# Returned Abeir "Continent"



## Achan hiArusa (Aug 13, 2010)

Forgotten Realms:  I pulled some maps off the internet and decided to scale Returned Abeir and see how large it was compared to the other continents on Toril.  The map of Returned Abeir is approximately 800 miles x 800 miles meaning it is a very small continent and fits nicely in the Trackless Sea between Maztica and the Faerun.  If I were to use it then I can put it in the middle of the Amn-Helmport shipping lane which would cause problems with trade.  I have attached a map, but if there are copyright issues please take it down.


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## Baron Opal (Aug 13, 2010)

That can't be right. It's supposed to be as big as Faerun, although not as big as the whole F-Z-K continent.

And, what's that other continent to the east?


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## doctorhook (Aug 13, 2010)

Wow, that place is tiny. Also, like the guy above me, what's the unlabeled continent in the east? (I'm not up on my Realmslore.)

Also, I never realised how much unexplored land there was on Toril.


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## Hunter In Darkness (Aug 13, 2010)

yeah there is, which is another reason some of us found the "return" of Abeir silly as it was uncalled for when ya got that much open land ya can add as much as ya like really.


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## Set (Aug 13, 2010)

Oh wow, Zakhara and Kara-Tur, how much I miss those settings!


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## Bluenose (Aug 13, 2010)

Baron Opal said:


> That can't be right. It's supposed to be as big as Faerun, although not as big as the whole F-Z-K continent.
> 
> And, what's that other continent to the east?




I think it's Anchorome. 

The southern one is possibly Osse, btw. And note, 'Returned Abeir' replaces Maztice rather than sits alongside it.


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## El Mahdi (Aug 13, 2010)

Bluenose said:


> ... And note, 'Returned Abeir' replaces Maztice rather than sits alongside it.




Yeah, I'm pretty sure the 4E FR campaign book said that returned Abeir replaced Maztica and it's environs (Including Anchorome and the southern continent too, I think???)


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## David Howery (Aug 13, 2010)

Urgh.  I haven't followed anything about the Realms since 2E days.  What's on this 'returned' continent?  Personally, one of the things I liked about FR was it's multicultural aspect, which included Maztica...


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## Henry (Aug 13, 2010)

El Mahdi said:


> Yeah, I'm pretty sure the 4E FR campaign book said that returned Abeir replaced Maztica and it's environs (Including Anchorome and the southern continent too, I think???)




That was my recollection, too -- but I don't own the FR Campaign Guide, so my memory might be tricking me from what I read from a friend while borrowing it.


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## Stormonu (Aug 13, 2010)

Well, I just checked the Abeir map, it is about 800 miles across, but I can't remember how far across mainland Toril is (and any listed distance is probably from Waterdeep to Thay).  I've got my old FR interactive atlas at home and that map of Toril looks like it is from that set.  Campaign Cartographer has a method where you can measure from point to point, so I'll double-check the distances on the map when I get home.


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## El Mahdi (Aug 13, 2010)

Stormonu said:


> Well, I just checked the Abeir map, it is about 800 miles across, but I can't remember how far across mainland Toril is (and any listed distance is probably from Waterdeep to Thay). I've got my old FR interactive atlas at home and that map of Toril looks like it is from that set. Campaign Cartographer has a method where you can measure from point to point, so I'll double-check the distances on the map when I get home.




Make sure to calculate it as Great Circle Distance!


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## Stormonu (Aug 13, 2010)

Gah!  Abeir is Greenland!


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## jimmifett (Aug 13, 2010)

David Howery said:


> Urgh. I haven't followed anything about the Realms since 2E days. What's on this 'returned' continent? Personally, one of the things I liked about FR was it's multicultural aspect, which included Maztica...




Places from the twin world of aebir got ripped and dumped on toril (and vice versa) when REDACTED got REDACTED, causing the REDACTED to be REDACTED, bringing down seperations between the worlds while the REDACTED was occuring.

The new continent is, i believe, home to some very nasty dragons and thier dragonborn slaves from aebir. There should be a missing part that landed on top of Unther and crushed everything udnerneath. This area is occupied by freedom fighting, bacon loving dragoborn that were fighting the dragons back on aebir and carved out a nation for themselves.


