed Greenwood wasn't a (bleep)
Every edition certainly has not had a base setting. That was a deliberate choice made by the 3rd edition writers to move away from how the past editions were intentionally generic in the core rules because they figured most DMs would want to make their own worlds (and sales of core rules vs setting books sure backed that up). Also, WotC's choices of Greyhawk in 2000, Points of Light in 2008, and Forgotten Realms in 2014 as base settings had nothing whatsoever to do with Gygax or Greenwood's personalities.
If people actually mean "setting that gets the most support in each edition" (which is not what 'base setting' has meant), even that hasn't been true. 1e had strong support for multiple settings, 2e had too much support for too many settings, 3e had strong support for multiple settings, etc. Up until recently, 5e probably topped 4e by a bit for the edition with the most tightly focused support on only one setting.
So "base settings", whatever the definition, is a recent invention of WotC and wasn't a thing for over half of D&D's history. Regardless, those decisions had nothing whatsoever to do with the personalities of someone who left the company long before any of them worked there or someone else who was never actually an employee.
Which is a problem. The Forgotten Realms should not be the "base setting" of D&D because a) 90% of the Forgotten Realms is absolute crap and b) D&D should not have a base setting. Every setting should be supported with the base game's mechanics and lore. And if it is going to have a base setting, it shouldn't be the Forgotten Realms.
Putting aside you're personal taste (which the bolded absolutely is) FR is the most established and most profitable setting that TSR or Wizards of the coast has had under their belt by an order of magnitude; the only two that have ever come close to challenging it have been Ebberon and to a lesser extent wildemont (which isn't technically an official setting), but both of those are a far cry from being able to act as a base line.
Further, having a common touchstone is good for players since it allows for them to be working from a base understanding as opposed to everyone having their own unique snowflake perception of the universe that becomes incompatible immediately on contact with another player.
Spelljammer is different from the other settings. Technically, it is basically every other setting in D&D (at least, it's every one that takes place on the Material Plane and isn't shielded from the rest of the Multiverse, like Dark Sun and Eberron are), so a Spelljammer book has to support the lore of every setting . . . which means that it really can't have much setting-specific lore in it, unless it covers a lot of possible locations (just read Boo's Astral Menagerie and you'll see that most of the monsters are unique to the Astral Sea or Wildspace, not any specific world).
Son, there are whole stellar empires and cultures that were established specifically for the Spelljammer setting that had their own stories and lore that were wholly independent of any other setting; Elven and orcish empires vying for power and control, the Giff mercenary companies, Mercantile Illithids offering access to rare goods, Star hives of Beholders... all of these were very much a thing and would have given players reasons to get invested in spelljammer as a setting as opposed to now where I can't think of a single reason to ever get on one of those flying boats.
Spelljammer not having much lore is kind of understandable for the setting. It's not preferable, but their other fairly recent actual setting books (Theros, Wildemount, Ravenloft) did have a lot of lore and they were good books. Ravenloft didn't give different lore for the base races because it is also like Spelljammer in that any setting has a place in it, but it had lore for its new races. I don't like the Theros setting much as a D&D world that much and it's definitely low on my list of "official settings I want to play/DM in", but the book is a really, really good setting book for Theros. And Wildemount is definitely the 2nd best setting book in all of 5e, just behind Eberron: Rising from the Last War. Theros, Wildemount, and Eberron all had setting-specific lore for the races that appeared in those settings. And it was good lore, for the most part. They clearly have the ability to make good setting lore for 5e settings. The "will" is a different question, but they have shown the will to do that in the past.
Oh they've put some effort in in the past to be sure, But as I'd already pointed out Spelljammer very much had a lot of lore to draw upon and they used... almost none of it.
And since that's the most recent product that they've released (and given the number of promos they did on youtube for it they seemed to think they were onto something) it is the standard by which I will hold them to since it was a setting where they had so much freedom to work with and used... none of it.
The next two settings that they're announcing a release for are Dragonlance and planescape, and both of those are considerably higher bars to clear then spelljammer so yeah: I seriously question their ability to deliver on this.
You know, I also believed that 90% of the Forgotten Realms setting was bunk. At least until I went down a serious rabbit hole with the setting. After that, I realized what its whole schtick was: diversity. The setting is so ridiculously diverse in terms of the cultures, geographical locations, and level of magic, that it actually feels more Earth-like than a world like Eberron or Exandria (which is the actual name of the world Wildemount is in, by the way) where (while there is diversity there as well) things are more uniform thematically.
