Dungeon Fantasy needs a bare-bones setting

[David Johnston2]

The fact is, DF settings ranging from individual dungeons to whole worlds are a glut on the market. We don't need them from Steve Jackson when we have shelves of them from Wizards of the Coast and their remoras.

[Novembermike]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Low-Tech was planned since before the forums existed. I'm referring mainly to more-specialized PDFs. People often say things like, "Given the convenience of PDFs, GURPS should return to focusing on historical worldbooks," or, "Given the convenience of PDFs, GURPS should try publishing more settings and adventures." Not those specific things, necessarily (those thinking of quoting me take note), but you get the idea. However, sales don't bear it out. Then we release some crunchy, low-profile item like Power-Ups 1 and it hits the Top 20.

Yeah, I'd have to agree with this. I generally have enough settings since I can take things like races, power structures, politics, general technology and magic level and the feel from a random book and it will probably be about as good as anything I'll find in a supplement (or at least I feel this way, I might be wrong and you might have some amazing settings that are better than Dresden Files, 40k, Arthurian Legend, Malazan etc). What I generally want is books that tell me how to do things, like run a more cinematic campaign or run a campaign where the players are gods or bugs or can shoot fireballs or whatever.

[Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

The fact is, DF settings ranging from individual dungeons to whole worlds are a glut on the market. We don't need them from Steve Jackson when we have shelves of them from Wizards of the Coast and their remoras.

Yass! Testify, brother! Testify!

Originally Posted by Novembermike

I generally have enough settings since I can take things like races, power structures, politics, general technology and magic level and the feel from a random book and it will probably be about as good as anything I'll find in a supplement (or at least I feel this way, I might be wrong and you might have some amazing settings that are better than Dresden Files, 40k, Arthurian Legend, Malazan etc). What I generally want is books that tell me how to do things, like run a more cinematic campaign or run a campaign where the players are gods or bugs or can shoot fireballs or whatever.

Yes! Hallelujah!

The DF series has all the rule-stuff that's needed to play a dungeon-fantasy. If one needs more flavor, the GM can show his creativity or use the enormous amount of material already on the market.

[demonsbane]

Here is what I meant by saying that Sean (Kromm) achieved a great exercise of synthesis. Contrary to analysis, synthesis isn't too focused on the particulars, hence the resulting feeling of "vagueness" (and open-endedness), that to my mind is the best path to follow here:

Originally Posted by Kromm

(. . .) The implied setting has at least one feudal polity headed up by the King; is dotted with quasi-medieval towns that feature inns, temples, Merchants' Guilds, Thieves' Guilds, halfling gangsters, and Town Watch; includes a Frozen North for barbarians to come from, a Mysterious East for martial artists, mountains for mountain elves, forests for wood elves, deserts and swamps for lizard men, etc.; is home to dragon-blooded descended from dragons, elder-spawn descended from Elder Things, and so on; holds ruins associated with Elder Things, Evil Runes, and Squid Cults; and supports a cosmology that includes an Ethereal Plane, an Astral Plane, a Spirit Realm, Dream Worlds, Elemental Planes, a Heaven, several Hells, and an Outer Void. Among other things. More detail than that is likely not wise, as it's kitchen-sink fantasy, which always works best when left vague.

(. . . ) it's possible to be specific in the window dressing (see my big list above that mentions the King, dragon-blooded, etc.) but vague in depth.

You give me a basic DnDish sketch (the bare-bones implied assumptions) which I already like; and then I'll be refining details . . . if I want to do it, and in my own way.

So, by saying . . .

Originally Posted by demonsbane

The "bare-bones implied default setting-set of assumptions" is more than enough. Heck, I even need to tweak it, or to remove some specifics . . .

. . . what I mean is that I can waive some of these assumptions if they aren't useful or interesting for my current DF approach, but by the current state of things, that is far of being an issue . . . so I'm not really defending the "anti-any-setting-element position" that Mailanka seems to believe:

Originally Posted by Mailanka

(Demonsbane) He claims that even a barebones setting would act as a limitation. I would counter that those who want a barebones setting want a limitation: They want some things set in stone so that they know.

. . . since I agree with that (some things already set, placed around there), which are the basic assumptions already implied in Dungeon Fantasy; things that at the same time constitute a reason why isn't really needed a "DF setting" book.

And this is another (simply down-to-earth) point that should be also taken in account:

Originally Posted by Kromm

And if we try to be all things to all people, we have to greatly increase series output so that we can publish generally useful content alongside setting-specific content . . . and frankly, we lack the resources to do so. Having no setting does the least harm here, as our sales records clearly show GURPS players rarely putting their money where their collective mouth is when it comes to settings. And that isn't surprising: Why would any real percentage of customers who've chosen a generic system get behind one specific setting?

I agree, too, with the latest posts of RyanW, vitruvian, Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2, Novembermike and David Johnston2.

[Mailanka]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

. . . what I mean is that I can waive some of these assumptions if they aren't useful or interesting for my current DF approach, but by the current state of things, that is far of being an issue . . . so I'm not really defending the "anti-any-setting-element position" that Mailanka seems to believe:

I don't really believe that you're "anti-any-setting." Obviously DF already has some implications, but it's a big step from implications to an actual setting. DF works well if you have a king and some villages and some dungeons. It's another thing, however, to say who that king is, give him a personality and an agenda and a court, to name the village and describe it, and explain how those dungeons came to be and what they're called.

When you say such things are limiting, I agree with you: the moment you say the King is X, the people who wanted Y begin to lose interest. If you say that all Barbarians come from the frozen wastes of the north (and thus have Arctic survival) you stop people from saying that they want to be barbarians from the sweltering southern deserts, and so on. My point is that people who want a setting want to know those things. They WANT a king who is X and NOT Y. They want barbarians from the frozen wastes and NOT the sweltering deserts.

But I also believe that these sorts of things are terribly easy to come up with on your own, that Fantasy gives you more than enough material to work with when coming up with your own thing, and that a DF setting would probably not sell well enough to justify the expense of making it (and yes, some setting is better than no setting, but we don't have infinite resources and time here).

[demonsbane]

And I agree with your points.

Besides, I think that stressing the role and usefulness of the GURPS 4e Fantasy book is a good thing.

[Greg 1]

Originally Posted by Kromm

This is quite true. I cannot and will not name products, but several things published in recent times were tests to see whether we could use forums feedback to justify publications. Let's just say that there were far more failures than successes.

Ignorant question: Why is it important not to say what the products were?

Things aren't that simple, unfortunately. If we don't write future material around a setting, then we face accusations of "not supporting the setting"; in fact, the standard criticism of most of our settings is not that they're bad but that they're unsupported.

I did not know that. I'll bow to your knowledge of the game market and of the weird ways of gaming customers.

Fortunately, I've been loving the crunch, so I'm happy.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Greg 1

Ignorant question: Why is it important not to say what the products were?

It would be unprofessional and probably against company policy to give specific information about how sales of products met up with expectations. Not only is that information private details of SJG's operations, it could also appear to be calling out individual authors (in-house or freelance).

[Sunrunners_Fire]

Originally Posted by RyanW

It would be unprofessional and probably against company policy to give specific information about how sales of products met up with expectations. Not only is that information private details of SJG's operations, it could also appear to be calling out individual authors (in-house or freelance).

They've given information on a specific product (deadtree Low Tech) that had sales which didn't meet expectations.

[Novembermike]

Originally Posted by Sunrunners_Fire

They've given information on a specific product (deadtree Low Tech) that had sales which didn't meet expectations.

Yeah, but that's generally going to be a large scale decision, not the result of one person deciding to say it.