Re: SotSM and Re: Dragon 315 Revists Old Settings

> I fail to understand the emotion here.

You fail to understand the excitement of people for potentially getting
new stuff for settings they love (that's the only way you can describe
the many hours people put into developing and bringing alive any
setting)?  Or you fail to understand the trepidation people have with
hacks like Eric Mona having a say in how one of their favorite settings
is handled and presented to the world?

 If you don't like it, don't
> use it. I
> for one would be glad of anything that puts SJ in the eyes of those
> who are
> unfamiliar with it, any chance of getting a new generation of people
> interested in the setting helps push towards truly reviving it rather
> than
> sustaining it.

And here's where your idea falls on its face in the mud and is run over
by a baluctherium team pulling a doomgrinder (bonus points to anyone
who can name both settings that inspired that picture!).  Spider Moon
is far less than inspiring, it is, in fact, a waste.  SJR4 Rock of
Bral, one little city, inspires in a whole setting of innumerable and
worlds and vast distances.  SJR? Greyspace inspires me (SJR2 Realmspace
less so and SJR7 Krynnspace not at all) because it has adventuring
opportunity.  And it's different.  Here there are elves who aren't in
decline (until the uninspiring 2UW), mighty slaver races, trade,
asteroid spheres full of colonies and DM created empires (see my
asteroid empire series), planets full of factions fighting (Ginsel),
and so on.  Eric Mona decries others fr being unoriginal but there's
nothing original in Spider Moon.  Drow vs. elves with the elves above
and drow below but fighting to come up to conquer?  Yawn.  Been there,
done that, seen the innumerable FR accessories.  Space travel is
treated haphazardly (in fact, it's basically ignored by saying roll a
couple dice) in favor of prestige classes and feats, some of which
really have nothing to do with SJ (in other words, they are generic).
And the setting is worthless.  There's lots of overarching, big enemies
and no little stuff.  No nice asteroid fields where I can place Rock of
Bral when I'm inspired by this article to buy the pdf (but since the
article doesn't inspire...).  No detailing of how SJ travel (that thing
that's left out, remember?) affects the military, communications, and
economy of the planets (the planets are all self-sufficient so how des
it affect economics on the planet?).  None of the things anyone who
spent a couple weeks on this list would find still vexes dedicated DMs.
 The Spider Moon article will not inspire anyone to come to SJ.

You say anything that moves the setting forward is good.  Spider Moon
ignored the existing setting so obviously it didn't move it forward.
You say anything that inspires people to turn to SJ is god but Spider
Moon turns people away.  In case it hasn't occurred to you, SJ has so
few fans because the premise, as it appears on the surface to be, is
not one that inspires most gamers.  I only got interested in it when I
read the first Dungeon module a few times.  And those modules were the
best SJ modules produced (SJR2 and SJR1 are great but they don't
contain any full length modules the way I'm referring to).  I liked the
idea of fleets and ships.  Honestly what attracted me to SJ wasn't
really ships in space but it's the first thing I've seen for AD&D (and
now, the only) that really dealt with with a naval feel and naval
possibilities.  Every other resource skims it or skips it (FOR3
included).  But no one will ever know that unless they get good SJ
articles that show this possibility.  And from the outside, SJ just
looks like a fantasy space setting.  And Spider Moon is the worst SJ
setting I've seen (and I have many poor ones to choose from given the
SJ modules that were released...).  So simple "exposure" to SJ will do
nothing for growing the fan base.  Bad articles will turn people away
from BtM and the .pdfs as much as the $20 price tag kept me away from
the boxed set until something else attracted me.


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