Let's Talk About RPG Worldbuilding

[Greg K]

I feel a lot of world builders fall into the trap of making too much mid-level canon, for example, detailed histories or setting notes about cultures. It might feel like fleshing out a world but in practice a lot of that sort of work never really informs actual play, sitting a couple of degrees more abstract than things the players will actually interact with. Often it feels quite sterile to read as well. While it is necessary to have some sort of big picture in mind to hang things off, this gets into diminishing returns pretty quickly, and can even be counterproductive to go down too far.

I think a better approach is to have some sort of big picture to hang the bits together, but then to largely focus on detail that directly affects the adventures - drive the canon off what you need for the adventures. This keeps it (a) useful and likely to be relevant and (b) more likely to feel 'lived in' rather than static and sterile, as it is designed to be used in an adventure. It also lends itself to a show-don't-tell approach to exposition.

Plus, if you drip-feed your setting canon rather than ramming a 200-page tome down players' throats it's more likely to keep them interested and wanting to see more.

You can have setting notes about cultures while both keeping things useful and relevant and not ramming a 200-page tome down the players' throats.

 

[dragoner]

I am going to put up a science fiction setting on DTRPG soon, 242 pages, with over 30 star maps of real stellar cartography, and over 30 world maps. It is 12 years in the making, with a good 7 of those being played, and in fact I decided to publish it after people said I should. A German game designer called it "insanely detailed", which I am unsure if that is a compliment or not.

Obviously maps are important to me, and I say this as I like making maps, beyond a stellar map, and world map, there are usually 10-20 other maps: the star system with all the planets, local area maps, city maps, tactical maps, all that. Right now the main folder is 46.5 GB, with 40,000+ files. That includes all sorts of stuff, a lot of NPC's, spacecraft, notes on organizations, as well as astrometry, and other technical data.

On the flipside, the players don't have to read anything, just do the character generation, and start playing. I am happy to let them see the setting, and some do, devouring all I write, most limit themselves to the few paragraphs at a time I generally write for background on a situation.

 

[Reynard]

That's an important note: you can focus on play related world building, but if you play in that same setting long enough you end up with a highly detailed setting with a lived in feel.

 

[dragoner]

I let it build naturally, having only a rough outline, and filling in details as players interact with it, freely changing things that they do not know about, to fit with the constantly evolving game. Such as the attack on a randomly generated space-liner, develops into their dealing with a Wintermute style AI that controls a bank, to writing up a page or three on banking and its involvement in developing the frontier of interstellar space.

 

[Tonguez]

It may just be me but I tend to start by envisioning a single scene and then building a story around it. For instance I got in my head the scene of a woman on a rugged cliff overlooking the sea giving birth in the middle of a storm.
That sparks some questions like -who is the women, where did she come from, why is she out here on this cliff, where is her family, what happens to the baby? Its the answer to those questions that become the setting - a harsh windswept peninsula jutting into a stormy sea (reminds me of Cornwall), the woman Wenna Kernowek, is from an isolated fishing village on lands owned by the Squire of Penruthen (Manor House on the Moors). The villagers are Wreckers who lure in passing ships (Lighthouse). Wennas baby is taken by the Storm Witch and will become a new sea hag. The Storm Witch is Patron of the local warlock/druid cult - Granite Moors, Rocky coast, isolated fishing village, offshore islands, dolmens, a lighthouse, a Manor house, a old shrine, a new chapel, the port at the base of the peninsula, surly locals, wreckers, customs agents, ghosts, bog hounds, selkies, hags, warlocks, druids, mermaids. NPCs: Storm Witch, Sea Hag (Morvah Kernowek), The Squire of Penruthan, Surly Locals

Then its deciding how the PCs will get involved (they’re on a ship lured in by wreckers? They’re Customs Agents from the local Magistrate? Something else?)

