D&D General "In My General Experience Playing D&D, DMs Care More About Setting Lore Than Players Do" (a poll)

[dave2008]

Unless I'm misunderstanding the question, this is disturbing that so many DMs seem to focus on "their" world than the other participants of the game. These are DMs who should be writing fantasy novels or scripting TV shows and have missed the most important part of the hobby - that it's a social experience with friends.

You are correct, you are misunderstanding the question.

 

[overgeeked]

True or False: "In My General Experience Playing D&D, DMs Care More About Setting Lore Than Players Do"

LOL. True. Players generally don't care at all about the setting. Unless they're a lore hound and like busting the referee's chops. All that "amazing" lore, all those epic lore drops, the players tune them out and wait until something relevant to their characters pops up.

 

[JEB]

IME, players care about setting lore if it directly impacts their activities, and otherwise don't usually give a hoot.

Agreed, generally. Though there have been rare exceptions, players who cared more about specific setting details than we DMs did.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

It’s a bit of a self fulfilling prophesy. Being a player who cares about lore tends to make you want to DM anyway.

 

[Art Waring]

I homebrew my own campaign settings, so yes I often do care more about my setting than players as a whole.

My players primarily care about their characters and the impact of their choices on the world, but only a few have actually shown interest in the world itself beyond their own sphere of influence.

 

[payn]

I certainly don't want to discourage homebrewers from making their own settings, but yeah as a player I'm usually underwhelmed.

 

[Celebrim]

In my experience, it depends very much on the quality of the lore.

Do players geek out on the lore of professional properties like Forgotten Realms or Star Wars or Star Trek? Absolutely they do, sometimes far much more than I the GM does. I'm actually less likely to adhere to canon strictly than some of my players would and do when they GM.

Likewise, do my players really get into my setting lore when it increases their understanding of my games and gives my games more resonance? Yes, they do.

The question sort of presupposes that the reader of a novel or the audience of a TV show cares less about the setting lore than the author, and often times that is demonstrably not the case. The question therefore comes down to "Can a homebrew setting have fans?" and I think the answer to that question is, "Yes."

 

[Yaarel]

A player character is a hero.

A DM character is the setting.

Ideally, the DM is building the setting around the heroes.

This intersection is the lore that matters.

 

[Celebrim]

A DM character is the setting.

Ideally, the DM is building the setting around the heroes.

No. Absolutely not.

"DM character" is a vague term. When I hear it I think of something like "DM PC" which is a whole different concept that a setting. I think it just obfuscates things to refer to a "setting" as a "DM character". Just call it the setting.

But even more than that, the DM is not building the setting around the heroes. Not every story involves the PC's being the chosen one in the sense that you could say Dune is built around Paul where he is the literal center of the setting and everything flows around and through him. Characters exist within settings and they inhabit settings and the usual thing is that the setting does not revolve around the character. Not every character is Harry Potter or Aang the Last Airbender, and in an RPG it is usually a huge mistake to have Harry Potter type characters that the whole setting is revolving around first because RPGs are usually meant to be social games and secondly because in RPGs even protagonists can die and then what are you going to do? In RPGs the story isn't fixed and predetermined. JK Rawlings may have already written out in her head the fate of "The Boy Who Lived" when she penned the first chapter, but in an RPG that's not a lot of fun.

I think you mean to say that ideally the DM builds the story around the PCs, rather than the setting around the heroes. The story is not the same as the setting though, and even then it's not clear that for all formats building the story around the PCs is a good idea. It tends to be a good idea when you have just 1-3 players, but the more players you have the more problematic it tends to become attempting to build the story around the PCs. And lastly, to quibble, since the story is not yet told, we can't say whether the role of the PCs will be heroes. They could be villains, for example. When you have larger groups, it becomes necessary to build the story around The Quest, where The Quest is some motivation that all the characters have agreed to have buy in on. In other words, if you have six players the characters are typically built around the story and not the other way around. For example in Blades in the Dark, The Quest is something like, "We're a gang of smugglers and we're trying to become successful." where as in D&D The Quest might be something like, "Were a band of mercenaries and we are trying to stop an Evil Necromancer."

