Lore Isn't Important

[MGibster]

So four pages in, do we even have a working definition of lore? Because I think of any setting information as lore.

 

[Reynard]

So four pages in, do we even have a working definition of lore? Because I think of any setting information as lore.

As OP but only speaking for myself, I was specifically talking about how precise details and deep dives are largely unnecessary, especially as it relates to fights over changes to that lore. Specifically, again in context of the OP, changes in lore don't matter and folks should probably chill about this character being race or gender swapped, etc.

More generally, as a GM I much prefer a shallower, more ephemeral lore because, frankly, I'm not trying to build an incorruptible second world fantasy
For me, that part of it just isn't important. I'd rather lay out some broad general truths and fill in whatever details are relevant at the time they are relevant and if they contradict previous details, well, historians are human. Maybe the wrong side wrote that previous history.

 

[MGibster]

As OP but only speaking for myself, I was specifically talking about how precise details and deep dives are largely unnecessary, especially as it relates to fights over changes to that lore.

Okay, I think I can get down with that. Even in an established setting like Star Wars, it's not like I'm going to get all pissy if we go to Tatooine and Tour Aryon isn't the Imperial governor. (I had to Wookiepedia that information. I love Star Wars, but I'm not married to it.)

More generally, as a GM I much prefer a shallower, more ephemeral lore because, frankly, I'm not trying to build an incorruptible second world fantasy

For my own settings, I don't bother with lore I don't think will matter in the game. I was running a Hell of Earth campaign set in Little Rock, and one of my players kept asking me questions about the demographics; How many people, how many children, old people, men, women, etc., etc. I kept answering her questions until she looked at me and asked, "You're just making this all up, aren't you?" The only question I had answered was the number of people, 5,000, and I hadn't given a thought to demographics.

 

[Reynard]

Okay, I think I can get down with that. Even in an established setting like Star Wars, it's not like I'm going to get all pissy if we go to Tatooine and Tour Aryon isn't the Imperial governor. (I had to Wookiepedia that information. I love Star Wars, but I'm not married to it.)


For my own settings, I don't bother with lore I don't think will matter in the game. I was running a Hell of Earth campaign set in Little Rock, and one of my players kept asking me questions about the demographics; How many people, how many children, old people, men, women, etc., etc. I kept answering her questions until she looked at me and asked, "You're just making this all up, aren't you?" The only question I had answered was the number of people, 5,000, and I hadn't given a thought to demographics.

EXACTLY

 

[hawkeyefan]

So I can offer an example that actually happened in my group.

One of my friends wanted to run Star Trek Adventures, the 2d20 system from Modiphius. He’s a huge Star Trek fan. The rest of the group are much more moderate in our enjoyment of Star Trek.

The GM selected our starting time period to be around the time of the Next Generation. He explained it would be around season 2. This meant very little to the rest of us beyond a very basic grasp.

So one of the players said he’d like to play an android. The GM said he could not because there was only one android in Starfleet at that time, Data.

And that’s about as good an example I can think of where lore gets in the way of play.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Okay, I think I can get down with that. Even in an established setting like Star Wars, it's not like I'm going to get all pissy if we go to Tatooine and Tour Aryon isn't the Imperial governor. (I had to Wookiepedia that information. I love Star Wars, but I'm not married to it.)


For my own settings, I don't bother with lore I don't think will matter in the game. I was running a Hell of Earth campaign set in Little Rock, and one of my players kept asking me questions about the demographics; How many people, how many children, old people, men, women, etc., etc. I kept answering her questions until she looked at me and asked, "You're just making this all up, aren't you?" The only question I had answered was the number of people, 5,000, and I hadn't given a thought to demographics.

What’s interesting is that there is no scenario where you wouldn’t be just making it up.

It’s interesting how many peopleseem to think if something is made up two weeks ago versus just now it’s somehow more authentic or whatever.

 

[RivetGeekWil]

explicitly false by the definitions in many rulebooks.

The participants may have different roles or responsibilities but they're all still players.

 

[MGibster]

What’s interesting is that there is no scenario where you wouldn’t be just making it up.

