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Any idea?  Out of the TSR or WoTC settings: which one was probably the least played overall? Which was the least influential?  Are those two different settings?

TSR Settings:

If Masque of the Red Death counts as a separate setting? Or one of the Historical settings - A Mighty Fortress, Charlemagne's Paladins et al. The historical setttings suffered from being way too historical, not enough fantasy - Charlemagne was all real Franks & Saxons, not Roland in shining plate armour wielding Durandala against 500,000 Moors...

Leaving those aside, I think Birthright was moderately popular, so probably Spelljammer.

The Masque of the Red Death had a fair amount of fan-driven support, so I don't think it would qualify (see Secrets of the Kargatane).

Jakandor comes to mind. Three books, but now it's almost completely forgotten.

From when I knew TSR staff back near the end.

2nd ed Dark Sun did not fare well. Something about it just did not click for some. (many?) That is the one mentioned most. I have to agree. I have/had it and it was oddly... meh. Like it was missing some spark the first had.

Red Steel was another that seemed to not catch on. And was then exlipesed by Birthright which has a very simmilar setting premise.

TSRs DragonQuest seemed to get some resistance. That is the one I heard the least about.

Outside of D&D

Zebulons Guide as a reboot of Starfrontiers met with all sorts of resistance.
The total reboot of Buck Rodgers didnt thrill many. Would have thrilled them even less had they been aware back then of what it really was.
The 3rd ed of Gamma World met with resistance. Especially since the EQ books painted it as a slapstick Wacky World instead of Gamma World.

The rest just seem to have slipped under the radar or never really caught on.

Quote from: Omega;8329762nd ed Dark Sun did not fare well. Something about it just did not click for some. (many?) That is the one mentioned most. I have to agree. I have/had it and it was oddly... meh. Like it was missing some spark the first had.

Wasn't the problem that it changed a lot of political and NPC assumptions in frustrating ways (the dreaded metaplot), and detailed so much of the world compared to the first one that a lot of the adventure potential dried up?

Quote from: Omega;832976Red Steel was another that seemed to not catch on. And was then exlipesed by Birthright which has a very simmilar setting premise.

I read that one. It felt very hodge-pogy, thrown together, like they had too many good ideas and didn't edit them down. Birthright may be extremely generic, but at least it feels like a thematic whole.

This is also a criticism frequently thrown at Eberron, but I disagree with it enough that I'm currently running Eberron in 5e.

Quote from: Omega;832976Zebulons Guide as a reboot of Starfrontiers met with all sorts of resistance.

The first four alien races in Star Frontiers were so well thought out that when you saw the uninspired ones they put in Zebulon's Guide you knew the rest of the book was going to be disappointing. At least some of the other added setting details were useful.

I would guess Hollow World, which was like a sub-setting for Mystara.

I mean, they literally got rid of it when they switched Mystara to 2e AD&D, saying it didn't actually exist.

I think the thing with Birthright is that the main boxed set only focused on one region of the setting, and that all the additional regions seemed like afterthoughts.

I'll opine al-Qadim.  I don't recall ever hearing of anyone playing a campaign in it*, nor seeing the lone dusty boxed set move from the RPG store shelf until...well wait, no, it was still there the last time I cared to look.

Also for some reason it sticks out in my head that tons of it got pulped when WotC took over from TSR, because they had tons of it still sitting in the warehouse because it hadn't sold.

...

* - now patiently awaiting 2 or 3 posts from people going NUH-UH!  I PLAYED IT!

Al-Qadim was successful enough in its day to get extended for an extra year.

  Birthright, by contrast, got a major 1998 relaunch cancelled at the last minute (after the catalog went to press).

Birthright was hurt by being their last big setting before TSR collapsed, so it was competing with too many others to really stand out, and they'd already lost a fair number of their regular buyers. Spelljammer was probably the greater underperformer though, in terms of the chances it got and the way it's near competition did.

Hollow Earth and Red Steel. They both felt shoehorned into Mystara. I know that sounds weird as Mystara itself, is a jumble of everything. Just my take on it. I really like Red Steel, none the less.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;833001Al-Qadim was successful enough in its day to get extended for an extra year.

  Birthright, by contrast, got a major 1998 relaunch cancelled at the last minute (after the catalog went to press).

Yeah, Birthright was a drag, especially the intro adventure where one of the PCs gets assassinated, no saving throw. Yeesh.

Quote from: Doom;833011Yeah, Birthright was a drag, especially the intro adventure where one of the PCs gets assassinated, no saving throw. Yeesh.

Lol. I recall a Ravenloft adventure (might have been from the shadows but could be wrong) where the players are beheaded at the beginning.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;833013Lol. I recall a Ravenloft adventure (might have been from the shadows but could be wrong) where the players are beheaded at the beginning.

  That's the one--RQ3 From the Shadows. Similar tricks were tried in RM2 The Created, Adam's Wrath, and Hour of the Knife. It was never permanent, but it smacked of railroading and unfairness based on comments I've seen.

I love Ravenloft, but it did suffer from some poor trends in adventure design--largely based on the theory of some designers that the only way to scare players was to threaten and/or kill the PCs.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;833013Lol. I recall a Ravenloft adventure (might have been from the shadows but could be wrong) where the players are beheaded at the beginning.

Don't forget the one where they are unfairly killed and brought back as flesh golems.

I vaguely recall a setting that looked interesting, can't remember the name of it though. Not published by TSR but a secondary company. As I recall it was in a purple-ish box and the map had no continents but lots of islands scattered across a vast sea. Came out around the late 80's or early 90's. Anyone know what I'm remembering? Was it worth anything?

Quote from: JeremyR;832980I would guess Hollow World, which was like a sub-setting for Mystara.

Wow, I loved Hollow World! It was really well done & I'm looking at using it in my Classic D&D Karameikos campaign once the PCs are higher level and won't be scared at large scale exploration. Sending them to the Land of Ancient Traldarans seems like a great fit, but almost everything is great (the Merry Pirates are a bit much maybe).

What about the one set on the other side of Krynn?  Talandis or something like that?  I've heard it was better but got the bad stink of being Dragon Lance's kid brother so people who liked Dragonlance didn't want it and people who didn't like Dragonlance didn't want it.

I also recall, that TSR had Lankmar and Hyboria but the Conan modules weren't around for long and might not even have gotten a setting box other than the rpg.

Quote from: David Johansen;833021What about the one set on the other side of Krynn?  Talandis or something like that?  I've heard it was better but got the bad stink of being Dragon Lance's kid brother so people who liked Dragonlance didn't want it and people who didn't like Dragonlance didn't want it.

   Taladas has a small but devoted following, but it didn't really seem to have legs. Dragonlance as a whole seems to be the same way, handicapped by the identification of the setting with Weis & Hickman.

  Of course, I'm one of the half-dozen people on the planet who positively likes the SAGA Rules System and the original Fifth Age.

I'd say Al-Qadim.

BirthRight is the setting that got me into the hobby. I purchased the box set at my local comicbook store one summer, not knowing that I actually needed anything else to play. So, when I got home, and read that I needed the core books I didn't actually have the money to buy those and play. It wasn't until that Christmas that my parents got me the Introduction to AD&D box set. BirthRight is a really underrated setting. It's not generic at all if you actually read the setting.

Quote from: Pat;832974SNIP

Jakandor comes to mind. Three books, but now it's almost completely forgotten.

I second this though Matzica would come in second place since it  at least was tied to the Realms coattails though I doubt many wanted to play Conquistadors  or D&D Aztecs/Maya/Inca whatever ...

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;833015That's the one--RQ3 From the Shadows. Similar tricks were tried in RM2 The Created, Adam's Wrath, and Hour of the Knife. It was never permanent, but it smacked of railroading and unfairness based on comments I've seen.

I love Ravenloft, but it did suffer from some poor trends in adventure design--largely based on the theory of some designers that the only way to scare players was to threaten and/or kill the PCs.

That stuff was pretty ubiquitous by that point. I don't mind the set ups as long as they aren't railroaded. The possibility of players having their heads cut off and ending up in Azalin's laboratory is fine, but it shouldn't be a foregone conclusion. The problem with those adventures was they basically said the GM should make these things happen. I ran the Created again a few years ago and the railroading was pretty heavy. At one point there is an NPC it says flat out, no mater what they players do, they can't kill him (and not because he had physical immunities or protections, just the GM was supposed to fudge rolls so he couldn't die). That said, there was still cool stuff going on in those modules. You just have to work around the stuff that was fashionable at the time.

Pelinore.

Quote from: Ulairi;833024I'd say Al-Qadim.

