Where 4e succeeded

Well, I'm here after all, making posts.  I wasn't sure I would be until after the New Year, and I don't know how much I'll be doing now, even.  But something occurred to me that I want to talk about.

Now, I never played 4e.  I never really even did more than skim the core books.  But I did look a fair bit at some of the supplemental material, skipping or skimming over the mechanics and focusing on the fluff.  See, at a micro level I think 4e got some stuff right with the mechanics here and there—minions, healing surges, etc. are all great ideas in an otherwise unpalatable sea of mechanics that I don't like.  But at a macro level, it was the setting that they got right, not the mechanics.  In fact, this was only hindered by the micro level; at some point, they had to still try too hard to be recognizably D&D to too much of the audience who were too invested into the weirdness that D&D had evolved into.

By this I mean that when people say that D&D is generic, vanilla fantasy, that's absurd.  D&D has evolved into a very specific type of fantasy: D&D-fantasy, that bears only superficial resemblances to its own sources, even.  Gary Gygax was specifically a fan of sword & sorcery, and even moreso of the smug, post-sword & sorcery stuff of the likes of Michael Moorcock and L. Sprague de Camp.  One of these days, maybe I can talk in more detail about how this "deconstruction" of sword & sorcery of the type these pencil-necks (quite literally in the case of de Camp) produced bears little other than superficial resemblance to real sword & sorcery, as pioneered by Robert E. Howard and expanded more faithfully by naturally alpha-like folks like Fritz Leiber, but for now suffice it to say that the influences of D&D are both sword & sorcery and anti-sword & sorcery, and Gygax actually seems to have been more a fan of the latter than the former.  D&D was also "hijacked" maybe you could say by high fantasy fans at some point in the early 80s and never looked back (probably because most of the players were high fantasy fans over sword & sorcery or even anti-sword & sorcery fans by then.)  That's not to suggest that D&D bears more than a superficial resemblance to high fantasy normally either.  While something like the Forgotten Realms appears on the surface to be high fantasy, it's not in actual play, for the most part.  Imagining Gandalf and Frodo "delving" a megadungeon is absurd.  While some suggest that the Mines of Moria is the prototype of the modern D&D dungeon, that's ridiculous, again except in a big superficial sense.  The Mines of Moria only take; what, two chapters in Fellowship, and for at least the first chapter, literally nothing happens except travel and character development.  Then there's a brief combat scene or two and an extended chase scene (a form of action scene that D&D didn't even bother trying to model for decades) and then they're out.  The whole time, the characters didn't want to go into Moria, and their only goal was to pass through it as quickly and quietly as possible.  It bears literally no resemblance to the concept of the dungeon in D&D.  There's no treasure hunt.  There's no "level clearing."

Anyway, D&D is its own thing.  And the longer its been around, the more esoteric and inbred it becomes.  As we saw with the launch of 4e, there are even people who didn't think it could be D&D without the esoteric details that have grown up around the Great Wheel being kept intact.  The notion that 4e introduced things like Graz'zt being a corrupted devil who became a demon lord and may still secretly be colluding with Asmodeus made D&D purists howl.  But this is the kind of stuff that actually made 4e great; the willingness to change these kinds of details with an eye for "instead of just keeping this as a sacred cow just because, let's see how we can make this concept more useful for players and DMs."  So, in general, there were two things that D&D 4e got very, very right at the setting level.

Cosmological changes
First off, they posited a major change to the cosmology.  Gone was the Great Wheel, and in was a duology based on the Astral Sea and the Elemental Chaos, with the other planes as domains within those vast extradimensional seas.  The whole thing is set up against a backdrop that rings with mythic resonance; as well it should, because it echoes concepts like the Titanomachy or the Gigantomachy; the primordials and the gods (basically equivalent beings from the Elemental Chaos and the Astral Sea respectively) warred in the distant past, and while the gods won, the primordials are not completely gone, and there's echoes of a future Ragnarok (or maybe just the return of the Titans) lingering as a potential threat to the multiversal order.