Obviously for those who wish for the world they play in to have a more unifying theme and/or for the world to be much simpler to work with, this is anathema. But for me, it's fascinating, and I'd even hazard to say it's something worth trying to salvage despite all the problematic elements in it.
You know, I also believed that 90% of the Forgotten Realms setting was bunk. At least until I went down a serious rabbit hole with the setting. After that, I realized what its whole schtick was: diversity. The setting is so ridiculously diverse in terms of the cultures, geographical locations, and level of magic, that it actually feels more Earth-like than a world like Eberron or Exandria (which is the actual name of the world Wildemount is in, by the way) where (while there is diversity there as well) things are more uniform thematically.
Obviously for those who wish for the world they play in to have a more unifying theme and/or for the world to be much simpler to work with, this is anathema. But for me, it's fascinating, and I'd even hazard to say it's something worth trying to salvage despite all the problematic elements in it.
Just my two cents.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Every edition certainly has not had a base setting. That was a deliberate choice made by the 3rd edition writers to move away from how the past editions were intentionally generic in the core rules because they figured most DMs would want to make their own worlds (and sales of core rules vs setting books sure backed that up). Also, WotC's choices of Greyhawk in 2000, Points of Light in 2008, and Forgotten Realms in 2014 as base settings had nothing whatsoever to do with Gygax or Greenwood's personalities.
Points of light wasn't even meant to be a setting, it was meant to be a suggested theme for your own setting, it just morphed into a setting because they were publishing adventures and needed somewhere to put them.
You know, I also believed that 90% of the Forgotten Realms setting was bunk. At least until I went down a serious rabbit hole with the setting. After that, I realized what its whole schtick was: diversity. The setting is so ridiculously diverse in terms of the cultures, geographical locations, and level of magic, that it actually feels more Earth-like than a world like Eberron or Exandria (which is the actual name of the world Wildemount is in, by the way) where (while there is diversity there as well) things are more uniform thematically.
Obviously for those who wish for the world they play in to have a more unifying theme and/or for the world to be much simpler to work with, this is anathema. But for me, it's fascinating, and I'd even hazard to say it's something worth trying to salvage despite all the problematic elements in it.
Just my two cents.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
I never said I thought anyone was trying to get rid of it. Especially when the descriptions of the races in the One D&D playtest still use the basic lore of those races in the Forgotten Realms. I was more just refuting that one earlier comment about the setting being trash.
Also I like that you specifically said the Sword Coast, because until a month ago, that was most of what I knew about the setting. Then as I said, I went down a rabbit hole, and I realized I didn't know much about it at all.
...the only two that have ever come close to challenging it have been Ebberon and to a lesser extent wildemont (which isn't technically an official setting),...
If you count Wildemont, then the setting that became more popular than anything published by WotC from 2008 to 2015 would be Pathfinder's Golarion. Which outsold D&D 4th edition by a significant margin.
WotC regained the lead after 5th edition convinced people to comeback to D&D.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
I mean, theres a hell of a lot more to the setting then the sword coast region and I'd absolutely adore having a chance to go and do a module in the anaroch, the dales, cormyr, sembia, Vaasa, Mulmaster, Calimshan... like any of them would be a refreshing take on it.
If you count Wildemont, then the setting that became more popular than anything published by WotC from 2008 to 2015 would be Pathfinder's Golarion. Which outsold D&D 4th edition by a significant margin.
WotC regained the lead after 5th edition convinced people to comeback to D&D.
Pathfinder isn't D&D or associated with WotC so kind of a moot point. It may have a root ancestor, but it is it's own thing and from where I'm standing they re more then welcome to keep it.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
I mean, theres a hell of a lot more to the setting then the sword coast region and I'd absolutely adore having a chance to go and do a module in the anaroch, the dales, cormyr, sembia, Vaasa, Mulmaster, Calimshan... like any of them would be a refreshing take on it.