BirthRight is the setting that got me into the hobby. I purchased the box set at my local comicbook store one summer, not knowing that I actually needed anything else to play. So, when I got home, and read that I needed the core books I didn't actually have the money to buy those and play. It wasn't until that Christmas that my parents got me the Introduction to AD&D box set. BirthRight is a really underrated setting. It's not generic at all if you actually read the setting.

I quite liked Birthright. I remember playing some really fun campaigns for it. I think we are looking at this though through the lenses of our own experience.

Is there any actual sales data on the different lines from that period?

My experience with what people were playing is so different from what I am seeing reported on this thread. Red Steel was something that got played quite a bit in my group for example (and we had at least 3 Masque of the Red Death Campaigns). Spelljammer was popular. Dark Sun was just huge with us. A lot of guys in my group read the forgotten realms novels and bought the setting material or modules, but I don't remember all that many actual campaigns.

Quote from: Opaopajr;833030Pelinore.

Is that the one with all the King Johns?

Masque is a difficult one to account for because it was the foundation for the second RPGA Living campaign, which may be skewing results.

  I've been given to understand that a lot of this stuff can be local or regional--Spellfire was apparently a big hit in some markets but not others--and even basing things on what product lines were continued or abandoned can be iffy due to contractual issues (TSR/WotC has to produce X amount of FR material a year to retain the rights), internal politics (appeasing Salvatore, Weis & Hickman had an impact on certain products happening or not happening at the start of the WotC era), marketing plans and other factors.

  It's like William Goldman said about Hollywood: NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;833031Is there any actual sales data on the different lines from that period?

  I've heard persistent rumors that Ravenloft was second only to the Forgotten Realms at some points (and at others nearly dipped to cancellation levels), but the only solid numbers I've ever seen come from the early 90s TSR catalogs, and even those require some parsing and have been disputed. Unfortunately, my copies are half a continent away at this point.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;833035Masque is a difficult one to account for because it was the foundation for the second RPGA Living campaign, which may be skewing results.

  I've been given to understand that a lot of this stuff can be local or regional--Spellfire was apparently a big hit in some markets but not others--and even basing things on what product lines were continued or abandoned can be iffy due to contractual issues (TSR/WotC has to produce X amount of FR material a year to retain the rights), internal politics (appeasing Salvatore, Weis & Hickman had an impact on certain products happening or not happening at the start of the WotC era), marketing plans and other factors.

  It's like William Goldman said about Hollywood: NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING.

Things were definitely fragmented back then. You could go one town over and find a whole cluster of gaming groups with completely different sensibilities than those in your community. In my case it was just an extension of liking Ravenloft and games like Call of Cthulu and TORG (for the Orrosh setting). The RPGA wasn't something anyone I personally knew participated in (though I was aware of it through ads). I am sure people in my area were in the RPGA, it just never seemed to be something that interested anyone in our group.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;833036I've heard persistent rumors that Ravenloft was second only to the Forgotten Realms at some points (and at others nearly dipped to cancellation levels), but the only solid numbers I've ever seen come from the early 90s TSR catalogs, and even those require some parsing and have been disputed. Unfortunately, my copies are half a continent away at this point.

No idea. They released a huge amount of material for Ravenloft in the early 90s. I was never short on new releases. So it wouldn't surprise me. With the people I played with, it wasn't really like you had to pick just one setting and go with it. I usually ran Ravenloft. One guy ran Dark Sun and Spelljammer (often in shorter campaign cycles). Another ran Birthright and so on.

Quote from: Opaopajr;833030Pelinore.

No idea if it got played much, but Pelinore was pretty influential in that a lot of WFRP material (especially Marienburg) drew heavily from it for ideas and presentation.

I would say Greyhawk.

Failed settings are just that, failed.  They don't go back to them, because they failed to grab people, they were never memorable enough for people to remember them.  But Greyhawk is that one setting that very, very few actually go back to, despite both TSR's and WoTC's attempts at bringing it back.  And everyone who's played D&D knows of Greyhawk.  But again, very few actively play in it.

So that's my answer.  Which is purely opinion.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833052I would say Greyhawk.

The reaction to this should be interesting.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833052I would say Greyhawk.

Failed settings are just that, failed.  They don't go back to them, because they failed to grab people, they were never memorable enough for people to remember them.  But Greyhawk is that one setting that very, very few actually go back to, despite both TSR's and WoTC's attempts at bringing it back.  And everyone who's played D&D knows of Greyhawk.  But again, very few actively play in it.

So that's my answer.  Which is purely opinion.

When 3E came out my group ran a year long campaign in Greyhawk. I don't think Greyhawk is the issue but more of WotC.

I think BedrockBrendan is spot on. Popular is a relative term in a niche like gaming. Mystara and BirthRight are AD&D to me. Mystara because that's what the Introduction to AD&D line that taught me how to play ran thorugh, I have all of the box sets that come with those cool audio CDs. And BirthRight, I still think is criminally underrated. I find it far more interesting than Forgotten Realms, Dragon Lance, and other D&D fantasy settings.

Greyhawk to me has been supplanted by the Kingdoms of Kalamar.

Quote from: Doughdee222;833018I vaguely recall a setting that looked interesting, can't remember the name of it though. Not published by TSR but a secondary company. As I recall it was in a purple-ish box and the map had no continents but lots of islands scattered across a vast sea. Came out around the late 80's or early 90's. Anyone know what I'm remembering? Was it worth anything?

Shadow World from Iron Crown Enterprises, maybe? The atlas came in a purple box, and the world of Kulthea kind of matches your description. It was for Rolemaster and Fantasy Hero, though, not D&D.

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v407/krpeterson1/97f18ef3-887c-4bc5-8786-d2473b1916d2_zpsfsb4in2m.jpg) (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/krpeterson1/media/97f18ef3-887c-4bc5-8786-d2473b1916d2_zpsfsb4in2m.jpg.html)

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833052I would say Greyhawk.

Failed settings are just that, failed.  They don't go back to them, because they failed to grab people, they were never memorable enough for people to remember them.  But Greyhawk is that one setting that very, very few actually go back to, despite both TSR's and WoTC's attempts at bringing it back.  And everyone who's played D&D knows of Greyhawk.  But again, very few actively play in it.

So that's my answer.  Which is purely opinion.

Welp, you'd be objectively wrong.

http://www.knights-n-knaves.com/phpbb3/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=5881

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833052I would say Greyhawk.

Failed settings are just that, failed.  They don't go back to them, because they failed to grab people, they were never memorable enough for people to remember them.  But Greyhawk is that one setting that very, very few actually go back to, despite both TSR's and WoTC's attempts at bringing it back.  And everyone who's played D&D knows of Greyhawk.  But again, very few actively play in it.

So that's my answer.  Which is purely opinion.

I've gone back to Greyhawk a couple of times. Though I've gone back to the older Greyhawk. Not the newer ones. It is a great setting then. Like Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, etc.

And this seems to be the recurring problem. People seem to really get into the original near blank slate settings that most of these were. Then along comes the next iteration which hammers down more and more and more and more. Which is why I am not a fan of Mystara.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;833062Welp, you'd be objectively wrong.

http://www.knights-n-knaves.com/phpbb3/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=5881

As I expected, a very interesting response (I'm not being sarcastic).

I'd say Birthright or Red Steel.

I've only ever met one person outside the internet who had ever heard of Red Steel.  I never met anyone outside the internet who had heard of Birthright.

I guess Hollow World is another one.  I had honestly forgotten it existed.  I think back in the day I just thought it was another name for the BECMI Known World (I don't know why, I just did).

I'd also say Council of Wyrms is not too popular.  Everyone I knew who got it had no interest in the setting, just in the idea of playing Dragons.

At least people had heard of Al Quadim.  I don't know anyone who ever played in that setting, but many people I used to talk D&D with had heard of it.

Greyhawk was one of those that wasn't really popular as a setting.  Greyhawk was just a place where a lot of modules took place in and was kind of a blank slate sort of place.  People could say they played in "Greyhawk" but that didn't really have any effect on their settings.   I guess the Known World of BECMI was the same way.  It was entirely different from the Realms, Dragonlance, Ravenloft, or Dark Sun players who really paid attention to those settings.

Quote from: Omega;833063I've gone back to Greyhawk a couple of times. Though I've gone back to the older Greyhawk. Not the newer ones. It is a great setting then. Like Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, etc.

And this seems to be the recurring problem. People seem to really get into the original near blank slate settings that most of these were. Then along comes the next iteration which hammers down more and more and more and more. Which is why I am not a fan of Mystara.

Is the BECMI Known World called Mystara?  Or do I have some settings confused?  There were an awful lot of them through the late 80s and 90s.

I read this after I posted my previous entry, so you're touching upon the same thing I was referring to.

