What's your favourite published setting and why? Doesn't have to be D&D

In no major Order.

Lord of the Rings.
A song of ice and fire.
Wheel of Time.
Harry potter.
Conan the Cimmerian.
Forgotten Realms.
Lovecraft.
Inheritance Cycle.
Dune.

And that's about it. Some kid books and shit like one off short stories and other things.

All of these being stories/series of booms I've read that I'd love to play on the table.

I'm a Realms fan as well, though I'll be the first to admit 3e and onward decisions (along with many 2e ones) kind fucked it a little bit.
5e's info on it seems to basically be one massive apology by the developers and writers to people who were annoyed by WotC treating the Realms like a serial novel series instead of an RPG setting like it was designed to be.

I'll have to check out Dark Sun.

I've always wanted a setting that resembles Conan.

It's actually a kind of pretty map to look at. I like the colors.

Planescape, baby. Specifically Sigil

Aside from that I just do Arthurian-style stranding where it's a formless land and Adventure rises up to meet our heroes.

Spelljammer.
Mystara.
And Paranoia.

You probably have too much hate in you. Let it roam free.

Eberron.

>That's why I like the Realms. It's familiar
No, it's not. It pretends to be "generic fantasy" but sucks hard at every aspect that makes generic fantasy cool

Found the edgy contrarian.

Dark Sun. It hooked me on fantasy shit, and I've actually run campaigns in it. Its just damn cool, is very open to doing whatever you want, and comes from a time when they didn't spare expenses to hire awesome artists and fill out entire books with fluff.

Hm, lets see
>Almost no actual kingdoms, be it medieval or pre-medieval ones, which normally are staple for generic fantasy, but FR has to have stupid magocracies shoved up everywhere, followed with mercantile republics and city states
>MAGIC, MAGIC EVERYWHERE, which doesn't even makes sense, as setting with that amount of magickfuckery should actually be more like Eberron than generic, but somehow it manages to stay medieval-renaissance with castles knights and shit, which doesn't make sense
>Focus on bathrobe faggots while classical fantasy is all about fighting men, and wizards are support cast/antagonists
>Everything can be explained with WIZARD DID IT
>Playground for OP DMNPCs of setting authors and licensed novel writers
>Insane power levels nowhere near Tolkien, Howard or Moorcock.
>Every culture in FR that is based on actual culture not only is simplified to the bare shalow-ass stereotype, but aslo has some "custom" weird shit added for the sake of "originality", except the added shit is so juvenily stupid that it had to took a severe autist to come up with it

And that's the tip of the iceberg

Care to elaborate or was that just "epic b8 m8 :DDD" as they say

Planescape is my favorite setting, cause it's inter-dimensional and has many settings embedded inside it.

I like Planescape more as an exposition of the AD&D cosmology than a setting for adventure, myself. But I agree its pretty awesome.

>Almost no actual kingdoms, be it medieval or pre-medieval ones, which normally are staple for generic fantasy, but FR has to have stupid magocracies shoved up everywhere, followed with mercantile republics and city states

What is Cormyr?

>MAGIC, MAGIC EVERYWHERE, which doesn't even makes sense, as setting with that amount of magickfuckery should actually be more like Eberron than generic, but somehow it manages to stay medieval-renaissance with castles knights and shit, which doesn't make sense

You're actually contradicting your previous point where you say that the setting features more magocracies than medieval kingdoms.

You're either trolling or you have the short term memory of a goldfish.

>Focus on bathrobe faggots while classical fantasy is all about fighting men, and wizards are support cast/antagonists

What fantasy is about fighting men? Conan? That's pretty much the only one I can think of. Tolkiens protagonists were not fighting men. Neither were LeGuin's.

It's clear you're trolling...

4/10 for the effort.

Didn't I already?

Tolkien's heroes aren't wizards, either though. They are leisurely Englishmen.

Though Aragorn is literally the master race who is a master swordsman at 80.

