Why Worldbuilding is Bad

[Hussar]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Hussar
This was never the definition and you know it.


Please read the KM post to which I am responding. That definition comes from him, not from me.

Quote:
Originally Posted by KM
Hussar has made a very cogent point time and again that worldbuilding is stuff done for setting beyond what is needed in next game session.


I am responding to what KM wrote, not what you wrote.

RC

Oops. Heh. MIssed that bit.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Oops. Heh. MIssed that bit.

No worries.

 

[Raven Crowking]

How about we don't assume the DM is a slack jawed moron and actually is a reasonable person?

Can we make the same assumption when the DM is doing worldbuilding?

As an aside, has anyone ever asked you this as a DM? I can't think of a single time I've ever had a player ask me this. Heck, it's usually an uphill battle to get the players to remember the name of the world we are playing in.

Yes. Regularly.

Me: Naw, I want to stick with straight cleric, but, I'm thinking more of a Buddhist sort of approach.
DM: Ok, that sounds fine. You don't really need a god with that, so, we'll just use a force. We'll have to hammer out a couple of domains, but that shouldn't be a problem. Really, I hadn't intended for any sort of Asian stuff in here, but, not a problem. We can simply say you are a fish out of water, from far away. Take a free language in something no one speaks. You'll be responsible for coming up with the religious trappings you feel comfortable with. You are a cleric, so, you should have some clerical duties, but, I trust you, so I'll leave that in your hands.

How is this not worldbuilding?

DM: Umm, I gotta ask, why?
Me: Well I want to get into my character.
DM: No, I mean, why are you messing about with this NPC? He's not important, and you're never likely to see him again. Why are you wasting the entire table's time with this? What do you want to get out of it?
ME: Ummm....

This strikes me as odd. The answer to the DM's question is obvious....because the player would enjoy role-playing his character talking to the cleric of the town. You could just as easily have said:

ME: Ok, are there any dungeons near the town?
DM: Just one.
ME: Ok, I go there. I'm going to kill monsters and take their stuff.
DM: Umm, I gotta ask, why?
Me: Well I want to get into my character.
DM: No, I mean, why are you messing about with this dungeon? It's not important, and you're never likely to see it again. Why are you wasting the entire table's time with this? What do you want to get out of it?
ME: Ummm....​

It is, IMHO, up to the players to decide what is important to their characters. If the DM wants his plot hook to be important, it is up to the DM to make it relevant and engaging. The player, in wanting to talk to the town cleric, is attempting to give the DM the opportunity to engage him in the setting. This is a perfect opportunity to drop in plot hooks that the player will actually care about. The DM, who hasn't done his homework, instead attempts to imply that there is something wrong with the player for trying to engage in a setting which (unfortunately) is non-existent.

IMHO, this is the clearest problem related to approach in worldbuilding that has yet to surface in this thread.

Again, we have the assumption that without detailed world building we are automatically railroading. Sorry, that's not true. World building and rail roading have nothing to do with eachother. Heck, my world built map could actually have this information on it and be precisely the same railroad.

I agree with this.

However, your above example -- telling the players what is, and what is not, important to them -- is classical railroading.

You can do wonderful worldbuilding and railroad....DragonLance is the classic example. You can do minimal worldbuilding and avoid railroading. The odds are good, though, that the more prepared you are for actions outside your session plans, the less likely you are to railroad.

Now, since we're going adventure first, a better solution would be something like this:

DM: Is there anything you need to do in town besides supplies shopping?
Players: Nope, we're good. Just gotta buy that hard tack and oats for the horses.
DM: You stand in awe in front of the entrance of X. Vast stone columns lie broken like toys in front of a massive cave...
Players: Huh? What's going on?
DM: Look, when you watched Raiders of the Lost Arc, how much time did Indie spend in a shop getting food and stuff.
Players: Can't really remember.
DM: Right. Told you this was going to be different. You're in front of X.
Players: You mean we don't have to ponce about for three hours haggling with horse merchants like in Bob's campaign?
Bob: Hey!
DM: That's right. Straight to the action. Just like a Conan novel. Just like Star Trek.
Players: Hrmm...