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## TarionzCousin (Aug 13, 2010)

It could have been worse; it could have come back as "Returned Abeir Incontinent."


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## El Mahdi (Aug 13, 2010)

TarionzCousin said:


> It could have been worse; it could have come back as "Returned Abeir Incontinent."




OMG! Why is it everyone wants to poop on the Realms???!!!


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## Set (Aug 14, 2010)

I always liked Io's Blood Isles, from the Council of Wyrms setting.  Plotzing that map down somewhere in Faerun (I kinda want to put it where Evermeet is, because I never really liked that place...) and using it as the launching point for the Dragonborn might have been an interesting option.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 14, 2010)

The map was more for comparison.  I used the scale on the lower right side to scale the returned Aberir continent.  The scale is 1000 miles in length.  The map for returned Aberir is 800 miles square.  So it is big enough to fit into the trackless sea and definitely much smaller than the Maztican continent it was supposed to displace, not that I would do that anyway, but more land is always a plus.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 14, 2010)

Sorry about the double post, but here is Toril with Io's blood in the corner.  The map is 1530 miles across so there may be a little distortion since I did the resizing by hand, but it's pretty close.


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## Dragonhelm (Aug 14, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> The map was more for comparison.  I used the scale on the lower right side to scale the returned Aberir continent.  The scale is 1000 miles in length.  The map for returned Aberir is 800 miles square.  So it is big enough to fit into the trackless sea and definitely much smaller than the Maztican continent it was supposed to displace, not that I would do that anyway, but more land is always a plus.




What I don't understand is why they didn't just drop Returned Abeir _between_ the Maztican continent and Faerun.

Maztica probably isn't the most popular of the Realms' subsettings, but why get rid of it completely?


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 14, 2010)

I don't know either (I have my theory, but I am going to be quiet about that, I had my rant).  If you had a few Maztican bound adventurers they could end up crashing on the Aberiran continent and finding out more of the place.  You can even put it closer to Evermeet, I just put it down there because it wouldn't cover up any words.


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## SPECTRE666 (Aug 14, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> Forgotten Realms:  I pulled some maps off the internet and decided to scale Returned Abeir and see how large it was compared to the other continents on Toril.  The map of Returned Abeir is approximately 800 miles x 800 miles meaning it is a very small continent and fits nicely in the Trackless Sea between Maztica and the Faerun.  If I were to use it then I can put it in the middle of the Amn-Helmport shipping lane which would cause problems with trade.  I have attached a map, but if there are copyright issues please take it down.



Looks like one of Mark Taylor's maps.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 14, 2010)

Who?  If there is a good cartographer out there I would like to have a link.


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## Trevalon Moonleirion (Aug 14, 2010)

The 'returned Abeir' thing was my biggest gripe with the 4e realms. I can live the the Spellplague, and other various changes, but that one bugged me.  For one, I'd never read about this twin-world thing in the first place (in either the 2e box set, or the 3e FRCS), nor any of the supplements I own, and for another, why replace Maztica when you've got a huge continent in the southwest of the map that you could use instead.

My homebrewed Realms just put Returned Abeir on that pseudo-Australia in the southwest, and say it was always there, just not really known to many.


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## Orius (Aug 14, 2010)

Bluenose said:


> I think it's Anchorome.
> 
> The southern one is possibly Osse, btw. And note, 'Returned Abeir' replaces Maztice rather than sits alongside it.




IIRC, Anchorome is supposed to be somewhere to the north of Maztica.  

And yeah, Abeir supposedly booted out Maztica.  I have no idea why they did that.  Probably I should be glad I'm not a huge Realms fan, given everything that's happened to it with the Spellplague, etc.


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## TarionzCousin (Aug 14, 2010)

Dragonhelm said:


> What I don't understand is why they didn't just drop Returned Abeir _between_ the Maztican continent and Faerun.
> 
> Maztica probably isn't the most popular of the Realms' subsettings, but why get rid of it completely?



Hey, the continent just crashed through time and space on its own; they couldn't control where it landed.


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## SPECTRE666 (Aug 14, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> Who?  If there is a good cartographer out there I would like to have a link.



A friend from candlekeep. Here is his deviant art page.


