grodog said:
Dan---
Can you please compare/contrast World Builder with Insidiae? I recently got a copy of the former, and am interested in your view on the different foci of the two tomes.
Thanks!
Ok, I can do that.
The World Builder "descriptionary" helps the Dungeon Master add descriptive detail to his campaign world, covering facts and things from the macro to the micro level. Since you own the book, hopefully you'll find it a good aid to your visualizing of people, places and all things typical to a fantasy milieu. I hoped this book would aid the DM during times of preparation, its chief focus the creation of adventures rich in description. The intent was not simply to give GMs a tool to write boxed description to read to the players (which can become a bad habit if overused), but to aid them in visualizing and quantifying their own individualized milieu.
Insidiae has a different focus. Some GMs are very good at creating the sort of detail that the World Builder provides in a portable compendium of glossaries, lists, tables, and illustrated guides. But those same GMs may not be too great at creating plots with a great deal of variance and flexibility in design. Conversely, it may be a newbie GM who can grasp the complexities of the game but has failed to realize the difference between RPG plots and novel writing. OR, it may be experienced and creative GMs who lack the time to sit down and think of something original every week. They might have relied on grabbing an adventure module and extracting from it what they need to run their next game session---a time honored and totally acceptable tactic I must add! Or, some masterful GMs can improvise on the fly, responding to the decisions of the PCs on-the-fly. Insidiae, as a brainstorming aid, is designed to be of use to all of those types of Game Masters.
Some GMs are very talented at plot creation, enjoying the painstaking process of creating non-linear adventures and reveling in the challenge of keeping the whole mess cohesive when their best laid plans slam headlong into the capriciousness of players. So be it, and the very best probably won't need this book. But I think any GM, from the most talented to the neophyte, can benefit from having a large menu of adventure plot options, the components of which are arranged in ever encompassing levels of detail, to facilitate a bird-eye view of a process that may have been more intuitive than systematic. In other words, it allows the new or experienced GM to "reverse engineer" the process of RPG plot creation. Thus, through the (hopefully) inspirational text entries and optional random tables and organizational forms the DM can cobble together something of interest in far less time than if he were to start from zero each time.
So, in summary:
World builder covers description and detail in adventure settings.
Insidiae is a brainstorming tool covering all sorts of intrigue, politics, problem solving, questing, and story.
