novelty and game environs.

From: styopa_at_iname.com
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 1999 20:53:15 -0600


>> From: <Kmnellist_at_aol.com>
>> Am I alone in thinking that a lot of Pavis and the Big Rubble are as
they are
>> as the result of a simple contivance to generate simple (really) old style
>> dungeon adventures? This makes it 'gameable' as it was designed to be,
>> 'cohesive' because it was well done, but I wouldn't really say it was
unique,
>> any more than lots of other 'fantasy' settings are unique, ie one of a
kind.
Brian T. responds:
>I would call the area fairly unique among gameworlds. Certainly
>you can't compare it to, say, Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, etc. which don't
>have a single unique concept in their entire pile of background and
>supplements? Certainly not to Call of Cthulhu, or Champions, or
>Pendragon, James Bond, or any of the games that borrow their settings from
>other literary works, movie genres, etc. Maybe Paranoia's setting? But
that's
>a warped futuristic setting that really has no substance beyond what's
>required to have encapsulated game sessions. Guess I'm just not familiar
>with all these games that have really unique settings...
>

Tekumel? Jorune? City States of Lei Tabor? (Oops, I dated myself with that one...). And just with TSR: Krynn - for all it's being beaten to death - was a rather novel campaign world. Black Sun or whatever the hell they called their psionic world? And while I'd agree that latter-day Greyhawk is somewhat cliche, remember that really, it FORMED the genre, so accusing it of lacking unique concepts is rather circular. And the older (c1979) Greyhawk campaigns DID have some more complex environs, such as Blackmoor.

>> stuff would inevitably step on peoples toes in some way. Most of Prax is an
>> empty wilderness filled with savages anyway so there aren't that many
details.
>
>I beg to disagree...the potential for areas like The Paps, The Dead
>Place, The Block, etc. are boundless...(and all the other places that start
>with "The", too). Savage != simple and boring...

To this I'd heartily agree- I was delighted at the "fleshing out" of Sun County, despite it's significant "gregging" of my campaign. I worked that into a long term adventure *anyway*. The characters were blasted back in time, did some significant things, and when they came back, all sorts of stuff had changed. Voila! (Of course, that rabbit can't be pulled out of the hat more than once, but it was worth it...) - -Steve (styopa_at_iname.com)
or at work (Steve_at_necadon.com)
http://surf.to/styopa


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