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## Hunter In Darkness (Aug 14, 2010)

Trevalon Moonleirion said:


> The 'returned Abeir' thing was my biggest gripe with the 4e realms. I can live the the Spellplague, and other various changes, but that one bugged me.  For one, I'd never read about this twin-world thing in the first place (in either the 2e box set, or the 3e FRCS), nor any of the supplements I own, and for another, why replace Maztica when you've got a huge continent in the southwest of the map that you could use instead.
> 
> My homebrewed Realms just put Returned Abeir on that pseudo-Australia in the southwest, and say it was always there, just not really known to many.




This to me is how it should have been done, Abeir is not another world. FR has tons of empty space. They should have just used it.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 14, 2010)

Thanks SPECTRE666.  

I think the continent south of Maztica is called Akota.  It was mentioned in passing as another land in the Al-Qadim book as a place that they traded with and is possibly an African analog.  Traders probably Island hopped off the Southwestern Isles, braved the open water to the next island and then traded, but that is all my conjecture based on the map and about two mentions of Akota in the Al-Qadim sourcebook.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 14, 2010)

Trevalon Moonleirion said:


> The 'returned Abeir' thing was my biggest gripe with the 4e realms. I can live the the Spellplague, and other various changes, but that one bugged me.  For one, I'd never read about this twin-world thing in the first place (in either the 2e box set, or the 3e FRCS), nor any of the supplements I own, and for another, why replace Maztica when you've got a huge continent in the southwest of the map that you could use instead.
> 
> My homebrewed Realms just put Returned Abeir on that pseudo-Australia in the southwest, and say it was always there, just not really known to many.




Darn, I'm double posting again.  I thought about doing that also and just spread the cities out on the Northern coast (along with Thymanther and Akundul) and move the Living Jungle from South of Kara-Tur to the plateau in the center of the large unknown continent.  It would be an interesting place after those additions (especially if the magic that protects Malatra were to fail).


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## El Mahdi (Aug 14, 2010)

Trevalon Moonleirion said:


> ...I'd never read about this twin-world thing in the first place (in either the 2e box set, or the 3e FRCS), nor any of the supplements I own...




Yeah, I don't think there ever really was anything in any of the FR products, other than an occasional mention of the worlds full official name as Abeir-Toril.  I think the Abeir part comes from Ed Greenwood's original notes.  It might be in a book somewhere and I've just never seen it though.  Maybe a resident FR expert here on the boards might know better.  I think it's kind of like the concept that Abeir-Toril was once linked with our world but has since drifted away, thus the _"Forgotten"_ Realms.  I'm not sure if that was really in any products either, but ir was definitely part of Ed's original gameworld.  I just don't remember where I read it...


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## Klaus (Aug 14, 2010)

Y'know, I have to say I like Returned Abeir more than Faerun...


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## Hunter In Darkness (Aug 14, 2010)

El Mahdi said:


> Yeah, I don't think there ever really was anything in any of the FR products, other than an occasional mention of the worlds full official name as Abeir-Toril.  I think the Abeir part comes from Ed Greenwood's original notes.  It might be in a book somewhere and I've just never seen it though.  Maybe a resident FR expert here on the boards might know better.  I think it's kind of like the concept that Abeir-Toril was once linked with our world but has since drifted away, thus the _"Forgotten"_ Realms.  I'm not sure if that was really in any products either, but ir was definitely part of Ed's original gameworld.  I just don't remember where I read it...




Puts on Realms lore hat

Well ya see Ed never named the world at all. He called it Faerûn but had not named the world. So they adopted the name of Jeff grubs world of Toril for the Greybox, not was Troil was in the T's in the encyclopedia and they wanted the world to be liststed first they changed the name to Abeir-Troil so it would be first

So it is just the planets name, not and never has been two worlds. The 4e Design team stated in a pod cast they didn't know why the place was called forgotten realms so made up the two worlds to explain it

When as you said any body who looks at the realms and knows any realms lore will tell ya it's because of earth, all the false earth cultures was not lazy nor was it a mistake, it was by design.