Obviously it's all made up at some point in time. What she was getting at is that I was making it up on the fly rather than having thought things out ahead of time.

It’s interesting how many peopleseem to think if something is made up two weeks ago versus just now it’s somehow more authentic or whatever.

Whatever authenticity might be or it's importance, I don't think that's the salient point here. Generally speaking, if you've had time to work on something it's going to be better than whatever you come up with on the fly.

 

[Fenris-77]

So there are two ideas about lore that I find mutually awkward. The lore I hate, and I mean I hate it with a passion, is the lore that accrues from a longstanding IP of any kind, whether that be Star Wars or Forgotten Realms. That lore tends to be deployed like a stick by players who have invested an inordinate amount of time in memorizing it and then feel like they be able to wield that subject mastery like a stick in game, and use it to correct both the GM and other players. So, yeah, no, not in my game. Then there's the 'good lore'. This is pretty much everything that's not the first example. Knowing things about the setting makes he game better, generally. It adds depth and interest, and this can and often does, come from some level of lore investment by the players. But it isn't a weapon, or a contest.

 

[clearstream]

So I can offer an example that actually happened in my group.

One of my friends wanted to run Star Trek Adventures, the 2d20 system from Modiphius. He’s a huge Star Trek fan. The rest of the group are much more moderate in our enjoyment of Star Trek.

The GM selected our starting time period to be around the time of the Next Generation. He explained it would be around season 2. This meant very little to the rest of us beyond a very basic grasp.

So one of the players said he’d like to play an android. The GM said he could not because there was only one android in Starfleet at that time, Data.

And that’s about as good an example I can think of where lore gets in the way of play.

I am more on the side of flexibility with lore, and that probably works best for most groups, but I wouldn't denigrate folk who love a specific lore and engage in the play because they want to explore a specific preexisting lore. I'm thinking of something like ICE's MERP. Or Bushido or RuneQuest as I have mentioned. Perhaps an ACW group who do not want anything anachronistic in their game.

That noted, perhaps in this case the GM made a different mistake. They assumed that what had been presented on screen was all there is, and all there could be. This is more about how lore should be translated from a static-linear medium to a dynamic non-linear one. A decision to start a Star Trek RPG at the begining of Season 2 is not a decision to play out the on-screen events of the series line-for-line from there. It may be a fixed starting point, but how it unfurls from there emerges from play.

At game start then, Data is the only android in Star Fleet. Good. From there, it must be that player choices can impinge what happens next. So when a player decides to roll up an android, it becomes true that there are now two androids in Star Fleet. Just as if a player disintegrates a canonical character, the further actions of that character that were shown in subsequent on-screen episodes, can no longer be going to take place. Perhaps the GM mistake was not so much the lore, but their grasp of what is implied in playing a game in a given setting... from a given starting point?

 

[pemerton]

If one is running a mystery scenario discovery of setting information will be very important, indeed the primary goal of play. Even when playing Brindlewood Bay you have to take risks to discover clues even if there is not canonical solution to the mystery.

I agree with @Reynard and @pointofyou - the facts that constitute the solution to a mystery frequently will not count as lore in the sense it is typically used (and in the sense it was used in the OP as best I can tell).

I have mysteries all the time in my RPGing, but they don't depend on "lore".

 

[pemerton]

Generally speaking, if you've had time to work on something it's going to be better than whatever you come up with on the fly.

In the context of GMing a RPG this is actually quite contentious, I think.

Here's my go-to explanation of the point. There are some people who, because of shyness or anxiety or neurodiversity, rehearse their conversations before they actually engage in them. Very often this makes those people not especially good conversationalists - because part of what makes for a good conversation is spontaneity and responsiveness.

Conversation is central to RPGing, and a key aspect of good GMing is producing fiction that is responsive to those concerns that spontaneously emerge in play. And so having worked on an answer won't necessarily make it better.

That's not to say that all prep in RPGing is pointless: of course it's not. The most recent thread I started here was about my prep of the T1 Moathouse as a Torchbearer adventure. But we need to think about what prep is good for. It's not just for making our shared fiction "better" by working on it.

