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<blockquote data-quote="Oofta" data-source="post: 7421798" data-attributes="member: 6801845">A lot of times when coming up with a history of a campaign world, less is more.&nbsp; In the same way you don't have to map out entire continents and would never map every alley of every city, leave space in your history for events that could have happened.For example, for my last campaign I started dropping hints that at one point dragons had ruled the land because I was thinking of running my next campaign stealing ideas from Tyranny of Dragons.&nbsp; I thought it would be fun if there was an ancient dragon from the time when the dragon empire fell that wanted to reclaim past glories.Did I have that written down in my history before I started dropping hints?&nbsp; Of course not.&nbsp; Even if I had, I may not have revealed it to my players.&nbsp; I have two sets of histories - the one the players know and the &quot;real&quot; one which may diverge from the accepted history.&nbsp; My point is that I have pretty massive gaps that I can always fill in later.Another point to this is that the accepted history may not be what actually happened.&nbsp; History is written by the victors and while I publish a timeline that they would reasonably know my &quot;real&quot; history has notes about actual events.So back to the OP, how did the world start?&nbsp; Do the PCs know how the world started, or do they just know the last few decades?&nbsp; Do the elder races share what they know or do they &quot;simplify&quot; the truth for other reasons?This gets a little tricky when you have extremely long-lived creatures or immortal beings, but their perspective on things may be quite different from mere mortals.&nbsp; In addition, even immortals may forget the past after a time.&nbsp; I remember reading a story of a (virtually) immortal woman that would keep diaries.&nbsp; Going back to her older diaries she would be reminded that she once had children and a husband but had no recollection of them.&nbsp; It had simply been too long and she could only remember so many things.TLDR: leave plenty of room in your history for mystery and discovery.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Oofta, post: 7421798, member: 6801845"] A lot of times when coming up with a history of a campaign world, less is more. In the same way you don't have to map out entire continents and would never map every alley of every city, leave space in your history for events that could have happened. For example, for my last campaign I started dropping hints that at one point dragons had ruled the land because I was thinking of running my next campaign stealing ideas from Tyranny of Dragons. I thought it would be fun if there was an ancient dragon from the time when the dragon empire fell that wanted to reclaim past glories. Did I have that written down in my history before I started dropping hints? Of course not. Even if I had, I may not have revealed it to my players. I have two sets of histories - the one the players know and the "real" one which may diverge from the accepted history. My point is that I have pretty massive gaps that I can always fill in later. Another point to this is that the accepted history may not be what actually happened. History is written by the victors and while I publish a timeline that they would reasonably know my "real" history has notes about actual events. So back to the OP, how did the world start? Do the PCs know how the world started, or do they just know the last few decades? Do the elder races share what they know or do they "simplify" the truth for other reasons? This gets a little tricky when you have extremely long-lived creatures or immortal beings, but their perspective on things may be quite different from mere mortals. In addition, even immortals may forget the past after a time. I remember reading a story of a (virtually) immortal woman that would keep diaries. Going back to her older diaries she would be reminded that she once had children and a husband but had no recollection of them. It had simply been too long and she could only remember so many things. TLDR: leave plenty of room in your history for mystery and discovery. [/QUOTE]

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