What do you want out of a Fantasy Setting?

Saelune

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As someone who loves world building and DMing DnD, I put alot of thought into creating fantasy worlds. I also look at alot of other ones for ideas and inspiration. Middle Earth from Lord of the Rings, Tamriel from The Elder Scrolls, Hyrule and all the other places from Legend of Zelda, and tons more.

And while I love my custom setting, I also kinda hate it and have been rethinking how I want it to be, but I also wonder what other people like and want.

So I am asking. Books, games, movies, tabletop RPG settings, etc, what do you want out of a fantasy setting?

Do you want high fantasy where people fly to work as wizard janitors on griffons? Where magic is common, widespread, and does everything and anything?

Do you prefer low fantasy? Where people dont believe in dragons...but then a dragon shows up and its this epic thing because magic is super rare and taboo?

Somewhere in the middle?

Do you want settings inspired by our real life mythology? Or our real world cultures? Fantasy settings based on Greek or Egyptian or Asian myth?

Do you prefer it traditional with tree hugging elves, Scottish sounding dwarves, and hoards of angry evil orcs?

Do you prefer it to feel like your on an alien world...but during its own medieval time period?

And how do you prefer to enjoy your favorite fantasy settings? Reading books and imagining it all in your head? Trouncing through it, sword in hand, via video games? Or roleplaying it at your kitchen table with friends?

And ofcourse, what do you hate in fantasy settings that turn you off and push you away?

Dont have to answer this point by point, was more trying to give people things to consider when answering.
 

Saelune

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Samtemdo8 said:
As traditional as it can possibly be.

And it needs to have Paladins. I love Paladins.
Care to elaborate more? Maybe some comparisons/references for what does and or does not meet traditional for you?
 
Jan 19, 2011
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A common sense RPG.

Instead of some random village in the mountain (that just happens to be located before the final boss) having the best equipment in the game, it is instead found in specialized markets in major cities. I'm furious when a group of 15-year olds with neon coloured spiky hair is being tasked with the saving of the world. It would be preferred if it was given to experienced, hand-picked specialists their late 30's/early 40's. Instead of using the "Fire" or "Water" elements (seriously?) you would use real chemical elements, such as carbon or germanium. You thought mastering 4 elements was tough? Try 118. When the ancient evil comes back, it's easily and quickly destroyed with modern tactics and technology. When you find the 1000-year old Sword of Greatness, it is found to be unusable due to the decay of time.

And the main villian has to follow the Evil Overlord List.
 

Hawki

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Saelune said:
So I am asking. Books, games, movies, tabletop RPG settings, etc, what do you want out of a fantasy setting?

Do you want high fantasy where people fly to work as wizard janitors on griffons? Where magic is common, widespread, and does everything and anything?

Do you prefer low fantasy? Where people dont believe in dragons...but then a dragon shows up and its this epic thing because magic is super rare and taboo?

Somewhere in the middle?
The only real preference I have is that I prefer high fantasy to low fantasy. However, people often misunderstand what these terms mean, so to clarify, high fantasy is where the setting itself is unique, where there's literally a fantasy world. Low fantasy is our world with fantastical elements. That doesn't stop me from enjoying low fantasy (e.g. Harry Potter), but I generally prefer the world to be separate from our own (not getting into gray areas such as Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, etc. - whatever links they have with our world, I mostly consider them high fantasy).

Saelune said:
Do you want settings inspired by our real life mythology? Or our real world cultures? Fantasy settings based on Greek or Egyptian or Asian myth?
It's not something I inherently desire, but I find that fantasy settings usually work better with a real world analogy/counterpart. I think the main reason is that real-world history is rich in...well, history, so using that in a fantasy setting helps give it a solid foundation.

That said, I have read the idea that (high) fantasy should inherently reflect the real world, and on that note, I don't agree. You can have a good fantasy setting that has no real-world analogue. Off the top of my head, Xenoblade Chronicles, which has no real-world analogues. The setting itself is absolutely bonkers, but it's still an interesting setting.

Saelune said:
Do you prefer it traditional with tree hugging elves, Scottish sounding dwarves, and hoards of angry evil orcs?
Eh...not too much.

I mean, I'm fine with these things, but in this day and age, I think you can do more with these tropes then simply playing it straight. As in, I'm fine with orcs who are good, elves who are dicks, dwarves who do stuff other than mine, etc.

