D&D General D&D, magic, and the mundane medieval

[pemerton]

Not quite sure what you mean by albatross to be honest.

That worldbuilding is a burden on gameplay. That holds things back.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Not quite sure what you mean by albatross to be honest.

My point was that it would be reasonable to say that casters are a one in a million thing. But that gets really weird when the pcs stumble across casters in like every adventure.

I just don't think one in a million is reasonable in a fantasy world. Where did the PCs learn from? Does magic follow the Rule of Two? What about all these magical traditions?

 

[Micah Sweet]

That worldbuilding is a burden on gameplay. That holds things back.

To be honest, I like worldbuilding more than gameplay. Its the best part of DMing to me.

 

[MGibster]

I see setting as a subset of worldbuilding. For me, setting without a larger context is just bad worldbuilding.

I think there are different philosophies when it comes to world building for RPGs. Some people favor building a realistic world that is logically consistent taking into account how institutions like government, religion, the economy, families, and religion would look in a world with dragons, powerful wizards, or contact with alien civilizaitons is a reality. Blue Planet is a science ficiton RPG set on a planet where 98% of the surface is covered in water and it's one of the best examples of world building in an RPG I can think of. It feels like a real living breathing world. Then there are settings that don't take a holistic approach, but instead the world revolves around what makes it interesting for adventuring. I think most D&D settings fall into this category. A lot of times I don't think the government, economy, or even religion makes a lot of sense if I look at it too far.

When creating own setting, I tend to favor the quick and dirty method. However, I do like to play/run in a setting that makes sense and seems like it could be real.

 

[MGibster]

Well to put it another way, how many superheroes are there in Smallville? Or from Gotham. New York is a bit different because unlike earlier superhero settings, Marvel decided that everyone starts in New York.

By the late 1980s, I decided if I were to become a super villain, I would steer clear of New York and go to Denver, Las Vegas, or Dallas because I wouldn't have to worry about the Avengers, Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Spider-Man, Power Man & Iron Fist, or Daredevil wrecking my plans.

 

[MGibster]

That worldbuilding is a burden on gameplay. That holds things back.

I believe good worldbuilding can lead to a richer experience. Although I hate the rules, there's a lot of great worldbuilding in Shadowrun that makes me actually want to play in the setting. Even though the game is narrowly focused on the antics of the runners, it feels like a real place were corporations have commodified everything including magic!

 

[Hussar]

By the late 1980s, I decided if I were to become a super villain, I would steer clear of New York and go to Denver, Las Vegas, or Dallas because I wouldn't have to worry about the Avengers, Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Spider-Man, Power Man & Iron Fist, or Daredevil wrecking my plans.

I think that nicely highlights @Pemerton’s point. From a world building perspective, Marvel New York makes zero sense. After the second or third time some alien army shows up, no one is going to stay. It’s insane.

But for the sake of the fiction, we turn a huge blind eye to it.

So yeah it is a constant tension between world building and building a setting for adventures.

 

[Baron Opal II]

As you probably know from my past posts, I think that the worldbuilding thing is a bit of an albatross around the neck of FRPGing. It creates these concerns both around GM fidelity to setting ("Am I using too many wizards?") and player fidelity to setting ("No, you can't play a XYZ because there are no XYZs in my world").

That's not to dismiss the importance of setting to RPGing, but you can have setting without world building and then most of these issues go away.

Well, worldbuilding is how you develop your setting. However, it begs the question how big is the world? From what I understand, the setting for Blades in the Dark is hard-limited to a single city, admittedly large. The worldbuilding is mostly done for you. There's a tremendous amount of information for Glorantha, Greyhawk, &c. not to mention the real world.

From what I have seen from your threads, your settings are preferentially limited. The horizon is far away, hard to reach, or both. You don't really need to build much beyond the local civilization. Exploration of what is over the next hill seems to be less important to you then how you facilitate or encourage your players to describe what's on this hill. My players enjoy finding out what is over the next hill. Which, as a process of discovery, they don't want to tell me what is there. They want to be surprised in their discoveries. And that requires a significantly larger setting.

Which, as you've probably picked up from my replies in threads, I really enjoy the processes of worldbuilding and extrapolating what cultures might exist given clime, resources, obstacles, and the presence of magic or high tech. Much like Micha, I enjoy the creative process as much as sharing it with my players.

Now, one datum that doesn't fit with my assessment of how you like to engage with our hobby is that you are quite fond of Traveller. Which is a rather large setting and the characters have a lot of freedom in where they can go. So there is that.



(To be clear, just in case, absolutely none of my post is meant to be accusatory or dismissive.)

 

[pemerton]

Well, worldbuilding is how you develop your setting.

You've used the second person here when it seems more like you intended the first person - as in, world building is how Baron Opal II develops their setting.

It's not how pemerton develops his setting.

From what I have seen from your threads, your settings are preferentially limited. The horizon is far away, hard to reach, or both.

<snip>

Now, one datum that doesn't fit with my assessment of how you like to engage with our hobby is that you are quite fond of Traveller. Which is a rather large setting and the characters have a lot of freedom in where they can go. So there is that.

Thinking of campaigns that are "active" in the sense that we might easily play a session or two if someone suggested it:

* Classic Traveller has involved the PCs visiting 9 worlds, I think, and the star map that I have built up in the course of play has 29 worlds on it (3 of those have been visited by PCs played by distinct players in a couple of off-shoot one-offs);

* Burning Wheel has seen travel from Hardby across the Woolly Bay to the Bright Desert, then up into the Abor-Alz, then through the hills back to Hardby;

* In Prince Valiant, the PCs started in southern Britain but have travelled as far North as York and as far East as Constantinople, Anatolia and Cyprus;

* In Agon, the PCs travel from island to island trying to find their way home;

* In our LotR Cortex+ game, the PCs have travelled into Angmar and as far north as Forochel, and have travelled to Ost-in-Edhil and entered Moria.


So I don't think my view about worldbuilding is particularly connected to the geographic scope of RPG play.

 

[Baron Opal II]

You've used the second person here when it seems more like you intended the first person - as in, world building is how Baron Opal II develops their setting.

It's not how pemerton develops his setting.

Okay. If you don't mind going into it, how do you develop your settings?

Thinking of campaigns that are "active" in the sense that we might easily play a session or two if someone suggested it:

[Examples]

So I don't think my view about worldbuilding is particularly connected to the geographic scope of RPG play.

I'm honestly surprised, except for Traveller. I think I don't understand what you mean by "worldbuilding" and why you feel it is an impediment. If you're interested I'd like to hear your thoughts about it.