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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5443068" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't agree with this - if only because it has the implication that I can't run a satisfying high-level campaign unless I put a lot of work into world building, which as a GM I just don't have the time/inclination to do (and I suspect I'm not alone).I want to say more about this below.I think this is more or less the right way to go, but as well as stating it in the sort of metagame language you use, I think it's also helpful to try to give it an ingame logic as well.Dropping this assumption helps give the solipsism an ingame logic. If the PCs are the only heroes, then there is no other high-level adventure taking place in the gameworld besides theirs. (This can be tricky if PC death is frequent, but in high level D&D raise dead/ressurection shouldn't be that hard to come by. If you need to introduce a new high-level PC, handwaving it shouldn't be that hard.)In my last high level game, the demonic threat emerged more-or-less contemporaneously with the PCs becoming ready to meet it. And it was a threat that the gods couldn't deal with, precisely because it was the result of contracts the gods had entered into as part of the original settlement between the heavens and the hells. Events in mid-level adventures set up some of the basic ideas of these constraints on the gods, and then the ramifications were introduced as challenges for the PCs once they became high level.In 4e, the ideas of the Dawn War, the Compact of Heaven, Primordials wanting to reassert their power, and the Primal Spirits keeping the world safe, all create ways to plausibly have threats emerge that only epic heroes can deal with, but which emerge only when you want to present thsoe challenges to the PCs. (The Plane Above also introduces the idea of travelling back in time to change mythic history - this is the perfect excuse for epic PCs to find high level opponents who aren't just hanging about failing to destroy the world.)Going back to the world building thing - I think that developing an ingame logic that supports narrative and solipsistic solutions to the problem isn't about world building at all. It's about scenario design. In particular, the resolution of low- and mid-level adventures should always be opening up the possibilities and prospects of your gameworld, with suggestions that there is more to the machinations of the gods, the devils, the efreets, the lich lords, etc etc, than they have resolved in this current adventure. You don't need to give details, just hints and a general "vibe". Then when you get to high levels you start cashing this stuff out. You can make up the details at that point, as long as they aren't grossly inconsistent with what came out before (in my experience you'll generally get away with minor inconstistences unless your players keep very detailed notes).That's how I like to do it, anyway.</blockquote>

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