I never felt Forgotten Realms was a blank slate.  I didn't come to view it that way until almost 15 years later.  When I did, it was because of some fairly generic dungeon crawly modules released under the FR imprint at the very end of 2e.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;833072As I expected, a very interesting response (I'm not being sarcastic).

Nor was I; the numbers are there, straight from the people who had their hands on it every day.  I mean, in light of that I'd never ever say "Well, GH outsold FR and that's a fact." because...well, the facts say otherwise.

I think the attempts to improve Greyhawk have generally been the drag on the setting.  It was wonderful as a lightly detailed map.  If I were to build on it I would add more city maps and location maps but keep the setting details pretty bare bones.

Quote from: David Johansen;833083I think the attempts to improve Greyhawk have generally been the drag on the setting.  It was wonderful as a lightly detailed map.  If I were to build on it I would add more city maps and location maps but keep the setting details pretty bare bones.

That's not a bad idea, but I might port some City and Town geomorphs into a new Greyhawk set along with "city encounters" (that is, what size city/town/hamlet you find in your travels) and some other bits like that, but as far as specifically designing towns, I wouldn't.

Your homebrew, of course.

Your friends only tolerated it because they couldn't be arsed to DM.

:D

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;833072As I expected, a very interesting response (I'm not being sarcastic).

I find hard to believe, because of the second poster's comment.  I have no idea if he really did own a game store or not, but the several I went to, if it had (as he stated) Drizzt or Forgotten Realms on the cover, it was sold within hours of being put on the shelves. Meanwhile, Greyhawk stuff used to linger for months.  But as always, anecdote.

And here's something, if Greyhawk is doing so well, why is it in 4 and 5e, they've more or less ditched it for FR?  Right now, they're porting Temple of Elemental Evil, the original adventure which was in Greyhawk over to Forgotten Realms, renamed it Princes of The Apocalypse.  And didn't they do the same for Keep on The Borderlands?  Although, I could be wrong on that one.

And I'm still trying to remember a world sourcebook for Greyhawk, where as I know of several for Forgotten Realms.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833090And here's something, if Greyhawk is doing so well, why is it in 4 and 5e, they've more or less ditched it for FR?  

My pet theory is that Holian and Mona ruined the Greyhawk brand when they decided that the Living Greyhawk Guide should be a droll historical text offering nothing for a party of PCs to actually do.  If the book had instead offered new exciting adventure locales and nefarious NPCs rather than blathering on about whatever dates various cities were founded, it could have potentially captured the imaginations of a new generation of DMs.

But alas, both Holian and Mona had apparently spent too many years discussing and debating the minutia of Greyhawkian lore on the old Greyhawk listserves whereby their Greyhawk magnum opus was focused upon answering the listserve minutia rather than opening up new mysteries and vistas to explore.

With the world's primary primer buried in tedium and dullery with the wide-eyed wonder long since closed, no punk teenage DM of the early 2000s would have any other position than to see it as a crusty old dodger.  Without inspiration for new DMs, WotC had little option but to shelve it.

I am convinced, though, that were WotC to greenlight a reboot with an author that cared about producing a worldbook that a DM could use to run tabletop adventures, it could arise as a pheonix from the ashes.  Greyhawk is, after all, the ADnD brand and lore in world form.  And the ADnD brand and lore clearly holds such resonance on the gaming community that 5e felt it had little option but to follow such branding and lore as closely as modernly possible.

Quote from: K Peterson;833058Shadow World from Iron Crown Enterprises, maybe? The atlas came in a purple box, and the world of Kulthea kind of matches your description. It was for Rolemaster and Fantasy Hero, though, not D&D.

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v407/krpeterson1/97f18ef3-887c-4bc5-8786-d2473b1916d2_zpsfsb4in2m.jpg) (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/krpeterson1/media/97f18ef3-887c-4bc5-8786-d2473b1916d2_zpsfsb4in2m.jpg.html)

Yeah, I think that was it, thanks.

And for the record, I love the original Greyhawk maps and guidebook from the early 80s. Still got them somewhere I think. There was a lot to do in that world, much evil that needed defeating. If I was going to run a campaign today my first thoughts would be to set it in Greyhawk. (I might not, I might set up my own world, but I would still spend time considering it.)

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;833036I've heard persistent rumors that Ravenloft was second only to the Forgotten Realms at some points (and at others nearly dipped to cancellation levels), but the only solid numbers I've ever seen come from the early 90s TSR catalogs, and even those require some parsing and have been disputed. Unfortunately, my copies are half a continent away at this point.

One of my first campaigns, when I was like 13 or something, was set in Ravenloft and run by an older (20s) guy from the local after-school activities center/club. He ran it out of the old AD&D box for Ravenloft. It was a blast, gothic horror vampires and sword-fighting and what have you. We players fucked up the campaign of course, we were young and stupid and had an idiot in the group whose response to everything was "my CE wizard attacks him". Still we had a good time, fondly remember that setting.

I found the D20 edition in a bookshop some years later and got all excited. Then I briefly looked through it. They had rules for halflings. And all the art was the same generic mid-fantasy shit you'd see in the worst of the early 2000s third-party D20 drivel that flooded the market at the time. Halflings in fucking Ravenloft? Guys in scale-mail(e)? Wizards throwing magic missiles? Fuck that shit, lame as all hell. Ravenloft was good becauseit had a very clear tone, gothig horror, and they fucked it up by trying to make it adhere to the worst of the blandness and streamlining that came with the 3rd ed. A terrible shame.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833090And here's something, if Greyhawk is doing so well, why is it in 4 and 5e, they've more or less ditched it for FR?  Right now, they're porting Temple of Elemental Evil, the original adventure which was in Greyhawk over to Forgotten Realms, renamed it Princes of The Apocalypse.  And didn't they do the same for Keep on The Borderlands?  Although, I could be wrong on that one.

And I'm still trying to remember a world sourcebook for Greyhawk, where as I know of several for Forgotten Realms.

With Forgotten Realms, I think it has more to do with the novel tie-ins. Adventures and novels in the same setting have more of a sales impact than material that does not have similar multimedia tie-ins. WotC is after the larger market share in this case.

Quote from: Old One Eye;833112My pet theory is that Holian and Mona ruined the Greyhawk brand when they decided that the Living Greyhawk Guide should be a droll historical text offering nothing for a party of PCs to actually do.  If the book had instead offered new exciting adventure locales and nefarious NPCs rather than blathering on about whatever dates various cities were founded, it could have potentially captured the imaginations of a new generation of DMs.

But alas, both Holian and Mona had apparently spent too many years discussing and debating the minutia of Greyhawkian lore on the old Greyhawk listserves whereby their Greyhawk magnum opus was focused upon answering the listserve minutia rather than opening up new mysteries and vistas to explore.

With the world's primary primer buried in tedium and dullery with the wide-eyed wonder long since closed, no punk teenage DM of the early 2000s would have any other position than to see it as a crusty old dodger.  Without inspiration for new DMs, WotC had little option but to shelve it.

I am convinced, though, that were WotC to greenlight a reboot with an author that cared about producing a worldbook that a DM could use to run tabletop adventures, it could arise as a pheonix from the ashes.  Greyhawk is, after all, the ADnD brand and lore in world form.  And the ADnD brand and lore clearly holds such resonance on the gaming community that 5e felt it had little option but to follow such branding and lore as closely as modernly possible.

I'm not sure anyone can do a reboot.

The 4e Magical Items book, Mordenkeinan's was a cute start, but it didn't do enough.

In fact, most people who regularly play D&D from the mid 80's know more about Forgotten Realm than I ever wanted to know.  In fact, a player who had a 20 year campaign had no idea that Tasha, Otiluke, Mordenkeinan or Melf were actually Greyhawk Wizards who designed their various spells.  Bigby, he didn't even know that Bigby was from there too.

Part of the problem with the Forgotten Realms originally, was that everything had already been 'done' due to the novels.  Turning it into a theme park because too much information had been given.

But Greyhawk barely ever got touched.  If they had given more than just a few adventures, maybe even just a city book/box set, there might have been more.

Again, I believe that Greyhawk is the least popular setting simply because TSR/WoTC never expanded on it past some basics, creating new worlds like Al Qadim, Forgotten Realms, Matzica (Or however it was spelt), they even tied Kara-Tur into the Realms, Mystara and all them, simply because no one over there knew what to do with Greyhawk.

And although I am not a fan of it (I'm not of the Realms either, effin' Elminster and The Drizzle...) I still think what both companies have done to it is kinda criminal in their negligence.

