How do you go about making your own world?

[Thyrkill]

Hi,

I am a frequent reader on these forums but do not post much. But I have hit a place in my DMing life that has me asking for help. And what better place to turn...

I have been running several campaigns off and on since 3e came out, and they have always been in a published setting (FR almost exclusively). And though I enjoy the published material, I feel as though there is something missing from my game. I have agonized over whether I am suffering from 3.5 burn-out, or if there is a "better" system out there. I have pondered the age old question: Do my players suck or is it me? And I have realized that I am not putting enough of my own ideas and imagination into the games. In a sense, I have used published settings and adventures as a crutch, and have consequently lost some of my love for the game.

With this said, I want to try my hand at creating my own world and putting some life back into my game and my Dming. Trouble is, where do I start? How do you create a world? Do you start small and work outwards or do you create the Grand Design first and then work inwards? If anyone is willing to part with their thoughts, ideas, and wisdom, I would be incredibly greatful.

Thanks very much,
Matt

 

[Crothian]

For me it started with Thesden. This is the city that all campaigns start in, it the destiney of the place. From there I expanded to the country it was in and other important cities and what is between the cities. Then I needed other countries some for conflict some for allies. I then sprinkled in the races that I wanted to use and made them fir the themes and feels I was building in my world. THe gods were easy because I went with a pseudo greek feel for them. I figured out the hostory by looking at what I had and figuring out how we got there. I then created ancient myths and stories of things past and brought in plenty of secrets for everyone to have.

From there things expanded slowly as players got interested in things. I have general ideas for most everyplace but details were only fleshed out when needed. 8 campiagns later and the world is doing pretty good.

 

[Shadowslayer]

Email me at
tjjjames
at
yahoo
dot com

I have a document you may want to read. Should get you down the right road.

 

[Ringan]

Well, I'm still new to building worlds as well, but here are some websites I have found that are very helpful:

http://www.giantitp.com/Gaming.html (The "World" section)
http://boards1.wizards.com/forumdisplay.php?f=295 (Forum dedicated to world-building)

Someone on these boards once mentioned that it is a good idea not to go into much more detail than your players will ever be interested in, because otherwise you will be doing work that will mostly be for your own interest. I think this is a good idea to keep in mind to prevent overworking yourself.

 

[Teflon Billy]

You absolutely can't go wrong picking up A MAgical Medieval Society: Ecology and Culture from the good folks at XRP.

Here's a link to the blurb

Honestly, I thought I ws pretty strong on world-buiding, but this book gave me a lot to think over.

 

[Crothian]

You absolutely can't go wrong picking up A MAgical Medieval Society: Ecology and Culture from the good folks at XRP.

Here's a link to the blurb

Honestly, I thought I ws pretty strong on world-buiding, but this book gave me a lot to think over.

It's also on sale for 5$ for the print version see this thread

 

[caudor]

Remember, it's not an all or nothing deal. You can have your own homebrew and still use bits and pieces of published material that you like.

A good approach, as already mentioned, is to start with one area or region and work your way out from there as needed. It can be a huge task to create an entire world from scratch, so breaking it into pieces makes sense. However, some other folks I know prefer a top-down approach.

There was a 2nd Ed. accessory called Thunder Rift that I used as a start for my my world. All I wanted was the nice map (didn't even read the booklet) and used the map to invent my own self-contained area. Later, I ended up placing the rift in mountain range in a published setting, but Thunder Rift was still mine.

 

[Zweihänder]

I think there are two ways to go about it, and I can share my experiences with each.

The first way is to design a setting around a campaign. This is a great way to make sure that everything is perfect for that campaign. In general, it starts around one point, one key location; ironically, for me, that was an extraplanar location. You then think of major events that you KNOW are going to happen, and devise places for them to occur, and how those places are connected. Et cetera, et cetera, this way is fairly simple, though occasionally artifical-feeling.

The second way is the one I prefer: designing a setting to be re-usable. In essence, you are designing a setting to be... a setting. Screw campaigns. The DMs can figure those out. This is what I did with my setting (currently in its internal Alpha phase) AfterIcarus. You start with an idea, a snag, a way to set your setting apart from others. This can be a higher-than-usual rate of deity-worshipper interaction, it could be a giant war between multiple monster races... in mine, it was a giant electromagnetic pulse going off in the modern world, destroying some technology, and mutating most life forms. From this idea, you then generate an ecology to the world. Where would different races live, and why? What is the local cosmology like? Planar structure? Economy? Politics? For this sort of setting, it is best to consult the writings of Rich Burlew, at www.giantitp.com.

 

[Terwox]

Patricia Wrede's worldbuilding site from 96 is primarily for fantasy authors, but it asks a lot of questions you'll want to ask yourself.

http://www.sfwa.org/writing/worldbuilding1.htm

 

[Goblyns Hoard]

The single most important factor in my experience of trying to create a world that feels whole is the gods. It's a part I always used to really hate doing but now I've come to think that it's the most crucial event - particularly if you want your world to have been created by those gods. For that to happen the world needs to reflect the abilities or personalities of the gods.

That doesn't mean that you have to start with the gods - you can create the world and then come up with gods that reflect it. But I would recommend coming up with at least the basic ideas for your main gods so that when you start to put the world together underneath it you can see their handprint on it. This is of course assuming that you want classic D&D style gods which created the world.

After that - what Teflon Billy said about Ecology & Culture - sound advice its a great book.