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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 9145840" data-attributes="member: 82106">I think it depends on the sort of game to be run, but I think there are rapidly diminishing returns by 5, in general. Take Stonetop as a benchmark. It has a moderately detailed description of the village itself, describing the major features, the social order and roles, the elements of the village's economy (though not it much detail), and its location within a wider region. The region gets a bit of a description, with certain landscapes described in terms of how they might relate to play, interesting facts, a few possible play hooks, etc. This serves well to allow the players to describe the details of THEIR Stonetop, how they fit into it, etc. The players will also develop the themes and conflicts, dangers, etc. through their backstories and indirectly by provoking the GM into framing challenging scenes involving whatever parameters they bring into play.Now, sometimes it can be useful to go beyond that, BitD describes Doskvol in a pretty good level of detail. Not down to all the buildings and streets, but at the level of the different regions of the city, their overall character, the city administration, politics, many different factions/crews and their potential relationships, etc. It describes appropriate NPCs to fill certain roles, like the leaders of some of the rival crews and factions. A few specific locations are also detailed, like parts of Charterhall that PCs might be interested in, the harbor etc. Even here there isn't anything like a floorplan or anything.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 9145840, member: 82106"] I think it depends on the sort of game to be run, but I think there are rapidly diminishing returns by 5, in general. Take Stonetop as a benchmark. It has a moderately detailed description of the village itself, describing the major features, the social order and roles, the elements of the village's economy (though not it much detail), and its location within a wider region. The region gets a bit of a description, with certain landscapes described in terms of how they might relate to play, interesting facts, a few possible play hooks, etc. This serves well to allow the players to describe the details of THEIR Stonetop, how they fit into it, etc. The players will also develop the themes and conflicts, dangers, etc. through their backstories and indirectly by provoking the GM into framing challenging scenes involving whatever parameters they bring into play. Now, sometimes it can be useful to go beyond that, BitD describes Doskvol in a pretty good level of detail. Not down to all the buildings and streets, but at the level of the different regions of the city, their overall character, the city administration, politics, many different factions/crews and their potential relationships, etc. It describes appropriate NPCs to fill certain roles, like the leaders of some of the rival crews and factions. A few specific locations are also detailed, like parts of Charterhall that PCs might be interested in, the harbor etc. Even here there isn't anything like a floorplan or anything. [/QUOTE]

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