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gomeztoo wrote:

So essentially, we stop playing a roleplaying game and interacting with NPCs, and instead revert to miniature battles.

I really fail to see what this has to do with the discussion at hand. Roleplaying is about the players taking an a role and trying to act upon it. DMs are going to do the same with NPCs. Ultimately it are the players and the DM who define that role. So if the DM decides that prejudice is not part of the game, then it would be good roleplaying *not* to have NPC act suspiciously towards monstrous characters. Downplaying or entirely removing prejudice does NOT make it a miniature battle game. Or do you really think that you cannot roleplay in Eberron since in that setting racial prejudices are more or less insignificant (especially compared to national differences)?

Sticking to the fluff in a setting has nothing to do with roleplaying. Doing so is good to provide common ground and it helps the players immerse themselves in the setting and their role. So yeah, it is best that in general players (especially the DM) stick to it, but ultimately the fluff is something we make up. For some players D&D IS a miniature battle game. They do not care about setting, let alone about how some silly tavern wench is supposed to behave because a book says so. Others want much more detail, or really like to shock NPCs and talk their way out of things and want more instead of less prejudice.

The 4E paragrim is one of diversity and this shows itself in (L)FR. It is a change from previous editions, but it is there none the less. There should be suspicion in some places and I agree with you and Tancread that if a DM is aware of it, he should act upon it. I also think that a DM should buy the books and do some background reading.

Bgibbons, there are some good reasons why we do not copy-and-past info from what every DM and player can read in the FR books. Saying the adventures are just generic fantasy adventures is not going to make a big impression on most people. FR IS a generic fantasy setting. It is one of the reasons it was published first. The adventure are in general still fairly region specific. Sure, adventures like CORE1-1, CORE1-3 and DRAG1-1 could be easily set in any other fantasy setting, but that does not mean it can easily be places in another region with FR. Further more, heroic level adventures are by definition generic. It is only at paragon level that the adventures are going to have region wide impact and become more and more ingrained in the setting as a result.

Pieter Sleijpen
LFR Global Administrator