Saelune said:
Do you prefer it to feel like your on an alien world...but during its own medieval time period?
Not too much, though I haven't come across this idea. Usually with high fantasy settings, the price for entry is "this world exists, deal with it." The world itself doesn't have to conform to our own understanding of planetology.

Saelune said:
And how do you prefer to enjoy your favorite fantasy settings? Reading books and imagining it all in your head? Trouncing through it, sword in hand, via video games? Or roleplaying it at your kitchen table with friends?
Don't have an inherent favorite, but I'm not, and have never been into tabletop roleplaying. I was into tabletop wargaming though.

Saelune said:
And ofcourse, what do you hate in fantasy settings that turn you off and push you away?
Thing I dislike most is when you rip off Lord of the Rings and don't do anything original.

A lot of Western fantasy owes itself to LotR, and I can accept that. However, the least I ask is that if you use LotR as a template, do something original with it. Off the top of my head, there's Shannara and The Wheel of Time, which basically adapt Lord of the Rings into their respective first installments. While their sequels do help distinguish their worlds, these are two fantasy settings I've never really been enamored with. Their origins as pseudo-adaptations aren't the root cause of this, but they don't help my ability to try and get into them.

Samtemdo8 said:
And it needs to have Paladins. I love Paladins.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Otf9Bnm48Kk
 

Casual Shinji

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I don't think I care too much what it does, just how it does it. Berserk has one of my favourite Fantasy settings not because it has elements of Lovecraftian, knights and castles, magic, alternate dimensions, and fairy tales, but because how well it manages to splice it together into a cohesive universe.

I like the setting of The Witcher 3 because of how mundane and unromantic the fantastical elements are presented. Where someone getting dragged off by a ghoul is seen as no more special than someone choking on a bit of food. And where anyone can just accidentally place a curse on someone by losing their temper.
 

Thaluikhain

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Some originality would be nice. If you are going to set your story in the usual theme park version of Medieval England, you need something to make yourself stand out, cause half of all fantasy did that as well.
 

Addendum_Forthcoming

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Fantasy? As in what my ideal would be?

Hrm, I'm going to say nWoD/CoD-style fairies. As in the type of inhuman, irreconcilable monsters with god-like powers within their alien realms that will steal away with humans to keep them as slaves and playthings, twist them with magic, transform them into mockeries of their former humanity that are witless of the ways to escape from their shackles until one fleeting chance to claw their way back home. To a place that more often than not hasn't even felt the loss of their presence due to the inhuman constructs the Fair Folk left behind to assume your place.

You know, fairies that are awesome and inhumanly alien, and beyond the capacity of mortals to understand. Bringing only despair, destruction, twisted wrecks of sanity lost, and untimely death.

Esoteric magic systems that cost the player and can potentially backfire that requires a certain level of preparedness?

I think the most important aspect of any fantasy game should be the antagonists. If you can make their reasons, their characterization, their motives alien enough, yet still fit, the rest will follow.

Changeling is kind of my favourite Chronicles of Darkness game. I like the mesh of a gothic modern world, mixed with madness, alienesque deities of insanity, twisted and wild magic, and strange inbetween worlds of soul-shredding thorns and deadly bargains and contracts. That which promise power but also hint at the darkness of going too deep down that maddening rabbit hole, and further away from whatever fleeting memories of humanity with its purchase.

Plus I like the idea of playing a character that feeds on human emotion and cultivating parasitic relationships whereby you foster social power through clever and subtle twistings of the powers of dream itself.

How often can you get to play the role of an aloof monster that 'charms' the knight, fosters that intimacy, and through whimsy--bridles them to suffer like all those that think they can tame the unknown? It's delicious roleplay material.

http://whitewolf.wikia.com/wiki/Changeling:_The_Lost

nWoD Changeling is probably the best sourcebook for ideas that are relevant to any sort of game that has aspects of the fantastic and utterly, inhumanly alien. It does live up to its tagline of; "A Storytelling Game of Beautiful Madness."

Particularly games that transgress realms and deal with schisms of a mundane reality experienced by players. If you're going for a more The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath-esque fantasy feel.