>What is Cormyr?
Single kingdom. Where's the rest. Is there like... five more? Or somewhere around it.
>You're actually contradicting your previous point where you say that the setting features more magocracies than medieval kingdoms
No. There are magocracies and weird bullsit yet at the same time people are fielding conventional armies, building castles despite the magic saturation of the setting is so dense that they are basically useless in face of high-power magic arsenal, using ox-drawn caravans and sail ships instead of portals and magic propulsion despite that with amount and average power of magicians in the setting it would be easy as fuck. But no, because we have to have OP magic AND generic fantasy at the same time, which creates contradictions and fail.
>Tolkiens protagonists were not fighting men
Far more than half of them were (I didn't use men in context of race). And of the remaining ones very few were magicians - low level magicians compared to anything in FR that is

>Far more than half of them were (I didn't use men in context of race). And of the remaining ones very few were magicians - low level magicians compared to anything in FR that is

[citation needed]

Earthsea is all about wizards and magic. So is Harry Potter. So is the Magic the Gathering story arc. So is pretty much every D&D setting.

Honestly, Conan is the only fantasy that I can think of which features a "fighter" as a protagonist.

Magic is what makes heroic fantasy.

>[citation needed]

Which of his protagonists were spellcasters? Gandalf isn't even a human. He's an angel.

Al'Quadim is really fucking fun to run/play in. You can have dark or high fantasy and it fits into many different settings if you just want to grab Zakhara and place it in. It also has the best modules in AD&D

Too bad that between radical islam and PC bullshit we will never see it reprinted.

>What is typical Otarian flavour to you?

Barbarians live in the mountains and like to fight. Paladins and knights are from the flat plainslands. There's an arena in the swamps. There's a coastal / underwater city rife with politics and treachery. There's a forest of megafauna and megaflora. There's a religious organisation that's organized evil without being obvious Nazi wannabes, thank Christ..

I distilled them down to the barest essences, but you get the idea.

Yeah, it really has nothing to do with real life or Islam or any of that shit. Its a combination of Arabian Nights and Ray Harryhausen movies. The introduction has as much.

PS; the PC game is a pretty cool Zelda clone.

I never said Tolkien's protags were spellcasters. They were hobbits. If I had to give Bilbo and Frodo a D&D class they'd be rogues but they're certainly not know for their combat prowess and feats of strength. In other words, they're not fighers.

That said, Gandalf and Saruman are probably the most powerful characters in LotR. I doubt even Aragorn could have taken on a Balrog and lived to tell the tale.

Now go on, tell me what great fantasy literature features fighting men as the protagonist.

So far I've given you

>Earthsea
>HP
>Magic the Gathering
>D&D

All of which feature wizards more prominently than fighters.

>Single kingdom. Where's the rest. Is there like... five more? Or somewhere around it.

Keep in mind that if we're talking proper Medieval setting then "kingdoms" are relatively rare, too. Like, there was an area called France but it's really not right to call it a nation-state prior to about 1400 or so. Same deal in Britain, Spain, and Portugal. The Holy Roman Empire was of course not really an empire given how little power the Emperor actually had, and Italy was a cluster of city-states.

You also have to remember that the most popular part of the Realms is the Sword Coast, which is specifically a wild frontier that is home to city-states more than proper kingdoms. Even then the Sword Coast contains nations like Elturgard, Waterdeep, and Amn. But city-states ruled by dukes are the norm because, well, that was the norm in Medieval times.

If you go further inland or further south then you've got Cormyr, Calimshan, Tethyr, Sembia, the Dalelands, Vaasa, Damara, Impiltur, Narfell, Thesk, Aglarond, Turmish, Chondath, Chentessa, and other locations. Most of them are monarchies or aristocratic oligarchies, much like Medieval Europe had.

True magocracies are actually pretty rare. Off the top of my head only Halruaa and Thay qualify. Evermeet doesn't because it's ruled by a line of monarchs who happen to be mages, rather than mages who happen to be monarchs.

>Now go on, tell me what great fantasy literature features fighting men as the protagonist.

...Don Quixote? Sort of?