Wizards knows this - it is the exact reason they want to move the Forgotten Realms away from being the default setting. 5e, at its core, is about making the game more accessible without trying to alienate older players. Wizards has, for quiet a while now, recognized that the longstanding, complicated, "hell of a lot" to it lore of the Forgotten Realms makes the game less accessible--it is intimidating to new players, there are plenty of lore snobs out there who get upset if a DM changes anything, there are folks who played Baldur's Gate and insist on applying that canon to everyone, even folks who never played the game, the fact that Forgotten Realms' popularity has taken a bit of a hit as other campaign settings have exploded, making Forgotten Realms default lore somewhat problematic at times, and countless other problems that either make folks not want to play in the Forgotten Realms or which some folks feel limits (or should limit) creativity within the setting.
This is not speculation or anecdotal--Wizards conducts plenty of customer surveys and the fact that they are acknowledging that Forgotten Realms as a default is a problem all but guarantees that their data shows that Forgotten Realms is, in fact, a problem as the default. After all, there is no question that Forgotten Realms is the most popular world--the fact that Wizards believes it should be relegated to setting-specific books means they think the harm it does to core modules and expansion of the game is larger than the benefit of utilizing their most profitable setting as a default.
I expect we will see something along the lines of Nentir Vale - 4e's "default setting" which looked a lot more like what we saw in MMM. It contained very short blurbs of lore on some gods, large monsters (which MMM still does for things like the Demonic Princes), and other named characters, but was generally setting agnostic, choosing to give players the basic building blocks of some main factions, a few cults, churches, and non-nation aligned organizations, and some elementary lore, without all the baggage inherent in a decades old setting, and without any specified lore language language that would compound on itself and become an unwieldy and bloated plane like Forgotten Realms.
And, again, just to tie this back to the main purpose of the thread, a decision to move to a more sandbox world does not actually constitute what the OP is concerned about in this thread--the removal of content that was in existing books from those very same existing books. Though more modern books will not contain all the details from things like Volo's, Volo's lore related to the Forgotten Realms is still good lore and still accessible, either in the digital version of the book if owned or through countless online wikis which obsessively chronicle tidbits of D&D lore. This is not so much an effort to excise any existing content from the game, just move the game forward in a way that removes a known-problem of setting bloat Wizards has been cognizant of for years.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
I mean, theres a hell of a lot more to the setting then the sword coast region and I'd absolutely adore having a chance to go and do a module in the anaroch, the dales, cormyr, sembia, Vaasa, Mulmaster, Calimshan... like any of them would be a refreshing take on it.
A lot of the problem with the Forgotten Realms is that there's so much of it; as a DM it's really helpful to have a lot of stuff that's blank where you can insert your own cool stuff, or where you can fit someone else's cool stuff without worrying about them being a thousand miles apart according to canon.
Pathfinder isn't D&D or associated with WotC so kind of a moot point. It may have a root ancestor, but it is it's own thing and from where I'm standing they re more then welcome to keep it.
Today maybe. But Pathfinder started in the classic SRD era of 3rd edition, when D&D had other publishers publish books for them, and allowed other publishers to write books for them. Paizo (Headquarters not far from WotC) got it's start publishing the Official D&D Magazines Dragon* and Dungeons*, Pathfinder as a Setting was semi-official much like Critical Role is now when released. Meaning if you include "Wildemount" in comparison than you have to consider Golarion which was 1st published in D&D's official Magazines.
*Dragon Magazine, and Dungeon magazine. Two separate magazines that gave official monsters, stories, maps, and adventures.
I am pretty sure the most popular setting it D&D is "Homebrew", which seems to me to be a good reason to move away from a default.
^^This 100% not sure if Homebrew games are more popular than new DMs doing adventures out of a book, but most experienced DMs have their worlds designed. With at least global maps and a few important cities worked out.
A lot of the problem with the Forgotten Realms is that there's so much of it; as a DM it's really helpful to have a lot of stuff that's blank where you can insert your own cool stuff, or where you can fit someone else's cool stuff without worrying about them being a thousand miles apart according to canon.
This is why Homebrew games are preferred by experienced DMs. I have a global map (Terra Draco), a tech setting (Steam) , and regions where the adventure can start. (About 30 of them), I have about 4 cities named per region, and let the players backstories fill in the blanks.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
I mean, theres a hell of a lot more to the setting then the sword coast region and I'd absolutely adore having a chance to go and do a module in the anaroch, the dales, cormyr, sembia, Vaasa, Mulmaster, Calimshan... like any of them would be a refreshing take on it.