 Realms lore hat off


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## jonesy (Aug 14, 2010)

Hunter In Darkness said:


> Well ya see Ed never named the world at all. He called it Faerûn but had not named the world. So they adopted the name of Jeff grubs world of Toril for the Greybox, not was Troil was in the T's in the encyclopedia and they wanted the world to be liststed first they changed the name to Abeir-Troil so it would be first.



Yowza! I never ever knew that. The Realms weren't my setting, I didn't spend a whole lot of time there. But holy Canadian bacon, 19 years of D&D and I never knew that.


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## Alzrius (Aug 14, 2010)

Hunter In Darkness said:


> The 4e Design team stated in a pod cast they didn't know why the place was called forgotten realms so made up the two worlds to explain it




That's the only part of the story that I didn't know, though it certainly doesn't surprise me at all. It's what you come to expect when the guys in charge don't bother to examine the history of the setting they're tinkering with.


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## Hunter In Darkness (Aug 14, 2010)

Alzrius said:


> That's the only part of the story that I didn't know, though it certainly doesn't surprise me at all. It's what you come to expect when the guys in charge don't bother to examine the history of the setting they're tinkering with.





Yeah I stopped paying any mind to it after like the 3rd or so podcast when it was clear they had no respect or understanding of the setting at all. Heck they didn't even know stuff that was in the 3.0 FRCS and was easy to learn.

If you will not ask the creator{whose number you have} and can not take the time to at lest read a setting book your company put out, the you have no interest in respecting any of the setting or those that play that setting . And to be blunt it showed.


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## Atlatl Jones (Aug 15, 2010)

El Mahdi said:


> Yeah, I'm pretty sure the 4E FR campaign book said that returned Abeir replaced Maztica and it's environs (Including Anchorome and the southern continent too, I think???)



Until I saw this map, I didn't realize that Abeir and Maztica are basically the same landmass!

Look at them.  They're exactly the same size, and the same shape (aside from some details).  You could easily superimpose one over the other.  The main difference is that Maztica is connected to other land at the north and south, while Abeir sits on its own.


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## Dragonhelm (Aug 15, 2010)

I think Returned Abeir should kill Maztica and take its stuff.  I won't be happy until we have dragonborn eagle knights and tiefling jaguar knights.


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## Lord_Blacksteel (Aug 15, 2010)

"Dragonborn Eagle Knights" - now you're trying to get your Warhammer in my D&D!


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## El Mahdi (Aug 15, 2010)

Dragonhelm said:


> I think Returned Abeir should kill Maztica and take its stuff. I won't be happy until we have dragonborn eagle knights and tiefling jaguar knights.




And Amnian and Lantanese invaders explorers with "Thunder Sticks" to hunt them down!


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## Nahat Anoj (Aug 16, 2010)

I like Returned Abeir and think it's a neat place, but recently I've been thinking that doesn't add anything to FR and it shouldn't have been included in the 4e FR book (as an aside, I don't think Maztica should have been included either).  This would have allowed them to devote some more pages to the more essential aspects of the Realms.


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## Mercurius (Aug 16, 2010)

I have a feeling that the 4E version of the Forgotten Realms will be kind of like Superman 3 or, hopefully, X-Men 3...the next version (5E) will just pretend it never happened.

Or, alternately, WotC could come out with a "Classic Realms" box set written by, and only by, Ed Greenwood that would turn back the clock to the original grey box set and be the canonical Greenwood Forgotten Realms with more from his personal campaign and all the TSR/WotC added stuff removed.


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## Dragonblade (Aug 16, 2010)

I think the 4e team should put out a comprehensive world atlas that includes EVERYTHING. The best part of the Realms back in 2e was the fact that they had fantasy analogs of ancient real world cultures and most of the world was mapped.

I'm really tired of fantasy worlds that include only a single continent consisting of pseudo-European cultures. I want a setting that encompasses a whole world with fantasy analogs for ancient and medieval Earth cultures with tons of detailed maps. Sadly, such a setting does not exist.

Kara-Tur, Maztica, Zakhara, these are all fantastic places, each one worthy of a setting book in its own right. It was awesome that 2e printed those settings and its a shame that 4e has not.

