Thoughts About My Next Game

I've been working in fits and starts to prepare good old "T1-4 The Temple of Elemental Evil" for my next game. I reasoned a while back that preparing a game in the "World of Greyhawk" would be both rewarding and less difficult than writing my own game. And yet I can't shake the nagging feeling that I should be working on my own setting.

The why of it is pretty simple. As much as I love the D&D of my youth I find the settings a bit bland. It's the old "Humans in Funny Hats" canard. If Elfs and Dwarfs and so forth don't have a unique perspective on the world or meaningful cultural distinctions from humans then they are no different from humans.

And I quite think the point applies elsewhere. Should all Clerics have power over the undead? Do all gods have Paladins? Do Clerics and Paladins make sense in a fantasy world missing the Christian context these classes seem to belong to? Should every race worship the same way? Should fantasy religions be divided by race or by geography as real world mythology?

I, of course, wouldn't be asking these questions if I was happy with the way things are.

On the other hand I do want to get back to running games. Doing so in a world of my own invention would be far more difficult than preparing a module. Sadly my heart just isn't in it, module preparation that is.

So the right thing to do is explore some ideas that might hold my interest and build around that regardless of effort.

More to Come…