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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gilladian" data-source="post: 5892964" data-attributes="member: 2093">You havea  LOT already laid out for you. You don't need to design a world, just a play area within a world. I'd say for a sandbox game of the sort you're describing, you need to have a map of your town, a general idea of who runs the town and who the important factions/individuals are, and their goals.How those goals intermesh with your overall plot/theme is a good place to focus. If the town's Guard Captain is a powerful and influential person, how is he going to respond to the invaders? How will he respond to the PCs as they grow in power and seek revenge? You kind of need to know where the "adventure sites" are, though not in major detail. If there are cave systems, or dungeons, or lairs, you need to know roughly how dangerous they are and the major inhabitant(s) so you can hint at their presence to the PCs along with proper warnings about the challenge level they might face if they go there. For example, the town's sewers are overrun with dire rats. Nobody LIKES going down there, but with some basic precaution, it is doable. Whereas everyone knows that the Fellwoods to the west of town are inhabited by giant spiders and some sort of evil sorceress. Nobody who has tried to take the west road in the past two years has made it through...Imagine leading a group of Taladoran soldiers into those woods!Concentrate on the things you know the PCs will need early on; a place to stay, things to buy, some simple adventures to get started, but also on the whole tone and flavor of the campaign. In a sandbox, especially, you can really scare them with glimpses of more powerful things!</blockquote>

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