Returned Abeir is a neat idea but it should NEVER have replaced Maztica. Having the fantasy analog to conquistadors and the New World is rife with possibilities for story, adventure, and intrigue. Returned Abeir falls far short, IMO of what Maztica offered. The same goes for Kara-Tur as well. Having a complete and well developed Asian setting that fits into the world allowed me to run a Marco Polo-esque campaign back in the day that was amazing. But instead the 3e team opted to release Oriental Adventures using Rokugan. I hate Rokugan.

What a wasted opportunity, IMO. And also no Al-Qadim? Again, what a waste.

I'm ok with the Spellplague and accelerating the timeline in 4e. I'm ok with a restored Netheril replacing Anauroch. I'm even ok with the idea of Returned Abeir. But having it replace Maztica bugs me and the lack of a world atlas that includes everything is just depressing.


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## Mercurius (Aug 16, 2010)

Or someone could come out with a fantasy version of Earth with various ages and cultures combined into one time, then let actual fantasy secondary worlds be just that: fantasy otherworlds, not fantasy versions of the real world.

I get tired of yet-another-fantasy-setting with this-and-that real world analog. Why go that route at all? If one wanted a fantasy Egypt or China why not just play a game in a fantasy version of our own world? This goes for Medieval settings as well; the qualities I like about the Forgotten Realms or Golarion or Greyhawk etc, are exactly those qualities that _haven't _existed in the real world. That pleasant "Realmsian vibe" is not its correlation to the real world, but its Greenwoodisms. Sure, the Dalelands were influenced by Medieval European culture, but they aren't a direct analog.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 17, 2010)

That already exists and was done better than Greenwood could ever do:

Tékumel :: The World of the Petal Throne

but try getting people to play.  Its not all that easy.  I've thought about putting Tsolyanu next to my European analog to see if that would make it more interesting.


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## Henry (Aug 17, 2010)

I do have one question: How many people reading this thread either have, or know someone who has, played a Maztica campaign in the past ten years? Either the PCs visited, or the campaign was centered there?

As a game setting, it just had very little draw, from my recollection, as cool as the idea was conceptually. I hazard a guess they wanted to replace it with something that someone might want to set a campaign in, or have PCs visit.


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## I'm A Banana (Aug 17, 2010)

> As a game setting, it just had very little draw, from my recollection, as cool as the idea was conceptually. I hazard a guess they wanted to replace it with something that someone might want to set a campaign in, or have PCs visit.




I played a 3e campaign in a pseudo-south-america, all feathered dragons and sun-emperors.

It wasn't Maztica, though. It was probably about as Maztica as Rokugan is Kara-Tur.

IMO, the legends and myths of Mezoamerica and South America are entirely deserving of D&D-style love, but I'd prefer them to be dedicated, like Nyambe, and not a one-off for Elminster and Drizzit to go play Colonialism Sucks for a few months. 

FR always had a mythic earth feel, which was part of its appeal, I think. Returned Aebir does nothing to enhance that, and the Spellplague was more fun when I did it the first time as Cthulu Comes To Town.  Maztica and the rest deserve a brief mention, but probably not much more than that. Returned Aebir should just go away. It's not like FR didn't have room for Dragonborn in its cavalcade of races and sub-races already. The thing just seems grossly unnecessary.


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## Dragonblade (Aug 17, 2010)

Henry said:


> I do have one question: How many people reading this thread either have, or know someone who has, played a Maztica campaign in the past ten years? Either the PCs visited, or the campaign was centered there?
> 
> As a game setting, it just had very little draw, from my recollection, as cool as the idea was conceptually. I hazard a guess they wanted to replace it with something that someone might want to set a campaign in, or have PCs visit.




How could they? Maztica has been out of print for almost 20 years. And even when it was in print it wasn't exactly easy to find, and TSR's marketing was horrible.

All of their stuff was focused on Faerun and everything else was an afterthought. All of their other settings were compartmentalized into obscurity. Really, they should have had more crossover from the start. In their Faerunian adventure modules, they should have included more exotic and mysterious NPCs from say Zakhara or Kara-Tur. Hint at the wondrous world beyond. Why is that Red Wizard of Thay importing mysterious and exotic spices from Zakhara? Why is a lich from Kara-Tur suddenly interfering in Cormyrean politics? The PCs free a djinn in Undermountain who promises a great reward if the PCs can track down his former master, lost years ago in the vast sands of the Zakharan desert thus setting off an epic trek across the globe. Huge possibilities!

