Why Worldbuilding is Bad

[Maxperson]

(1) Even if the action (of the play, of the RPG session) extends beyond the opera house, you can add on that stuff as needed. In serial fiction, new elements of the setting are established as needed. In RPGing the same thing is possible. The fact that some GMs and some RPG groups prefer that it all be done in advance doesn't show that it has to be.

Yes, story now worldbuilds as it goes along. I don't think anyone here has claimed that it all has to be done in advance.

So someone who says "I find worldbuilding to be unhelpful/counterproductive" isn't necessarily confused about what RPGing involves. Nor are they necessarily saying that those who enjoy it are confused.

But someone who gives a non-RPG setting like Phantom is confused about what RPGing involves. A movie, play or TV show is never going to play out like an RPG would and doesn't involve the same kind of worldbuilding needs as an RPG does.

(2) This semantic debate seems exceptionally pointless. If someone says "Worldbuilding is bad" because eg it kills spontaneity or it bogs down narration in needless detail, it's pretty clear what they have in mind. Someone else may or may not agree with that; but it adds nothing to the conversation to bog it down with discussion of whether "worldbuilding" is the word that ought to have been used to express that preference.

Definitions are not pointless. When you have someone misrepresenting a word, it's incredibly unhelpful to just wander on through the conversation with people using a word that is central to the conversation in different ways. It's not only unhelpful, but it actively harms communication. Until people get on the same page, the conversation can't go forward. Once [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] acknowledged the definition and moved on to his position as dislike of excessive worldbuilding, the conversation started to progress and we started to have discussions going on as to what excessive meant. Once he dug in his heels again, it derailed once more. It seems like he doesn't actually want the conversation to happen.

 

[Aldarc]

I think you are projecting here. All I can go on is what works when I run games, and what I've seen from other GMs.

And clearly people who disagree with you don't as they are just "projecting" and going on inexperience, paint chips, and bad faith. Furthermore, if you are going to quote my comment, I would certainly appreciate if you showed signs of reading it. I did clarify that this was not all worldbuilding but "excess worldbuilding." I would prefer if you would spend less time accusing others of projecting and more time treating the experiences and viewpoints of others who may disagree with you as being similarly rooted in their own game experiences and observation.

Until people get on the same page, the conversation can't go forward. Once [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] acknowledged the definition and moved on to his position as dislike of excessive worldbuilding, the conversation started to progress and we started to have discussions going on as to what excessive meant. Once he dug in his heels again, it derailed once more. It seems like he doesn't actually want the conversation to happen.

This obligation works both ways, Max. It looked like to me that you refused to move the conversation forward with your heels dug in deep until Hussar offered a temporary concession for the sake of moving the conversation forward. I am hardpressed to find any signs of your attempts to meet in the middle and reach an understanding. If you are insisting that you have the only correct understanding for the definition of "worldbuilding" and expect everyone to kowtow to it then this conversation will most certainly not move forward.

 

[pemerton]

When you have someone misrepresenting a word, it's incredibly unhelpful to just wander on through the conversation with people using a word that is central to the conversation in different ways. It's not only unhelpful, but it actively harms communication. Until people get on the same page, the conversation can't go forward.

This just isn't true. As long as I know what someone means by a word they are using, I can discuss things with them even though I would use the word differently.

I don't get discombobulated everytime I experience a North American using the word "bathroom" or "liberal" differently from how I would.

When it comes to words, like "worldbuilding" in this thread, where differences of usage reflect broader differences of approach to what is valuable or not valuable in the broader activity (RPGing) being discussed, paying attention to those differences actually helps understanding, by helping locate a given poster's contribution in a broader conception of what is worthwhile about the hobby.

 

[pemerton]

someone who gives a non-RPG setting like Phantom is confused about what RPGing involves. A movie, play or TV show is never going to play out like an RPG would and doesn't involve the same kind of worldbuilding needs as an RPG does.

It strikes me as a vanity to think that this applies more to fiction than than gaming, because such excess worldbuilding IMHO often comes from GMs who are using their worldbuilding as an exercise of self-indulgence.

To the extent that these two posts express conflicting views on the matter, I'm firmly with Aldarc. RPGing, and it's "need" for worldbuilding, is not wildly different from any other narrative artform.