What is considered lore vs plot vs backstory vs etc. is going to vary from DM to DM, but I definitely heavily agree with the bolded.

I would quibble with this in the following way: the DM doesn't get to settle lore vs plot vs backstory unilaterally. These different baskets into which our fiction can be placed have their parameters established by the play of everyone at the table.

 

[Xamnam]

I would quibble with this in the following way: the DM doesn't get to settle lore vs plot vs backstory unilaterally. These different baskets into which our fiction can be placed have their parameters established by the play of everyone at the table.

Unilaterally, sure, no.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

Exploits and struggles are not confined to the PC's internal life. I think in most RPGing, the internal life of the PC is not all that vivid - it's the external life - the fighting, the sneaking, the looting - that tends to be the focus of play.

But this is nevertheless quite different form learning the abstract or impersonal details of an imaginary place.



If as a player you are trying to learn something through the vehicle of your PC - the classic example is a PC exploring a dungeon, but obviously there are indefinitely many other possibilities - then discovery can be exciting. But as @Reynard says, I don't think it normally matters whether what is discovered is profound or relatively shallow.

In my most recent Torchbearer session, the players via their PCs discovered a throne that lets the one who sits in it project their point of sight out into the world, "flying" about to spy on the landscape. This was literally a discovery, in that they (and their PCs) did not know about this throne until they found it and then experimented with it (during the experimentation one of the players did conjecture its purpose, based on some features of its layout and the room it was in).

This sort of thing can be exciting discovery in a RPG.

But it doesn't depend on lore at all. In the fiction, the throne has a creator, but that creator has a name and two lines of backstory (most of which the players have learned, by having their PCs undertake research). If more backstory is needed of course it can be authored, but that will be in further relationship to what the PCs are doing. I'm not looking for a chance to just drop in some lore that does not bear upon or follow from the players' play of their PCs!

I have GMed games that have been regarded as "lore rich" and "lore driven" by those who play in them and by those who observe them. What I learning GMing those games was that lore works well as a context or framework for play. But it is the players' play of their PCs which is key. This also informs what counts as "good" lore: it should be relevant to play, and potentially be driving of play. This is why I think 4e's default lore is great - it is laden with conflicts that players can easily by into just through building their PCs - whereas, say, genealogy that is not relevant to establishing conflict or driving action (eg JRRT's genealogies of the Kings of Rohan and the Ruling Stewards of Gondor) is in my view pretty optional.

Generally I agree it has to be somewhat related to the framework of play (though, that can simply be its presence helping to set tone) I will note that it usually isn't clear to me going in what lore will be relevant and what won't.

A lot of the time I find myself pulling in what might have otherwise been extraneous details in examples-- even something as seemingly superfluous as a genealogy could very easily be pulled on when the players are researching a curse they need to break or something, not that I create genealogies in the first place.

I think the biggest difference you might find in this thread, is actually less about the importance of lore, but how different GMs use different pieces of lore and how much lore they consider actionable, as well as whether the lore exists before the participants sit down to play.

Like, is this lore actionable (This page is meant to be creative commons in case that comes up)?

Because in my view, it could be-- its jumping the gun a bit, but I want to run a campaign in Shoga someday and I built it accordingly to have interesting places PCs can visit. It also could help inform Onika (Orc) characters who play elsewhere in the setting by identifying which mountain range they're most likely to have been from and what it means about the role that they're playing, and some of these Oni might someday serve as challenges for the PCs.

But I'm also not really looking to change it on beat for any specific player, I might revise or create lore to suit the tastes of the people I play with in the long term, but its not going to be something I performatively cast aside in service to my players as is being discussed elsewhere in this thread.