The Legend of El-Dorado and the Cities of Gold could have been used as inspiration for an awesome clash of cultures style campaign where Faerunian treasure hunters clash with native Maztican cultures. Eberron got it right with the whole Xen'Drik as the mysterious continent with danger filled jungle ruins, fierce tribes, and ancient magic that calls to explorers from more "civilized" lands. This is the model they should have used for Maztica. The key is to integrate their settings, not compartmentalize and separate the settings which essentially relegated them all to oblivion.

We don't need yet another Underdark sourcebook, or another Silver Marches sourcebook. There is value in those products but lets flesh out the rest of the world first and make it an exciting and dynamic place rife with possibilities for epic adventures and treks to exotic lands far away.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 17, 2010)

There was a City of Gold adventure:

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/tsr9349.zip

And the other Maztican stuff can be found here:

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/tsr1066.zip
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/tsr9333.zip
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/tsr9340.zip

But it is true, about all most of my players wanted from Oriental Adventures in 2nd Edition were the martial arts rules and ninjas.


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## Dragonblade (Aug 17, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> There was a City of Gold adventure:
> 
> http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/tsr9349.zip
> 
> ...




Very nice that those downloads can still be found. Now lets get this into 4e. Lets revise it and make it more compelling. Look at what Eberron did with Stormreach being the gateway to exotic Xen'drik and do the same for Maztica. Give the Faerunian cultures a compelling reason to visit there. A maguffin that serves the same purpose that the dragonshards and lost relics do in Eberron and then integrate it closely into the core setting the same way they did with Returned Abeir being integrated tightly into core Realms by making it the homeland of the Dragonborn and even dropping one Abeir nation smack dab in the middle of Faerun (though that was a bit of a kludgy approach).

Paizo is taking this approach with Golarion to much success. Make a big world full of exciting places to visit, and then churn out sourcebooks and adventure paths that give the players a reason to vist all these exotic places and facilitates the DM in taking them there. The more that players and DMs want to go to these places, the more books and adventures they sell, and more books and adventures in turn fuels the desire of players to go there and DMs to run it. Its a great model. The key is integration. Make it one dynamic, interconnected, and living world.


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## Mercurius (Aug 17, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> That already exists and was done better than Greenwood could ever do:
> 
> Tékumel :: The World of the Petal Throne
> 
> but try getting people to play.  Its not all that easy.  I've thought about putting Tsolyanu next to my European analog to see if that would make it more interesting.




There are a fair number of fantasy settings that aren't focused on Medieval Europe and other real-world-analogs: Talislanta, Jorune, Dark Sun, Everway, the Scarred Lands, Planescape, even Eberron. But I'm not simply talking about "weird fantasy" like Tekumel, the problem of which is that it is too weird, too exotic. Tekumel would be great to visit in a campaign, but maybe not so great to play in. 

Much of the Forgotten Realms, while being very familiar, isn't directly analogical. Actually, most of Greenwoodian Faerun - it is not as much Medieval Europe as it is quintessential D&D Land. Waterdeep (or Greyhawk, for that matter) are not realistic Medieval cities, but they are classic D&D cities.

I'm a huge fan of Talislanta but I enjoy it more as an art piece and a place to visit through reading sourcebooks than a favored world to play to play in. I'm less of a fan of Tekumel, but it is the same general idea. I think it is a combination of being too exotic but also lacking those classic D&D archetypes that most of us grew up with.


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## Hunter In Darkness (Aug 17, 2010)

Henry said:


> I do have one question: How many people reading this thread either have, or know someone who has, played a Maztica campaign in the past ten years? Either the PCs visited, or the campaign was centered there?
> 
> As a game setting, it just had very little draw, from my recollection, as cool as the idea was conceptually. I hazard a guess they wanted to replace it with something that someone might want to set a campaign in, or have PCs visit.





The issues is there was no need to replace it, look how much uncharted land there is. It was an unneeded change that was done just to be doing it.