That being said, I'm pretty sure my love of these types of things is partly the result of my dad telling me a shitload about Celtic mythology as a kid. All the stuff his (possibly mad) grandmother told him to watch out for as a kid.
 

the December King

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I like my settings to reflect LOTR/DnD/Pathfinder tropes- a world of mainly humans, with maybe a few other races like elves, dwarves, orcs, gnomes and/or muls to add some variety. Individual motivations work against racial stereotypes- there are evil elves, charismatic dwarves, selfless humans, etc. (when I roleplay, however, I cannot stand to play any of the fantasy common races like humans, or elves- I prefer monsters, the less 'human' the better, and I also prefer inventing their societies/cultures/relations with other races/racial traits)

These racial stereotypes are built on ignorance- the same ignorance that states here there be dragons, forbidden places, etc.,the ignorance created from poverty, disasters and horror. This is the other aspect I like in my settings, or at least the ones I tend to gravitate towards DMing/enjoy reading about- I despise utopias and thriving humanity/ golden ages (unless events quickly lead to a catastrophic fall, thus getting me back to my preferred state). I need the setting to be repressive, for the common folk to be cowed, and the wealthier classes to be hamstrung, whether through disturbed trade routes or heavy losses faced through war or other failed endeavors. A (superficially, at least) Dark Age.

In this environment, I like watching the brave strike out and effect change, the smart to solve mysteries, and the daring to help others in need. Repressed folk can rise up, roles challenged- in effect, I want the actions of the players (or at least contemporary NPCs) to be the driving force behind change in their world. They don't have to start out as making world-changing decisions, obviously, but that's the way I like to direct the events, even if they are incidental results.
 

TheFinish

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It really depends. My favorite setting of all time is Nehwon, specifically Lankhmar, City of the Black Toga and the Sevenscore Thousand Smokes. Which is, overall, pretty low-fantasy.

But then I also love Warhammer Fantasy Battle, which is a strange mix of High and Low fantasy. And I also like Age of Sigmar, which is all High Fantasy all the time.

I only have two big preferences:

A) I'm a sucker for settings in Ancient Time. You know, Ancient Mesopotamia. Bronze Age stuff. With Hittites and Assyrians and Akkadians and all that good stuff (Blame Nippur of Lagash for this one).

B)I really like Post Apocapyltic Fantasy (think Earthdawn or Numenera). Where the Magic may be Magic, or maybe it's old technology. Where players can find ruins of the civilisations from before, except instead of a laser gun they find an ancient magical weapon made with techniques long lost. Or maybe they DO find a laser gun. It just tickles my fancy something fierce.

Which is why it would surprise no one that my own setting includes both of these.

Other than that, I like my settings to be consistent within the rules they've established for themselves, and for those rules to have a modicum of sense:

- If there's racial enmnity (the old Dwarfs vs Elves), why?
- If race X is extremely good at Z, why?
- If Magic works way X and not Z, why?
- If something in the setting is like something in the real world, but it doesn't work like it does in our world, why? (Guns are the biggest and most common thing where I ask this question)

That sort of stuff.

Sorry for the long post, I just really like Fantasy.
 

Ogoid

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These days I've been finding myself more and more interested in the very lack of any thoughts of verisimilitude or consistency displayed by the worlds of 80's cartoons like He-Man or Thundercats. True, the shows themselves were, to put it mildly, nothing much in terms of writing, but I really miss the amount of sheer imagination, unbridled by any constraints of convention or habit (or simple common sense) that went into them.

You know, where you could have a literal race of robotic teddy bears [http://thundercats-ho.wikia.com/wiki/Berbils], because screw considerations like "how would that even work" or "that doesn't make sense in any conceivable way".
 

Canadamus Prime

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Th3Ch33s3Cak3 said:
A common sense RPG.

Instead of some random village in the mountain (that just happens to be located before the final boss) having the best equipment in the game, it is instead found in specialized markets in major cities. I'm furious when a group of 15-year olds with neon coloured spiky hair is being tasked with the saving of the world. It would be preferred if it was given to experienced, hand-picked specialists their late 30's/early 40's. Instead of using the "Fire" or "Water" elements (seriously?) you would use real chemical elements, such as carbon or germanium. You thought mastering 4 elements was tough? Try 118. When the ancient evil comes back, it's easily and quickly destroyed with modern tactics and technology. When you find the 1000-year old Sword of Greatness, it is found to be unusable due to the decay of time.

And the main villian has to follow the Evil Overlord List.
You should play Secret of Evermore on the SNES. It doesn't meet your requirement of the hero being in his 30's/40's, but he's initially not trying to save the world either. Also the magic system is based on mixing together various ingredients.
 