A lot of the problem with the Forgotten Realms is that there's so much of it; as a DM it's really helpful to have a lot of stuff that's blank where you can insert your own cool stuff, or where you can fit someone else's cool stuff without worrying about them being a thousand miles apart according to canon.
See I'd argue the opposite; since there is so much lore it actually causes the setting to be far more cosmopolitan and "Anything goes" as a general rule of thumb and pretty much anything that has been released for any of the settings or splat books would be able to credibly fit into a campaign with a little effort. True, some GM's and/or players may feel intimidated by the sheer volume of it, but the biggest thing I'd tell people is to focus on using what you need without having to internalize the whole of it; Like if you are a cormyrian noble then the most you'd really need to know is that it's an old, well established human nation founded and led by the obarskyr dynasty, that it's much more "civilized" then the sword coast and that it's a hot bed of intrigue.
You don't need to know the full genealogy of the crown silvers, the main exports of arabel, how many orcs are buried in dead orc pass, or what the fourth king did during the 5th year of his reign because frankly most of that is trivia that isn't terribly applicable to you or the campaign as a whole.
And as a GM having a dragon's treasure trove of lore to access means that I have *thousands* of sources of inspiration for campaigns and characters and villains and heroes to draw upon along with a setting that players can look into on their own if they so choose or not; I ran an entire adventure based out of the island of Snowdown that was inspired by novels written decades ago combined with the current status of the island as being occupied territory by Amn and my players were surprised and delighted to go back and see how I'd tied together all of this keeping in mind that they had virtually no knowledge of the setting's lore prior to this since most of them were relatively new.
For myself, If I was going into someone doing a homebrew FR campaign that diverged I'd probably note the difference but as long as it didn't inexplicbly just change things (IE the great western sea is now an endless desert and everyone is a gun slinging cyborg cow boy) I'd just go "huh" and see where it goes because at the end of the day I'm not the one GMing and this person might be able to give me a fresh perspective on something else (IE life in Menzoberranzan or Shou Lung or amongst the Tuigan). I'm sure there are some FR lore enthusiasts who are completely intractable but I suspect that they're far less common then folks here abouts would seem to think.
*Dragon Magazine, and Dungeon magazine. Two separate magazines that gave official monsters, stories, maps, and adventures.
Not true on "official." While some designers for D&D wrote for Dragon and Dungeon in their capacity as TSR employees. Dragon was mostly open to fan contributions (some of whom like Ed Greenwood would produce official products for D&D). Dragon provided ideas, some designer, some fan generated, to add to your game, plus general articles reviews and commentary on TTRPG space. Dungeon magazine the same thing but focused specifically on adventures. It's like saying UA or DMsGuild is "official." Neither are. None of the Witch classes published in Dungeon over the years, for instance, were official.
The publications when they moved to Paizo were licensed to use the D&D brand (and became more focused on D&D as opposed to Dragon's earlier broader interest in the TTRPG, though mostly TSR produced TTRPGs, hobby) but stuff in Dragon was never "official" options for the game.
While the culture or more accurately fandom of D&D may consider Pathfinder part of D&D (preserving 3/3.5 or whatever), from the perspective of the D&D brand, Pathfinder isn't D&D.
Pathfinder isn't D&D or associated with WotC so kind of a moot point. It may have a root ancestor, but it is it's own thing and from where I'm standing they re more then welcome to keep it.
Today maybe. But Pathfinder started in the classic SRD era of 3rd edition, when D&D had other publishers publish books for them, and allowed other publishers to write books for them. Paizo (Headquarters not far from WotC) got it's start publishing the Official D&D Magazines Dragon* and Dungeons*, Pathfinder as a Setting was semi-official much like Critical Role is now when released. Meaning if you include "Wildemount" in comparison than you have to consider Golarion which was 1st published in D&D's official Magazines.
*Dragon Magazine, and Dungeon magazine. Two separate magazines that gave official monsters, stories, maps, and adventures.
No, this is entirely inaccurate.
Not sure where you heard that, but as someone who was a subscriber through the transition and an occasional freelancer for Paizo at the time published in Dragon magazine, I assure you this is 100% false.
Golarion was never published in Dragon or Dungeon magazines. The setting was created specifically in response to WotC ending Paizo's license to publish Dungeon & Dragon magazines. Finding themselves suddenly without their primary income stream, they started the Pathfinder adventure paths (then just the name of the product line, not a separate RPG until 4e) as well as adventure modules and *in those* started to build out the world of Golarion individual bits and pieces at a time. Paizo never included any of that in Dungeon or Dragon magazines and only started publishing material for it after they no longer published the official magazines.