>>Far more than half of them were (I didn't use men in context of race). And of the remaining ones very few were magicians - low level magicians compared to anything in FR that is
>Who is Aragorn
>Who is Legolas
>Who is Gimli
>Who is Boromir
>Who is Eomer
>Who is Theoden
>Who is Thorin
>Who is Turin
>Who is Beren
>Who is Fingolfin
>Who are all the other elvish princes from FIrst age
>Who Merry and Pippin end to be

>So is Harry Potter
>Bringing book about secret wizard society in modern world to a discussion about generic fantast
> So is the Magic the Gathering story arc
Bringing shitty card game with fluff no one even cares about into discussion about generic fantasy
>So is pretty much every D&D setting
Aretn't we just discussing why D&D setting fails to emulate generic fantasy? And FR is like square power in that aspect compared to any other D&D setting that even tries to be "generic"

Only Earthsea point stands. Except Earthsea wizards are vastly different than D&D ones. And fantasy doesn't end at Le Guin, Tolkien and Howard.

Wont stop over sensitive faggots getting butthurt about it. They will never officially publish it again because they wouldn't want the possible backlash.

Beowulf, Gilgamesh, Odysseus is at least fighter/thief.

People like to hear stories about heroic badasses, not faggy wizards.

>Who is Aragorn
Ranger/Paladin

>Who is Legolas
Ranger

>Who is Gimli
Fighter

>Who is Boromir
Fighter

>Who is Eomer
Cavalier

>Who is Theoden
Cavalier

>Who is Thorin
>Who is Turin
>Who is Beren
>Who is Fingolfin
>Who are all the other elvish princes from FIrst age
Good question, really, but given what I remember of the First Age I find it highly likely that all of them were Hexblades, Eldritch Knights, or some other combination thereof.

>Who Merry and Pippin end to be
Rogue/Fighter

>And fantasy doesn't end at Le Guin, Tolkien and Howard.

Well, what are some examples of modern fantasy, then?

Harry Dresden? Wizard, obviously.
Druss? Barbarian, but he's got a big magic axe.
The Beastmaster? A druid if ever there was one.

Gilgamesh is two-thirds god. I'm not sure he qualifies as simply a "fighter". Might as well include Herakles.

Hang on, though.

Tarzan of the Apes? Beastmaster.
John Carter of Mars? Fighter, and also Superman.

Hmm...modern fantasy, let's say within the past 100 years or so...

...

Those aren't the protagonists. They're as much supporting characters as Gandalf.

So basically you can't name a single fantasy series that features a fighter as the MC except for Conan.

Honestly I don't know why WotC doesn't publish MTG settings for D&D. I'd love to play on Zendikar or Ravnica. Could always homebrew it I suppose...

Oh look, it's another one of the caster haters who only plays musclemen to compensate for his repressed homosexuality.

>I'd love to play on Zendikar

Boy are you in luck.

magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/plane-shift-zendikar-2016-04-27

However, to answer your question, it's mostly that they don't like crossing the streams. There's an article about it somewhere, but I think it boils down Magic and D&D's fundamental rules not really being all that compatible, and not wanting to have to deal about fanboys of one complaining about getting something wrong in the other as a necessary sacrifice for how things work.

>fighter archetypes that are demigods
That's just what you pay the bards to say about you after you reach name level.

I'm also not sure we should be including myths from thousands of years ago when talking about Tolkien.

I know it's hard to remember, guys, but Tolkien lived and died within the past 150 years, and did all his writing within that time. It's much more proper to compare him to Burroughs, Howard, or heck, even Salvatore, then it is to compare him to Homer or Ovid.

>magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/plane-shift-zendikar-2016-04-27

That's fucking awesome user. Cheers for that.
>However, to answer your question, it's mostly that they don't like crossing the streams. There's an article about it somewhere, but I think it boils down Magic and D&D's fundamental rules not really being all that compatible, and not wanting to have to deal about fanboys of one complaining about getting something wrong in the other as a necessary sacrifice for how things work

I suppose it would lead to Planeswalkers becoming a class in D&D which could be a problem unless you're running a Planescape campaign.

That and Planeswalker is too...wide...to be a class.

Some planeswalkers are more magic-focused, others know a little and like to punch people in the face.

It would work best as a D&D 4e Theme. So you get a few iconic powers but are otherwise your class.