Quote from: Gabriel2;833074I guess Hollow World is another one.  I had honestly forgotten it existed.  I think back in the day I just thought it was another name for the BECMI Known World (I don't know why, I just did).

I'd also say Council of Wyrms is not too popular.  Everyone I knew who got it had no interest in the setting, just in the idea of playing Dragons.

1: Dont feel bad. I thought the exact same thing. That it was a new BX/BECMI setting. Which it essentially was. Just not in the way I thought. When I finally got it it was so damn "MEH" it felt like walls and walls of text and the totally forced stagnation/stasis setting just didnt grab me. It felt too locked down.

2: I DMed Council of Wyrms till two dragon obsessed players put me off the whole deal. Neet setting though and well presented unlike some of the others. Really needed a good DM to run it though as it could get out of hand fairly easily.

Quote from: Gabriel2;833075Is the BECMI Known World called Mystara?  Or do I have some settings confused?  There were an awful lot of them through the late 80s and 90s.

Yep. BX has the "Known World/Karemeikos" setting which was fairly blank overall. Isle of Dread devoted a sentence or two to each kingdom and the rest was all for you to embellish. Mystara and the rest came after. Mystara, Hollow World, Thunder Rift, and I think Red Steel. And of course all the Gazeteers.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833090And here's something, if Greyhawk is doing so well, why is it in 4 and 5e, they've more or less ditched it for FR?  

Realms has a ton more books and is where WOTCs current literary cash cow of Drizzt resides. He's on the cover of the new Dungeon! Board game, hes in the D&D adventures board game, he was in the first series 5e minis box. Hes slated to be in the new Underdark+Demons module even!

There may be some minor legal issues too depending on where the rights to the setting are. Same as with Dragonlance. For a long time that was a huge cash cow until they killed it with too much meddling and one too many cataclysms. Talks before 5e was done were starting to look like 5e would be set in Krynn. But for whatever reasons they went back to Realms.

As for Next playtest Borderlands. No. It was not set anywhere that I saw. it was a blank that could be dropped anywhere. And all it was was just the caves.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833130But Greyhawk barely ever got touched.  If they had given more than just a few adventures, maybe even just a city book/box set, there might have been more.

Again, I believe that Greyhawk is the least popular setting simply because TSR/WoTC never expanded on it past some basics, creating new worlds like Al Qadim, Forgotten Realms, Matzica (Or however it was spelt), they even tied Kara-Tur into the Realms, Mystara and all them, simply because no one over there knew what to do with Greyhawk.

Um...

Greyhawk got at least two boxed sets and at least one hardback. A fair chunk of the most classic of the early modules were all nominally or directly set in Greyhawk.

It got alot of support untill about the changeover to the Loraine era I think.

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;833120I found the D20 edition in a bookshop some years later and got all excited. Then I briefly looked through it. They had rules for halflings. And all the art was the same generic mid-fantasy shit you'd see in the worst of the early 2000s third-party D20 drivel that flooded the market at the time. Halflings in fucking Ravenloft? Guys in scale-mail(e)? Wizards throwing magic missiles? Fuck that shit, lame as all hell. Ravenloft was good becauseit had a very clear tone, gothig horror, and they fucked it up by trying to make it adhere to the worst of the blandness and streamlining that came with the 3rd ed. A terrible shame.

Err, I've got my AD&D Ravenloft black box right here and I'm looking at it right now to make sure I'm not misremembering anything. Halflings are rare but they have always been in the setting. The rules allow their presence and there is a country in the core where a citizen population of them exists (Darkon). There is no rule restricting armor, and NPCs are listed wearing scale mail. Although many spells are significantly altered, Magic Missile is untouched and perfectly legal.

Now maybe your GM ran things very differently and you never realized it, but you can't say the 3rd edition version of Ravenloft "fucked" the setting up by using things that were always there.

I will agree the art in the black box was better, but overall I personally thought the 3rd edition line was very useful and mostly well thought out. Turning half-orcs into calibans was genius for instance, and the domain gazetteers were great time-savers.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;833149I will agree the art in the black box was better, but overall I personally thought the 3rd edition line was very useful and mostly well thought out. Turning half-orcs into calibans was genius for instance, and the domain gazetteers were great time-savers.

  I have to wonder if BMR was looking at the original 3.0 version or the 3.5 "Player's Handbook". I never spent money on the latter, but IIRC based on flipping through it myself, one of its many missteps was including artwork that did feel more 'generic fantasy'.

  Ravenloft 3E was a very swingy line--you had stuff like Van Richten's Arsenal and the Gazetteers which were among the best stuff ever done for the setting, and then you had things like Champions of Darkness. A lot of this can be traced to the fact that you essentially had two different sets of freelancers for most of the line's run, and developer oversight was minimal at the best of times.

The utterly unknown Ghostwalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwalk).

An official wotc released campaign setting few seem to be aware of and absolutely no one seems to care for.

Quote from: Gold Roger;833169The utterly unknown Ghostwalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwalk).

An official wotc released campaign setting few seem to be aware of and absolutely no one seems to care for.

    If you want to bury a setting, release it immediately--as in a month or two--before an edition changeover or revision. :)

Quote from: Gold Roger;833169The utterly unknown Ghostwalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwalk).

An official wotc released campaign setting few seem to be aware of and absolutely no one seems to care for.

I think I remember seeing that.  I thought it was a megadungeon style adventure module.

Quote from: Omega;833145There may be some minor legal issues too depending on where the rights to the setting are. Same as with Dragonlance. For a long time that was a huge cash cow until they killed it with too much meddling and one too many cataclysms. Talks before 5e was done were starting to look like 5e would be set in Krynn. But for whatever reasons they went back to Realms.

  Novels-wise, Krynn was a huge cash cow. Gaming wise, it's been sputtering since about midway through the original modules, based on my observations.

 After the first 14--of which I could find most of the second half still in shrinkwrap in a Fargo FLGS c. 2000--it got 2 adventure anthologies and a hardcover, and that was it under 1st Edition. Then 2nd Edition launched with good support for Taladas ... and that faded out by the end of 1990. After some elf adventures in 1991, they made a big relaunch with the Tales of the Lance boxed set, introductory adventures, and a repackaging of the original modules in 1992 ... and that died at the end of 1993 (or mid-1994, if you want to count the final volume of the repackaged original modules).
 
  After Dragons of Summer Flame, which was a story conceived and executed by Weis & Hickman--although they would have preferred a trilogy with adventure support to the single volume that wound up being published--TSR gave the Dragonlance fans in the gaming department the go-ahead to do a new DL game with certain restrictions--card-based, not based on AD&D, set after DoSF, featuring 'big, mean dragons'. The Fifth Age game launched to mixed reactions, just in time for TSR to collapse, but it managed to stagger through to February 2000.

  At that point, WotC had pretty much handed over the setting to Weis & Hickman again to do their War of Souls trilogy (which went through numerous revisions so that what we got was very different from what had been proposed, from what I hear). And WotC spent the entire three years of that publication dithering on whether or not to support DL as a game line until just around the publication of the last volume, at which point they settled on licensing it out to Margaret Weis Productions (fka Sovereign Press) for the rest of 3E's run. They withdrew the license when they pulled all their licenses in-house for 4E, and while they'll drop names and talk up Dragonlance, there's been no sign of anything happening. The novels ended back in 2009 or so, IIRC, and aside from reprints of the core Weis & Hickman stuff, nothing's been done.

  With one exception--apparently WotC approached Jim Butcher, of the Dresden Files, about doing a reboot of Chronicles. He was interested, but dropped out when he couldn't get assurances that Weis & Hickman were okay with the idea.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833130But Greyhawk barely ever got touched.  If they had given more than just a few adventures, maybe even just a city book/box set, there might have been more.

Por Que?  Greyhawk has shit tons of material.  

Multiple campaign guides as the timeline advances detailing the three main eras.  There is both a city boxed set and a later update on Greyhawk City.  Regional sourcebooks cover most of the Flaneass.  Of course lots and lots of adventures.  Somewhere north of a dozen novels (or more if you count Rose Estes, though none of the Greyhawk fans do).  A popular video game and a shitty board game.  Not to mention being the living campaign for years and years.

The problem with Greyhawk is it only ever got two good authors who produced material with an eye toward mystery and gameability (Gygax and Sergeant).  Then the tAB reboot and LGG magnum opus were given to boring as shit authors who wrote out the mystery and artists who did nothing to help bring it.  Making Greyhawk boring is what killed it, not lack of material.

Quote from: Gold Roger;833169The utterly unknown Ghostwalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwalk).

An official wotc released campaign setting few seem to be aware of and absolutely no one seems to care for.