Once I’ve got those details I’ll get the Players to determine how they fit in and ask them to come up with their own NPC connections and any other motivations they might bring. I also give flexibility in scenes - essentially scene aspects so even if its not mentioned previously, if its reasonable to assume something is present the PCs can use it)

 

[Yora]

You can have setting notes about cultures while both keeping things useful and relevant and not ramming a 200-page tome down the players' throats.

Players don't do homework anyway. Don't count on anyone reading more than one page, and even then some will never get around to it.

 

[Nobby-W]

I let it build naturally, having only a rough outline, and filling in details as players interact with it, freely changing things that they do not know about, to fit with the constantly evolving game. Such as the attack on a randomly generated space-liner, develops into their dealing with a Wintermute style AI that controls a bank, to writing up a page or three on banking and its involvement in developing the frontier of interstellar space.

I think that's pretty much the best way to do this sort of thing. You also end up with something that feels lived in. Quite often lore written in isolation has a sterile feel to it.

 

[Nobby-W]

You can have setting notes about cultures while both keeping things useful and relevant and not ramming a 200-page tome down the players' throats.

It's certainly not impossible, although I feel this sort of thing gets into diminishing returns fairly quickly and (IMO) matters less than a lot of folks might think. To take Traveller as an example, you could set a sandbox game somewhere in the Third Imperium or generate a sandbox using the process described in How to make a Traveller Sandbox and the players' experience would likely not be materially different.

Taken to extremes, it also tends to act as an attractive nuisance as this sort of setting canon serves better as a topic for pedantic old grogs to witter about online than as material that informs actual campaign play. Several major franchises (Traveller, Glorantha and Tekumel come to mind) have actually gotten a bad reputation on the interwebs as being hostile to new players because of this essentially useless lore and the intimidating antics of the old grogs arguing about it online. I've seen multiple instances of folks posting about wanting to get into a game but being intimidated by these people.

That's not to say it's all useless, but - to take another example from Traveller - CT Supplement 7 (Traders and Gunboats) is a far more useful than Supplement 9 (Fighting Ships). S7 covers a handful of designs that are on a scale relevant to a party of adventurers, and gives background aimed at helping a DM to use them in a game, including deck plans. S9 has a series of one page vignettes on a couple of dozen mostly large capital ships that are way too big to use in most games. It doesn't provide deck plans or (unless you're playing Trillion Credit Squadron) much in the way of useful support for actually using them in a game.

I think setting canon is an area where it's possible to have too much of a good thing and/or put a lot of effort into stuff that isn't terribly useful.

 

[dragoner]

I think that's pretty much the best way to do this sort of thing. You also end up with something that feels lived in. Quite often lore written in isolation has a sterile feel to it.

"Oh, the places you will go ..." Never thought I would be reading up on Swiss banks in the 1880's and the development of their railroad, but here we are. History is a good way to do setting with out it getting too sterile, such as the players arrived at an asteroid base during a war where the troops there were in a semi-sort of rebellion, they had fun and asked where I came up with the idea for the adventure, I admitted that I had used the Étaples mutiny.

Everyone is different though, my way is no better or worse than someone building off a picture in their head, or anything else, we all wind up at the same place, hopefully.

 

[Greg K]

Players don't do homework anyway. Don't count on anyone reading more than one page, and even then some will never get around to it.

Find better players. I have never had an issue with players not reading through 1 to 5 pages of handouts that are parcelled out.
First, the player players, normally, receive 1-2 pages containing a general summary of the various culture cultures (a few sentences on each). Next is,another page to page and a half based on the culture that interests a given player. These pages will have more indepth information on the culture (including available classes, class variants, and or subclasses found within the culture), notable NPCs, some current events and other notable information. Finally, based on certain class choices (e.g. clerics ), they may get an additional 1-2 pages. For clerics, it would have information on vestments, holy days, tenets, stricture, tailored spell lists to deity, etc. Only after they have read the relevant information, will I consider player submitted concepts, goals, background, etc. for a character (and this is before a player can create their characer mechanically).
If I had a player not wanting to read, they will have to listen to me go over the general and then read the remaining information before they can make a character. If they still do not want to read, they do not play and can find the exit. There is no exception.