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## Dragonhelm (Aug 17, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> That already exists and was done better than Greenwood could ever do:
> 
> Tékumel :: The World of the Petal Throne
> 
> but try getting people to play.  Its not all that easy.  I've thought about putting Tsolyanu next to my European analog to see if that would make it more interesting.




To give credit where due, Maztica is the brainchild of Doug Niles.  He's the one who wrote the novels, did the boxed set, and pushed for its creation to begin with.

Thanks for the link, btw.  I'll check that out.




Henry said:


> I do have one question: How many people reading this thread either have, or know someone who has, played a Maztica campaign in the past ten years? Either the PCs visited, or the campaign was centered there?




I had my players go there once, and that was around 15 - 20 years ago.  I saw it only as a one-shot.

I do see some merit with the eagle knights and jaguar knights.  As for the gods, I could see Qotal being a half-dragon/half-couatl aspect of some other deity (Bahamut?).  Otherwise...meh.  

Plus, Maztica is kind of a cool name.  Maya + Aztec + Inca = Maztica.  

I just think it needed to be developed differently to make it more interesting.  I certainly wouldn't run a campaign set there, but I wouldn't mind visiting a place with an Aztec theme, if done right.




> As a game setting, it just had very little draw, from my recollection, as cool as the idea was conceptually. I hazard a guess they wanted to replace it with something that someone might want to set a campaign in, or have PCs visit.




I think that's it exactly.  Of course, they could have spent the time to remake Maztica to make it into something people would want to game in as well as add the new landmass.  Perhaps, though, this was the easier route to go.




Dragonblade said:


> Very nice that those downloads can still be found. Now lets get this into 4e. Lets revise it and make it more compelling. Look at what Eberron did with Stormreach being the gateway to exotic Xen'drik and do the same for Maztica. Give the Faerunian cultures a compelling reason to visit there. A maguffin that serves the same purpose that the dragonshards and lost relics do in Eberron and then integrate it closely into the core setting the same way they did with Returned Abeir being integrated tightly into core Realms by making it the homeland of the Dragonborn and even dropping one Abeir nation smack dab in the middle of Faerun (though that was a bit of a kludgy approach).




This might be a good project for someone to tackle.  There's a dedicated Maztica area on the Piazza (under Forgotten Realms).  You might also approach Candlekeep.


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## Orius (Aug 17, 2010)

Mercurius said:


> Much of the Forgotten Realms, while being very familiar, isn't directly analogical. Actually, most of Greenwoodian Faerun - it is not as much Medieval Europe as it is quintessential D&D Land. Waterdeep (or Greyhawk, for that matter) are not realistic Medieval cities, but they are classic D&D cities.




Problem is that some of the Realms stuff outside Faerun and Zahkara are pretty bland rip-off of real world stuff.  The history section in the Maztica box is pretty much cut-and-paste pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, and the Horde came off as bland (how the heck do you get bland out of Mongols?)



Dragonhelm said:


> Plus, Maztica is kind of a cool name.  Maya + Aztec + Inca = Maztica.




TVtropes calls it Mayincatec.    With a reference to Maztica of course.


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## Mercurius (Aug 17, 2010)

Orius said:


> Problem is that some of the Realms stuff outside Faerun and Zahkara are pretty bland rip-off of real world stuff.  The history section in the Maztica box is pretty much cut-and-paste pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, and the Horde came off as bland (how the heck do you get bland out of Mongols?)




Yes, exactly--which is why I don't like fantasy analogs of real world cultures. You simply cannot match the richness of our world. The joy of world building is that you get to create something new; the joy of gaming in a fantasy world is you get to go somewhere you wouldn't otherwise get to go to.

Nothing wrong with gaming in a fantasized version of our world, but might as well make it Teotihuacan rather than "Miztecapotitlitl."


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## wingsandsword (Aug 17, 2010)

Fantasy analogues are an integral part of the Realms, even within Faerun.  Even places that aren't copies of real-world places are copies of other fantasy places.

Chessenta is an analogue of Greece, Durpar is an analogue of India, Mulhorrand is a very thinly veiled analogue of Egypt, Unther is a copy of Mesopotamia.

Luiren is Tolkien's Shire more-or-less copied to the Realms. 