For whatever reason, ghosts just don't seem that popular lately.We've been wading through a shit flood of zombies for what feels like a decade and a half now, and vampires and werewolves are still a creepy pop culture staple (not the good kind of creepy), but ghost-based material is thin on the ground.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833090I find hard to believe, because of the second poster's comment.  I have no idea if he really did own a game store or not, but the several I went to, if it had (as he stated) Drizzt or Forgotten Realms on the cover, it was sold within hours of being put on the shelves. Meanwhile, Greyhawk stuff used to linger for months.  But as always, anecdote.

And here's something, if Greyhawk is doing so well, why is it in 4 and 5e, they've more or less ditched it for FR?  Right now, they're porting Temple of Elemental Evil, the original adventure which was in Greyhawk over to Forgotten Realms, renamed it Princes of The Apocalypse.  And didn't they do the same for Keep on The Borderlands?  Although, I could be wrong on that one.

And I'm still trying to remember a world sourcebook for Greyhawk, where as I know of several for Forgotten Realms.

Believe or disbelieve at your leisure.  Take it up with the person who actually had the job of managing Greyhawk at Wizards: it ran a close second to FR.  Which is also an answer to your question.  A close second.  This isn't 1978, nor 1985, nor 1995 nor 2005 when even the mighty Wizards of the Coast can run multiple campaign settings.  You seem to have moved the goalposts on Greyhawk from "least popular" to "well it was 2nd therefore it wasn't popular at all was it".  Make up your mind.

Quote from: Gabriel2;833074I'd say Birthright or Red Steel.

I've only ever met one person outside the internet who had ever heard of Red Steel.  I never met anyone outside the internet who had heard of Birthright.

I guess Hollow World is another one.  I had honestly forgotten it existed.  I think back in the day I just thought it was another name for the BECMI Known World (I don't know why, I just did).

I'd also say Council of Wyrms is not too popular.  Everyone I knew who got it had no interest in the setting, just in the idea of playing Dragons.

At least people had heard of Al Quadim.  I don't know anyone who ever played in that setting, but many people I used to talk D&D with had heard of it.

Greyhawk was one of those that wasn't really popular as a setting.  Greyhawk was just a place where a lot of modules took place in and was kind of a blank slate sort of place.  People could say they played in "Greyhawk" but that didn't really have any effect on their settings.   I guess the Known World of BECMI was the same way.  It was entirely different from the Realms, Dragonlance, Ravenloft, or Dark Sun players who really paid attention to those settings.

BirthRight was a victim of the time it released. I know a lot of folks in real life that play it because it's my group. I think for my age range it has a bigger impact.

Maztica?

I'm bringing it up because I saw it on the shelf at my FLGS exactly once, many years ago, and then it went off my radar. Never saw anyone online or off- play it or talk about playing it.

Was it any good? Was there any support for it?

Or did I just imagine the whole thing?

Quote from: thedungeondelver;833183Believe or disbelieve at your leisure.  Take it up with the person who actually had the job of managing Greyhawk at Wizards: it ran a close second to FR.  Which is also an answer to your question.  A close second.  This isn't 1978, nor 1985, nor 1995 nor 2005 when even the mighty Wizards of the Coast can run multiple campaign settings.  You seem to have moved the goalposts on Greyhawk from "least popular" to "well it was 2nd therefore it wasn't popular at all was it".  Make up your mind.

    On the other hand, it was the first and second year of a heavily promoted relaunch vs. the eleventh or twelfth year of a long-running setting, and WotC heavily pushed the D&D nostalgia during the 25th Anniversary year (1999), which was also the second year of Greyhawk. Whether Greyhawk would have had legs or not is uncertain; I'm inclined to suspect it might have, but contractual requirements, novels, and other factors made the Realms the better choice for WotC's new "only one supported setting" philosophy.

  I'm only speculating here, but given the fanbases, I also suspect that they may have felt Realms fans would do a better job rolling with 3E's controversial changes to the setting mechanics (dwarf wizards! Half-orc paladins!), while Greyhawk was better left in the hands of fans who could take or leave that stuff in a minimally described and Living Campaign-driven setting.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;833149Err, I've got my AD&D Ravenloft black box right here and I'm looking at it right now to make sure I'm not misremembering anything. Halflings are rare but they have always been in the setting. The rules allow their presence and there is a country in the core where a citizen population of them exists (Darkon). There is no rule restricting armor, and NPCs are listed wearing scale mail. Although many spells are significantly altered, Magic Missile is untouched and perfectly legal.

You are entirely right, what I lamented was the tone more than anything - the Halflings, the pseudo-medieval anachronisms were kind of down-played and used to support the setting's atmosphere more than anything. For me Ravenloft was curses and vampires, forbidden lore and medieval superstition.

The D20 edition changed this by trying to facilitate heroic fantasy' roleplaying. Gone was the mood, the whole feel of the plane. Instead of shady vampires in capes you had a focus on the guys in armor, the magic missiles, the halflings... the subtly of the setting was no more. Of course two gamers can give you three versions of the same setting they both remember with perfect clarity, we two apparently saw different things in the Ravenloft setting :)

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833090I find hard to believe

(http://i.qkme.me/3s2oyx.jpg)

Sorry, couldn't resist. :D For what it's worth, I'm just as surprised.

Quote from: Xavier Onassiss;833185Maztica?

I'm bringing it up because I saw it on the shelf at my FLGS exactly once, many years ago, and then it went off my radar. Never saw anyone online or off- play it or talk about playing it.

Was it any good? Was there any support for it?

Or did I just imagine the whole thing?

Maztica was terrible; an incredibly lazy copy of the real world.  WotC gave away the pdf for a long time.

Among the Forgotten Realms expansions, though, I suspect Maztica got significantly more gameplay than the Horde.

I see this as an unfair question because numerous factors existed at various times in TSR's existence that determined whether a certain setting received marketing dollars or better authors.

I remember Birthright arriving when TSR and 2e was waning, but I had friends who swear that Birthright was an incredibly fun setting with fresh exciting ideas.

I actually ran multiple Hollow World campaigns. I really loved blending that setting with Ravenloft. I did not run the setting RAW, but FOR ME, the Hollow World ideas really lent themselves to a Dreamlands tone for horror where the PCs encountered peoples stuck in a recurring living dream and if the PCs lingered too long, the dream would devour them as well.

I had this rule that each night you slept in a realm, you woke up with more and more gear that matched the realm. AKA, in the Hollow World's faux Egypt, you would awaken to your sword becoming a Khopesh and the female PC would find themselves painting black lines around their eyes.

It was a creepy reminder that the Hollow World was Not-Okay and they needed to find their way out...or pick their favorite dream realm which is how a couple PCs retired.

Quote from: Gold Roger;833169The utterly unknown Ghostwalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwalk).

An official wotc released campaign setting few seem to be aware of and absolutely no one seems to care for.

That's probably it. I notice it's the only other real (objective) contender mentioned here besides Pelinore. Even Red Steel and Jakandor got more product support and brand awareness. Only other real competitor I can think of is Dragon Fist, but I don't remember how closely the setting is tied to Shadowfist the CCG, which could effect popularity recognition.

Council of Worms got a box set and revised hard cover reprint. Mahasarpa is a free pdf offered supplement to OA 3e — I guess it counts, but Pelinore was from TSR's UK division in Imagine magazine, so you had to pay for it at some point. Diablo and Conan were small releases, but they have mass recognition. Can't think of anything else that comes close to Pelinore, Ghostwalk, and Dragon Fist.

Quote from: The Butcher;833191(http://i.qkme.me/3s2oyx.jpg)

Sorry, couldn't resist. :D For what it's worth, I'm just as surprised.

Except I didn't lie.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;833249Except I didn't lie.

I don't think he's saying you did, I question the source.  Lisa Stevens may have overstated the case.  Or she could have told the truth.  The issue for me, is that I'm trying to remember anything that was Greyhawk specific that wasn't an adventure, whereas I have several 2e books on various parts of the realms, including the old Undermountain Box Set.

If someone could point me to some Greyhawk box sets or books in the 2e era, I'd appreciate it.  I'm honestly curious.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833258If someone could point me to some Greyhawk box sets or books in the 2e era, I'd appreciate it.  I'm honestly curious.

The City of Greyhawk boxed set was a 1e/2e crossover product descibing the city and surrounding area.  It was decent but not great.

From the Ashes boxed set was the main campaign setting for 2e.  It describes the world in the immediate aftermath of the Greyhawk Wars and has a dark tone with evil forces everywhere.  I like it a lot.  Carl Sergeant was the author, look for his stuff.

The Marklands is a soft cover regional setting book for the two main good-ish kingdoms.  Both have many problems for the PCs to embroil themselves in.  Very well done, another Sergeant book.