See I'd argue the opposite; since there is so much lore it actually causes the setting to be far more cosmopolitan and "Anything goes" as a general rule of thumb and pretty much anything that has been released for any of the settings or splat books would be able to credibly fit into a campaign with a little effort. True, some GM's and/or players may feel intimidated by the sheer volume of it, but the biggest thing I'd tell people is to focus on using what you need without having to internalize the whole of it; Like if you are a cormyrian noble then the most you'd really need to know is that it's an old, well established human nation founded and led by the obarskyr dynasty, that it's much more "civilized" then the sword coast and that it's a hot bed of intrigue.
Let us take a moment to examine your post. "You" would argue the opposite; "you" would tell the problematic actors to get over it; "you" would not have a problem with a DM changing the lore--your entire post is predicated on your personal experiences and opinions. Handwaving away "some" actors as problematic who you apparently think you can fix with a simple revolution ignores both the scope of those problematic actors and their refusal to accept deviation. One need not look very hard on these forums to find sycophantic One True Lore folks who aggressively defend their version of the lore, often at the expense of other--often new--users.
As I already said--which I will repeat since you either missed it or ignored it due to its undermining your anecdotal argument--Wizards has real data at their fingertips, collected through years upon years of polling and other data collection methods. Wizards is constantly tracking what type of game players like; what settings are their favourites; what products they are buying; what problems players are expressing; what people are saying online... countless other data points that a company with over a billion dollars in revenue track in order to better target their products.
By defending your anecdotal position over Wizards' data-based position, you are, in effect, saying your personal views on the issue should control and your minority opinion justifies the further promulgation of something data suggests is problematic to a wider audience and the greater expansion of the game itself. You will have to pardon me if I find your anecdotes less compelling than a data-based drive to benefit the greatest number of pocketbooks players.
9 pages in and I don't think anyone has addressed the fact that "amoral" means having nothing to do with morality while "immoral" means against morality, or bad?
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
*Dragon Magazine, and Dungeon magazine. Two separate magazines that gave official monsters, stories, maps, and adventures.
Not true on "official." While some designers for D&D wrote for Dragon and Dungeon in their capacity as TSR employees. Dragon was mostly open to fan contributions (some of whom like Ed Greenwood would produce official products for D&D). Dragon provided ideas, some designer, some fan generated, to add to your game, plus general articles reviews and commentary on TTRPG space. Dungeon magazine the same thing but focused specifically on adventures. It's like saying UA or DMsGuild is "official." Neither are. None of the Witch classes published in Dungeon over the years, for instance, were official.
The publications when they moved to Paizo were licensed to use the D&D brand (and became more focused on D&D as opposed to Dragon's earlier broader interest in the TTRPG, though mostly TSR produced TTRPGs, hobby) but stuff in Dragon was never "official" options for the game.
While the culture or more accurately fandom of D&D may consider Pathfinder part of D&D (preserving 3/3.5 or whatever), from the perspective of the D&D brand, Pathfinder isn't D&D.
Just to clarify here as well - both magazines were official, even under Paizo. My articles published by Paizo in Dragon magazine had to meet WotC approval. Now if WotC never wanted to refer to or re-use anything published in the magazines, that's up to them. Just like there's information in full books that they don't want to refer to or re-use. But just because it was in a soft cover magazine rather than book did not make it unofficial. All work was paid work by freelance designers that was reviewed by rules editors and approved. They weren't fan publications that licensed the logos.
UA differs because it is work-in-progress for playtesting and therefore unfinished.
DMs Guild differs because there is zero WotC approval or review. Any content within the guidelines is allowed.
Dragon and Dungeon magazines did get TSR/WotC approvals and have been considered official canon sources all through the magazines' history.
Edit to add: In fact, thinking back on what I had published, a very clear example of how WotC viewed the magazines as official was during 3.5 they published the Spell Compendium collecting spells scattered throughout official sources other than the PHB into one handy book. This included spells published only in Dragon Magazine by Paizo. So WotC considered it as official as their "Complete [blank]" series, Manual of the Planes, Draconomicon, and other hardcover products.
