What Makes Your Homebrew Great?

[Psion]

Its consistency.

Things happen for a reason, people behave certain ways for recognizable reasons. Politics is a effective way of dealing with political problems.

There you go. To put my own spin on it, I'd say the logical flow of things.

One of the reasons I dug Babylon 5 was there was an over-arcing storyline that made things make sense. I like gaming like that as opposed to merely unconnected episodes.

But I want to do that. I don't feel comfortable being shoehorned into some elses multi-month long plot. I am interested in the development in my world and want players to be an active part of it.

 

[Hjorimir]

In a nutshell: the theme of my campaign – dubbed Reflections – is that the world (Tæün) is only a reflection of God’s (Æhü’s) Will. The actions of the players (and maybe something else; he-he) are shattering these Reflections, which results in huge Paradigm Shifts. The problem is that they are not sure how to control the Shatterings and the truth of the Mysterion (Divine Plan).

The latest action of the players have brought dragons back into the world.

After that, it gets complicated with things like Machiavellian politics, secret societies, prophecy, religious strife and reformation, the fabric of the planes weakening, and a few other things that I can’t go into.

Just your average D&D game, really.

 

[Vraille Darkfang]

Why are my adventures better than anything I can buy?

Because I'm simply the best game designer ever.

Actually, I am the BEST game designer when it comes to my games. I know how different party members react to different situations. I know my parties strength & weakness, their motivations & inspirations. No publsihed module can touch that.

Published modules rely on people doing X in response to Y (thus why the dungeon format was so popular in the beginning, it was naturally linear). Some modules have a more organic if PC's do X, see T; if they do Y, see B. You still get the player that does U-CS+WTF, that tottaly throws off the module.

In the 15 years I've been gaming, I've run less than a dozen modules, less than 5 successfully (and 2 of those were Death in Freeport).

While I like to think my Homebrew has the potential to match FR or Greyhawk given the right circumstances, I know I'm better able to run it, because its my own creation.

 

[Odhanan]

There are some inherent qualities to homebrew settings:
1- a DM can design the world around the PCs
2- a DM can make the world evolve and change according to previous PCs actions without having concerned looks from his players (contrarily with an established settings - try to modify the FR with Thay who "won" a global war, you'll see some of your players getting worried).
3- you can take bits and pieces from great published materials and add them together to make a whole even greater than the sum of its parts.
4- most importantly, you can use whatever makes you thrill as a DM to build your homebrew. A thrilled DM will be better than a DM-not-so-thrilled. Almost always.

Now, speaking of my homebrew specifically, what makes it great is:
1- a combination of Arcana Evolved, Ghostwalk Campaign Option, Laelith (a French-developed medieval metropolis for D&D) and my own ideas which makes the whole better than the sum of its parts (see above).
2- player characters who are getting some influence in the world as they progress (they are now eighth level, and one of them will become a senator pretty soon, allowing for massive political plots with targeted adventuring/dungeon delving from time to time. That makes the characters part of the world, and the story about the characters in the world, not as outsiders.
3- have rule components that really emphasize the campaign I want to have. As the creator of the setting, I know more than anyone else what part of the setting is important for the campaign, so I'm able to represent these points in the rules. I can create specific Prestige Classes, specific character traits and rule variants to get the best out of the equation Game Rules + Campaign World.

 

[the Jester]

I haven't read most of the posts above, so forgive me if I'm repeating what other homebrewers have said, but this is why I like homebrews.

Advantage #1: I know the world better than the players. If I run a FR game, there's a very real chance that at least one player knows the world better than I do. That's awkward for both of us. Even if he doesn't use his player knowledge, things will occasionally be jarring for him as I depict things in contradiction to some obscure sourcebook about subject X. With my own campaign world, nobody knows it like I do, even if they've played in it for the entire time.

Advantage #2: No damned metaplots. I hate the overarcing stories running through modules and especially in novels that tamper with your campaign world (if you want to follow 'canon' and be able to make full use of later supplements). Thankfully, this phenomenon seems to be seriously toned down since 3e came out, but the possibility alone drives me away from published settings. If my campaign has an overall plotline going on (and it does) it's my plotline.

