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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dungeonosophy" data-source="post: 6370829" data-attributes="member: 6688049">***blink, blink, blink***Where's the audience for an edition of D&D which explicitly guides each DM to invent their own world (with worldbuilding rules built into the DMG), and/or stitch together a world out of whatever D&D books they already own, instead of being guided to buy 60-some titles, most of which are set in the Forgotten Realms?Wow, what has D&D culture come to?That's what I call corporatist-shaped imagination. What a pity the minds of the newer generations of gamers were shaped in such as a way as to express disdain and incredulity at the suggestion of hardwiring a homebrew culture into the game. I prefer that didn't sound insulting. In real life, I'm sure I'd like gaming with you (I recognize that message board posts are a narrow picture), yet I am here to stand against the mindest which you just expressed.I understand you use "generic" to mean "medieval fantasy".Gah, I don't want it all laid out ahead of time. I want to invent the world as I go along. (And at the same time, I'd like the published D&D Multiverse to flourish as a coherent setting for novels, and for DM's who like that...and maybe as worlds for my party to visit. Krynn and Toril (and even my beloved Mystara) are nice places to visit, but I don't want to couch my campaign there.)I suggest a hodgepodge only in these two cases:1) Making use of whatever RPG books we already happen to own, regardless of which edition, and which company, and which world they're set. For example, besides the 5e Basic Rules, my entire game library consists of the Pathfinder Beginner Box, a True20 book, two Blue Rose books, a One Ring book, Dragon Age, and DCC RPG. That's plenty. I started a new 5E campaign last week which begins in Sandpoint (from Golarion)...but the rest of the map is not going to be Golarion. The rest of the map is going to be pieced together from whatever adventures are contained in those other books I own. (Here's <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?358702-My-Own-Fifth-Edition-campaign" target="_blank">the campaign log so far</a>--two TPKs in one night!) 2) If one sees a product that one really likes, but which isn't set in the same world, then it'd make sense to just stitch its map to your world map. For example, sticking Freeport in the ocean west of the Sword Coast.The example I gave of Glantri and Nentir Vale stitched to the Sword Coast assumes that those were the books the DM already owned, or he saw the Glantri PDF and a 4E Nentir Vale book, and bought them because he liked them. So he stitched them to the Sword Coast.I suggest four options to be included in the DMG:1) Invent an entire world from scratch, with in-depth pantheons, world map, and one or more unique themes, so that the geography of the world and the trajectory of the campaign are more-or-less laid out from the start.2) The same, but randomly generated by rolling on worldbuilding tables. (Like how scif-fi rpgs often have a planetary generator.) Roll for campaign setting themes too. ("Roll d% three times: Okay, our world is a gothic horror theme, with a Roman Empire-style civilization, where gnomes are the primary race). Roll for world names ("Jarth", "Grynn", "Aveir"). Roll for continent names ("Maerun", "Yoerik", "Ferilia"). Roll for campaign setting names. ("Bluehawk", "The Forgotten Sun", "Azure Realms")3) Use one of the published settings of the D&D Multiverse: Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, and so forth. Though I like the published D&D worlds, it is obvious that these do tend to become "brands" which suck people into following the canon of a world. I know that sounds somewhat negative. And I know, of course, that people are "free" to modify the world. Yet the continuity of a published setting does take on a life of its own which is not necessarily in line with the venerable culture of homebrew worldbuilding.4) Piece together a world which is gradually stitched together from whatever adventures one happens to own, and which are only stitched together in the course of actual play (instead of being layed out ahead of time.) This is method I'm most interested in. Here's why: someone bought the Starter Set. So they ran their characters through the Phandelver adventure. So the "World" consists only of the Sword Coast. Then they found a map of Faerun on the internet, and used that shape for their world map. But they put their own names on the map, because they wanted to make their world different. They decided to use the Celtic pantheon for the gods of this world. Then the 5E War of the Lance adventure path came out, which included an appendix for converting all of the adventure to each of the published worlds (which I suggest be including in all 5E adventures, at least as a web enhancement). He likes the story, so he bought the book, and used the Forgotten Realms conversion notes to place the events on his own map.That's an either-or dichotomy:A) Either use the Forgotten Realms (or one of the other published worlds) pretty much exactly as written, though with a few DM tweaks.orB) Invent an entire world whole-cloth, with its own pantheon, all new names--even to the extent that one is writing as if one were a copyright lawyer, making sure that no name or concept could be the basis for being accused of plagarism (which is how professionalized authors have to be in our corporatist culture). Don't use any published adventures either. Hand-write all adventures from scratch.I'm suggesting a fourfold spectrum with more options, more guidance, and more nuance than that twofold mindset.</blockquote>

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