Re: Offtopic - "4DVENTURE"

From: "Steven" <steven.james.1@??????????.??.uk>
Sent: Sunday, August 26, 2007 8:08 PM

<snip>
> 3rd ed has been player paradise, with just about everything for
> them...but way, way too little for the DM and especially, a lack of
> "fluff".
> But, fluff is hard to sell: who uses it? If it's only DMs, that's less
> of the market....
> As the medium changes to web based, costs drop, a .pdf with lots of
> fluff, is much cheaper to sell, than print. Alas, digital books still
> suck compared to ye olde paper book. It's a genuine pleasure ot read a
> book, not a .pdf. One can hope technology can create a workable, good
> "e-book".

I fail to see why Print-on-Demand can't be offered as an option for all 
eBooks.

> I'm a DM, I love fluff, I love great settings, TSR made some great ones.
> WOTC only produced Ebberon, and most folk think it's sucks (woot, yes
> the suck word, lol). It's interesting, but somehow, it lacks "soul",
> just doesn't appeal to me or nearly any players I game with.

I would love to see "Jeff Grubb's version of Ebberon". :-)

> Some folk seem to hate 3rd ed because of WOTC, not so much because of
> the rules, which I don't get at all (unless you got screwed over
> somehow).

They probably read Michael Moore's "Stupid White Men" and think that WotC 
have "downsized" their favorite campaign setting out of existance.

> I find that mind boggling, considering how TSR damned near
> wiped D&D out, *forever*, as a living game (without new players, a game
> dies, like it or not). TSR *sucked hugely*. Fantastic creative talent,
> but total incompetents running it, the facts prove this conclusively:
> TSR died.
> I have no easy answer to the problem of keeping "corporate suits" out of
> creativity (because they are gross bungling useless smorons toput it
> bluntly) vs the need for sound business planning (which creative folk
> often don't get at all, hell, most corporate suits don't!)

Hmm. "Stupid White Men" again. :-)

I think that certain game designers have become so well respected that they 
are given more control over things. But this seems to mostly be happening at 
3rd party publishing companies.

I think I would be more willing to buy into new campaign settings, if I knew 
they had a "caretaker" who would maintain the integrity of the game. I would 
consider buying any d20 System compatible fantasy world that had Jeff Grubb 
as its caretaker.

> They can't use the Realms any more, really, they wh*red it out so much
> it's polluted, in simple terms. A good setting requires originality,
> broad scope, but with tightly imagined areas/groups etc for a basis to
> set characters as starting points, and then..let folk do with it as they
> want!!!

They can't win really. Shadows of the Moon gets slated because it "doesn't 
have enough SJ" and their FR product line gets slated for having "too much 
FR".

> I came up with a good mechanic for this in my own game setting
> ;)

If you come down on WotC (and/or TSR) and then say you have something 
better, you are asking for trouble. I'm sure we all accidentally introduce 
errors into our game material. I wouldn't want to stick *my* head onto the 
block and claim to beat WotC.

I hope that your setting will eventually get turned into part of a crystal 
sphere.

> The Realms has been explored and detailed to death, that's really a
> massive choke to creativity: if you put in a plot, will it hold versus
> current cannon? That adds in a huge log jam.

The surface of Faerun may have been fully explored, but there are *plenty* 
of other places that need more coverage.

I would even have been interested in a 3rd edition version of the Arcane Age 
subsetting. Role-playing in the distant past allows for ultra-high level 
spells or the creation of artifacts and I think that could be a fun 
alternative to running a standard epic game (in the current era). Time 
travelling rules, would also allow DMs to run 3rd edition games back in the 
1st edition era and reuse all of the old adventures.

David "Big Mac" Shepheard
Virtual Eclipse Role Playing Club
http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/virtualeclipselrp/links/d20_system_001071937434/Spelljammer_001071430476
http://www32.brinkster.com/virtualeclipse/