Iuz the Evil is a soft cover regional setting book for the demigod's empire.  Another well done book with lots of hooks.  Again by Sergeant.

Ivid the Undying was an unpublished regional setting book for the former lands of the Great Kingdom.  WotC released it for free online.  Typing it into google will probably get you a legal copy.  The best of the 2e era Greyhawk books, just fantastic.  The last of Sergeant's works.

The Scarlet Brotherhood is a shitty regional setting book for the Brotherhood, Amedio, and Hepmonaland.  Terrible and derivitive of real world shit.  Avoid it.

Against the Giants was a regional setting book disguised as an adventure for the giant controlled land of Geoff.  It was OK.

The Adventure Begins was a soft cover campaign setting book rebooting things after a few years hiatus.  As much as I love Roger Moores easy writing style, he took away the darkness of the setting and reset much of this gains that evil had made without adding new hooks, thereby reducing the amount of adventure available.  Also not nearly as complete as other main campaign setting books/boxed sets, so I would not use this as a primary source.

This is all off the top of my head, almost certainly missing some.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;833013Lol. I recall a Ravenloft adventure (might have been from the shadows but could be wrong) where the players are beheaded at the beginning.

That was my first exposure to Ravenloft. My character was the one beheaded.


Lame.

Quote from: Gold Roger;833169The utterly unknown Ghostwalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwalk).

An official wotc released campaign setting few seem to be aware of and absolutely no one seems to care for.

I had it and lost it. Was pretty neet. But yeah. Obscure as per WOTCs standard substandard marketing.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833258I don't think he's saying you did, I question the source.  Lisa Stevens may have overstated the case.  Or she could have told the truth.  The issue for me, is that I'm trying to remember anything that was Greyhawk specific that wasn't an adventure, whereas I have several 2e books on various parts of the realms, including the old Undermountain Box Set.

If someone could point me to some Greyhawk box sets or books in the 2e era, I'd appreciate it.  I'm honestly curious.

OK:

The City of Greyhawk
TSR: AD&D 2 (1989 Box)


1990

MC5: Monstrous Compendium Greyhawk Adventures Appendix
TSR: AD&D 2 (1990 Looseleaf)
Night Watch
TSR: Fiction (1990 )

1991

Greyhawk Wars
TSR: Generic 1 (1991 Box)

1992

From the Ashes [From the Ashes (585-590 CY)]
TSR: AD&D 2 (1992 Box)


1994

Siege of the Tower
TSR: Fiction (1994 )

1995

Bigby's Curse
TSR: Fiction (1995 )
The Oerth Journal #1
The Oerth Journal: AD&D 2 (1995 PDF)
The Oerth Journal #2
Council of Greyhawk: Generic 1 (1995 PDF)

1996

The Oerth Journal #3
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1996 PDF)
The Oerth Journal #4
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1996 PDF)

1997

The Oerth Journal #5
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1997 PDF)
The Oerth Journal #6
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1997 PDF)

1998

The Adventure Begins
TSR: AD&D 2 (1998 )
The Oerth Journal #7
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1998 PDF)
The Oerth Journal #8
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1998 PDF)
Player's Guide to Greyhawk

1999

Against the Giants
TSR: Fiction (1999 )
Against the Giants: The Liberation of Geoff [Geoff, giants]
TSR: AD&D 2 (1999 )
The Oerth Journal #9
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1999 PDF)
The Oerth Journal #10: Discovery & Exploration
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (1999 PDF)
The Scarlet Brotherhood
TSR: AD&D 2 (1999 )
White Plume Mountain
TSR: Fiction (1999 )

2000

Descent into the Depths of the Earth
TSR: Fiction (2000 )
Council of Greyhawk: AD&D 2 (2000 PDF)

Quote from: thedungeondelver;833279OK:

The City of Greyhawk
TSR: AD&D 2 (1989 Box)

I actually just got that recently from the RPG effects of a player that passed away.

Quote from: Omega;833281I actually just got that recently from the RPG effects of a player that passed away.

I'm sorry for your loss, use the set well; I'm sure they'd appreciate that.

Hey, thedungeondelver, IIRC the 3rd Edition Greyhawk stuff was mostly in the RPGA Living Greyhawk campaign sections of Dungeon and Dragon magazine during that era. Don't forget those.

Quote from: jeff37923;833308Hey, thedungeondelver, IIRC the 3rd Edition Greyhawk stuff was mostly in the RPGA Living Greyhawk campaign sections of Dungeon and Dragon magazine during that era. Don't forget those.

Very true; I assumed the question was just about 2e product but yeah it about doubles or halves again if we inclued the LGG and Dungeon & Dragon magazine content.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833090And here's something, if Greyhawk is doing so well, why is it in 4 and 5e, they've more or less ditched it for FR?  

In my opinion it is because Forgotten Realms is more mallable and more of a blank slate than Greyhawk. Greyhawk is a patchwork of realms with a few city-states. Forgotten Realms is a patchwork of city-states with a handful of realms.

So if you designing something it probably slightly easier to find a corner of Forgotten Realms to set it in than it is Greyhawk.

Understand it is not dramatically different, but just enough.

Personally, I like Greyhawk way better than Forgotten Realms. And I view the use of FR as being a bit lazy. There are plenty of empty spaces in Greyhawk to set most types of modules.

Quote from: estar;833354In my opinion it is because Forgotten Realms is more mallable and more of a blank slate than Greyhawk. Greyhawk is a patchwork of realms with a few city-states. Forgotten Realms is a patchwork of city-states with a handful of realms.

That is funny. I allways saw it the other way around. Greyhawk being the more open setting and Realms being the increasingly more locked down one.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;833249Except I didn't lie.

Whoever told him no one played Greyhawk did.

Quote from: Omega;833356That is funny. I allways saw it the other way around. Greyhawk being the more open setting and Realms being the increasingly more locked down one.

The Realms has more details published. But Wizards doesn't seem to be as beholden to that detail as you would think. They are willing to jump ahead in time and change things up to get the module they want setup. Look at the area covered in the Lost Mine, Elemental Evil, Horde of the Dragon Queen, and what they did a couple of years back in those areas.

Most of it set in area of scattered settlements and city states.

Quote from: S'mon;833019Wow, I loved Hollow World! It was really well done & I'm looking at using it in my Classic D&D Karameikos campaign once the PCs are higher level and won't be scared at large scale exploration. Sending them to the Land of Ancient Traldarans seems like a great fit, but almost everything is great (the Merry Pirates are a bit much maybe).

I always regret not buying the Hollow World boxed set when I saw it on a stall in the Amsterdam book market.

Quote from: JeremyR;832980I would guess Hollow World, which was like a sub-setting for Mystara.

I mean, they literally got rid of it when they switched Mystara to 2e AD&D, saying it didn't actually exist.

I think the thing with Birthright is that the main boxed set only focused on one region of the setting, and that all the additional regions seemed like afterthoughts.

When did they remove Hollow World? I was collecting all of those books at the time, and don't remember them retconning HW out of Mystara....my impression was they started small with Karameikos and Glantri, then never got any further with the Mystara conversion to 2E.....but that they simply never got around to addressing all the other stuff. Or did I just get lucky and not have read the One Thing that removed Hollow World from Mystara at the time? Which I'll say is lucky because I loved HW and had all of it back then, used it for my 2E games.


On the OP: I"ll second/third Jakandor and raise everyone with the Tale of the Comet (http://www.amazon.com/TALE-COMET-Odyssey-Camapign-Expansion/dp/0786906537) universe, another Odyssey product that was mainly aimed at providing an excuse for DMs to blow shit up in time for 3E.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833258I don't think he's saying you did, I question the source.  Lisa Stevens may have overstated the case.  Or she could have told the truth.  The issue for me, is that I'm trying to remember anything that was Greyhawk specific that wasn't an adventure, whereas I have several 2e books on various parts of the realms, including the old Undermountain Box Set.

If someone could point me to some Greyhawk box sets or books in the 2e era, I'd appreciate it.  I'm honestly curious.

There was more 2E Greyhawk product than you remember. Greyhawk Wars boxed set followed by a bunch of modules, From the Ashes Boxed Set (and more modules), then later the revival with no boxed sets, but a bunch of modules (Return of the Eight, Greyhawk Player's Guide, The Adventure Begins, Scarlet Brotherhood, Slavers, Star Cairns, Doomgrinder, etc.)

I've been collecting 2E Greyhawk lately, and there is a lot of it.

There were the Vecna modules that also delved into a crossover with Ravenloft, too. All 2E era.

