What is *worldbuilding* for?

[AbdulAlhazred]

System matters. Its very hard to do this in D&D, for instance, but baked in to DW and BW. Its doable to greater or lesser extents in other systems.

I know next to nothing of BW, but DW certainly is OK with a certain amount of DM prep. It recommends that the DM create what are called 'fronts', which are basically organizations and general plot arcs, possibly down to the level of some NPCs and a description of what these groups do, where they exist, etc. Remembering that in DW maps are supposed to 'have a lot of white space' and be basically just some names and a general list of ideas.

DW is also pretty thematically tight, the world is a pretty D&D-esque fantasy world, and the PCs are larger-than-life figures which populate it (though they may be reasonably limited in the capabilities at level 1, they are still fairly powerful to start with and don't have to 'build out' to their full potentiality in their class, a level 1 wizard is still a wizard, even if he's not a super powerful one).

You could run DW without any prep at all, it isn't exactly hard to do that, but the game as-written doesn't imagine you will go to that extreme.

 

[Emerikol]

I think in the timeframe 2011-2013 I was running 2 4e campaigns and I prepared NOTHING. I mean, I was running them in my setting, so there's some established stuff, but I just winged it entirely 4e is especially good for that, particularly with encounter design. I think both of those campaigns were some of the best ones I've done. I ended up moving and the group was hankering to play the new Star Wars game, so we broke them off, but they both ran well up to the early parts of paragon, and I haven't any reason to believe they'd have broken down after that.

Now, maybe I'm weird, but if I just close my eyes for a second, all sorts of ideas will come forth and I just pick one. Sometimes it seems wildly improbable, but it works. If things need to move forward and I am feeling a lack of character material to engage, then I put out some bait, otherwise I'm really just pushing back what the players throw at me and adding twists to it as they pass checks or not.

I didn't always play this way. In the 90's I created vast timelines and whatnot. It was WAY too much work and I didn't find the return on investment or quality of the game warranted it. I get better games for less work now Again, possibly unique to me and maybe certain other people that like to do it that way.

If it works for you it works. What I find when I encounter on the fly games is a very shallow world. World events rarely drive anything. To me it lacks something. I suspect that the prep that many people do is substandard as well. I find if the DM does the prep well the world is very rich and exploring the mysteries of such a world and really be satisfying.

While surely system choice is driven by campaign preferences to a degree I’d hesitate to say that most games can’t be adapted to whatever style you like. I love to read and buy rpgs of all sorts but many of them I know in practice aren’t for me. I do think when I’m building my own system I can take ideas from even the systems I think aren’t well suited to my style. They have something worthwhile.

 

[Sadras]

One consequence of pre-authored setting is that the GM may (frequently does, I believe) use it to declare actions unsuccessful based on secret considerations of fictional positioning. (This is what the map example has mostly been about.)

Another is that the pre-authored setting reflects the GM's conception of the concerns/themes/direction of play.

I agree with both your observations. Speaking for myself I believe I have reflected how neither of those two are a concern at our table given that I strive not to have 'boring sessions' (extreme as this map example is) and that I attempt to tie-in/bake as much of the character backstory (when provided) into the campaign and obviously picking up (and using) any additional interests/themes provided by the players during play.

Say 'yes' is A technique, but it isn't the last word in story-driven play. Its just a good starting point, and you're perfectly OK to say "yes, but..." or "yes, and..." etc. (like the found money above). Sometimes you say "make a check". It is also possible for different participants to say "wait, that violates my sense of genre appropriateness, why do you want to tell it that way?" And obviously if you get a player who constantly has that issue and doesn't like to collaborate at all then they might not be a good match for the table

This I feel is where this improv-like approach (for lack of a better description) would not work for my table. I have players who are not interested in being part of the creative process on that scale. They prefer DM prepping the story legwork - which includes a strong storyline and secret backstory.

 

[Ratskinner]

<snip>
Now, maybe I'm weird, but if I just close my eyes for a second, all sorts of ideas will come forth and I just pick one. Sometimes it seems wildly improbable, but it works. If things need to move forward and I am feeling a lack of character material to engage, then I put out some bait, otherwise I'm really just pushing back what the players throw at me and adding twists to it as they pass checks or not.

I didn't always play this way. In the 90's I created vast timelines and whatnot. It was WAY too much work and I didn't find the return on investment or quality of the game warranted it. I get better games for less work now Again, possibly unique to me and maybe certain other people that like to do it that way.

I feel the same way, but I'm currently running a 5e game with some old-schoolers....gotta prep. At first it was really cool, but now I keep drifting off during prep fantasizing about how much simpler and richer it would be to do in Fate or DW, or how to rewrite D&D to be totally player-facing so that I can....well, anyway.

I think its one of my few gripes about 5e overall, that its a throwback to an era when I had to do a ton of prep for games. The DM side was one area that I thought 4e did a great job (especially monster stat blocks). The way monsters were set up made it easy, but 5e seems a huge step back in that department. (Even if it does better reflect the traditional "heart" of DMing.)

 

[Sunseeker]

This I feel is where this improv-like approach (for lack of a better description) would not work for my table. I have players who are not interested in being part of the creative process on that scale. They prefer DM prepping the story legwork - which includes a strong storyline and secret backstory.

I can admittedly be a difficult person to DM for sometimes, because I'll easily vaccinate between being content to sit back and enjoy the show and wanting to lead the circus. It's one reason I rarely take issue with railroads. If the story is interesting enough, I'm happy to move my pieces as necessary and watch things unfold. What drives me nuts are games and DMs who want to control everything, but provide nothing of value. If I'm going to give up my agency, I'm going to demand some sweet cut scenes in return. (I'm looking at you Diablo III!)

