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<blockquote data-quote="Mephistopheles" data-source="post: 5048880" data-attributes="member: 4460"><p>I try to stick to the First Rule of <a href="http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/dnd/dungeoncraft/" target="_blank">Dungeoncraft</a>: Never force yourself to create more than you must. Start small, with just enough in place to get things started. This kind of open-ended design allows you to respond to signs your players are giving you rather than feeling bound to things you've already invested a lot of time in creating; if a player has an interesting theory about the unexplored and foreboding Wood of Hollow Trees, an area for which you've done nothing but mark on the map and name, you're free to nab the idea and build on it - you get some free inspiration, the player gets to feel that he or she guessed right when the party gets around to exploring it (don't overdo it, and be sure you have enough smoke to obscure the mirrors).</p><p></p><p>Use a mix of hard and soft borders to keep the players from roaming outside of your designed area. Hard borders are often geographical, while a soft border is something that is at first impassable but can be broken through later - creatures that the players can't defeat or negotiate past right away, or some form of magical or other barrier that perhaps requires advancement or questing within the existing area to overcome. Soft borders are good because with time the players can overcome them and change the lay of the land, so to speak, by opening up new areas to explore. Keep a few set piece sites on hand, caves or dungeons or small wilderness adventures, in case the players go in a direction that takes you by surprise and you need to something for them to do when they get there.</p><p></p><p>The <a href="http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/" target="_blank">West Marshes</a> posts on ars ludi are a good resource for sandbox style play.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mephistopheles, post: 5048880, member: 4460"] I try to stick to the First Rule of [url=http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/dnd/dungeoncraft/]Dungeoncraft[/url]: Never force yourself to create more than you must. Start small, with just enough in place to get things started. This kind of open-ended design allows you to respond to signs your players are giving you rather than feeling bound to things you've already invested a lot of time in creating; if a player has an interesting theory about the unexplored and foreboding Wood of Hollow Trees, an area for which you've done nothing but mark on the map and name, you're free to nab the idea and build on it - you get some free inspiration, the player gets to feel that he or she guessed right when the party gets around to exploring it (don't overdo it, and be sure you have enough smoke to obscure the mirrors). Use a mix of hard and soft borders to keep the players from roaming outside of your designed area. Hard borders are often geographical, while a soft border is something that is at first impassable but can be broken through later - creatures that the players can't defeat or negotiate past right away, or some form of magical or other barrier that perhaps requires advancement or questing within the existing area to overcome. Soft borders are good because with time the players can overcome them and change the lay of the land, so to speak, by opening up new areas to explore. Keep a few set piece sites on hand, caves or dungeons or small wilderness adventures, in case the players go in a direction that takes you by surprise and you need to something for them to do when they get there. The [url=http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/]West Marshes[/url] posts on ars ludi are a good resource for sandbox style play. [/QUOTE]
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