D&D 5E Do You Prefer Sandbox or Party Level Areas In Your Game World?

So these are two approaches that campaigns can (and do) use. They have various names, but I'm using these names. I've used both approaches in the past.

Obviously there is more nuance than the definitions below, but these are two possible extreme ends of the poll when voting feel free to choose whichever end you tend towards, or embellish in the comments.

Sandbox -- each area on the world map has a set difficulty, and if you're a low level party and wander into a dangerous area, you're in trouble. The Shire is low level, Moria is high level. Those are 'absolute' values and aren't dependent on who's traveling through.

Party -- adventurers encounter challenges appropriate to their level wherever they are on the map. A low level party in Moria just meets a few goblins. A high level party meets a balrog!

Which do you prefer?

 

[Ovinomancer]

I think you're underestimating the cumulative effect of random/unstructured/on-the-fly content generation. If everything is made up on the fly, it's a rare dm indeed who can keep the world constant, believable and integrated - in other words, 'living' as opposed to 'moving.' My best evidence of this is that you tend to get the same effect from entirely random settings that were generated long before the game begins. It's still a mess of unconnected nonsense. (plus a reliance on random tables will lead to repeated encounters)

I have direct experience with everything made up on the fly, and your imagined problems didn't arise. And, I'm not a particularly rare GM, or exceptionally skilled. On-the-fly doesn't mean not taking notes, or ensuring established fiction isn't established.

Put another way: the first time the gm either checks notes or makes something up on the spot, I probably can't tell which. But if they're always making it up on the spot, I'll see through that by the end of the first session.

In D&D, I don't doubt it, because D&D requires a minimum level of prep due to how the system works. On the other hand, I think you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between that minimum level and an exceptional level.

A well-thought out setting where all the bits are thought of in terms of how they relate to the other bits is a different, and generally better experience for everyone involved. The whole game just flows better and build up to more, because the elements build on each other. This creates more meaning to all the details, and thus more 'weight' to the game overall. The stakes are higher. It is, of course, a lot more work, and not the end-all of having fun at the table - but as a player I can tell pretty quickly if the dm is thinking ahead or not, and the ones that aren't are not as much fun to play with (all else being equal).

I disagree this is true, although I don't doubt that this is your experience. I also strongly suspect that most of your experience is with a narrow set of approaches within the D&D or D&D-alike set of systems (characterized by strong GM control over the fiction, GM control over play, and preference for prepared adventure/plot play -- this encompasses a lot of systems). That's not really a bad thing -- it's by far the most popular approach to RPGs, and definitely dominates the hobby space, so different exposure is actually hard if you're not intentionally seeking it or happen to be in an small cluster where other game approaches are strong. However, this approach, while you desire it, I think it more for other reasons that the ones cited -- you dislike finding out things are made up on the spot for a reason other than it wasn't believable or fun in the moment. Again, a violation of skilled play assumptions (it's us against the key, with the GM moderating) or trust issues (the GM needs some constraint) are the most common, here.

 

[jmartkdr2]

I have direct experience with everything made up on the fly, and your imagined problems didn't arise. And, I'm not a particularly rare GM, or exceptionally skilled. On-the-fly doesn't mean not taking notes, or ensuring established fiction isn't established.

In D&D, I don't doubt it, because D&D requires a minimum level of prep due to how the system works. On the other hand, I think you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between that minimum level and an exceptional level.

I disagree this is true, although I don't doubt that this is your experience. I also strongly suspect that most of your experience is with a narrow set of approaches within the D&D or D&D-alike set of systems (characterized by strong GM control over the fiction, GM control over play, and preference for prepared adventure/plot play -- this encompasses a lot of systems). That's not really a bad thing -- it's by far the most popular approach to RPGs, and definitely dominates the hobby space, so different exposure is actually hard if you're not intentionally seeking it or happen to be in an small cluster where other game approaches are strong. However, this approach, while you desire it, I think it more for other reasons that the ones cited -- you dislike finding out things are made up on the spot for a reason other than it wasn't believable or fun in the moment. Again, a violation of skilled play assumptions (it's us against the key, with the GM moderating) or trust issues (the GM needs some constraint) are the most common, here.

Well, it's a DnD forum, so yes I'm talking about DnD. It would be weird to dismiss the DnD experience form a discussion about DnD.

Although I've seen the same effect in Masks and Fate, albeit less so.

 

[iserith]

This makes a rather badly wrong assumption of what you think my understanding is, or that I, myself, think that noting what matters and what doesn't for a given play goal isn't important (overwhelmingly so) to providing the desired experience.

I also think that most people don't have a broad enough base of experience/knowledge to really analyze play, and/or the motivation to be critical of play activities. I further think that this isn't at all a bad thing, because putting in effort to analyze a hobby experience is not high on most people's agenda, and rightly so.