This drove lots of changes, both great and small. As Yakk, a poster online said about it, "An essential feature of 4e cosmology is that it is presented as legends and stories rather than facts. These legends/stoeies may not perfectly agree with each other: and this is intended.  The effect is that even if Players read it, the fact that they disagree means that the DM gets to decide which variant is true, and even if none are. While this does fall under rule 0, the presentation makes it very clear. The events and structure of the cosmolgy are left vague and legendary, so it is easier to warp them." Let me quote some of the text at the DriveThruRPG description of the 4e Manual of the Planes.  The best sources for what was actually going on in the cosmology here are that aforementioned book, and Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters.  I've snipped portions that are more descriptive of the book rather than the cosmology without ellipses.

D&D 4e massively changed D&D's worldview, and part of that was a revamped cosmology. The new World Axis had actually originated with the Forgotten Realms, which was planning a view of the heavens as early as 2005 or 2006. It was then co-opted by the SCRAMJET world design team for D&D 4e.  

A new cosmology meant that D&D's classic Great Wheel was being thrown out. The main complaint? "Needless symmetry". The Great Wheel required planes for every alignment and every element … whether they were useful in games or not. The World Axis was instead built for "maximum playability", where there was "no 'dead' space". As the designers explained, the Great Wheel had contained good-aligned planes that were never used and elemental planes that were too deadly. Now there was the opportunity for adventure everywhere. 

The World Axis also moved D&D's cosmology toward the "points of light" model that was at the heart of the new game. This was particularly obvious in Astral Sea, where goodly home bases were now points of light in a rugged, ruined environment … but the same model could be found in all the new planes of the D&D multiverse.  Richard Baker described the new World Axis as a "bobbin or wire spool", with the mortal world dwelling between two great seas: the Astral Sea above and the Elemental Chaos below. This cosmology is given a rich (and symmetrical) mythical background, where the Primordials (of the Elemental Chaos) long ago battled against the Gods (of the Astral Sea). This history links the entire World Axis cosmology, something that had been missing from the Great Wheel; it's also what gives the Astral Sea its post-apocalyptic, "points of light" feel. 

The Elemental Chaos, which was called "Primordial Chaos" in early drafts, is a conglomeration of the elemental planes of previous editions. The new blended plane is intended to be more accessible (and less deadly) for adventuring than the stark, undifferentiated elemental planes of old. Surprisingly, the classic plane of the Abyss is now connected to the Elemental Chaos. A few classic layers get detailed here, including Lolth's Demonweb, Baphomet's Endless Maze, and Orcus' Thanatos — all of which had appeared in adventures in days past. 

The Astral Sea is what had once been the Outer Planes, home to all the gods. Like the Elemental Chaos, it's now more accessible to adventurers. In fact, it now pays homage to the Spelljammer (1989) setting, because magical ships can sail the Astral Sea, traveling from one island domain to another. The Nine Hells gets special attention as one of the Sea's domains. They've been totally revamped. Rather than being a stack of layers — the common model for planes in the Great Wheel — the Nine Hells is now a mighty planet, with all of the layers except Avernus being underground caverns.  

Demons and devils are widely differentiated, and that starts with the revelation that Demons are now corrupted elementals — explaining the placement of the Abyss in the Elemental Chaos. Beyond that, the designers envision demons as "merciless, savage, hateful destroyers", disorganized and self-destructive, but eager to "destroy the creations of the gods. Devils are the rebellious servants of the gods. They're organized instead of chaotic; subversive instead of murderous; and slippery instead of tough. 

The Eladrin perhaps underwent the largest changes. The race dated back to Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix II (1998), where they were strange fey native to Arborea. They moved to the Feywild in the new cosmology, but more importantly, the eldarin of previous books were just the powerful lords of the Feywild; the race now also included less powerful entities who were available as player characters — essentially turning them into the "high elves" of previous D&D games. 

Finally the Primordials were a new race of mythic beings, as powerful as the gods. They would be extensively featured throughout D&D 4e's run and would be enumerated in some later volumes.

This isn't all necessarily bad from the point of view of a D&D traditionalist, though.  Among other things that it made actually make more sense, the Temple of Elemental Evil with this Primordial/Deity split actually makes some sense.  Imix, Ogremoch, etc. and the rest of the Princes of Elemental Evil are clearly Primordials.  For that matter, so are many of the Demon Lords.  If you read the Demonomicon book, it even explains how the obyrith fit.  I mean, all of this stuff actually fits together into a cosmology that makes some sense without just feeling artificial like the standard D&D cosmology always did.

