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<blockquote data-quote="Nathal" data-source="post: 573770" data-attributes="member: 1809">Re: Re: The Most useful of All Sourcebooks is Here (TLG PR)&nbsp; The book is a guide to filling your standard D&amp;D style (or Lejendary Adventure style) game with descriptions that enhance your presentation of the campaign setting so that the players get a greater sense of immersion.&nbsp; Yes, it has tons of information on geography---all you would need to create realistic landscapes (including water sources above and underground).&nbsp; &nbsp; History &quot;advice&quot; it does not specifically cover, that being the domain (I believe) of the next book in the series, Living Fantasy (these books in the &quot;Gygaxian&quot; series work together well but none requires the other).&nbsp; It does cover facts that would aid in constructing a believable game setting: governmental types, royal offices, servants &amp; staff, possible officials of a typical fantasy Temple, a useful list of titles of Royalty &amp; Nobility (Western European and otherwise), and many other facts and elements that would help to flesh out the details.&nbsp; The book also contains a HUGE &quot;spell types generator&quot; for use in dreaming up new spells for ANY fantasy game setting, which means that it acts as a brainstorming tool not confined by strict rules on spell construction (as that aspect is well covered in other supplements in the D20 realm).&nbsp; I suspect that the intricacies of &quot;magic in society&quot; will be a topic well covered in Living Fantasy.&nbsp; The focus of the WB is more like a painter's pallet, a brainstorming aid, or a verisimilitude toolkit. As my co-author Gary [and don't ask &quot;Gary who?&quot;] summed up the book in another forum, &quot;The WB book is a compilation of many lists and facts--things that I know I want to have at my fingertips when I'm designing a community, an adventure, or writing a story...and didn't have on tap. So, with the urging and co-authorship of Dan Cross, we went to work and gathered all the information we could think of that would be useful when writing. As Dan said, it is a &quot;descriptionary&quot; sort of work. I'll be glad when I have it in hardcopy so I can quit searching the electronic ms, files I now use.&quot;In answering another similar question on that same board I wrote in response: &quot;Gamers should find that this book allows one to accomplish---effortlessly---what is often a fun but difficult (or at least time-consuming) aspect of DMing: World Building (facts), thinking of &quot;things&quot; to put into all kinds of rooms (library, lab, torture chamber, privy, etc), populating areas with appropriate flora and fauna, determining simple treasures while running &quot;on-the-fly&quot;, etc. It can be used in preparation of a campaign, to help dream up surroundings for characters in a novel, or even as a quick reference during a game in answer to simple questions like, &quot;what is the building's construction? Is it unique?&quot;&nbsp; Although I am sufficient to the task of building encounter locations and other areas , I wanted a handy menu of &quot;descriptors&quot; to lend everything verisimilitude! Buildings, trees, clothing, geography, herbs, facts and charts on society and weather and...etc...&nbsp; &nbsp;Note that the book does not rely on random generators, because it is organized in a thematic way, components of the whole sublisted in some instances (like building construction broken down into wall types, door types, window types, etc).~Dan Cross</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Nathal, post: 573770, member: 1809"] [b]Re: Re: The Most useful of All Sourcebooks is Here (TLG PR)[/b] The book is a guide to filling your standard D&D style (or Lejendary Adventure style) game with [i]descriptions[/i] that enhance your presentation of the campaign setting so that the players get a greater sense of immersion. Yes, it has tons of information on geography---all you would need to create realistic landscapes (including water sources above and underground). History "advice" it does not specifically cover, that being the domain (I believe) of the next book in the series, Living Fantasy (these books in the "Gygaxian" series work together well but none requires the other). It [i]does[/i] cover facts that would aid in constructing a believable game setting: governmental types, royal offices, servants & staff, possible officials of a typical fantasy Temple, a useful list of titles of Royalty & Nobility (Western European and otherwise), and many other facts and elements that would help to flesh out the details. The book also contains a HUGE "spell types generator" for use in dreaming up new spells for ANY fantasy game setting, which means that it acts as a brainstorming tool not confined by strict rules on spell construction (as that aspect is well covered in other supplements in the D20 realm). I suspect that the intricacies of "magic in society" will be a topic well covered in Living Fantasy. The focus of the WB is more like a painter's pallet, a brainstorming aid, or a verisimilitude toolkit. As my co-author Gary [and don't ask "Gary who?"] summed up the book in another forum, "The WB book is a compilation of many lists and facts--things that I know I want to have at my fingertips when I'm designing a community, an adventure, or writing a story...and didn't have on tap. So, with the urging and co-authorship of Dan Cross, we went to work and gathered all the information we could think of that would be useful when writing. As Dan said, it is a "descriptionary" sort of work. I'll be glad when I have it in hardcopy so I can quit searching the electronic ms, files I now use." In answering another similar question on that same board I wrote in response: "Gamers should find that this book allows one to accomplish---effortlessly---what is often a fun but difficult (or at least time-consuming) aspect of DMing: World Building (facts), thinking of "things" to put into all kinds of rooms (library, lab, torture chamber, privy, etc), populating areas with appropriate flora and fauna, determining simple treasures while running "on-the-fly", etc. It can be used in preparation of a campaign, to help dream up surroundings for characters in a novel, or even as a quick reference during a game in answer to simple questions like, "what is the building's construction? Is it unique?" Although I am sufficient to the task of building encounter locations and other areas , I wanted a handy menu of "descriptors" to lend everything verisimilitude! Buildings, trees, clothing, geography, herbs, facts and charts on society and weather and...etc... Note that the book does not rely on random generators, because it is organized in a thematic way, components of the whole sublisted in some instances (like building construction broken down into wall types, door types, window types, etc). ~Dan Cross [/QUOTE]

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