[quote="Llowellen"]I think Greyhawk is a great choice. It was my game world for over 15 years and only the advent of 3e caused me to look elsewehere. I will always have a great fondness for the classic Greyhawk setting. [/quote]

Yeah, I'm pretty fond of Greyhawk, too. I spent my formative years playing and dming in that setting.

I agree you need to dig a little, though, to get the most out of it if you're playing 3rd edition.

Still, the [i]Living Greyhawk Gazetteer[/i] sits proudly on my shelf :D

I am not sure how much money you have to spend and whether or not you have already parted with any - but you might want to consider The Kyngdoms. Ghostwind has my review of it and it should be gracing the main page pretty soon. It is a 'standard fare' fantasy campaign along the lines of Forgotten Realms or Greyhawk, but the difference being the entire campaign sourcebook is available for free at their website.

I always say you can never go wrong with for free - you don't even need to wait for my review, you can just check it out for yourself at www.thekyngdoms.com

Cheers
Ian Hewitt

It depends what 'style' of game you like, really. And how much you like to develop your own material as opposed to having lots of published support... and if you like to have a steady stream of new stuff for the setting you're using, or are content to work with what's already there.

[b]Forgotten Realms[/b] is a high-magic world, a lot is accomplished by that means. There's quite a lot published for 3e, as well as a considerable past history from earlier editions (which is good for setting & storyline even if you have to restat monsters & NPCs). Most of the old stuff is on RPGNow as PDF if you want to gather materials on a particular area or topic you are going to cover in your game.

[b]Greyhawk[/b] has little published for 3e - basically a good gazetteer is all - but there is a steady stream of modules for the [i]Living Greyhawk[/i] campaign, all as free downloads from the RPGA although you have to mess around with their 'reporting' system to get them even if you aren't actually running the campaign. Again there's a lot from earlier editions ripe for the converting. It was the original setting, and is the one referred to in passing in the 3e core rulebooks (things like the deities given are those available there). Greyhawk tends to be lower in magical power than the Realms, but a strong sword arm gets you out of most difficulties.

[b]Eberron[/b] is the new boy on the block and so there's material coming out thick and fast at the moment. It takes a different slant, with a lot of intrigue going on. The main continent has just had a major war and they are picking up the pieces and various power blocs are reasserting themselves. Magic is fairly strong, and subtly different from mainstream D&D... loads of additional things going on like Dragon Marks.

[b]Freeport[/b] is an intriguing place, but it is basically one city stuck on some rocks pretty much in the middle of nowhere. Think something like the Canary Islands - quite a step from the mainland but a good ship will get you there. This has the advantage that you can then expand the world as you please with a published setting or one of your own design at a later date - but until you do so your game is a bit constrained. The book [i]Freeport: City of Adventure[/i] is bursting with plot ideas waiting to be developed, and there are a few published full adventures to get you started, but most of the time you will have to come up with your own scenarios based on what's going on in town. It's good for city intrigue stuff, but if you like a good dungeon-bash... well, the city's built on rocks and doesn't have much scope for dungeons (the first adventure [i]Death in Freeport[/i] sort of has one, but it could be described as a rather large cellar complex!).

Those are the ones I can talk about off the top of my head, I'll need to flip through the others before I can give you that kind of a summary.

Hugs and kisses,

[quote="Nightwing"]Are you just looking for official D&D settings or are you after ideas for worlds of your own?[/quote]

Pretty much published settings. While I would love to devote time to creating my own, I just can't do that at the moment. A decent published setting gives me something to work or tinker with.

It might not hurt to run the question past the potential players, also, as to what type of campaign they'd like to play...

I'd like to suggest Eberron, mainly due to its relative youth. Being such a new setting, there is a flood of new information coming out about the setting, though there are still plenty of mysteries that no players will know about.

Having said that though, your angle towards a more straight-lined, 'pure fantasy' setting makes me think that Eberron may not be your thing. FR would probably be your best bet from that perspective, as it really is a fantasy world, and it is highly detailed, meaning you can devote more time to play, rather than campaign background work.