For what it's worth, I still love to run and play 5e. I've even done prep heavy games in the last few years, where I ran a hexcrawl using many of the same approaches laid out in this thread -- keyed hexes, random encounters, random events, etc. -- and had fun doing so. I don't associate that with creating a more believable world, though, as the most lived in world I've had yet was in a different system and had zero prep outside of reading the rulebook and it's thumbnail setting sketch and finding a few pictures of evocative art to help set the mood. What I do associate prep with is strong skilled play, though, as things are not keyed to the PCs but rather the PCs' job is to read the foreshadowing and clues and make good choices.

I strongly agree. I can run a game that is heavily prepped (as I outlined upthread) and even within that context improvise a lot including creating new content on the fly as needed and nobody would be able to tell the difference. Or I can run a game cold with no prep at all. Obviously some game systems make this easier than D&D does, so I don't prefer to do that in D&D, but I can and I doubt anyone would be the wiser. (And I have a lot of evidence that this is the case over the years.) Now, I have worked on these skills for decades and can spin up complex situations and challenges on par with some of the ones I post on these forums in seconds. Not everyone can do this, so I believe folks when they say in some cases they can tell what's going on. However, I don't think that in an of itself is the reason for disliking it. I think it does have more to do with trust in a skilled play format as you say.

 

[pogre]

IME, it takes a talented DM to pull off an engaging sandbox. Most DMs that advocate and run sandboxes are not that talented. It certainly takes the right kinds of players too.

If you are sandbox DM - don't get fired up - I am sure you are the exception!

 

[Ovinomancer]

Well, it's a DnD forum, so yes I'm talking about DnD. It would be weird to dismiss the DnD experience form a discussion about DnD.

Although I've seen the same effect in Masks and Fate, albeit less so.

I'm not dismissing it. I'm saying that the justification given doesn't align, and that further examination could improve play by allowing better alignment.

 

[Ovinomancer]

IME, it takes a talented DM to pull off an engaging sandbox. Most DMs that advocate and run sandboxes are not that talented. It certainly takes the right kinds of players too.

If you are sandbox DM - don't get fired up - I am sure you are the exception!

I think this is largely due to a misalignment of process to goal -- too much work on things with low impact and not enough on things that do have impact. This usually is lumped into "experience," but the experience needed is to overcome the assumptions on how to play. Largely because there's a lot of advice and tradition behind certain approaches because they're what has been done, and these can (but not always) actively result in misalignment to play goals. The "experience" is more about when to ignore this stuff, not in learning it more betterer.

 

[Maxperson]

I have direct experience with everything made up on the fly, and your imagined problems didn't arise. And, I'm not a particularly rare GM, or exceptionally skilled. On-the-fly doesn't mean not taking notes, or ensuring established fiction isn't established.

As someone who does a mix and ends up coming up with a fair amount on the fly, I can see both side of what you guys are saying. Yes, you can take notes on the sessions and make sure that established fiction is established and meshes with other prior fiction, but that's not the same thing as @jmartkdr2 is saying.

Let's say your party goes a country called Blaandik and starts interacting with the ruling family there. 5 sessions in you on the fly establish that there's a spy from the neighboring kingdom, Flaandik. Stuff happens. It's a grand ole time. That's different from a sandbox game where both Blaandik and Flaandik have been thought out and meshed together, including the presence of the spy from the very beginning.

In his game, since he knows the spy is there from even before the PCs arrive, he can have the spy doing things and taking advantage of the situation from the moment the PCs enter the picture. In your game, there might have been a time 4 sessions before the spy was made up on the fly where that spy had the perfect opportunity for something and should have taken it, but you had no idea the spy even existed then. That can create a disconnect in some players as they remember that moment and now that moment seems off.

Both styles have a lot to offer, and also include drawbacks.

 

[jmartkdr2]

I'm not dismissing it. I'm saying that the justification given doesn't align, and that further examination could improve play by allowing better alignment.

I guess I would sum up my position as: "All else being equal, a well-prepped world is more engaging than one made up as play progresses."

That first subclause being a very big "if," of course, and even then the statement refers to a specific kind of fun that a player or dm may not care about. But within those constraints (including the fact that I personally do like exploration a lot) - prep is important.

 

[jmartkdr2]

Anywho, thinking back to the original question: there's also a middle ground of "there are encounters of many levels, but there are always encounters at the pc's level."

So a sandbox, with a few curated toys just for you.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I guess I would sum up my position as: "All else being equal, a well-prepped world is more engaging than one made up as play progresses."

That first subclause being a very big "if," of course, and even then the statement refers to a specific kind of fun that a player or dm may not care about. But within those constraints (including the fact that I personally do like exploration a lot) - prep is important.

There's no evidence to support your assertion though, as you'd have to set up some equal test that does both and shows prep wins. On the other hand, there's lots of evidence that no (or light) prep can create engaging games and that heavy prep can create engagibg games. There's also strong evidence both can fail miserably. Your assertion rings hollow.

I don't doubt or disagree heavy prep serves play goals -- I've recently run games where it has for me. I doubt the play goal served is actually believability or verisimilitude or something similar, but rather something else that hides behind this.