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Message: <blockquote data-quote="CarlZog" data-source="post: 2040977" data-attributes="member: 11716">It depends on your approach. Generic is easy if you assume the star systems you are discussing are operating in a vacuum (pardon the pun) -- with no existing contact with the culture of your game setting. However, if you're looking for a list of worlds you can plug-in to an existing storyline, it may be hard to impossible depending on how little you're willing to fudge it. You can generate planets all day long, filling them in with creatures and cultures,  but without details on the surrounding area of space, it may be useless.To my mind a "generic" but useful gazetteer would still have to reflect each planet's relationship with its surrounding star system -- both physically and socially. In fact, a guide that treated star systems rather than planets as the defining unit makes more sense. Then each planet and its occupants have a means of fitting into the puzzle sensibly.  But even then, meshing that system's backstory into your setting may be substantial legwork for the GM.I'm more interested in systems and galaxies created in context. This is why I'm a huge fan of Alternity's Star Drive setting. It gets accused of being "generic" because it has no gimmick -- it's just people in the far future with a special focus on the area of space that is the frontier of their time. But the connections between the societies, their institutions, species, and histories  are rich in detail and filled with adventure possibilities.Carl</blockquote>

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