>Conan
To be honest, Dark sun resembles Conan only in terms of swarthy naked-tude, sword and sorcery-dom and general themes of magic being spoopy fuck u up n1gga shit.

If you want to play in the Hyborian age there's nothing stopping ya.

The map's there, the setting notes are already written by the man himself.

Pick up a system and go!

Much as people love to hate it, Forgotten Realms. I just love the totally cliche-filled, run-of-the-mill fantasy stuff where dwarves mine and elves sing laa-laa-laa in the forest. Another thing I like about it is the openness, being able to make up a story of almost any kind.

No, but the source for his world is (mostly Norse) mythology. The story of a mythic king returning to save his people at their hour of need is also an ancient tale.

Fantasy writers only reading and copying fantasy is a big problem and why most of it is so awful.

I'd make Planeswalker a 5E Background, personally. In modern Magic all being a Planeswalker does is give you the ability to go from one plane to another - there's no innate power boost or anything, and Planeswalking is itself a process that takes several minutes, not something you can pull off in the middle of a fight.

Tolkien is standing on the shoulders of giants just like the rest of them. The Lord of the Rings is basically Catholic Apocrypha by way of the Ring of the Nibelung.

>Hexblades, Eldritch Knights, or some other combination thereof.
>Hexblades
>Eldritch Knights

get out of here with that mess. thems are just fighting men, dressed up with dumb titles

Besides, Turin and Beren were definitely just straight up fighters as their whole thing was feats of strength and being badass, and any "magic" stuff came from their equipment (Turin having Gurthang, for instance)

And Fingolfin too was just a badass who happened to have some "magical" equipment (though the magicness of most weapons in Tolkien is up for debate as most of the powerful swords and such were just smithed better or out of weird materials)

Actually you have a point.

I tend to think of planeswalkers as wizards since that's how MTG originally described them. In was a game of two wizards casting spells at each other.

But modern planeswalkers seem to be "ordinary" people whose spark just ignited. So I suppose anyone could potentially be a planeswalker.

I'm still not clear on how someone like say, Elspeth for example, works mechanically. Can she cast spells like Swords to Plowshares and summon soldiers and knights from the Aether or does she just command armies?

Dark Sun is a crazy high magic setting. It literally takes place after the magic apocalypse, and having psychic powers is common.

>So basically you can't name a single fantasy series that features a fighter as the MC except for Conan.
As much as you can't name single one except Earthsea
And...
Turin has his own book
Beren is as close to being protagonist of Silmarillion, almost all other potential protagonists of it who AREN'T LITERAL DEITIES are too
Elric is fighter/wizard, but closer to the former, and his magics are nowhere close d&d-like wizards
Most of characters in ASoIaF who are actually doing shit themselves instead of just sitting back and pulling strings are martials.

Legends and myths, despite time difference, are still much closer to what average person imagines as fantasy than urban fantasy in vibe of HP or Dresden. Also have lots of retellings, like White's Arthurian cycle. So you've got Lancelot, Arthur, Beowulf, Sigurd, Cuchulainn and fuckton of others.
Broken Sword's protagonist, whatever his name was, was a martial.
Kane is warrior/wizard, but even more focused towards warrior side than Elric, and way more.

>Can she cast spells like Swords to Plowshares and summon soldiers and knights from the Aether or does she just command armies?

Both, though in the context you're speaking of, the former. Properly speaking only those who can cast magic anyway can have their Spark ignite, but that would be one of those things I'm willing to sacrifice on the altar of D&D to make an M:tG setting of it work.

>Cuchulainn

So we're just going to ignore his warp-spasm, then.

Barbarian rage

Planeswalkers in the original context of magic are basically a type of god. They are immortal, can go wherever they like, and are huge dicks that cause chaos and destruction wherever they go. In at least one very early magic story, they actually literally summon creatures from their home planes to fight for them regardless of their feelings on the matter.

Now they are kind of like a bunch of super heroes.

I can name plenty.

>Earthsea
>The Wheel of Time series - Rand is a channeler which is basically a sorcerer in that setting
>Harry Potter - as much as you hate it, it's much more relevant to modern fantasy literature than Beowulft or Gilgamesh or mythology that predates Christianity.
>The Shanara Chronicles which is also a hit TV show

Oh and if you're including Arthurian legend then Merlin is just as important a character as Lancelot.