Not sure where you heard that, but as someone who was a subscriber through the transition and an occasional freelancer for Paizo at the time published in Dragon magazine, I assure you this is 100% false.
Golarion was never published in Dragon or Dungeon magazines. The setting was created specifically in response to WotC ending Paizo's license to publish Dungeon & Dragon magazines. Finding themselves suddenly without their primary income stream, they started the Pathfinder adventure paths (then just the name of the product line, not a separate RPG until 4e) as well as adventure modules and *in those* started to build out the world of Golarion individual bits and pieces at a time. Paizo never included any of that in Dungeon or Dragon magazines and only started publishing material for it after they no longer published the official magazines.
Pretty sure that some of their earlier adventures published in Dragon got reworked into Pathfinder after the split.
9 pages in and I don't think anyone has addressed the fact that "amoral" means having nothing to do with morality while "immoral" means against morality, or bad?
Amoral = lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something.
So? That has nothing to do with the issues in the OP, or the the following conversation, which has gone in some bizarre directions IMO.
Every edition certainly has not had a base setting. That was a deliberate choice made by the 3rd edition writers to move away from how the past editions were intentionally generic in the core rules because they figured most DMs would want to make their own worlds (and sales of core rules vs setting books sure backed that up). Also, WotC's choices of Greyhawk in 2000, Points of Light in 2008, and Forgotten Realms in 2014 as base settings had nothing whatsoever to do with Gygax or Greenwood's personalities.
If people actually mean "setting that gets the most support in each edition" (which is not what 'base setting' has meant), even that hasn't been true. 1e had strong support for multiple settings, 2e had too much support for too many settings, 3e had strong support for multiple settings, etc. Up until recently, 5e probably topped 4e by a bit for the edition with the most tightly focused support on only one setting.
So "base settings", whatever the definition, is a recent invention of WotC and wasn't a thing for over half of D&D's history. Regardless, those decisions had nothing whatsoever to do with the personalities of someone who left the company long before any of them worked there or someone else who was never actually an employee.
Putting aside you're personal taste (which the bolded absolutely is) FR is the most established and most profitable setting that TSR or Wizards of the coast has had under their belt by an order of magnitude; the only two that have ever come close to challenging it have been Ebberon and to a lesser extent wildemont (which isn't technically an official setting), but both of those are a far cry from being able to act as a base line.
Further, having a common touchstone is good for players since it allows for them to be working from a base understanding as opposed to everyone having their own unique snowflake perception of the universe that becomes incompatible immediately on contact with another player.
Son, there are whole stellar empires and cultures that were established specifically for the Spelljammer setting that had their own stories and lore that were wholly independent of any other setting; Elven and orcish empires vying for power and control, the Giff mercenary companies, Mercantile Illithids offering access to rare goods, Star hives of Beholders... all of these were very much a thing and would have given players reasons to get invested in spelljammer as a setting as opposed to now where I can't think of a single reason to ever get on one of those flying boats.
Oh they've put some effort in in the past to be sure, But as I'd already pointed out Spelljammer very much had a lot of lore to draw upon and they used... almost none of it.
And since that's the most recent product that they've released (and given the number of promos they did on youtube for it they seemed to think they were onto something) it is the standard by which I will hold them to since it was a setting where they had so much freedom to work with and used... none of it.
The next two settings that they're announcing a release for are Dragonlance and planescape, and both of those are considerably higher bars to clear then spelljammer so yeah: I seriously question their ability to deliver on this.
You know, I also believed that 90% of the Forgotten Realms setting was bunk. At least until I went down a serious rabbit hole with the setting. After that, I realized what its whole schtick was: diversity. The setting is so ridiculously diverse in terms of the cultures, geographical locations, and level of magic, that it actually feels more Earth-like than a world like Eberron or Exandria (which is the actual name of the world Wildemount is in, by the way) where (while there is diversity there as well) things are more uniform thematically.
Obviously for those who wish for the world they play in to have a more unifying theme and/or for the world to be much simpler to work with, this is anathema. But for me, it's fascinating, and I'd even hazard to say it's something worth trying to salvage despite all the problematic elements in it.
Just my two cents.
Nobody's trying to get rid of the Forgotten Realms, they're just trying to push the game away from the idea that the social and economic structure of the Sword Coast represents the default conditions for humanoids on every D&D world unless otherwise noted.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Points of light wasn't even meant to be a setting, it was meant to be a suggested theme for your own setting, it just morphed into a setting because they were publishing adventures and needed somewhere to put them.