Quote from: camazotz;833416On the OP: I"ll second/third Jakandor and raise everyone with the Tale of the Comet (http://www.amazon.com/TALE-COMET-Odyssey-Camapign-Expansion/dp/0786906537) universe, another Odyssey product that was mainly aimed at providing an excuse for DMs to blow shit up in time for 3E.

   I don't think that was the intent; Tales of the Comet was planned for release in early 1997, and wound up being one of the first products released under WotC management. If anything, it may have been meant to prime the pump for Alternity.

  The three products that were marketed as 'campaign ending/transition' items were all early 2000 releases--The Dungeon of Death (FR--kill off your characters!), The Apocalypse Stone (generic--blow up or shake up your setting!), and Die Vecna Die! (Greyhawk/Ravenloft/Planescape--shake up the multiverse!)

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;833120One of my first campaigns, when I was like 13 or something, was set in Ravenloft and run by an older (20s) guy from the local after-school activities center/club. He ran it out of the old AD&D box for Ravenloft. It was a blast, gothic horror vampires and sword-fighting and what have you. We players fucked up the campaign of course, we were young and stupid and had an idiot in the group whose response to everything was "my CE wizard attacks him". Still we had a good time, fondly remember that setting.

I found the D20 edition in a bookshop some years later and got all excited. Then I briefly looked through it. They had rules for halflings. And all the art was the same generic mid-fantasy shit you'd see in the worst of the early 2000s third-party D20 drivel that flooded the market at the time. Halflings in fucking Ravenloft? Guys in scale-mail(e)? Wizards throwing magic missiles? Fuck that shit, lame as all hell. Ravenloft was good becauseit had a very clear tone, gothig horror, and they fucked it up by trying to make it adhere to the worst of the blandness and streamlining that came with the 3rd ed. A terrible shame.

I wonder which one you looked at. That stuff was always there in each core campaign set, primarily because the original Ravenloft premise was that you started in some normal fantasy land and got kidnapped  by the mists into Ravenloft....so de facto the setting had to assume that anything you could play in Greyhawk or FR would be able to make its way to Ravenloft.

Even without the core conceit of "kidnapped in horror land" all of the usual fantasy stuff could be found somewhere in the Domains of dread, a byproduct of the weird domain-prisons constructed in the likeness of the dark lords' homelands. Vecna had a domain ripped from Greyhawk for a while, and Soth's domain was from Dragonlance. The "big lich" Azalin of the campaign had also been ripped from Greyhawk. However, for every "classic fantasy" region with elves and halflings there were usually a half-dozen domains with none of or very few such tropes.

Honestly though, every damned book in the 80's (even Dark Sun) without exception included all the checklist tropes because TSR didn't want to overlook any possible playable option for someone, cause that was like leaving money on the table...it was the way it was done, and the DM's job was to cut that crap out to suit to taste and make it more interesting. It just so happened that in the meat of the Ravenloft world, most of the good bits were in the modules and the gazetteers. Some of the modules from back then remain the best modules ever released (for that style of play).

Quote from: thedungeondelver;833000I'll opine al-Qadim.  I don't recall ever hearing of anyone playing a campaign in it*, nor seeing the lone dusty boxed set move from the RPG store shelf until...well wait, no, it was still there the last time I cared to look.

Also for some reason it sticks out in my head that tons of it got pulped when WotC took over from TSR, because they had tons of it still sitting in the warehouse because it hadn't sold.

...

* - now patiently awaiting 2 or 3 posts from people going NUH-UH!  I PLAYED IT!

I'm literally running a campaign in it right now. I post my session write-ups and notes on this very site.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;833424I don't think that was the intent; Tales of the Comet was planned for release in early 1997, and wound up being one of the first products released under WotC management. If anything, it may have been meant to prime the pump for Alternity.

  The three products that were marketed as 'campaign ending/transition' items were all early 2000 releases--The Dungeon of Death (FR--kill off your characters!), The Apocalypse Stone (generic--blow up or shake up your setting!), and Die Vecna Die! (Greyhawk/Ravenloft/Planescape--shake up the multiverse!)

Actually yeah you are definitely right....it was a SF add-on, not the one I was thinking of. That was an apocalypse type module (Apocalypse Stone and the others you mentioned) which provided an end of the world scenario for DMs.

To answer the OP, I'd say Red Steel / Savage Coast or Maztica. They barely made it past the initial setting write-up.

Quote from: David Johansen;833021What about the one set on the other side of Krynn?  Talandis or something like that?

At the time I really dug Taladas.  NOBODY wanted to adventure there, though...

Another one comes to mind.

The Polyhedron version of Spelljammer. I havent met anyone who has had anything good to say about it so far.

What about Urban Arcana? Was it disliked or just WOTC didnt promote it well?

Quote from: Angry_Douchebag;833440At the time I really dug Taladas.  NOBODY wanted to adventure there, though...

I still think about it from time to time.

What reasons did they give for not wanting to adventure there?

since I pretty much owned everything from 1e and 2e I made it a point to utilize all of it at some point. Hands down the least popular in my group was Maztica. But I got them to go there and we still had fun.

My personal least favorite is Ravenloft. I don't think D&D handles gothic horror very well.

Quote from: tenbones;833705My personal least favorite is Ravenloft. I don't think D&D handles gothic horror very well.

I agree there.  I've done wonderfully with the newer version of Dragon Warrior though.  Castle Ravenloft was AMAZING with DW.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;833698I still think about it from time to time.

What reasons did they give for not wanting to adventure there?

Same reason someone else gave up thread; it wasn't the Krynn they knew with the familiar landmarks and characters.

Quote from: tenbones;833705My personal least favorite is Ravenloft. I don't think D&D handles gothic horror very well.

I think D&D can handle gothic Horror darn well. The trick is you need a writer who can actually write gothic horror setting. Same with a Conan-esque low magic setting. Wrong writer and its going to come across as Forgotten Realms.

Quote from: Omega;833766I think D&D can handle gothic Horror darn well. The trick is you need a writer who can actually write gothic horror setting. Same with a Conan-esque low magic setting. Wrong writer and its going to come across as Forgotten Realms.

The writing is not the issue, it's the mechanics.  In my case it was the Magic System.  In a horror game where magic SHOULD go wrong, it can't because of how D&D works.

And after a while (level 4+) hit points (especially 3.x) got silly to where there was no tension.  And if you keep the Players down at level 3 or less, they can sometimes feel cheated, after all, the whole point of D&D is character improvement, right?

And then there's the lack of magical toys for the PC's...

D&D as written does not work all that well with Ravenloft.  The setting itself has wonderful ideas and presentations throughout the years.  But that's not the issue for me.

Quote from: Angry_Douchebag;833440At the time I really dug Taladas.  NOBODY wanted to adventure there, though...

Taladas was pretty much the first *mature* (not as in content, but as in "coherence" and, uhm, worth of retelling); I also think Taladas still remains popular. There was a guy, James O'Rance was his name, I believe, who wrote huge fanbooks and posted them online, about 15 years ago, that became my entry into the WWW aspects of roleplaying. And then there was a series of novels, published in the late 2000s that were actually pretty good - not just for D&D fiction, but for fantasy fiction, in general -  which makes them a rarity.

I am pretty sure the (sub-) setting is still getting some love, here and there, as the DL community by itself is still going fairly strong.


I think the setting getting the least love is Spelljammer - because, apart from some godawful crossover material, á la "Drows in Krynn", etc. the setting's stand alone material never really got great recognition by the fans. Like, yeah giant hamsters, and all, but really, I know probably a hundred people that each have probably a hundred D&D books, and SJ stuff, I have never seen in any private collection. - Like, that would be my gutt.based estimation, sorry if sounded all too subjective.

Quote from: Omega;833462What about Urban Arcana? Was it disliked or just WOTC didnt promote it well?

I think that one is even more explicitly like how I view Greyhawk.  I don't think it's used as a setting so much as a unifying label for homebrew.

Quote from: Angry_Douchebag;833762Same reason someone else gave up thread; it wasn't the Krynn they knew with the familiar landmarks and characters.

Yeah, basically.  The vibe I've always got from it is that it's Krynn for people who don't like Dragonlance.

For people like me, it was off putting because I like Dragonlance, Analon, and the War of the Lance stuff.  Taladas didn't seem to offer me anything.

For many people who didn't like Dragonlance, it was still Dragonlance, so it didn't offer them anything either.

I understand it has a cult following, though.

Quote from: Omega;833766I think D&D can handle gothic Horror darn well. The trick is you need a writer who can actually write gothic horror setting. Same with a Conan-esque low magic setting. Wrong writer and its going to come across as Forgotten Realms.

My problem with D&D and Gothic horror is not the setting per se. I think the system itself doesn't lend itself well to the genre.

the abstraction of HP and the general gung-ho nature of D&D players makes creating the feeling of danger or dread (npi) challenging for veteran players without going into gonzo-campy mode.