To me, the Forgotten Realms is defined as a highly detailed collage of real-world analogues and fantasy stereotypes knitted together with a few uniquely Faerunian elements of realmslore.  Removing the real-world analogues, scrapping the detailed lore, and re-writing much of the uniquely Faerunian elements while inserting 4e-isms (like Dragonborn) was breaking the back of the Realms and bowdlerizing it into another indistinct D&D setting.


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## Bluenose (Aug 17, 2010)

wingsandsword said:


> Fantasy analogues are an integral part of the Realms, even within Faerun.  Even places that aren't copies of real-world places are copies of other fantasy places.
> 
> Chessenta is an analogue of Greece, Durpar is an analogue of India, Mulhorrand is a very thinly veiled analogue of Egypt, Unther is a copy of Mesopotamia.
> 
> ...




Slightly modified analogues of real-world cultures and fantasy stereotypes seem pretty much like the way most D&D settings are written.


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## wingsandsword (Aug 17, 2010)

Bluenose said:


> Slightly modified analogues of real-world cultures and fantasy stereotypes seem pretty much like the way most D&D settings are written.




Really?

Where were the analogues of Egypt and Central America (for example) in Greyhawk?  It's pretty much all fantasy pseudo-Europe, at least everything I've ever seen of that setting (except for the 1e version of Kara Tur which places it on this world instead of Toril)

Where were the analogues of Imperial China and India (or other places) in Dragonlance?

Where were the analogues of India and Arabia (ect.) in Birthright?  If there was an official D&D world that was more western-European in style, I can't think of it.

Where were the analogues of Feudal Japan (ect.) in Eberron?  It doesn't even really have analogues of medieval Europe, more like 19th and early 20th century Europe at best.

You could have a prime-world with analogues of anything in Planescape or Spelljammer, but those settings were intentionally very open ended and designed to let the DM insert new sub-settings like cultural analogues at will (but even then, none were in the canonical texts that I know of).

The only other official D&D setting I can think of with a pattern of real-world analogues is Mystara, which was more of the Basic D&D setting that had an AD&D treatment performed in the 2e era.


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## Klaus (Aug 17, 2010)

I don't mind real-world-inspired cultures, as long as the campaign takes into account the effects of different real-world technologies being exchanged. For instance, most RPG settings are based on Europe circa the Dark Ages (with some Middle Ages/Renaissance thrown in, like plate armor and universities). If you include an analog to Ancient Egypt, you have to advance the "Egyptian" technology to match the rest of the setting, with lamellar armor, steel kopeshes, etc.


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## Dragonhelm (Aug 17, 2010)

wingsandsword said:


> Where were the analogues of Egypt and Central America (for example) in Greyhawk?




Greyhawk's version of Egypt is called Erypt, located in Western Oerik.


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## Bluenose (Aug 17, 2010)

wingsandsword said:


> Really?
> 
> Where were the analogues of Egypt and Central America (for example) in Greyhawk?  It's pretty much all fantasy pseudo-Europe, at least everything I've ever seen of that setting (except for the 1e version of Kara Tur which places it on this world instead of Toril)




Zindia is central America. "tropical land where rich cities rise from steaming jungles."  More Maya than Aztec, frankly.


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## Achan hiArusa (Aug 17, 2010)

So you are actually defending the pseudomedieval pseduoTolkien knockoffs of Greyhawk, The core of the Forgotten Realms, and Dragonlance as unique richly rendered worlds?  Really?  By what standard?  Compared to Glorantha, Kulthea, Mythic Europe, or Harn they look like patchwork continents filled with modern day people with medieval technology.  I'm not saying all TSR/WotC worlds are that way Eberron, Dark Sun, and even Red Steel had wonderful flair that is seriously lacking in either Greyhawk or the Forgotten Realms.  So if you put a realm that is a knockoff of another culture in either of those two worlds then it is par for the course and matches just fine with the blandness of Cormyr or the City of Greyhawk.


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## TarionzCousin (Aug 18, 2010)

Achan hiArusa said:


> So if you put a realm that is a knockoff of another culture in either of those two worlds then it is par for the course and matches just fine with the blandness of Cormyr or the City of Greyhawk.



It's only as bland as you and your DM make it.


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