Character driven play is not inherently superior to story driven play. I get sick of that claim because it's so obviously based solely on theory and not experience. Indeed once you get up to like 8 or 10 participants in the play, character driven play becomes almost impossible and can't be the focus of play because there isn't enough spotlight time for that. I feel like half the indy movement was driven by GMs that only had 1 or 2 players and they were theorizing about the entire span of RPGs based on satisfactory games with just a few participants.

Now I do agree that there is an intersection between the story and the lore that needs to happen. There is no need to info dump a lot of lore into a story that isn't going to inform play, but ironically, it's a lot easier to make that decision when you are the GM running a story based game than it is when you are the GM running a character driven game. Because if it really is a character driven game with the PC setting the goals through backstory and play, you can't know as GM what lore is going to inform play and what hook the player is going to respond to.

 

[Yaarel]

No. Absolutely not.

"DM character" is a vague term. When I hear it I think of something like "DM PC" which is a whole different concept that a setting. I think it just obfuscates things to refer to a "setting" as a "DM character". Just call it the setting.

But even more than that, the DM is not building the setting around the heroes. Not every story involves the PC's being the chosen one in the sense that you could say Dune is built around Paul where he is the literal center of the setting and everything flows around and through him. Characters exist within settings and they inhabit settings and the usual thing is that the setting does not revolve around the character. Not every character is Harry Potter or Aang the Last Airbender, and in an RPG it is usually a huge mistake to have Harry Potter type characters that the whole setting is revolving around first because RPGs are usually meant to be social games and secondly because in RPGs even protagonists can die and then what are you going to do? In RPGs the story isn't fixed and predetermined. JK Rawlings may have already written out in her head the fate of "The Boy Who Lived" when she penned the first chapter, but in an RPG that's not a lot of fun.

I think you mean to say that ideally the DM builds the story around the PCs, rather than the setting around the heroes. The story is not the same as the setting though, and even then it's not clear that for all formats building the story around the PCs is a good idea. It tends to be a good idea when you have just 1-3 players, but the more players you have the more problematic it tends to become attempting to build the story around the PCs. And lastly, to quibble, since the story is not yet told, we can't say whether the role of the PCs will be heroes. They could be villains, for example. When you have larger groups, it becomes necessary to build the story around The Quest, where The Quest is some motivation that all the characters have agreed to have buy in on. In other words, if you have six players the characters are typically built around the story and not the other way around. For example in Blades in the Dark, The Quest is something like, "We're a gang of smugglers and we're trying to become successful." where as in D&D The Quest might be something like, "Were a band of mercenaries and we are trying to stop an Evil Necromancer."

Character driven play is not inherently superior to story driven play. I get sick of that claim because it's so obviously based solely on theory and not experience. Indeed once you get up to like 8 or 10 participants in the play, character driven play becomes almost impossible and can't be the focus of play because there isn't enough spotlight time for that. I feel like half the indy movement was driven by GMs that only had 1 or 2 players and they were theorizing about the entire span of RPGs based on satisfactory games with just a few participants.

Now I do agree that there is an intersection between the story and the lore that needs to happen. There is no need to info dump a lot of lore into a story that isn't going to inform play, but ironically, it's a lot easier to make that decision when you are the GM running a story based game than it is when you are the GM running a character driven game. Because if it really is a character driven game with the PC setting the goals through backstory and play, you can't know as GM what lore is going to inform play and what hook the player is going to respond to.

When an author writes a story, everything the book mentions revolves around the heroes.

That is how it works.

That is how a good DM works.

That is when the players care about the setting.



In a D&D game, there is an interaction, a kind of dialogue between the heroes and the world. The DM chooses how to respond to the heroes. The entire world is the character that the DM plays.

 

[Laurefindel]

I voted false in the sense that for players I'm used to play with*, setting lore is important for players and DM alike.

But if "care more" = "know more", than yeah, DMs definitely care more than players about lore.

*I know there are players who don't care about the lore. I'm answering for me and my circle of gamer friends.