You would need that in the first few hours as well, if it were an RPG where the participants would be coming up with their own script and questions. Phantom is not an RPG and the way it is set up does not at all represent an RPG adventure. It's apples and oranges.

Even if the action (of the play, of the RPG session) extends beyond the opera house, you can add on that stuff as needed. In serial fiction, new elements of the setting are established as needed. In RPGing the same thing is possible. The fact that some GMs and some RPG groups prefer that it all be done in advance doesn't show that it has to be.

Yes, story now worldbuilds as it goes along. I don't think anyone here has claimed that it all has to be done in advance.

But what do you think the OP is talking about? What do you think [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] is talking about? And what are you talking about when you say that, unlike a play, worldbuildinfg would be needed "in the first few hours" of a RPG?

Do you think that the sort of stuff the OP, or Hussar, is objecting to - eg thousand-year histories of a place or a people that have no bearing on the actual situation presented in play - is going to come up in circumstances in which setting is established on an as-needed basis?

 

[hawkeyefan]

Introducing an otyugh for the same reason - ie specifying that, in such-and-such a place an otyugh is to be found performing sanitation services - would be worldbuilding (on a similarly modest scale).

I was contrasting actually describing a part of the gameworld as including an otyugh with writing up a monster description that includes notes about the ecological role that otyught's serve. I don't think that the latter is worldbuidling.

Okay. But what if a DM selects such a monster for inclusion in their game world? Presumably when "stocking" a dungeon or similar. Isn't that DM deciding to include a world element?

I would say so. Sure, it may be a minor element, but so much of this discussion seems to rely on scope, so I think that's relevant.

[MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] regards writing up a monster desctiption which says "this monster is/was a servant of this other monster" as worlduilding (eg kobolds as slaves of dragons). I don't think I agree: the AD&D MM tells me that hobgbolins hate elves, that goblins hate gnomes, etc, but I don't really see that as worldbuidlding either.

It depends. If this is what is in the Monster Manual or whatever source is being used, then there certainly seems to be a world that is being implied. For example, the world of Toril or Oerth, etc. Now, any given DM can choose to use those elements or not, which is really just a case of the DM building a world of his own.

I think the connections that are offered in the material....that hobgoblins hate elves and the like....are really key to what I am talking about. Those bits that establish or attempt to establish a larger world. Taken as written, the inclusion of hobgoblins implies the inclusion of elves....and if you then look at the information about elves, then several other elements become implied, as well.

Now, a GM can alter these to suit his or his players' tastes, and he is therefore building the world in which they will play.

That said, maybe the difference is this: hobgoblins hate elves doesn't mean that if you use hobgoblins you have to use elves; it just means that if you don't use elves you have a "gap" in your account of hobgoblins (they have no one to hate). Whereas kobolds typically serve as slaves to dragons tends to imply that if there are kobolds, there are also dragons. So using a kobold commits you also to using a dragon. I can see how that's more like wordlbuilding.

Using an otyugh commits you to there being refuse - but that's hardly anything specific about a world at all, and so I don't think that using an otyugh is, per se, worldbuilding beyond the bare fact of the otyugh being there.

Well, it possibly commits you to more than that, depending on circumstances. It could commit you to the presence of monsters if none have been established prior. Or perhaps to the presence of aberrations, which have their own possible implications from a worldbuilding aspect. Again, these may or may not apply, but this is certainly possible, and I would imagine that we can easily select a monster that would serve as a better example in this regard.

Ultimately, these bits of lore are the tools of worldbuilding, I'd say. I think I made a comment just a bit upthread about them being the bricks that the DM uses to build the world.

 

[Bedrockgames]

And clearly people who disagree with you don't as they are just "projecting" and going on inexperience, paint chips, and bad faith. Furthermore, if you are going to quote my comment, I would certainly appreciate if you showed signs of reading it. I did clarify that this was not all worldbuilding but "excess worldbuilding." I would prefer if you would spend less time accusing others of projecting and more time treating the experiences and viewpoints of others who may disagree with you as being similarly rooted in their own game experiences and observation.

This obligation works both ways, Max. It looked.

I am reading it. And I think you guys have too low a bar for 'excessive world building'. I think what people here are decrying as excessive world building, to a lot of posters, feels like the right amount. No one has said, the bar for how much is right, should be the same for everyone. But only one side seems to be taking the position that the amount of world building needs to be extremely low, before it becomes 'excessive world building'. I think that line of reasoning is as flawed as the OP assertion that World Building is bad. I am reading what you are saying. I just don't agree with what you are saying.