But, I think a collaborative table can function with a few "builders" and a few "watchers". The folks who aren't interesting in building just have to be willing to accept that sometimes they're going to be taken along for the right when another player gets going. And I think there will be nothing lost for those people because now they're getting 3 people to tell them a story instead of 1. Sort of like tables that rotate DMs. Some people just don't want to DM. As long as not DMing makes them happy then there's no problem. It only becomes a problem when you have "too many cooks in the kitchen" or too few people to contribute fresh material.

 

[Jester David]

Say what you want but I’ve never met a DM who could pull it off for long at all doing it on the fly. Not something a huge as a full blown encounter. Now I have seen DMs using existing content with creative flourishes.

In my current game I try not to plan *that* much, not unless I'm doing a dungeon crawl or the like. I tend to plan some encounters mostly because I use minis and drawing the maps in advance saves time, but depending on how much time I have to prep I can run a session largely improv.
As it's a reactive sandbox game, I also don't plan more than a session ahead, so I can tailor things to the players.

However, the world is a heavily detailed homebrew setting. So much of my planning is just writing NPCs and expanding elements of the setting.
And because I'm a worldbuilding snob who hates the illogical results of spontaneously created campaign settings. It invariably leads to unnatural ecologies and impossible rivers.

 

[Manbearcat]

I think the last few pages of advocacy positions on worldbuilding/big granular setting/metaplot approach are the most transparent and clear on the “why worldbuilding” question, on the nature of players at the table (what those players want and what is expected from them), and the play paradigm that emerges as a result.

This is probably a wrap.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I think the last few pages of advocacy positions on worldbuilding/big granular setting/metaplot approach are the most transparent and clear on the “why worldbuilding” question, on the nature of players at the table (what those players want and what is expected from them), and the play paradigm that emerges as a result.

This is probably a wrap.

I'm not so sure. Are you saying that these align with your previous 9 points or are you saying that you have a new viewpoint? If the former, well, no, I can't agree with you (mainly points 7, 8, and 9). If the latter, I'd actually be interested in hearing about your new insights. Either way, not really a wrap.

 

[Manbearcat]

@Ovinomancer

I don’t have the spare time to look up those 7 points (and the 8, 9 caveat extension), but here is what I’ve seen in terms of advocacy in the last few pages.

1) It’s an activity from which some derive enjoyment as a stand-alone craft.

2) It aids the cause of granular interaction with the gamestate so of-kind decision-points can be navigated for a certain player archetype.

3) It aids extrapolation/inference for GMs whose games hew to a process-sim, hexcrawl ethos (who typically hack the rules a bit to aid this); related to 2. Also includes adjudication by way of secret (perhaps unknowable) backstory.

4) It aids the passive setting/metaplot consumption/wonderment experience for certain player archetypes.

5) It aids extrapolation/inference for GMs whose games hew to a hybrid of storyteller: process-sim ethos.

6) Related to 4 and 5 above, it (along with resolution mechanics that are opaque and/or require heavy GM mediation) allows a GM to more easily exert covert Force (Illusionism) for players of persuasion (4); including adjudication by secret, unknowable backstory which may or may not exist (eg classic GM blocks against classic PC power plays).

7) It ensures GMs will be interested in any content that is a fundamental part of play (“the GM is supposed to have fun too”).

8) It fascilitates GMs in constraining the pace of play toward a granularly-intensive, more methodical (therefore slower) bent.

I think that covers it.

 

[Ovinomancer]

@Ovinomancer

I don’t have the spare time to look up those 7 points (and the 8, 9 caveat extension), but here is what I’ve seen in terms of advocacy in the last few pages.

1) It’s an activity from which some derive enjoyment as a stand-alone craft.

2) It aids the cause of granular interaction with the gamestate so of-kind decision-points can be navigated for a certain player archetype.

3) It aids extrapolation/inference for GMs whose games hew to a process-sim, hexcrawl ethos (who typically hack the rules a bit to aid this); related to 2. Also includes adjudication by way of secret (perhaps unknowable) backstory.

4) It aids the passive setting/metaplot consumption/wonderment experience for certain player archetypes.

5) It aids extrapolation/inference for GMs whose games hew to a hybrid of storyteller: process-sim ethos.

6) Related to 4 and 5 above, it (along with resolution mechanics that are opaque and/or require heavy GM mediation) allows a GM to more easily exert covert Force (Illusionism) for players of persuasion (4); including adjudication by secret, unknowable backstory which may or may not exist (eg classic GM blocks against classic PC power plays).

7) It ensures GMs will be interested in any content that is a fundamental part of play (“the GM is supposed to have fun too”).

8) It fascilitates GMs in constraining the pace of play toward a granularly-intensive, more methodical (therefore slower) bent.

I think that covers it.

Those have some similarities to the original 9, but some important differences as well. I like these better. I may have some issues with your 6), but largely because I'm not entirely certain what you're driving at. I think that system is a bigger determinate of the use and acceptability of GM force rather than setting elements, but those two do go hand in hand quite often.

I also think there's a lot to say about systems that use grids for combat vs theatre of the mind. It's much easier to wing it, and therefore be fully responsive to player input, in TotM games, but you lose much of the tactical aspects of the grid. Conversely, grid systems need maps, and it's hard to consistently provide interesting maps with tactical aspects on the fly, so those systems reward prep. Once you have a system that rewards prep in some instances, then it has a follow on effect of rewarding more prep so that the prep work already invested becomes relevant. 3.x was really bad about this, as the prep for combat was grueling, and so there was a strong incentive towards using GM force and Illusionism so that generated content was useful.

D&D in general has this feature/bug. The systems you generally espouse don't have this feature/bug. So, I think system has a big impact on what worldbuilding is for.