TakerFoxx

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I want the setting to be as colorful, fantastical, and outright ridiculous as possible, but the people to feel completely real and the problems they face be comparable to problems we face here.
 

FalloutJack

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Having played in a number of fantasy worlds (both in tabletop and in video games), I come to understand that I can go with a wide range of fantasy options and be fairly content. Of course, with that in mind, I like trope-breakers the best.
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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I'm actually a big fan of hellscapes and eldritch horrors. I loved the Dante's Inferno game, and I play as many lovecraft video games as are worth playing.
So i need a hero's journey, a tortured hell world to travel through, a big fuck off axe or mace, and preferably evil chanting.
Also cultists. Maybe its the 40k fan in me, but cultists are my Nazis - I can kill them all day and not feel bad. I can drown a cultist in its own piss, and be smiling the whole time!

What I'm saying is I want to make the most out of the setting. Its like when people say the best 40k stories are about regular Guardsmen - its utterly baffling. In a setting of werewolf space viking, planet sized monsters, deamons manifesting every sin, space elves, Egyptian cyborg zombies, football hooligans in greenface, and giant mecha weeaboos, you really want to see what Frank and Sally are doing?! What a waste of the premise!

Do something cool with the setting, don't waste it.
 

Abomination

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I have been on a "Flintlock Fantasy" binge recently. It can be high or low fantasy but technology is firmly in the late 1700s or early 1800s - the industrial revolution is just around the corner.

Magic, something that only the few elite have access to, has some serious competition with technology being available to the lowest commoner.

Now mages who dominated battlefields can be felled by a single plucky recruit with a muzzle-loading musket.

Brian McClellan's "Power Mage" series explores this wonderfully.
 

Sentay

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Ok here's my formula...

+1 for gravitas. Regardless of the context of your story and how interesting or rote it is, if you get characters that can emote or act properly I'm willing to overlook some of the cliches.

+1 if it has either lots or almost no magic, setting with moderate magic (at least for me) have been done too much, granted they can still be good but you have to have some other quality to draw me in.

+2 for exoticism, if the environment, races, culture is something new or something old but with a good spin on it. I'm willing to overlook a lot for this.

+2 setting created with a clear sense of anthropology. Ie if there are dragons and kobolds and they are so numerous and deadly then why do humans / elves / dwarves exist and how have the draconian hordes not become the dominant race (they don't have to be just or good, they just have to suffer under the yolk of consequences. KINDA LIKE EVERYTHING IN REAL LIFE).

+2 good villains. Any series where the villain has a decent amount of screen time and has goals that make sense and are practical.
 

Auron225

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TakerFoxx said:
I want the setting to be as colorful, fantastical, and outright ridiculous as possible, but the people to feel completely real and the problems they face be comparable to problems we face here.
More or less what I always look for. I love high fantasy settings and to see the creators imagination on full display, but I love realistic characters in these settings. It's the perfect combination in my mind for complete immersion in a fantasy world.

EDIT: On another note, I'm paying close attention to other people's answers here. I'm coming up with ideas for my own game (which is set in a fantasy world), so your opinions on fantasy settings are all welcome. I mean, I'm also realizing how unlikely it is that it'll ever actually get made given my current circumstances, but still. The more ideas I come up with, the more likely it is to one day exist - but also the more sad I'll be if it never does.
 

sageoftruth

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I'm with Casual Shinji. If the world feels enough like a living breathing world, I'll accept it no matter what it has in it. I want to feel like I'm exploring something new and unfamiliar, even if it has things I've seen before like elves and dwarves. If if it runs on old familiar plot tropes rather than an honest attempt to realistically capture an alternate reality, then my sense of wonder will be gone.
 

JoJo

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Originality is a big plus for me. If I'm reading a fantasy book, or watching a fantasy film, or playing a fantasy game, then my greatest desire is to dive into a fascinating new world. I mean in reality, yeah, there's only so many ideas out there, but I'd prefer to avoid cookie-cutter moulds like Tolkien knock-offs that have been done to death. Riffing off mythology or legends isn't so bad, especially if it's from a mythos we don't see often.

Aside from that, I like real and raw fantasy. I don't expect strict scientific accuracy, but things being roughly plausible is nice. Magic is preferably rare, mystical and hard to master. If there are non-human races, then they are significantly different from humans, more along the line of dragons or nature spirits rather elves or dwarves. A world as rich as our own, with a multitude of nations, peoples, languages, and faiths, is ideal.