Tell Me Your Favorite D&D Setting

If we're talking "vanilla" medieval fantasy settings, I'd probably go with Greyhawk. Forgotten Realms are overused and a tad too high magic/cartoony for me and I'm just getting into Mystara through an ongoing game I'm not much excited about. Effectively, many of the settings tweak the gameplay experience quite a bit, so it's almost like picking a different game to play.

Planescape is clearly my favourite, if the profile picture wasn't an indication enough. It's different, gritty, surreal and allows for a lot of creativity, original ideas and unexpected twists. I tend to take the published books at face value and then tweak/customize much of the canon in order to maintain that sense of wonder. On top of that, it can accomodate an urban adventure in Sigil as much as it can host a planeswalking exploration campaign.

The post-apocalyptic Dark Sun is another favourite, it's so different and evocative, though I'd argue it loses a bit of its charm if you take it into less lethal, newer editions of D&d.

Birthright is also great for experiencing that "domain level" play, with elements of management and strategy. Haven't seen such a solid mechanic since probably PF1's Kingmaker or the recent Strongholds & Followers by Matt Coleville.

Midnight is also great and receiving a 5e update soon, basically a Tolkienesque "what if the bad guys had won" deal. Unique atmosphere, grim, gritty and abolishing several things D&d takes for granted like magic, shops, vendors etc.

Much as I liked the Dragonlance novels, can't say I'm crazy for the setting itself. Same for Ravenloft, it's great when you read it but when implemented it's a bit rough

I actually really like Forgotten Realms. I just wish they would publish more places outside of the Sword Coast.

I also love Forgotten Realms, but before the spellplague lol !!

Eberron

I'm a big fan of Eberron and Golarion, and I've even found myself fascinated by Grim Hollow and begun dipping my toes into Tal'dorei (I'll get around to actually watching Critical Role eventually), buuuuuut...

My heart will always belong to Greyhawk. Maybe I'm just an old fart or stuck in the past, but I don't know, I just really like the lore of the old Greyhawk books and gazetteers. It was the first setting I got to experience, and the one that really got me interested in all the D&D lore bits from when my dad introduced me to the hobby back in ye olde 2e days.

I like Eberron too, am currently playing in an Eberron game over Zoom. Would really like to try Dark Sun. Not D&D but I enjoy the Old World setting of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

I recently stumbled into Numenera's Ninth World setting (Beneath the Monolith is the 5e conversion). It fascinated me, and I was fortunate enough that Qralloq advertised a game for it shortly after. I'm really impressed by Monte Cook's work on it! It stimulates a sense of wonder and imaginative wanderlust that I haven't felt in a long time. There feels like so much mystery right underneath the surface, and the book is dripping with adventure hooks.

I just picked up one of the novels set there, and I fully expect to run a game (Either Cypher System or 5e) in that world in the future.

How far in the future? Expressing interest nice and early! :D

Roughly one billion years. It's called the ninth world because human civilization had peaked and crashed eight times before the time of the game, leaving all kinds of crazy remnants around of forgotten technological epochs.

I think he was asking how far in the future would Skeptical be running a game, not how far in the future it will be set.

Yes, Skeptical will be running it in roughly one billion years. PBP is slow, don't forget 😋

As for regular dnd settings, I have only played dnd 5e and homebrew ones. I actually loved the scifi setting I played a while back where we were all police officers helping out the alien government that took over Earth in Bellflower California in the year 3022 but we were in a simulation the whole time so we didn't know which was the real one to the simulation one. That game never finished but it was an interesting concept.

Also Legend of Zelda dnd where we played in the locales of Hyrule and the places in Ocarina of time was pretty fun.



As for published modules, I have only played Dungeon of the mad mage which was pretty good too.

I enjoyed the setting of The Masters Vault one-shot I ran as a dm which you can play on roll20 too.

I usually just play on roll20 and discord so haven't played in many settings though.

I would love to one day play in a Critical role dnd game and stuff one day tho but do love homebrew settings and would love to create my own one day to run on roll20 and discord.

I'm just enjoying the world I have created for the quest for the Briarwood inn play by post game too as it is just an inn and Village which are in a Demiplane and the dark dangerous woods of Whimsy that has invaded that Demiplane too.

I tend to think of homebrewing as half the fun, and that's been true as well for most of the GMs I've played with, but of the published settings my favorite is Eberron. It's thematically tight and stays away from being quite so medieval Europe as a lot of the other settings. Plus I'll always think pretty fondly of the old 3.5 version for going a bit more cinematic than regular D&D.