Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Rogukan, Shadowrun, Original, et. al.

Which setting do you typically use when you game and why? What do you consider to be the pros and cons of your favored setting?

Have you recently tried a new setting? Have you (or your gaming group) done anything special to make that setting come alive?

I invite you to share your opinions and experiences with game settings.

Historically, I have alternated between Mystara and Greyhawk in my D&D campaigns. Both have their pros and cons. Mystara is lighter in tone and more detailed in its presentation of particular kingdoms. It is a little silly for some people, but seems to be a good "animated movie" style setting. This isn't to say that it has no darkness, it does, but the world's situation isn't very dire.

Greyhawk is pretty much the opposite of Mystara in every way. There are some products which detail the cities/kingdoms, but for the most part a good deal of the specifics are left to the DM. Add to this that Oerth is a setting where evil seems to be "winning" and that the PCs are one of the forces who can turn the tide and you get a pretty exciting campaign. Consider the after-effects of the first raid on the Temple of Elemental Evil. BTW, when I say there are less specifics, I don't mean there are none, but Greyhawk fans are notorious for their arcane ability to create tomes based on single passages of history.

Interestingly enough, my most recent campaign takes place in Eberron. The world is highly detailed and I like the tone. There are so many villains and adventure/campaign ideas in each book that it can become overwhelming. It's really rich and WotC has put some great effort into this setting. I wish that Greyhawk or Mystara had this kind of support.

I think Greyhawk is a great, generic fall-back setting-- especially for *ahem* older gamers and I have to admit, I like it a lot. In my opinion, one of its advantages is that you don't need a ton of setting-related data in order to come up with an adventure (or use a module) there. It's a good, solid fantasy setting.

I haven't personally played in the Mystara setting, and although I have dabled with Eberron, I haven't committed to using it yet. I have often heard it compared favorably against the Forgotten Realms.

Often, I think it's a real shame that WotC and other RPG companies don't continue to support older settings. They make the focus all about selling the 'new' setting and its accoutrements. I guess this leaves the door open for smaller, d20 press publishing to fill in gaps.