 

[Bedrockgames]

To the extent that these two posts express conflicting views on the matter, I'm firmly with Aldarc. RPGing, and it's "need" for worldbuilding, is not wildly different from any other narrative artform.

It is different, and its different for the very reason that RPGs are always different around this stuff than movies, books and television. In a movie or book, the director/writer has complete control over what we see and where the characters go. In RPGs, the GM does not have control over what the players characters do. A script writer who hasn't fleshed out a given section of town beyond the one room the hero is in, simply doesn't show us what is beyond that room if he doesn't have material on it. In a game, players at any point can start opening doors, moving in unexpected directions, and blowing up walls. You can do it on the fly as well, if you are able to (and even people who do a lot of world building come up with stuff all the time when they need it). But world building gives you a good foundation to work off of during play.

I do think world building can be useful in fiction too. I don't agree with the OP at all in that respect. But I do think it is less crucial in those mediums than in RPGs.

And again, if people have an approach they are comfortable with that involves zero world building, more power to them. That is great and fine. But when people say 'world building is bad' or 'too much world building is a problem' (and mean anything beyond a minimal amount), it leaves those of us who use world building as an essential tool, and have seen its utility in practice for years, scratching our heads.

 

[Tony Vargas]

It is different, and its different for the very reason that RPGs are always different around this stuff than movies, books and television. In a movie or book, the director/writer has complete control over what we see and where the characters go. In RPGs, the GM does not have control over what the players characters do.....

Well, it varies a bit in a couple of ways. In some RPGs the GM & players share that authorial power/director stance/whatever to varying degrees. In some RPGs, the GM has a great deal of control (subtle or not so subtle) over what the player characters can/may do, and/or whether they succeed or fail, in others, the players have a great deal more control.
So it can be very much like fiction (movies/books/TV/pick your medium), but with a team doing the writing & directing.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Well, it varies a bit in a couple of ways. In some RPGs the GM & players share that authorial power/director stance/whatever to varying degrees. In some RPGs, the GM has a great deal of control (subtle or not so subtle) over what the player characters can/may do, and/or whether they succeed or fail, in others, the players have a great deal more control.
So it can be very much like fiction (movies/books/TV/pick your medium), but with a team doing the writing & directing.

I don't know that I would agree with all those breakdowns of play style and approach, but even accounting for variations of how people play the game, the fact that the characters themselves have agency through the players makes anything to do with world building completely different. All it takes is someone asking a question like "where do they get the grain from" and suddenly a world building consideration that writers can avoid by deciding the characters don't ask the question, GMs and players have to deal with. And none of us are saying world building is a requirement of every style. If you have a collaborative style that doesn't seem to need it (or at least needs a minimal amount). That is fine. I think what we are saying is the vast, vast majority of games do seem to require world building. And it requires it in part because of the things that make RPGs so different from literature and movies.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I don't know that I would agree with all those breakdowns of play style and approach, but even accounting for variations of how people play the game, the fact that the characters themselves have agency through the players makes anything to do with world building completely different.

Not even meant as a breakdown or analysis, just acknowledging there's a range out there. That range does include depriving players of a great deal of 'agency,' not only in the context of worldbuilding, but certainly in that context if you prioritize it.

All it takes is someone asking a question like "where do they get the grain from" and suddenly a world building consideration that writers can avoid by deciding the characters don't ask the question, GMs and players have to deal with.

Heh, depending on their audience, writers may very well have to consider that (and get soundly mocked when they don't) - and depending on their players, DMs may not...

And none of us are saying world building is a requirement of every style.

I got the impression Max was saying something close to that - if not a requirement than an inevitable product.

If you have a collaborative style that doesn't seem to need it (or at least needs a minimal amount). That is fine. I think what we are saying is the vast, vast majority of games do seem to require world building.

Honestly don't care about 'vast majority' so much when talking something so theoretical as that. Not that I care a great deal about theorizing, or at least, not in a positive way, but appealing to (relative) popularity doesn't help.

And it requires it in part because of the things that make RPGs so different from literature and movies.

They're both exercises in creating fiction, and they're both meant to entertain. The similarities are pretty important, too.