Points of Light
Secondly, is the concept of the Points of Light and the setting of Nentir Vale.  Now, when you and I hear the word Vale, we think of a valley, and while something like the Yosemite Valley comes to mind, but Nentir Vale is obviously quite a bit bigger than that.  A more comparable geographic feature would be something like the Bighorn or Pannonian Basins, though—big enough to be an entire (modestly sized) country, but small enough that you can get around easily enough without feeling like you have to use travel magic or really long trips.

More to the point, however, is the idea that the D&D game is set during a Dark Age.  There's no great empires of the present, although echoes of great empires of the past have a profound effect on the world.  There's not a lot of interconnectedness, because Nentir Vale has been depopulated after the waning of empires, and overrun by monsters and barbarians to the extent that anything lives there at all.  Ruins of greater empires of the past dot the landscape, smaller settlements eke out a living, and fend of various threats, and there's really a lot of space for a player character group to go and find pretty significant adventure not far away.  There's a large town or even a city or two, but they operate as fairly independent city-states in a world under siege, that are only tenuously connected with each other.

While the implications for making the game playable are obvious, this is also important, quite frankly, from the implications of storytelling too.  Almost every genre of historical adventure fiction is in the frontiers, or in the aftermath of a Dark Age, or otherwise where there are lots of open activities for conflict.  The only notable examples are picaresque tales in the decadent cities of corrupt and flawed empires, or cold war type intrigue and skulduggery between rival Great Powers.

From Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters here's a summary of the core conceits of setting design.

The design of the world of 4th Edition DUNGEONS & DRAGONS operated under certain shared assumptions about what is cool about D&D and what would make the game more fun. These key conceits do not apply to a specific setting; rather, they should be true for anyone creating a D&D world, leaving as much of the fine detail as possible to the individual Dungeon Master. 

As the game developed, some of these ideas shifted as well, but they remain the basic guidelines for world design.

The World Is More Fantastic: D&D cultures should blend real-world cultures and fantastic elements, not merely elements of medieval and Renaissance Europe. It’s okay for D&D environments to have no realistic analog. 

The World Is Ancient: Empires rise and empires crumble, leaving few places that have not been touched by their grandeur. Ruin, time, and natural forces eventually claim all, leaving the D&D world rich with places of adventure and mystery. Ancient civilizations and their knowledge survive in legends, magic items, and the ruins they left behind, but chaos and darkness inevitably follow an empire’s collapse. Each new realm must carve its own place out of the world rather than build on the efforts of past civilizations. 

The World Is Mysterious: Wild, uncontrolled regions abound and cover most of the world. City-states of various races dot the darkness, bastions in the wilderness and amid the ruins of the past. Some of these settlements are “points of light” where adventurers can expect peaceful relations, but many more are dangerous. No one race lords over the world, and vast kingdoms are rare. People know the area they live in well, and they’ve heard stories of other places from merchants and travelers, but few really understand what’s beyond the mountains or in the depth of the great forest unless they’ve been there personally. 

Monsters Exist All Over: Most monsters of the world are as natural as bears or horses are on Earth, and monsters are everywhere, both in civilized sections and in the wilderness. Griffon riders patrol the skies over dwarf cities, behemoth beasts carry merchants’ goods long distances, yuan-ti have an empire a few hundred miles from a human kingdom, and efreet in their City of Brass appear in the mountains suddenly like Brigadoon emerging from the mists. 

Creatures Need a Place in the World: Creatures shouldn’t be introduced into a vacuum. Any monster or player character race we make in the game should occupy a unique space in the D&D world. We need to make sure that new creatures have a new and compelling role in the world, in addition to an interesting mechanical purpose. 

Adventurers are Exceptional: The adventurers created by the players are the pioneers, explorers, trailblazers, thrill seekers, and heroes of the D&D world. Although some nonplayer characters might have a class and gain power, they do not necessarily advance as the PCs do, and they exist for a different purpose. Not everyone in the world gains levels like PCs. An NPC might be a veteran of many battles and still not become a 3rd-level fighter; an army of elves is largely made up of nonclassed soldiers. 