 

[TwoSix]

Character driven play is not inherently superior to story driven play. I get sick of that claim because it's so obviously based solely on theory and not experience. Indeed once you get up to like 8 or 10 participants in the play, character driven play becomes almost impossible and can't be the focus of play because there isn't enough spotlight time for that. I feel like half the indy movement was driven by GMs that only had 1 or 2 players and they were theorizing about the entire span of RPGs based on satisfactory games with just a few participants.

It's weird, my first instinct was to disagree with you, but I've long stated that character-driven play really only works for maybe 3 players, 4 max, and that story-driven play becomes a near-necessity with larger groups, so I largely agree with this assertion.

I do think setting can and should be mutable even with larger groups, though. Like, I'll emphasize or add certain races if one of the players picks an uncommon race, or I'll change the overall movers of the plot to contrast with the player's PC choices.

 

[Maxperson]

I did not think this was worthy of a poll until I saw some people think players do care.

I know my players care. All four of them. Three care a lot. One cares a little.

 

[Maxperson]

I mean, DMs kinda care about everything more than players. It’s how they ended up being the DM.

I don't agree with that. Most DMs in my experience are DMs because they aren't afraid to do it. A lot rides on the DMs shoulders and a lot of players worry that they will screw it up, so they don't try. That's actually a form of caring.

 

[Burnside]

I care about lore as a player, but in most games I'm the only player who really does. And even I focus mainly on lore that affects the campaign.

 

[payn]

I know my players care. All four of them. Three care a lot. One cares a little.

Is this your campaign theme song?

 

[Maxperson]

Is this your campaign theme song?

More like.

 

[Celebrim]

When an author writes a story, everything the book mentions revolves around the heroes.

That is how it works.

I don't think that that is true. I'm having a hard time thinking of an example that holds true for. I think you are trying to affirm the truth of Chekhov's Gun, using different words, but I don't even think Chekhov's Gun holds true as an absolute principle (Hemingway famously rejected it) but your restatement here of it is even less true than what Chekhov was claiming. Chekov claimed all elements of the story must be necessary to the story, but that's not the same as claiming all elements of the story must revolve around the protagonist. (And again, you are mixing up 'hero' and 'protagonist'.)

Yes, I realize we are just arguing semantics here, but semantics are important. Because when we get to this statement:

That is when the players care about the setting.

I want to agree with that idea, but how you built up to it is I think wrong and misleading. Yes, the majority of players only care about the lore setting in as much as they think that lore will inform and impact the propositions that they make in play. (I can imagine a player who has Sensation as a primary Aesthetic of play and who therefore likes being narrated to for its own sake, but I think that's rare.) On that I think we largely agree. But I don't agree that the lore of the setting must literally revolve around the protagonists in order for them to care about. If anything, good setting lore tends to make the protagonists revolve around the setting (as it were).

In a D&D game, there is an interaction, a kind of dialogue between the heroes and the world. The DM chooses how to respond to the heroes.

And see I'm with you through that, and want to agree, but then you enter into these simplified abstractions and you lose me.

The entire world is the character that the DM plays.

No.

Yes, the job of the DM is to bring the setting to life, but to say that the setting is a character is to risk a great deal of information loss and create a lot of misunderstanding. There are big differences between the concepts of "setting", "NPC", and "PC". The DM has to maintain a certain degree of impartiality. In my game I have this concept of "demographics" which is one of the first things I establish for myself when planning a campaign, and it has to do with "what are average things in the setting like". It's baseline that I use to establish what anything I didn't prepare ahead of time is probably like so that when I have to improvise I have a baseline for what is fair. That's part of the setting. I'm running a Star Wars campaign right now, and so there is a ton of preexisting lore out there that by definition wasn't created to revolve around the PC's in my game. A lot of the time what I'm doing with lore is establishing to the players, "Yes, this is a Star Wars universe." I'm creating a feel to the universe that is supposedly frequently remind them of the Star Wars movies (especially the original trilogy). This has nothing to do necessarily with the PCs. It's just building a living world that draws on the players pre-existing out of game feelings.

