Thread: Have the Realms been ruined?

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Honestly I was (am) the guy who has yet to ever read a Realms book. I read enough of the campaign guide to look at a few regions. Honestly the Realms exist to me that is miracle in its self. I mean with all the super powers that were running around in 3.x and how most of them Nova'ed going into 4e. I was more of a fan of the Realms when I played it as a home campaign things were more exciting.

No the realms aren't ruined. What would have to happen for the realms to be "ruined"?

Originally Posted by Matt James

I don't mind questions but your answers are weighted. Why could you not put a simple yes or no?

for fun. there hasn't been a poll here in MONTHS, i was trying to liven it up. thanks for keeping it open.

take one for yes and no if you want to.

I don't think they've been ruined in the least.

I also don't think 4e is necessarily a step up or down from 3e--it's just a step in a different direction.

I like the stories I get to tell in the new setting, and honestly it doesn't feel any different gaming/DMing in the 4e Realms.

I think I just love the Realms, and I like it in all its incarnations.

Cheers

The Third Edition Realms were very detailed and filled in, and that was great - to read about. As a DM, however, I found myself kind of penned in, because I like to run a campaign that is deeply rooted in the canon.

With 4E, like Vic said earlier (and I too started with the old grey box), the world is again painted in broad strokes, and I can make it my own and still keep my campaign deeply rooted in the canon. I actually liked the Spellplague. I like spellscars, and the Plaguelands, and Netheril, and Retunred Abeir, and Akanul...

The Realms feel alive and magical still, and my campaign from 3.5 has continued past the time jump into 4E with a new generation of characters and new enemies in the same world with new rules. Just last session I was running my players through a 4E adventure (Pyramid of Shadows) that ended and left them in a 2nd Edition setting (Wyllowwood in Undermountain), being hunted by an old Steven Schend NPC, Dhusarra Yr Fadila El Abhuk, as she and her Malarites hunted the party through the forest in a High Hunt. It was very cool and fun and felt just like Faerun.

I greatly dislike nearly all of the changes and don't feel that any of them were necessary, and wish that if they'd felt the need to shake off the mountain of canon that FR built up during 2E and 3E that they would have just done what they're doing with DS and just rebooted to the Grey Box with the necessary 4E adjustments made.

Far too late now, though. I wouldn't say they've completely ruined it, but I've been primarily a novel reader and I have little to no interest in 4E novels. (The only one on my list is ESdB's Downshadow, and that one's on the list because I like his stuff.)

Well, it was purely a business decision. And to a greater degree I agree with you Nai. It might have been cool to take a step back, when the Realms were young and less cluttered.

maybe not ruined but completely trashed. yes it was detailed and for those comitted to such a reichly detailed setting it was great, if it was too detailed there was always greyhawk. for those that say it was too much in 3rd ed, did you even play 2nd ed? the world was actually bigger and more detailed back then, 3rd ed dropped Maztica, the Hordelands, Sossal, Nimbral, and Zakhara. I guess i should have seen them making it smaller which may have been ok, but to destroy have the gods, ruin the magic, and have complete realms (Mulhorand, Unter, Part of Chessenta, Lapaliiya, The entire Shaar, Halruua, etc.) completly wiped out with a few sentences about plague lands, is completely insulting; I guess I should be glad I got to play in the realms when it was good in the 1990s, and most of the 2000s, because if I was a new gamer looking at it now I would just laugh and think wow that's it, kinda pathetic.

but i digress...

I’m still waiting for , “The Forgotten Realms were ruined when it went from the Dragon articles to the first Grey box.”

I still use the old lore so I'm not sure why people get so rilled up- it is not obsolete unless you make it that way. As in, you go out of your way to rebuke the old lore so that you can have a platform to rail against the new Realms with.

DDI articles support the Realms every month as well, so it's not like the Realms are being ignored. [INSERT plug for my upcoming Explore Ikemmu article due out in a week or two]

We can agree on disliking the Spellplague, but I don't subscribe to the emotional rants of those who would rather deconstruct the Realms instead of keeping the old lore alive. I hope that makes sense and that I am conveying it in written form.

it says I cant vote.....wonder why....

anyway the answer is yes and no