Magic Is not Everyday, but it Is Natural: No one is superstitious about magic, but neither is the use of magic trivial. Practitioners of magic are as rare as classed fighters. Magic should never cross over into the silly or replicate modern conveniences: We don’t want “magitech” such as arcane elevators and air conditioners, or flying sea serpents to put out fires. At the same time, we don’t want a real-world medieval fear of magic that gets wizards burned at the stake. There might be minor magic that is relatively commonplace; for example, a wealthy farmer might have a magically sharpened plow, but not an animated combine. People might see evidence of magic almost every day, but it’s usually quite minor—a fantastic monster, a visibly answered prayer, a wizard flying by on a griffon—but powerful and experienced practitioners of magic are far from everyday. 

“Good” and “Evil” Mean More: Being aligned toward good means being a champion who actively fights for what is right, not merely someone who supports such ideals. Being good is a defense against evil, never a vulnerability to evil. Likewise, evil is more than just bad thoughts. Most average people aren’t aligned one way or the other. You can’t use magic to know whether or not a creature is evil or good: You must judge it by its actions or know its nature (demons, for example, are always evil). 

Remote Gods: Gods are largely distant and detached from the world (with some exceptions, particularly evil gods). Most don’t take an active part in worldly affairs, but they have exarchs and angels who act on their behalf. Gods can be encountered, fought, and killed (although some might be too powerful to challenge). They aren’t omniscient or omnipotent, but they do grant spells to clerics and hear the prayers of their faithful. 

One Sun, One Moon: The world assumes what will be most easily accepted by players without imposing unfamiliar calendars and phenomena. 

No Forced Race Relations: The settlements of the PC races are usually points of light but aren’t necessarily goodaligned. They are places where people can share shelter from the dangers of the wild wide world. There is no inherent racial enmity between PC races, and hostile attitudes do not generally go beyond fear or lack of respect. 

Death Matters Differently: It’s generally harder to die than in previous editions, particularly at low level. When a heroic-tier player character dies, the player creates a new character. A paragon PC can come back from the dead at a significant cost. For epic-tier characters, death is a speed bump. Being raised from the dead is available only to heroes, and it’s more than just a spell and a financial transaction. NPCs, both good and evil, don’t normally come back to life unless the DM has a good reason. Monsters and NPCs shouldn’t use the same rules for death as PCs. When they’re down, they’re out—PCs don’t have to slit every monster’s throat after the battle and burn the corpses (except maybe for trolls). 

Fantastic Locations: D&D adventures should take place in fantastic settings—no more 10-by-10 rooms with two orcs. Encounters should occur in areas with interesting threats—from encounter traps that activate every round to hazards that were formerly considered monsters, such as assassin vines or gray ooze. 

Less Evil Fighting Evil: Too much in previous editions deals with evil fighting itself: Demon lords and archdevils war on each other rather than threatening the PCs. We don’t want to waste space on things players can’t use. Make sure conflicts are important and useful to making the game fun.

Now, obviously I don't agree with everything that that says, but all in all, it's a great place to start talking about how to set up your setting.  And frankly, some of those conceits led even further into cul-de-sacs that I'm not interested in, but having a list of conceits about how your setting will work is a good place to start.  As always, I can't ever play anything exactly as written, because there's always at least small, micro level details that I want to change.  But overall, I think the direction 4e went with regards to setting design was the right direction.

Sadly, I suspect that by and large, it was too much for some fans, and the design team took a step back from the scale of the changes.  For me, it was the mechanics changes that drove me away, the setting changes tended to draw me back.

Of course, I'd already independently come up with many similar ideas, and even gone further with them than the R&D team was willing to do, but then again, it wasn't a requirement of mine that my game resemble "standard" D&D or be marketed to anyone other than my group, so the constraints were obviously different.  I"m impressed how even many elements of the planar cosmology seem very much in line with things I had done with some of the settings that predated Dark•Heritage, like Leng Calling specifically, which led to Pirates of the Mezzovian Main, which ended up being the model which I adopted when I graduated Dark•Heritage Mk. III to Mk. IV.

Which reminds me; I haven't really given much thought to planar conceits in DH5.  I'm also not sure that I necessarily want to think too hard about it; if I go back to something like my Leng Calling, which would make the most sense, it'll feel derivative of 4e now, even though I actually developed it earlier.  Oh, well.  Such is the fate of the procrastinator who doesn't do anything with his homebrew except noodle around with it.