Has anyone tried a D&D setting in the real world?

[CrackedChair]

For example, did you have a setting that mixes the fantasy world of most D&D worlds with the real world and it's history? Like, were stuff like magic in actual medieval England existed, Orcs and Half-Orcs consisted of most of the Mongolians, or maybe even have most of Feudal Japan rules by warlords with a load of levels in Fighter or Paladin?

[Nifft]

For example, did you have a setting that mixes the fantasy world of most D&D worlds with the real world and it's history? Like, were stuff like magic in actual medieval England existed, Orcs and Half-Orcs consisted of most of the Mongolians, or maybe even have most of Feudal Japan rules by warlords with a load of levels in Fighter or Paladin?

Kinda.

I figured that the advances of magical technology would enable some really terribly brutal warfare techniques, and so the Axial Age basically rendered the lands of the most powerful expansionist empires -- Europe, India, and China -- uninhabitable magical wastelands.

The setting was based on those who escaped, and had eventually rebuilt a vaguely feudal civilization in North & South America ~1k years later.

So: real-world geography, but very much NOT real-world population distribution.

[Yora]

Many adventures for Lamentations of the Flame Princess take place in 16th century Europe.

[Zaydos]

TSR did under the Ravenloft label despite not actually taking place in the Domain of Dread. I don't know much more about it than that it exists.

[Mutazoia]

So...like Shadowrun? Only maybe a little earlier in the world time line?

[Berenger]

Like this?

[Nightcanon]

Not D&D, but the Warhammer fantasy setting is based on a version of Renaissance Europe, and there's Middle Earth, of course. Then there are Arthurian and Robin Hood type settings, (again, mostly not D&D but including Doug Niles' Moonshae Islands, which was envisaged as a version of Arthurian Britain and later incorporated into the Forgotten Realms, and there was a FR trilogy based on Cormyr fighting off a 'Mongol' horde). The problem with this approach is that incorporating the more numerous humanoid races becomes tricky: it's fine having elves, dwarves, gnomes etc as secretive peoples who live in the deep forests or underground, but if you have hoards of Orcs invading from Mongolia/ North Africa, or tribes of Gnolls roaming the Serengeti/ American Mid-West, you can end up with some uncomfortable implications ("it's Earth in the 1400s, but people from X are Orcs not humans in my version of reality..."). That may or may not be an insurmountable obstacle for a homebrew campaign, but it's unlikely to be picked up to be published as a campaign setting commercially in the 21stC.

[Jonagel]

Pax Britannica takes that idea on pretty well!

http://paxbritannicarpg.com

[woweedd]

For example, did you have a setting that mixes the fantasy world of most D&D worlds with the real world and it's history? Like, were stuff like magic in actual medieval England existed, Orcs and Half-Orcs consisted of most of the Mongolians, or maybe even have most of Feudal Japan rules by warlords with a load of levels in Fighter or Paladin?

(Emphasis mine.)
Um...NO offense, but that has a bit of unfortunate implications, no?

[sktarq]

I would say the whole point of D20Modern was this.

Most of the magic stuff was "hidden" to avoid consequences of having wizards and mind flayers et al.

[The Eye]

For example, did you have a setting that mixes the fantasy world of most D&D worlds with the real world and it's history? Like, were stuff like magic in actual medieval England existed, Orcs and Half-Orcs consisted of most of the Mongolians, or maybe even have most of Feudal Japan rules by warlords with a load of levels in Fighter or Paladin?

That's racist.

How about the americans be the fat undeads?


Mindless and fat, sounds just perfect.

[Frozen_Feet]

I play Lamentations of the Flame Princess, so games set in random places on historical Earth have become a mainstay on my tables. I don't even try to explain where dwarves, elves and halflings come from; if someone asks, I make roundabout references to whatever folklore happens to exist in that part of the world. Such concerns are usually forgotten when faced with LotFP's signature weirdness.

London is my favorite place, because Death Love Doom takes place near it.

[Vogie]

That's racist.

How about the americans be the fat undeads?

Yeah, if you start categorizing actually pairing D&D races to human races, it's going to get really racist really fast. #1 no-no in appropriative worldbuilding.

However, if you make a cosmopolitan society where there are all D&D races everywhere, then you can use the keystones of certain locales, such as the Feudal Paladins of Japan, the Warriors of Gaul, the Nomadic raiders of the east, the Clerics of the Mediterranean, et cetera.

The Race doesn't matter, but certain societies either revolve around or discourage/encourage a certain class. Make the Druids in the Americas act differently than the Druids of Scandinavia, who act differently than the Islander druids, even though they may all be elves/orcs/gnomes/humans/et al. In one area they're leadership, in another they're a utility support class, in yet another they're outcasts.

[Frozen_Feet]

You can't really dodge prejudices if you want to do historical Earth with any accuracy. However, historical prejudices by and large weren't the same as modern ones. For example, Somalis have a long-lasting feud with Amharat (Ethiopians), partly for religious reasons, and this has lead to wildly exaggerated stereotypes on both sides. When Somalis escaped to Ethiopia during their civil war, some honestly believed Amharat would eat their babies.

If you replaced Amharat with baby-eating gnolls, I'd wager most non-Somali players would be completely unobservant of any racism - because as outsiders, they would not associate baby-eating with Amharat and thus not get the gnolls could be stand-ins for any real people. They would just be fantasy monsters doing monster stuff.

[Daedroth]

I'm doing it, a D&D world in the XIV-XV (1390) Gotholonia (Catalonia).

Races exist and are part of our world, for example, due to the help in the conquest of Mallorca island dwarfes have been awarded with several mountains where they live by their own, though technically their king is vassal of Martin the Humane.

Some things are changed because a demonic incursion in the 1200s, for example the Catholic Church has been broken, making protestantism much more early and widespread (And that has made the templar knights actually survive) and several churches has apeared (As the Church of Jerusalem, in the iberian peninsula).