I never said I thought anyone was trying to get rid of it. Especially when the descriptions of the races in the One D&D playtest still use the basic lore of those races in the Forgotten Realms. I was more just refuting that one earlier comment about the setting being trash.
Also I like that you specifically said the Sword Coast, because until a month ago, that was most of what I knew about the setting. Then as I said, I went down a rabbit hole, and I realized I didn't know much about it at all.
If you count Wildemont, then the setting that became more popular than anything published by WotC from 2008 to 2015 would be Pathfinder's Golarion. Which outsold D&D 4th edition by a significant margin.
WotC regained the lead after 5th edition convinced people to comeback to D&D.
I mean, theres a hell of a lot more to the setting then the sword coast region and I'd absolutely adore having a chance to go and do a module in the anaroch, the dales, cormyr, sembia, Vaasa, Mulmaster, Calimshan... like any of them would be a refreshing take on it.
Pathfinder isn't D&D or associated with WotC so kind of a moot point. It may have a root ancestor, but it is it's own thing and from where I'm standing they re more then welcome to keep it.
I am pretty sure the most popular setting it D&D is "Homebrew", which seems to me to be a good reason to move away from a default.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
A lot of the problem with the Forgotten Realms is that there's so much of it; as a DM it's really helpful to have a lot of stuff that's blank where you can insert your own cool stuff, or where you can fit someone else's cool stuff without worrying about them being a thousand miles apart according to canon.
Today maybe. But Pathfinder started in the classic SRD era of 3rd edition, when D&D had other publishers publish books for them, and allowed other publishers to write books for them. Paizo (Headquarters not far from WotC) got it's start publishing the Official D&D Magazines Dragon* and Dungeons*, Pathfinder as a Setting was semi-official much like Critical Role is now when released. Meaning if you include "Wildemount" in comparison than you have to consider Golarion which was 1st published in D&D's official Magazines.
*Dragon Magazine, and Dungeon magazine. Two separate magazines that gave official monsters, stories, maps, and adventures.
^^This 100% not sure if Homebrew games are more popular than new DMs doing adventures out of a book, but most experienced DMs have their worlds designed. With at least global maps and a few important cities worked out.
This is why Homebrew games are preferred by experienced DMs. I have a global map (Terra Draco), a tech setting (Steam) , and regions where the adventure can start. (About 30 of them), I have about 4 cities named per region, and let the players backstories fill in the blanks.
See I'd argue the opposite; since there is so much lore it actually causes the setting to be far more cosmopolitan and "Anything goes" as a general rule of thumb and pretty much anything that has been released for any of the settings or splat books would be able to credibly fit into a campaign with a little effort. True, some GM's and/or players may feel intimidated by the sheer volume of it, but the biggest thing I'd tell people is to focus on using what you need without having to internalize the whole of it; Like if you are a cormyrian noble then the most you'd really need to know is that it's an old, well established human nation founded and led by the obarskyr dynasty, that it's much more "civilized" then the sword coast and that it's a hot bed of intrigue.
You don't need to know the full genealogy of the crown silvers, the main exports of arabel, how many orcs are buried in dead orc pass, or what the fourth king did during the 5th year of his reign because frankly most of that is trivia that isn't terribly applicable to you or the campaign as a whole.
And as a GM having a dragon's treasure trove of lore to access means that I have *thousands* of sources of inspiration for campaigns and characters and villains and heroes to draw upon along with a setting that players can look into on their own if they so choose or not; I ran an entire adventure based out of the island of Snowdown that was inspired by novels written decades ago combined with the current status of the island as being occupied territory by Amn and my players were surprised and delighted to go back and see how I'd tied together all of this keeping in mind that they had virtually no knowledge of the setting's lore prior to this since most of them were relatively new.
For myself, If I was going into someone doing a homebrew FR campaign that diverged I'd probably note the difference but as long as it didn't inexplicbly just change things (IE the great western sea is now an endless desert and everyone is a gun slinging cyborg cow boy) I'd just go "huh" and see where it goes because at the end of the day I'm not the one GMing and this person might be able to give me a fresh perspective on something else (IE life in Menzoberranzan or Shou Lung or amongst the Tuigan). I'm sure there are some FR lore enthusiasts who are completely intractable but I suspect that they're far less common then folks here abouts would seem to think.
