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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 9044959" data-attributes="member: 29398">Quite often IME there are but two truly important things to many players: surviving, and getting rich.  Anything beyond that is a bonus. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />In theory, perhaps.  In practice, unless you've got a high degree of player buy-in, it'll end up being about gold and levels.Completely depends on the players, and I probably run for a more casual lot than you do.Given as it's a world I made up, and that in its physics, geology, cultures, etc. it has to account for magic (both mortal and not) and divine interference, I find no problem with having it be a place of conflicting goals, cultures, morals, and species.In other words, I'm going to unapologetically make it playable.What I'm not going to do is tailor it to any specific characters.  Quite the opposite, in fact: I'm going to try and make it such that any character or group of characters can find something to do there if they look, without regard to who those characters might be at any given time.Then the game would have a different focus.  If the characters were diplomats, for example, then it'd tend toward the non-violent intrigue/diplomacy game I mentioned earlier.  If they were rulers and monarchs it'd be a game about ruling realms a la Birthright.  If they were knights it'd be about knightly stuff (and would draw heavily from A Knight's Tale for its flavour if I had any say in it!). <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />  And so on.How long were those campaigns?  My experience is that if they stay in one place too long the players get bored of that place, which inevitably means the characters will soon enough start doing things they shouldn't, thus wearing out their welcome.  They'll have to move on.Also, in a long campaign it's fun to change up the background or atmosphere for variety's sake.  The world has jungles and deserts and oceans and arctic and forests and cities and dungeons - might as well use all of them as adventure backdrops at some point, hm?Those GMs who see the PCs as the world's only adventurers would have it this way by default.Because we both thought it'd be fun to run something chosen randomly.  Hell, all the characters were random-rolled as well, even down to class and species.  Odd thing happened, though: that party somehow ended up working out really well and are still going three real-world years later.That the Emperor should conveniently show up shortly after the players decide on a whim to overthrow him?  Yes, I get the sense that some here are suggesting exactly this; that because the players have decided their goal is to take out the Emperor, it's now my duty as GM to - by way of focusing on their stated goals - somehow put the Emperor in their path.</blockquote>

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