What is you favorite Fantasy Setting ?

[Pstrych9]

I've got a few too, and I'm shocked that I'm the first one to mention my first selection!

1. Homebrew- Homebrew settings have the huge advantage of being optimised for your own talents, interests, play style, etc. The way you can easily modify GURPS makes it arguably the best system for a homebrewer, even if the ruleset itself wasn't already superior.

2. Banestorm- I actually initially only bought Banestorm on the strength of the rest of the 4e line, with all the rest of the settings on my plate already. When you take a deep look, though, the advantages of this setting really start to stand out. The banestorm idea itself is extremely handy as a GM for introducing various elements that make for an awesome session, but would ruin a campaign. It also covers the length and breadth of typical fantasy well enough that nothing really seems missing. Even the apparent lack of large swathes of untamed wilderness of different kinds is covered, and in a way that is arguably better in an RPG context than having them a static feature on the map. You CAN have any particular terrain type, even one that would ruin the flavour of nearby areas in the longrun, fade in with a banestorm, and out with another one later on. A banestorm is SUCH a handy and open-ended tool for kick-starting adventures and campaigns ;-) I like the idea so much that I'm making it a feature of some of my homebrews from now on.

3. Dark Sun- I always found this setting held back by the D&D rules, but GURPS solves all of those problems and lets it take it's place as THE kickass Sword&Sorcery setting. Banestorms kick the mayhem up a notch or three, and flavourwise fit like a glove (not OJ's) ;-)

4. Earth- A shockingly underused campaign setting in fantasy RPGs, with a ton of advantages.

5. Harn- I like Harn almost as much for it's use as a generic sourcebook of low fantasy as I like it as a setting in itself.

[Collective_Restraint]

Is Banestorm that good ? When I first bought GURPS I was thinking more of adapting my DnD game into the system. But now that the PCs in my game died, I'm wondering if I should maybe switch to Banestorm, which is a campaing already using GURPS 4e rules.

[LoneWolf23k]

Originally Posted by Collective_Restraint

Is Banestorm that good ? When I first bought GURPS I was thinking more of adapting my DnD game into the system. But now that the PCs in my game died, I'm wondering if I should maybe switch to Banestorm, which is a campaing already using GURPS 4e rules.

Banestorm is very good, and has the following advantages over most DnD settings, amongst others:

#1 - It's readily customisable, thanks to the handy-dandy Banestorms: add whatever you want with little more then a "Banestorms brought it" explanation.

#2 - real-world religions: Forget Paladins worshipping a vague "Light" concept, or battles between Deities which are pretty much just epic-level beings.. Religion on Yrth is entirely a matter of faith, and religious conflicts are less a matter of "God of Good vs God of Evil", but more a real-world "We follow God, you're a Heathen Bastard" style slugfest between foes of equal moral worth.

#3 - Wide variety of character/adventure opportunities: From Conan-style barbarian warriors to Shaolin Monks to Gandalf wannabees and swashbucklers, you can play just about any kind of cliched Fantasy character you want in Yrth, and then some...

[Collective_Restraint]

Sounds nice. I looked at all the available PDFs from the GURPS website and it does look good. That put aside is there a fantasy setting as detailed and big as the Forgotten Realms ? Seriously, that campaign world is so big, detailed, varied could you imagine it under the GURPS system instead of the D20 system ? The richness it would bring to all the NPCs of the Realms instead of being stuck with the class-based system ?

[The Cardinal]

existing RPG settings:

Banestorm
Mystara / Known World
Wilderlands of High Fantasy
DCC #35 - Known Realms
Midnight
Conan
Amber


other fantasy worlds:

Erikson's Malazan
Paul Kearney's Forsaken Earth


Malazan

[holymadness83]

You guys have some good taste.

I'll give shout out for Eberron, Darksun, Planescape, and all the Michael Moorcock stuff.

But what gives? I didn't see any mention of Gene Wolfe's stuff. The gurps supplement for Book of the New Sun was sparse but good. It's an incredible setting with an interesting combination of tech and fantasy.

I perhaps ought to say that the supplement is sparse enough as to be useless without actually reading the epic trilogy (perhaps with the coda book also).

Go check it out. You won't be disappointed.

[transmetahuman]

Haven't been reading much fantasy lately, and I've never been a big fan of S&S low-tech settings. These are the fantasy settings I most want to play GURPS in, in no particular order:

Cabal
Technomancer
The Buffy/Angel Whedonverse
Amber
Lord of Light (okay, I'm a big Zalazny fan)
Brust's Vlad Taltos/Phoenix Guards world

[Perssek]

Originally Posted by Pstrych9

I've got a few too, and I'm shocked that I'm the first one to mention my first selection!

3. Dark Sun- I always found this setting held back by the D&D rules, but GURPS solves all of those problems and lets it take it's place as THE kickass Sword&Sorcery setting. Banestorms kick the mayhem up a notch or three, and flavourwise fit like a glove (not OJ's) ;-)

Of course - Dark Sun was one of my favorite settings in TSR line - and we already played it in GURPS for almost a full year. A friend made a pretty good conversion guidebook, that was followed by what can only be described as GURPS Dark Sun character chapter. The party had almost everything: defilers, mules, thri-kreens and elves. One of the fun times of my life (and I wasn´t GMing!).

[The Wrathchild]

Favourite Fantasy?

Shadow World - this is the finest of the old "vast setting, really several settings in one with overarching plots and several power leves of adventure possible".

HârnWorld - this setting is just the ... finest one ever published. Some find the low-fantasy, realism-oriented content bland (but I certainly don't!), but I foresee that we'll never see a more in-depth cohesive and consistent setting that this.

Dark Sun - so grim, so grim.

Dragonlance - who can resist dragons and epics?

[mearrin69]

I'd give a vote for Eberron too. If SJG had hired Keith Baker to do the setting for GURPS it'd be at least 2x as good. Some of WoTC's 'sacred cows' look good grazing on the slopes of Xen'drik but a few of them look like yaks - yeah, including the Yakfolk.

I don't know where people get (see numerous threads on these forums) that a system prevents or inhibits roleplaying (D&D is often named) but Baker's setting actually encourages it. All IMHO, of course.

[edit]In answer to the poster after me: Ah, I see. But, let's be precise with the language. The system limits your ability to design characters open-endedly, with all of the little specific knick-knacks you'd like to have. It does not prevent you from appropriately role-playing the character that you choose to build within the rules.[/edit]

I'd say get the main book and play it with GURPS. Unfortunately all my friendly gaming neighbors are stuck on D20 so that's what I use as well.
M