And the big one:

Advantage #3: I get to create my own little world. I actually find that I take as much joy in setting creation as I do in actually running the game! I love drawing maps, I love putting together clever monsters, I love weaving consistent dungeon ecologies together. I really feel limited in a published setting- most of the work is done already.

These are all matters of personal taste; YMMV.

 

[Aristotle]

Familiarity: I know everything there is to know about a setting, so I don't have to worry about leaving something out that happened in an obscure novel, or having players complain about continuity issues. I can nudge and rework things to fit backgrounds of characters my players want to play. I can supply my players with as much or as little information as I want without worrying that so-and-so has the sourcebooks and knows everything there is to know about create A or culture B.

Expense: When you are a "poor gamer" or a "poor college gamer" it can be difficult to keep up with both the rules supplements and the setting supplements. Now you only have to worry about the rules, as you create the setting stuff as you need it.

Built to Strengths: A homebrew can be built to the strengths, or interests, of the gaming group. If your players are into games dealing heavily with intrigue and politics, you can create the 'perfect setting' for that without the awkwardness that can arise when you tack such things onto some other settings.

Fun!: I'm a world builder. This is what I do to relax. It interests me, but a built world isn't as much fun if you never get a chance to share your reation with others. It needs to be run.


I don't assume I can 'do it better' that the professionals, and most homebrewers agree. A lot of people assume that to be our reason, but it rarely enters our minds. The quality of the finished work is subjective. Of course the setting is 'better' for US.

 

[NewLifeForm]

All the best and more...

In homebrew, you can fix all the elements of the game you and your players think are bent out of shape or broken. These fixes are made not because the game is unbalanced or badly constructed rules-wise, but because the system elements don't fit your vision of the world you created.

In my main campaign world, there are far more PC races, components play a bigger and more versatile role, magic is a bit more free form and mysterious (both an art and a science as they say), simple magic has been mass produced to form low-level technology (light spell street lamps, a printing press, alchemic guns and cannons, etc.) and a dozen other elements it would take several D&D hardcovers to contain.

These additions and adjustments don't necessarily make D&D better, but they do make it better for us, and really, that's all that counts.

NewLifeForm

"It's life Jim, but not as we know it..."

 

[TerraDave]

And the big one:

Advantage #3: I get to create my own little world. I actually find that I take as much joy in setting creation as I do in actually running the game! I love drawing maps, I love putting together clever monsters, I love weaving consistent dungeon ecologies together. I really feel limited in a published setting- most of the work is done already.

These are all matters of personal taste; YMMV.

That is the big one. Over the years, the main reason I have probably DMed is to bring TerraV to life: the campaign was to serve the world, not the other way around!

Of course, there are limits to this (...no, your players are not going to read long writeups of campaign world related things, yes, the sessions are more about fun than your briliant metaplot...), but I have little doubt that for many DMs homebrewing is much more of an end then a means.

 

[Mallus]

In a word: flavor.

In a few more words: "My setting is playful, historically inaccurate (and therefore readily accessable), and deeply informed by a love of the genre(s)".

In a Hollywood pitch: "Its like Conan meets the Three Musketeers directed by Wes Anderson"

And because it has...

... a ziggurat-laden city where the trolleys are pulled by dinosaurs.

... a scheming fallen angel who's easily distracted by women of historical importance, canasta and gin.

... a race of wise monkey-men who ride collie-dogs.

... a terraced city on the inside of a flooded caldera teeming with duelists and democrats.

... undead politicians.

... a deified pastry chef, cocktail waitress, courtesan, pirate, and divorce lawyer.

 

[Crothian]

My home brew has history. We've ran seven campaigns in it that had the character reach 10th -30th level in them. I know it like the back of my hand, the time line has been advanced a totalt of about 250 years in campaigns we have run and that relaly helps develope and interest the players and characters.