YMMV

Quote from: Christopher Brady;833779The writing is not the issue, it's the mechanics.  In my case it was the Magic System.  In a horror game where magic SHOULD go wrong, it can't because of how D&D works.

Then you write magic out of the setting or at least vastly curb its usefulness and work out classes appropriate to the setting that do not get so overpowered.

IE: You end up with Call of Cthulhu.

Quote from: tenbones;833824My problem with D&D and Gothic horror is not the setting per se. I think the system itself doesn't lend itself well to the genre.

the abstraction of HP and the general gung-ho nature of D&D players makes creating the feeling of danger or dread (npi) challenging for veteran players without going into gonzo-campy mode.

YMMV

That is the thing though. If the setting says "No magic" then that impacts everything else. Like Dragonlance or Dark Sun and "No Clerics" for example.

If you write a D&D gothic setting and Mordenkeinen is wandering around then thats not very gothic aside from the look and atmosphere. IE Castle Ravenloft module.

Youd need to adjust some things. But the core AD&D system is readily adaptable to a gothic setting. Even a gothic Earth one. Limit the PCs to humans, limit the access to classes or write new classes. Make magic either damn hard to come by, or really limited in scope, power or reliability.

Quote from: Omega;833941Then you write magic out of the setting or at least vastly curb its usefulness and work out classes appropriate to the setting that do not get so overpowered.

IE: You end up with Call of Cthulhu.

That just masks the issue, simply because depending on the edition, we may end up with a long, slow attrition fight, for the minions.

Least popular setting?

Maybe Buck Rogers XXVC?

used AD&D 2e with a percentile skill system, had starship combat, robots and rayguns... but came at a time when computers were coming (slowly) to the fore and players my age (born late sixties/early seventies) would have been discovering other stuff. Like having to work for a living, booze, women, cars etc.

Plus of course it's always associated with the Williams woman and all that entails with (mis?) management of TSR and all that.

I can imagine the neckbeards not touching it with a bargepole just for that reason.

I Loved the computer games though.

Quote from: tzunder;833381I always regret not buying the Hollow World boxed set when I saw it on a stall in the Amsterdam book market.

I just picked up a complete copy of Hollow World and HWR1-3 at HPB.  It shows Allstons roots as a comic/pulp lover.  It feels like the the TV series The Lost World.  Lower magic so for folks who complain about the balance of wizards vs fighters this setting should be an improvement.  
overall I'm glad i picked it up.

Quote from: Bunch;834003I just picked up a complete copy of Hollow World and HWR1-3 at HPB.  It shows Allstons roots as a comic/pulp lover.  It feels like the the TV series The Lost World.  Lower magic so for folks who complain about the balance of wizards vs fighters this setting should be an improvement.  
overall I'm glad i picked it up.

Yeah, lower magic but outer-world MUs can bring in a bunch of spells unknown to the natives, so you get a cool Colonialist vibe where the outer-world Conquistadores get superior spells as well as armour/weapons - while at the same time some other spells just don't work. It seemed very well done to me.

(BTW I only just realised running Mentzer recently that he already deliberately toned down a lot of spells from AD&D level, creating a far more balanced high-level game, and one where you can't eg easily scry/buff/teleport your enemies to death).

Quote from: APN;833978Least popular setting?

Maybe Buck Rogers XXVC?

Plus of course it's always associated with the Williams woman and all that entails with (mis?) management of TSR and all that.

I can imagine the neckbeards not touching it with a bargepole just for that reason.

I Loved the computer games though.

There were two great SSI gold box versions  of Buck Rogers made.

One of the reasons it got come dislike was that it seemed to needlessly kill off and replace Star Frontiers. It got alot of support. But unfortunately that was so Williams could line her pockets with the royalties.

Then it got cancelled and replaced with a new game that got even less attention.

Quote from: S'mon;833019Wow, I loved Hollow World! It was really well done & I'm looking at using it in my Classic D&D Karameikos campaign once the PCs are higher level and won't be scared at large scale exploration. Sending them to the Land of Ancient Traldarans seems like a great fit, but almost everything is great (the Merry Pirates are a bit much maybe).

Yeah, Hollow World was spectacular!

Quote from: Omega;834309One of the reasons it got come dislike was that it seemed to needlessly kill off and replace Star Frontiers.

That was a crime right there. By all rights Star Frontiers should have become one of the great scifi tabletop rpgs.

(I just noticed I write 'scifi' differently every time. Sometimes with a space, sometimes with a hyphen, sometimes as one word. Gotta get my act together.)

Quote from: APN;833978Least popular setting?

Maybe Buck Rogers XXVC?

I loved XXVc it was such a direct port of D&D 2we and yet it's one of my favorite versions (and I generally hate 2e).  It's the integration of the thief's skills with proficiencies and the addition of flat stat values to those that make it so great.

But there was a lot of good design work and thinking in there.  The best weapon for a fighter is not the rocket pistol or the rocket launcher but a needle pistol with its three shots per round.

And vehicles are on a different scale but the damage values for heavy weapons are the same against characters because movie physics.

And the setting is a nice transhuman solar system where Mars is ascendant and earth is largely an economic backwater.

Quote from: Gabriel2;833074I'd say Birthright or Red Steel.

But red steel was never marketed as a setting on its own, it was an area supplement for Mystara.  It's like saying "The Duchy of Urnst was the least popular fantasy setting".  

Anyways, they might not know "red steel", but I bet when you say "voyage of the princess ark" you have a lot more people remembering it.

Quote from: Pat;832974Jakandor comes to mind. Three books, but now it's almost completely forgotten.

That was my guess too.

Quote from: RPGPundit;835080Anyways, they might not know "red steel", but I bet when you say "voyage of the princess ark" you have a lot more people remembering it.

I loved reading that in the Dragon Magazines.

Quote from: RPGPundit;835080But red steel was never marketed as a setting on its own, it was an area supplement for Mystara.  It's like saying "The Duchy of Urnst was the least popular fantasy setting".  

Anyways, they might not know "red steel", but I bet when you say "voyage of the princess ark" you have a lot more people remembering it.

I thought there was a Red Steel setting box set.  The one person I know of who remembers it talks about it like it's a full standalone setting.

Regardless, I'm admittedly very confused about the B/X and BECMI settings.  So, I don't doubt that I've got it wrong.

Quote from: Gabriel2;835119I thought there was a Red Steel setting box set.  The one person I know of who remembers it talks about it like it's a full standalone setting.

Regardless, I'm admittedly very confused about the B/X and BECMI settings.  So, I don't doubt that I've got it wrong.

There was a boxed set and it was pretty good from what I recall. I think they may have presented it so you didn't need the other mystara stuff if you didn't want, but they definitely mentioned  it. There were a few Mystara boxed sets at the time. They had a Glantri one too.

Quote from: RPGPundit;835080But red steel was never marketed as a setting on its own, it was an area supplement for Mystara.  It's like saying "The Duchy of Urnst was the least popular fantasy setting".  

Anyways, they might not know "red steel", but I bet when you say "voyage of the princess ark" you have a lot more people remembering it.

My copy touts it as a self contained setting. Which it pretty much is as the cynnabar effectively keeps the users within the boundaries. When I first got it I did not even realize it was set in Mystara until looking closer and reading the Princess Ark stories that tie in loosely. Though as noted below. It says Savage Coast on the box. But it is self contained.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;835133There was a boxed set and it was pretty good from what I recall. I think they may have presented it so you didn't need the other mystara stuff if you didn't want, but they definitely mentioned  it. There were a few Mystara boxed sets at the time. They had a Glantri one too.

Red Steel got at least one more boxed set. Savage Baronies. But I have never seen it so cannot say what was in it. The Red Steel box itself was presented like a standard setting box. Though it lists itself as part of the Savage Coast. Definitly not a gazeteer.
Hollow world says "Campaign Set" on the box.

Quote from: Gabriel2;835119I thought there was a Red Steel setting box set.  The one person I know of who remembers it talks about it like it's a full standalone setting.

Regardless, I'm admittedly very confused about the B/X and BECMI settings.  So, I don't doubt that I've got it wrong.

Late-era TSR always seemed to be anti-Mystara, in spite of the enormous amount of stuff they made for it.  Its like they were ashamed of it, even though it was probably the biggest, most detailed, and most spectacular setting they ever did over the years.

So yeah, the Red Steel and Savage Baronies sets were made in such a way that if you weren't a mystara fan you could use them standalone, which was dumb.  

Anyways, both those sets were mostly reposting the stuff that was covered of that region in Princess Ark.