D&D General Does a campaign world need to exist beyond what the characters interact with?

[Blue]

I tend to characterize it as not existing until the party interacts with it. I'm like the holodeck, baby. If the PCs zigg when I expected them to zag I just make something up. No need for it to exist until the PCs encounter it.

To support your statement, can you please actually address the points I brought up about why it is needed in some cases.

 

[MGibster]

To support your statement, can you please actually address the points I brought up about why it is needed in some cases.

Nope. Not if you're going to frame the discussion in such an unfriendly manner. (Remember, I can't read your tone of voice or see your body language. Maybe you mean to be friendly and are genuinely interested in what I have to say, but I can't tell here.)

 

[Yora]

The OP suggests a sort of dichotomy between 1.) worlbuilding that directly serves players and 2.) worldbuilding detail for it's own sake/for the DM/in case it's needed. Maybe you're suggesting a third type, worldbuilding that directs the type of gameplay that's supposed to happen in a setting--which, potentially, helps the DM keep focus and, even if it doesn't immediately serve the players, could be expected to as a game progresses. This is something I should probably think about to do worldbuilding better.

My approach is directly at the service of the players. Not to have them sit around for story time, but to provide them with information and details that they can grab on to and use as leverage for actually doing things proactively in the game.
When a campaign gives players full freedom of choice, then it is difficult to make any choices when the players have no understanding of what kind of things will lead into cool adventures and what things would be just treading water in place with no interesting developments resulting from it. Even when the players can toy around with everything in the environment of the game world, it's very useful to have some things covered in bright blinking lights to attract their attention and leave other things only generally implied in the background.
When you have an overall concept in mind as the creator, it becomes a lot easier to identify which aspects should be big and attention grabbing, and which ones would only flood the players' attention with useless information or make them chase after threads that really don't go anywhere.

 

[Blue]

Nope. Not if you're going to frame the discussion in such an unfriendly manner. (Remember, I can't read your tone of voice or see your body language. Maybe you mean to be friendly and are genuinely interested in what I have to say, but I can't tell here.)

I put out several points, and your refutation ignored them all. Which I felt was rather rude so my request to you was just a straightforward request to support your points and refute mine.

You've now doubled down on not providing any support for your position and instead of adding to the discussion it feels like you are trying to turn this to reframing that my "please address the points" was unfriendly.

I don't think this particular discussion is worth any more back and forth. I'm going to take a break for a while from your posts so we don't escalate this.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Mostly because I'm usually the DM, and I care and my enjoyment matters too. And I'd rather believe that there's more to the world than what my PC has experienced first-hand.

Sure, that is the DM fantasy. Which can be great. I’m pretty sure that is one of my DM’s favorite parts too. However, 90% of his fantasy doesn’t make it to the table (in his case).

 

[Hussar]

Simple answer? No, campaigns do not need to exist beyond the PC "spotlight".

Longer answer - it will largely depend on the needs of the campaign. But, at the end of the day, setting should service the campaign, not the other way around and I've found a lot of DM's who forget that. Sure, the shape of windows in Forgotten Realms settings might be of interest to read about (and no, I'm not making that up, there was a rather lengthy post by Greenwood on the old WotC site that spent several pages detailing windows in buildings in FR) but they really, really don't matter to the game very much.

And the game should, IMSNHO, always come first.

 

[Rabulias]

It's kinda like the thought experiment about relativity. Imagine you wake up in a room with no windows and all doors are locked. A sign says you have been kidnapped and either placed on a spaceship undergoing constant acceleration of 32 feet/sec/sec (duplicating Earth's gravity) or you are locked in the ground-based simulator (still on Earth). There is no way you can tell which is true.

So if the players go somewhere in the campaign world and the DM tells them what they find there, does it matter if they ad-libbed it on the spot, or prepped it months ago "just in case"?

If the DM enjoys world building for its own sake and/or their own fun, there is no problem with that, but I hope no new DM thinks they need to detail (or even sketch out) parts of the world that never intersect with the players.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Sure, that is the DM fantasy. Which can be great. I’m pretty sure that is one of my DM’s favorite parts too. However, 90% of his fantasy doesn’t make it to the table (in his case).

That's probably about right for me too. Doesn't mean I'm not going to do it, or that I don't enjoy it as much or more than what happens at the table.

 

[Magister Ludorum]

I won't run and dislike playing in a setting that only exists through character interaction. That to me is a stage play, and not a TTRPG. To me, the setting is meaningless if it only exists to service the players, and setting and worldbuilding are the best parts of the game IMO.

We rarely agree on this issues (not necessarily a bad thing) but on this issue we are in complete accord. I am uninterested in playing in a world that doesn't feel real to me outside the players' actions, and I am fundamentally incapable of running or designing a world like that.

 

[Lanefan]

It's kinda like the thought experiment about relativity. Imagine you wake up in a room with no windows and all doors are locked. A sign says you have been kidnapped and either placed on a spaceship undergoing constant acceleration of 32 feet/sec/sec (duplicating Earth's gravity) or you are locked in the ground-based simulator (still on Earth). There is no way you can tell which is true.

Until I lay my boot to the door and kick it open...

So if the players go somewhere in the campaign world and the DM tells them what they find there, does it matter if they ad-libbed it on the spot, or prepped it months ago "just in case"?

It matters if (or, IME inevitably, when) the DM ad-libs herself into blatant contradictions or inconsistencies due to not remembering or not writing down what we saw there last time or what we-as-characters/players already knew about the new area.

If the DM enjoys world building for its own sake and/or their own fun, there is no problem with that, but I hope no new DM thinks they need to detail (or even sketch out) parts of the world that never intersect with the players.

Parts of the world that never - and never will - intersect with the players/PCs, sure. But how do you know ahead of time which parts those will be unless you intend to somehow force your players to keep their PCs within a predefined area?

I played with a guy once whose character's motto was "Where the map is blank, I'll go." And he did, all over the setting world. Characters like that - or even the potential existence of characters like that - are why I think a DM wants at least a vague idea in mind of what's where in the world beyond just the adventuring region.