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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lonely Tylenol" data-source="post: 3073596" data-attributes="member: 18549">I'm with Buzz.  Long-winded background materials are fine, but as I have discovered from experience, you have to give the players a reason to read them.  The system I developed for establishing background was to develop a series of background cards.  Every important person, place, or event gets one, and I write them as I think I'll need them.  The cards have the name of the thing in question, information like dates, nearby things, and notable quotes.  They have a short (250 words or less) description of the background item, written from the perspective of "what everyone ought to know about it."  They also have one to three legends/rumours which may or may not be true.It's an easily-digestible briefing that can be read in under three minutes.  Then it goes into the file for quick reference by the players: "Who was Captain Boohag again?  Let's dig out his card."  If a player wants more info, I usually have an expanded version of the card that contains Knowledge check info for DC 15, 20, 25, and 30, as well as my own notes regarding that character, place, or event.  I've also got a complete write-up for myself, which I can provide to players who want more in-depth information.This approach can be applied to a setting as well.  Instead of a book of information about history, culture, etc., a campaign setting document should be designed along the lines of the setting summaries provided to WotC during the campaign search.  A short, perhaps 3 page document that lays down the theme of the setting with heavy emphasis on the style of adventures one can expect, along with the major mysteries, critical events, and sensory words that convey the look and feel of things.  If you can get the players hooked on that, they'll be more likely to want to find out more about the world.I think that what got me interested in learning more about Greyhawk was not the fact that there's a lot written about it, but rather that I knew something about it already.  I knew about Bigby, Tenser, and Mordenkainen, but what about the rest of the Circle of Eight?  I knew that Dragotha exists from the White Plume Mountain maps, but where is he and what's his story?  I got pulled in by the stuff that looks cool right off the bat, and found out that the more depth I got, the more fun it became.By making information easily digested at first, it allows players to assimilate it quickly, which gives them a basis on which to care about the more long-winded stuff.</blockquote>

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