 

[MGibster]

So there are two ideas about lore that I find mutually awkward. The lore I hate, and I mean I hate it with a passion, is the lore that accrues from a longstanding IP of any kind, whether that be Star Wars or Forgotten Realms. That lore tends to be deployed like a stick by players who have invested an inordinate amount of time in memorizing it and then feel like they be able to wield that subject mastery like a stick in game, and use it to correct both the GM and other players. So, yeah, no, not in my game. Then there's the 'good lore'. This is pretty much everything that's not the first example. Knowing things about the setting makes he game better, generally. It adds depth and interest, and this can and often does, come from some level of lore investment by the players. But it isn't a weapon, or a contest.

In the late 80s or very, very early 90s, one of my friends said they liked Star Wars more than Star Trek for gaming because the former's universe was so wide open compared to the latter. For any younglings reading this thread, there was a time just a few years after Return of the Jedi where there was nothing new coming out for Star Wars other than what was produced for WEG's role playing game.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I think a good way to think of it is this… does the setting ask or imply interesting questions?

When are those questions answered? Beforehand? Or during play?

 

[clearstream]

I think a good way to think of it is this… does the setting ask or imply interesting questions?

When are those questions answered? Beforehand? Or during play?

That made me think - does the lore imply interesting answers to the players' questions?


EDIT So here I agree with the the thought that their ought to be a pregnancy in lore. Framing, context, implications. Further, I would say that in the best case lore is opinionated. A group's chosen lore implies this and not that. It is not bland or a tabula rasa. Their lore may - I think should - exclude. Some examples lay out an opinion - Duskvol, Glorantha, Stonetop - others lay out how to form an opinion - Dungeon World. The "opinions" I am thinking of are not final, closing words: they act to inspire rather than stifle.

 

[Baron Opal II]

Lore is as important as it is interesting or useful to the players. Sometimes it can point towards clues, add flavor and differentiation to character backgrounds, or allow players to prepare more effectively when facing certain foes. It could be plot hooks. It could be why a weapon harms a shadow and not a gargoyle. It depends.

I agree that making decisions about the setting ahead of time make things more cohesive, but flexibility in the moment is important, too. I advocate for being as well read as possible so that when you do have to make things up on the fly it is with better verisimilitude.

I think a good way to think of it is this… does the setting ask or imply interesting questions?

When are those questions answered? Beforehand? Or during play?

Well, both I would say. Depends on the question. Players could uncover some secret related to lore, and then decide what that means to them. Is it something to exploit, hide, destroy? Perhaps a reason to befriend or betray?

 

[hawkeyefan]

Well, both I would say. Depends on the question. Players could uncover some secret related to lore, and then decide what that means to them. Is it something to exploit, hide, destroy? Perhaps a reason to befriend or betray?

What would be a good example of an interesting question implied or asked by a setting that’s answered beforehand?

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

What would be a good example of an interesting question implied or asked by a setting that’s answered beforehand?

Generally, larger themes work this way because they inform how the world will work when certain things happen-- for instance "What Happens When You Die?" is answered by my setting "You are taken to a place in the spirit world for about a year to come to terms with it, then immersed in special water that dissolves the bonds between you and the energy / memories produced by your soul, which can be reincarnated as a new person, and the separated residue is used to create gods and spirits" its interesting because it suggests a process that can produce a lot of stories depending on how it's interacted with.

For example, players might roleplay their characters coming to terms with their death, they might explore how that energy is used to create spirits and the dynamics of what that means spirits are, there might be a dungeon that explores the idea of where this special water comes from, they might interact with the process of how souls are distributed back into the world, they might interact with spirits who were made from certain people and see how that influences them, their own characters might achieve a kind of immortality by having their ideals made into spirits.

So the question exists to prompt the creation of something interesting.

Another example is "What Became of the Hero King whose city fell to Darkness?" and the interesting answer is probably "His spirit was cruelly locked into his family's sword and is wielded by the avatar of the darkness that consumes the city" which is interesting because the players might retrieve that sword, liberate the city from darkness, and one of them might take up the (now intelligent) sword and interact with it and his new situation.

Incidentally this is probably why my setting has so many godforsaken ruined cities that my a player of mine got annoyed all the cool cities were destroyed, I keep coming up with them as dungeon concepts for them to explore, instead of "here's this really cool thriving city i came up with."