Players Don't Care About Your Setting

[MGibster]

This is a case of a player just not buying into playing in an existing setting, they want to cooperatively develop the setting as they go and have things said by players be the setting.

Wanting to cooperatively develop the setting as they go long is probably something that needs to be established before the game starts. Since players don't care about the setting (hence the title of this thread), it could be that in this particular instance this player just wasn't familiar with the setting and just assumed dwarves must be great smiths. I'm partially joking about players not caring about the setting. I've found sometimes players are only partially familiar with the setting or they have a different interpretation of the setting with the GM.

 

[grankless]

I have absolutely zero interest in unilaterally designing a setting as a GM. I tried, it was boring. Now we all make the settings up as a group, let things change or develop as necessary, and bam, everyone is more engaged, one person doesn't need to take on the role of Designing Everything... it's great! Try it some time. Talking to your friends around the table will almost certainly make your games better.

 

[Starfox]

I've made peace with this issue. Yes, its hard to get players engaged with my setting. But they can stand me occasionally taking about that this and that happened because of setting reasons. I've come to realize I mainly work on the setting for my own sake, to make the stories make sense to me and create a framework for inventing new stories. Its worth investing in the setting just for myself. Sometime the players engage with the setting, but that is usually very local and not the reason I do all the work.

 

[kigmatzomat]

Could you run a game about revealing a setting's secrets? I suppose a mystery does this on a small scale. Or you could take the Supernatural route, adding a tiny bit of connective tissue at the end of each session.

I did that and it can work. My 3e campaign was based on all the things in the Dragon Lance Adventures book that didn't make sense and writing a backstory with "unseen" actions that tied it all together with the presumption some form of the Chaos War had happened so there was minimal magic. At first level they found corpses of adventurers and a map to a city that none of them knew existed even though it was less than a hundred miles away. They reached the deserted city under a mountain, saw some true ogres, had a dragon eat their pack mule, escaped, fought weird foes that were using shards of a broken Dragon Orb, and ultimately uncovered the history of the mythical Smiths, why the gods "came from beyond", why the gods were so paranoid about psionics, why Raistlin could destroy the gods, and how to bring back magic.

It did take 23 levels and the entire publication length of 3rd edition (started the summer 3e came out using the gencon phb and as it finished we were reading through the 4e phb). So maybe try a simpler secret if your group isn't solid.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I've made peace with this issue. Yes, its hard to get players engaged with my setting. But they can stand me occasionally taking about that this and that happened because of setting reasons. I've come to realize I mainly work on the setting for my own sake, to make the stories make sense to me and create a framework for inventing new stories. Its worth investing in the setting just for myself. Sometime the players engage with the setting, but that is usually very local and not the reason I do all the work.

I appreciate setting and verisimilitude for their own sakes, both as a player and a DM, because I want what happens in the world to make logical sense to me (within the conceits of the setting, of course). For me, my appreciation of TTRPGs comes from a juxtaposition of my loves for speculative fiction (which is why I want fantasy and/or science fiction elements) and history (which is why I want logic and consistency, and for the world to resemble RL outside of those speculative elements). Both parts are very important to me.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Here’s a pretty good blog I read recently that has a solid take on it all, and which made me think of this thread.

Good Lore vs Bad Lore

 

[Committed Hero]

When I am forced to make a timeline, I now make them go in reverse order. That way, players who are less interested in the setting can read a bit and know the general gist of what's happening now. They aren't put off by things that happened eons ago and probably don't affect their character's life in a meaningful way. Players willing to do a deeper dive - because their PCs are older, or they want to know more about the setting - can go as far as they like and {(ideally) see how the major events have shaped the setting.

 

[Voadam]

When I am forced to make a timeline, I now make them go in reverse order. That way, players who are less interested in the setting can read a bit and know the general gist of what's happening now. They aren't put off by things that happened eons ago and probably don't affect their character's life in a meaningful way. Players willing to do a deeper dive - because their PCs are older, or they want to know more about the setting - can go as far as they like and {(ideally) see how the major events have shaped the setting.

I do the same.

Most relevant stuff to the immediate situation up front for the reader and more background structure the further you go.

 

[Theory of Games]

 

[Aldarc]

Sure, they may be fun to read for pleasure. I personally find the Silmarillion pretty boring overall. But opinions on that will vary by taste. And, reading is (almost always) a solo activity. If someone is reading something and they decide they don’t like it, there’s no harm in simply not reading any further.

But… think of it as a game. If LotR was an RPG, almost none of the Silmarillion is needed for play. None of it actually matters. The “players” never actually interact with any of it.

It’s the kind of self indulgence that I think is among the worst traits a GM can have (and trust me, I include myself in that).

I find LotR pretty boring in comparison to The Silmarillion and the Hobbit. I have been able to re-read the latter two a fair number of times, but there is invariably a point when I try re-reading the former when I grow bored and stop.