I've lost my muse....

[Tuerny]

I have been working on homebrew settings for years now, pretty much since I first started reading fantasy fiction and playing fantasy video games (before I even got into tabletop role-playing games ten long years ago). I have enjoyed it greatly and at times it was the main reason I was involved in gaming..

But now? Its gone. It seems my ability to go from initial idea to an almost complete setting has dwindled down to nothing. My last setting (which I put into its most recent form a little over a year ago) was probably my greatest work thus far with the campaign guide exceeding sixty pages.

Has this happened to any of you before? What have you done about it? Should I keep raging against the dying of the light or move on to the Forgotten Realms like I have been contemplating?

 

[Crothian]

Maybe you just need to take a break from creating. You might go to the FR for a little while and then when the creative juices are flowing again start writing a new home brew.

Personally, I stop DMing and become a PC for a while. That always gets me back in the mood fast.

 

[Kilmore]

Well, not every time can be your most creative time. Think about what you plan on doing with your setting. Plan on making it a fully publishable setting? Writing original fiction in it? If you have a world sitting on a shelf there are so many things you can do with it. Maybe it's time to lay off of thinking on a grand scale and start working down to the local level in a few areas of interest. Eventually, the bigger forces at work will reveal themselves and make you take a fresh look at the big scene.

 

[Chauzu]

Well, I've been working on my own same world for the last 10 years, long before I started gaming. I've never even felt like turning my back on my world even once. I take everything I learn and show it in my world. More importantly I put my heart into my world, and I am even preparing to start my own novel taking place in my world. I plan on working on my world until I am an old fart and can't see what I'm writing anymore.

 

[Mortaneus]

Change genre.

 

[Snoweel]

My setting has been in production for about 6-7 years. I get enthused, I lose interest, I have a creative burst, I put it on the shelf...

It's natural, I think, to go through such periods of creativity and lack thereof.

Don't sweat it, Tuerny.

Spend your non-creative periods on Toril haggling with gnoll shopkeepers and buying drinks off Illithid bartenders.

Pretty soon you'll see there's no better setting than your own.

 

[BrooklynKnight]

*gives you selma hyek*

 

[Michael Morris]

If I know anything, I know something about this... The answer is simple.

Walk away

Put everything on a shelf where it can be found and walk away. Your muse will return, probably when you least expect it.

 

[kengar]

*gives you selma hyek*

No Fair! I want Salma Hayek!!

..but then, who doesn't?

Seriously though, Tuerny, unless you are on an external deadline (publisher demanding their advance back, etc.), don't sweat it. I've been working on a conversion (setting included) for WarhammerFRP now for over a year off & on. It's for my own amusement as much as anything so if I run dry for a bit and set it aside, no big deal. Later on I'll pick up my copy of Apocrypha Now or something, flip through it, and get inspired all over again.

Better to take a break if you can and come back when you've got something worth writing rather than filling the screen with blah.

(Now if only I'd take my own advice when it comes to posting! )