Good luck with whichever way you choose to go.

cheers

blair

Are you just looking for official D&D settings or are you after ideas for worlds of your own?

Thanks for the input.

[quote]It depends what 'style' of game you like, really. And how much you like to develop your own material as opposed to having lots of published support...[/quote]

Good point. I think I fall into the category of wanting a good base to work with and then developing things from there. If I'm honest I'd say Eberron and Iron Kingdoms tempt me the most - my only concern with IK is that it strays too far from 'cookie cutter' fantasy and relies on guns, trains and mechs for interest, or that Eberron is similar but uses a saturation of magic to replace technology.

I have been reading up on both DragonLance and Iron Kingdoms lately. Of the two, I'm considering IK for my next self-contained world to explore. I like the variety of characters, the mix of steam and magic, and the material is some of the best I've seen in a long time. The books are dense, yet never dull reading - especially the Monsternomicon. I am currently making my way throught the World Guide.

I considered DragonLance for awhile, and it's still in the back of my mind. Thanks to Ghost, I had a change to peruse the Campaign Setting and the Age of Mortals book, in addition to the Key of Destiny adventure. Being a fairly new player (I just started in again a couple of years ago after a VERY long hiatus) I fell in love with this setting after reading some of the recent DragonLance novels, particularly Blades of the Tiger. My son pulled the Minotaur character from the setting for a recent campaign I was running and it fit in nicely (nothing like a cow with big horns and a smelly disposition to liven up a bunch of Greyhawk characters!).

If I had to choose between the two today, I'd do Iron Kingdoms.

Having said that, I have read through most of the Eberron books and like them as well. I'm just not ready to go there yet.

Happy reading!

Assuming that you're looking for something that is more along the baseline of Greyhawk, I'd recommend taking a good look at Kenzer's [i]Kingdoms of Kalamar[/i] line. Very rich with a good mix of low and moderate magic.

Other good campaign settings that haven't been mentioned and are considered good are:

-[i]Scarred Lands[/i] from Sword & Sorcery (the setting has been placed on hiatus, but there is enough material to keep you busy for years)

-[i]Oathbound[/i] from Bastion Press (this is a high fantasy setting much akin to [i]Planescape[/i] and [i]Dark Sun[/i] and isn't to everyone's tastes)

-[i]Warcraft[/i] from Sword & Sorcery (a really good adaptation from the popular computer game)

-[i]Midnight[/i] from Fantasy Flight Games (a very dark campaign set in a world where an evil deity rules)

-[i]Arcanis[/i] from Paradigm Concepts (the single most popular RPGA sanctioned campaign setting)

This is all really helpful folks - thanks. It's good to know that there well thought of settings out there for 3.5.

I would have to go with Ghostwind here and say check out Kalamar. We use our own CS, but Kalamar looks good. I use quite a bit from their setting and Player's guide.

I like Kalamar I guess b/c it is almost 'striaght fantasy' - very similar to Greyhawk (which was the default setting I used when not using our own CS).

never was a big fan of FR, though the 3e stuff done for the setting has been great. Less interested in the heroes and more there for the PCs. there is LOTS of details already done though, so if you want a setting with the basics upon which to build - go Greyhawk or even Kalamar.

Connors

Thanks to all who helped out. I decided on Greyhawk in the end, and I'm enjoying what I'm reading so far.

Edit: I have also bought a setting called Dark Legacies which looks to be awesome. http://redspirepress.com/

I think Greyhawk is a great choice. It was my game world for over 15 years and only the advent of 3e caused me to look elsewehere. I will always have a great fondness for the classic Greyhawk setting.

Don't be misled though by the 'generic/vanilla' Greyhawk content that is passed off in the Wizards' books though. Do yourself a real favour and look into the actual products bearing the logo. I also strongly recommend www.canonfire.com as the premier Greyhawk fan site. They have an absolute wealth of free fan-written material and a solid base of Greyhawk old timers who have a wealth of knowledge that they are always happy to share on their mailing list - Greytalk.

Cheers
Llowellen