Not true on "official." While some designers for D&D wrote for Dragon and Dungeon in their capacity as TSR employees. Dragon was mostly open to fan contributions (some of whom like Ed Greenwood would produce official products for D&D). Dragon provided ideas, some designer, some fan generated, to add to your game, plus general articles reviews and commentary on TTRPG space. Dungeon magazine the same thing but focused specifically on adventures. It's like saying UA or DMsGuild is "official." Neither are. None of the Witch classes published in Dungeon over the years, for instance, were official.
The publications when they moved to Paizo were licensed to use the D&D brand (and became more focused on D&D as opposed to Dragon's earlier broader interest in the TTRPG, though mostly TSR produced TTRPGs, hobby) but stuff in Dragon was never "official" options for the game.
While the culture or more accurately fandom of D&D may consider Pathfinder part of D&D (preserving 3/3.5 or whatever), from the perspective of the D&D brand, Pathfinder isn't D&D.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
No, this is entirely inaccurate.
Not sure where you heard that, but as someone who was a subscriber through the transition and an occasional freelancer for Paizo at the time published in Dragon magazine, I assure you this is 100% false.
Golarion was never published in Dragon or Dungeon magazines. The setting was created specifically in response to WotC ending Paizo's license to publish Dungeon & Dragon magazines. Finding themselves suddenly without their primary income stream, they started the Pathfinder adventure paths (then just the name of the product line, not a separate RPG until 4e) as well as adventure modules and *in those* started to build out the world of Golarion individual bits and pieces at a time. Paizo never included any of that in Dungeon or Dragon magazines and only started publishing material for it after they no longer published the official magazines.
Let us take a moment to examine your post. "You" would argue the opposite; "you" would tell the problematic actors to get over it; "you" would not have a problem with a DM changing the lore--your entire post is predicated on your personal experiences and opinions. Handwaving away "some" actors as problematic who you apparently think you can fix with a simple revolution ignores both the scope of those problematic actors and their refusal to accept deviation. One need not look very hard on these forums to find sycophantic One True Lore folks who aggressively defend their version of the lore, often at the expense of other--often new--users.
As I already said--which I will repeat since you either missed it or ignored it due to its undermining your anecdotal argument--Wizards has real data at their fingertips, collected through years upon years of polling and other data collection methods. Wizards is constantly tracking what type of game players like; what settings are their favourites; what products they are buying; what problems players are expressing; what people are saying online... countless other data points that a company with over a billion dollars in revenue track in order to better target their products.
By defending your anecdotal position over Wizards' data-based position, you are, in effect, saying your personal views on the issue should control and your minority opinion justifies the further promulgation of something data suggests is problematic to a wider audience and the greater expansion of the game itself. You will have to pardon me if I find your anecdotes less compelling than a data-based drive to benefit the greatest number of
pocketbooksplayers.9 pages in and I don't think anyone has addressed the fact that "amoral" means having nothing to do with morality while "immoral" means against morality, or bad?
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Just to clarify here as well - both magazines were official, even under Paizo. My articles published by Paizo in Dragon magazine had to meet WotC approval. Now if WotC never wanted to refer to or re-use anything published in the magazines, that's up to them. Just like there's information in full books that they don't want to refer to or re-use. But just because it was in a soft cover magazine rather than book did not make it unofficial. All work was paid work by freelance designers that was reviewed by rules editors and approved. They weren't fan publications that licensed the logos.
UA differs because it is work-in-progress for playtesting and therefore unfinished.
DMs Guild differs because there is zero WotC approval or review. Any content within the guidelines is allowed.
Dragon and Dungeon magazines did get TSR/WotC approvals and have been considered official canon sources all through the magazines' history.
Edit to add: In fact, thinking back on what I had published, a very clear example of how WotC viewed the magazines as official was during 3.5 they published the Spell Compendium collecting spells scattered throughout official sources other than the PHB into one handy book. This included spells published only in Dragon Magazine by Paizo. So WotC considered it as official as their "Complete [blank]" series, Manual of the Planes, Draconomicon, and other hardcover products.
Pretty sure that some of their earlier adventures published in Dragon got reworked into Pathfinder after the split.
Amoral = lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something.
So? That has nothing to do with the issues in the OP, or the the following conversation, which has gone in some bizarre directions IMO.