>Oh and if you're including Arthurian legend then Merlin is just as important a character as Lancelot.

Not really. Merlin doesn't really have many stories to himself. He's a secondary character in other people's stories. Lancelot has stories of his own.

Part of the reason I enjoyed Ob Nixilis in the Zendikar story. He harkens back to the dickass reality-skipping wizards era.

Uh-huh, the warp-spasm is a bit more than just that. He friggin' bends and twists like The Thing.

>Merlin doesn't really have many stories to himself.

So we're just going to ignore the movie, mini-series, and ongoing TV series based on him, then.

I hate to break it to you, but most people's exposure to King Arthur is going to be from something first published in the 80s or later, not classic Arthurian myth.

Merlin has had movies and TV shows about him.

He's pivotal to the story.

What did Lancelot do besides cuck king Arthur and ruin everything?

Get arrested?

Eberron

It mixes the best parts of 1920s pulp action with the crazy stuff I love in D&D, and the setting itself is structured in a way that helps makes gradual scope increases work well over a campaign.

Even if you take it literally and not as a poetic hyperbole thats still a singular innate magical ability that doesnt make a spear wielding martial into a fucking wizard

realms always struck me as a good setting to let 3.pf player go rules as written. its not like any given power level is going to run out of things to do. and if they finally put drizzt out of his misery, all the better.

i tend towards custom settings myself. if i had to pick, Theah from 7th sea is pretty great. couldn't come up with a better setting for a game of Musketeers Of The Caribbean.

source? google finds nothing

It's one of the things I like about Rul from Shadow of the Demon Lord. They don't pull back or try to over-sell. "That's the city of theives, she's the Elf Queen, that's Wizard Island, and you bloody well love it."
-and I did.

Your google-fu is weak
nixxical.deviantart.com/art/The-avariel-319674255

What things should I read to get what this all is about? Dunno if I ever find a group, I just want to lore

>Harry Potter - as much as you hate it, it's much more relevant to modern fantasy literature
No it isn't.
It is revelant in modern fiction and popculture and there is no denying of that. But only reason because it is even classified as a fantasy is BCUZ IT HAS MAGICKS
It bears no relation to what is talked about here. Not a fucking bit.
It's like bringing cyberpunk into discussion about classical interstellar sci-fi with alien races, empires, federations adn interplanetary wars because "cyberpunk is sci-fi too"
It is dumb enough to not realize this on your own, but not getting it after it being pointed to you twice or thrice makes you an extreme retard.

I'm the asshole who always finds some fault with just about every RPG setting out there - well, not necessarily a 'fault', which suggests an somewhat objective error, but rather something that doesn't match my personal tastes - so I've been slowly working on my own which will probably be even shittier.

Al-Qadim, far and away. At the time I'd imagine the Arabian Nights aesthetic was still fresh, and as someone who enjoyed using kits it was fun to see their origin.

I'm also very fond of Shadowrun, if that counts. I swear it has something for everybody--our group's experienced alarming success with it as a gateway RPG.

Honourable mentions go to Spelljammer (it takes sci-fi in a novel direction) and Dark Sun (I love hard settings). Hell, even Ravenloft brings something t the table. Evidently I'm just a sucker for AD&D.

I still can't get over that Ethiopian city in the middle of the map

Planescape by far.

thanks man

Mystara master race!

Plus I like steampunk like settings... my homebrew setting mirrors much of FF6

Darksun was awesome to play in, though it seemed I was the only one who enjoyed rationing water.

Dragonlance was awesome to play in, cuz hey... dragons and minotaurs

generally any setting where its viable to get my Viking on, I'm down with.

I always wanted to play a fantasy game set in the Ringworld setting.

Exalted, to be more specific Malfeas.

Shame about the game itself.

Never played a game in Ravenloft. Is it at all good as a setting?

The way that you described it makes it seem as if it's a little sub-par.

I'm enjoying the Realms so far. Anybody run a campaign in Rashemen?

Also interested in running Dark Sun in 5E some time. What's the best sourcebook available?