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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pacio49" data-source="post: 2051441" data-attributes="member: 28472">Okay, as a DM I've always preferred to grow my own worlds than to use a prefab setting. With that said, I've been around the block a time or two and my biggest fear is that the things I'm coming up with on my own end up looking a lot like some of the various devices employed by published sources. Sometimes, my world has preexisted, other times I have to wonder if I picked up a term in passing and it somehow wormed its way into my work subconsciously.I'm always wondering whether it's a meme (an idea whose time has come and simply needs to be expressed, surfacing through several people at the same time), or if I'm actively borrowing.  I can never tell, since I really take pains not to look through published settings unless I'm playing a character in them in another game.  It irks me sometimes, because items that I'll spend a long time crafting and creating backstory on I will then find cropping up in a published resource.Some examples from my current world (see The Tol Vehara Story Hour if you want a more in-depth explanation of history):Blasted Lands and Taint. Granted, this has existed since Thomas Covenant series, and everywhere you look you find Wild Lands, or Blight, or Blasted Lands, etc. The thing that irks me is that I spent a while trying to make the concept workable, with havens that were islands of normalcy among the perverting influence of the Taint's miasma.  Then, I happen to flip idly through a 3e Rokugan setting book (I forget which one, perhaps the core), and I find that yep... there's a similar setup there.Diamond Throne.  I haven't even looked into this one yet, but it's the phrase that sparked this thread for me.  The old continent in my homebrew is a confederacy of cities with magical towers topped in crystal that looks like various gemstones. The lords of the cities take their name from the gem that their tower holds (Sapphire, Opal, etc.), and the overlord rules from the Diamond Throne.  Now, a throne made of diamond isn't necessarily anything that hasn't been imagined before, but I'm cringing to think that it's part of something currently 'in play' from major published sources.I'm curious to see whether or not other homebrewers find the same thing happening.  I know where a few of my ideas come from, and I'm not ashamed to take inspiration from various sources and make it somehow my own, but I have to wonder whether the whole thing comes off as an eclectic trash heap or something with a fresh, unique flavor.I guess I'll have to ask my players.  Anyone else have this happen to them?</blockquote>

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