This is not the same thing as animating an NPC or a PC. My relationship to the setting is different than my relationship to an NPC, and my ethos and relationship to an NPC when I'm a DM is different than my relationship to a PC when I'm a player. Let's just not confuse that. A "DM PC" is a problem that arises when the relationship and aesthetics of play the DM has to an NPC becomes that of a player to a PC, and it's a bad thing. The setting is literally only the time and place of a story. Sometimes people say, "The setting became almost a character in the story" when the setting is particularly richly illustrated, but that's only a metaphor. It's not a literally true claim.

 

[Yaarel]

In my game I have this concept of "demographics" which is one of the first things I establish for myself when planning a campaign, and it has to do with "what are average things in the setting like". It's baseline that I use to establish what anything I didn't prepare ahead of time is probably like so that when I have to improvise I have a baseline for what is fair. That's part of the setting.

Defining the "average" − what is typical − relates to setting the themes and mood of the setting. It is important. When you decide it, you need to make sure it is characteristics that your players actually care about and want to engage. In other words, the setting needs to expand on the themes of the character concepts that the players create. Like any solid story, the setting themes can contrast and challenge the heroes, or corroborate and support the heroes. The themes include repetitions and variations to show up in different ways.

The players play heroes. (Evil player characters dont normally happen in my campaigns.) The DM plays the setting.

Ideally, if the players are less interested in part of the setting, then dont go there. Create and develop something that does interest them. Record the parts that players like, and the setting grows and develops from there.

The setting will materialize around the players interests.

I'm running a Star Wars campaign right now, and so there is a ton of preexisting lore out there that by definition wasn't created to revolve around the PC's in my game.

As the DM, you are the canon. Someone elses canon doesnt matter. Something might be true in a movie or a book, but not true at your table. Conversely, something might be canon for your table, that doesnt exist in a movie or a book.

It is your world. You decide how it works. You decide what happens. You decide what does what. Why. And when.

As DM, it is your world.

You play the world.

A lot of the time what I'm doing with lore is establishing to the players, "Yes, this is a Star Wars universe." I'm creating a feel to the universe that is supposedly frequently remind them of the Star Wars movies (especially the original trilogy). This has nothing to do necessarily with the PCs. It's just building a living world that draws on the players pre-existing out of game feelings.

If a Star Wars movie or book happens to be what interests your players. And interests you! Great.

But it is still your world. Your choice to follow canon closely is your choice. A player might follow a certain archetypal hero closely for the hero that they are playing. A DM might follow a setting closely for the setting that they are playing. Or either might get casual or experimental.

Doing something that interests both the DM and the players is an important part of the ongoing dialogue between the setting and the heroes.

"The setting became almost a character in the story" when the setting is particularly richly illustrated, but that's only a metaphor. It's not a literally true claim.

In D&D, it is a literally true claim: the "setting" is a "character".

There is actually a person who is this setting in the story. A reallife person who is roleplaying a setting!

 

[Celebrim]

In D&D, it is a literally true claim: the "setting" is a "character".

There is actually a person who is this setting in the story. A reallife person who is roleplaying a setting!

Everything you wrote above this point I agree with. I was just about the push the like button and complain that somehow we'd gone from an argument to agreement, when you wrote the above.

When I am the GM, I am not roleplaying a setting. There are a lot of verbs you could employ to describe what I am doing with the setting, but roleplaying is not one of them. The setting is not a character, and it isn't being roleplayed. When a player rummages a desk, I am not roleplaying the desk by describing its contents. The desk is not a "role". And there is probably a process of play that tends to conform to the division here. The DM shifts hats and often shifts voices when going between being the narrator of the setting and role-player of an NPC. I think that there are cues that GMs that are going to develop to call out when they are in narrator "hat".

By describing the setting I'm not making it a character, nor am I as the GM the personified setting. The setting is it's own separate thing that isn't a person. I don't think that it is a useful analogy to say it is a character much less something that is literally true. I think I'd rather stick to the concrete description of just describing the setting for the sake of clarity.