What are the tools for Home Brewing a World?

[CanadienneBacon]

Osprey Publishing puts out a wonderful series of books that I have found to be time-and-again very good information sources when I sat down to work on my setting. Some of their titles that I've either borrowed from the library or own include:

Medieval European Armies
Armies of the Crusades
Saxon, Viking, and Norman
The Wars of the Roses
The Scottish and Welsh Wars
The Knights of Christ
French Medieval Armies

The Crusades
Seige Weapons of the Far East I and II
Medieval Seige Weapons I

The Janissaries

Crusader Castles of the Teutonic Knights I
Fortifications in Wessex c. 800-1066
Norman Stone Castles I

All their books are an amateur historian's delight and go into wonderful detail about their subjects. Maps and aerials, when appropriate, are often included. The books aren't cheap, however. Border's seems to offer their Osprey books for roundabouts $15 each.

 

[Orius]

There's only one thing you REALLY need, and others have already mentioned it:

Your imagination.

Sure, stuff like world builidng guidebooks, encyclopedias, the Wikipedia, atlases, various other sorts of reference material and so on are helpful, but the imagination is the most important. Make it up, and use whatever references you want as tools to shape your creation.

A lot of players aren't going to be too worried about realism if they're having fun. Personally, I probably wouldn't want a player who's constantly griping about realism in my game.

Honestly, a campaign world will never be perfect in terms of realism. There's no DM out there who is so well versed in earth sciences that he or she will be able to create a world that works exactly as the laws of the natural world state. In fact, I'd say mankind doesn't even know all of the laws of nature that govern how our world works. And that's just the natural world. You're not counting the social sciences, economics, or any other such fields of knowledge. As long as things are relatively balanced and not game breaking, it should be good enough.

 

[TerraDave]

What I recommend as a guideline is "think about play"

Bad 1 (GM is making a world without considering play):
"Well, a society at this technological level would have gaslight. Oh, and that means some piping underground. Well, just in case it ever comes up, I'd better map out the piping system, and figure out how each side of the river's gas lines work."

Bad 2 (GM is trying to use Threat/Reward/Asset/Problem to dictate what he does - which is not going to work because they're empty without content):
"Well, a society at this technological level would have gaslight. I don't know how these gaslight lampposts turn into a problem / asset to the players, so I'll just leave them out."

Good (GM is thinking about Threat/Reward/Asset/Problem as he does everything else, and uses that to manage his time):
"Well, a society at this technological level would have gaslight. How can I make that something more than window dressing? Oh, what if there's danger of a gas explosion? Maybe the players can take advantage of that by tearing up the cobblestones on purpose.

AHH. Now if you are going to this level of detail, then I contradict what I said before.

This is obviously too much. Gasslights: Improvise as needed. Full stop.

 

[buzz]

For a real glimpse into how inspiring worldbuilding can be, read the appendices to the Lord of the Rings, particularly the one on dwarves. It is full of epic history, and yet hardly restrictive if one were to use it as the background of dwarves, or something like it, in one's campaign.

I think the issue at hand is the presumption that a DM needs to approach anywhere near that level of prep in order to create a setting for their D&D game. Sure, there are gamers out there who have the time to invest in such an undertaking, but I honestly have to wonder how many of them there really are.

I'd put it this way: were I to write a book on GM'ing aimed at someone with minimal experience, I'd probably want to present them with something like Ryan's methodology. I would not want to present the idea that they need to think extensively about dwarvish history before they can even consider starting a campaign.

Also, I think it's worth noting that Tolkien spent a lifetime working on ME. Ditto Greg Stafford on Glorantha, and M.A.R. Barker on Tekumel. These extensive settings didn't spring to life fully-formed; in the latter cases, they evolved via play, and in the former, evolved throughout the novel-writing process.

 

[Ry]

Designing Situations (TRAPs being one method for that) is useful in a game because Situations are designed to be interactive, and that's what the game is about. If you're designing a world for the purpose of a game, then this is what you should focus on. If you're designing a world as a personal creative expression, as a work of art, as a springboard for a novel, to pay homage to Tolkien, and so on, then the criteria are different.

Like anything else, if you're spending a lot of time on it you should know the purpose of the work, and your time is best spent pursuing that purpose. Know what your goal is and pursue that.

 

[Reynard]

I'd put it this way: were I to write a book on GM'ing aimed at someone with minimal experience, I'd probably want to present them with something like Ryan's methodology. I would not want to present the idea that they need to think extensively about dwarvish history before they can even consider starting a campaign.

i was referring to DM worldbuilding in general, not necessarily what newbie DMs should do. There are lots of DMing activities -- houseruling, custom monsters and magic items, "winging it" -- that I think are good practices that I wouldn't necessarily suggest to a new DM.

 

[buzz]

i was referring to DM worldbuilding in general, not necessarily what newbie DMs should do. There are lots of DMing activities -- houseruling, custom monsters and magic items, "winging it" -- that I think are good practices that I wouldn't necessarily suggest to a new DM.

Right, but I guess my point is that world-building doesn't need to be reserved for experienced DMs, because the DM-as-Tolkien thing is more about preference/goals as Ryan mentions above. It's not really needed.

 

[Psion]

I hope the above 3 examples answer Psion as well.

It sounds like our takes here aren't so very far apart. Communication is a good thing.