DM: Is there anything you need to do in town besides supplies shopping?
Players: Nope, we're good. Just gotta buy that hard tack and oats for the horses.
DM: You stand in awe in front of the entrance of X. Vast stone columns lie broken like toys in front of a massive cave...
Players: Huh? What's going on?
DM: Look, when you watched Raiders of the Lost Arc, how much time did Indie spend in a shop getting food and stuff.
Players: Can't really remember.
DM: Right. Told you this was going to be different. You're in front of X.
Dave: Wait a second. My character is a druid. If we don't do the wilderness journey, then half my schtick is gone.
Bob: Hey! I'm a bard. Half my schtick is interacting with people.
DM: That's right. Straight to the action. Just like a Conan novel. Just like Star Trek.
Dave: Hrmm. You don't read much Conan, do you?*​

* I just reread the first Conan story, and there is tremendous amout of worldbuilding in it. In one scene, Conan is drawing a map and discusses the layout of the world to the north in a fair amount of detail, although it has nothing to do with the story. In another early Conan story, Conan needs magical help to cover a vast distance quickly -- while we don't see the actual travelling, we are told what happened in the intervening time. Certainly travel time is part of Conan's world.

Again, let's not assume complete incompetence on the part of the DM. If the DM is a blathering idiot, no amount of world building is going to help him either.

Maybe. But I wouldn't enjoy the game you're describing. (I realize that others might, however.)

DM: Well, it's a journal so it doesn't really say. It's not like there's an entry - Day 37 Decided to leave my journal behind.

QFT.

That struck me as odd, too.

As a DM, I love the answer, "You don't know, do you?" or "Who are you asking?"

Again, we have the assumption that without world building you force railroads, AND, now we have the assumption that the setting cannot possibly be consistent, that the setting is completely dependent on the whim of the DM at the time. Sorry, doesn't follow.

Without world building the setting is completely dependent on the whim of the DM at the time. That seems to follow to me. Can you explain why it doesn't?

Of course, this assumes that there was anything in the forest. How is this different than RC's assertion that good adventure design should kow tow to the players?

Um...RC's assertion is that good adventure design should NOT kowtow to the players.

 

[Hussar]

How is this not worldbuilding?

By your own definition this isn't world building. How is this moving from generic to specific? We have a nameless force (not even a god) as the patron of the cleric (which we mechanically HAVE to have - the force, not the cleric), any and all duties and whatnot of the cleric is entirely left in the player's hands. Other than the bare minimum dictated by mechanics - picking domains, what world building have we done here? His home isn't named and is "very far away". Other than a vague "somewhat Chinese" we don't have much of anything here.

Don't conflate theme with world building. The character has a theme - Asian monk/fish out of water. He has pretty much no detail.

It is, IMHO, up to the players to decide what is important to their characters. If the DM wants his plot hook to be important, it is up to the DM to make it relevant and engaging. The player, in wanting to talk to the town cleric, is attempting to give the DM the opportunity to engage him in the setting. This is a perfect opportunity to drop in plot hooks that the player will actually care about. The DM, who hasn't done his homework, instead attempts to imply that there is something wrong with the player for trying to engage in a setting which (unfortunately) is non-existent.

And, fair enough. This goes back to the assumption that our DM isn't incompetent. If he is, then, well, there isn't much we can do about it. The response - no, there's nothing really going on - is perfectly reasonable. Sure, the DM could also use the cleric as a source of plot hooks, and, I agree, that would likely be the best way to go. Without knowing more of the specifics of the adventure, it's pretty hard to tell either way.

However, your above example -- telling the players what is, and what is not, important to them -- is classical railroading.

Hang on, I didn't say that. I asked the player what he was intending to achieve. Granted, I didn't ask it very nicely, but, that is what I asked. I assumed that there were actual plot hooks being given to the players and then Mr Cleric has gone walkabout in town looking for something to do while the other players gather supplies, since that was Darth Shoju's comment.

If, OTOH, the players are fumbling about in the dark, then, yes, you would be exactly right. Again, without more information, it's pretty hard to tell.

DM: Right. Told you this was going to be different. You're in front of X.
Dave: Wait a second. My character is a druid. If we don't do the wilderness journey, then half my schtick is gone.
Bob: Hey! I'm a bard. Half my schtick is interacting with people.
DM: That's right. Straight to the action. Just like a Conan novel. Just like Star Trek.
Dave: Hrmm. You don't read much Conan, do you?*

Hang on. One second ago, you were saying that players shouldn't get what they want whenever they want it. Yet, now, we've got the players in an uproar because I've moved the action away from their supposed spotlight.

Which is it? Should I be constantly rewriting adventures to dovetail nicely with the PC's? Or should the PC's be created with some idea of the themes of the adventures I intend to run? Let's not forget here, I'm advocating that the entire campaign arc be created in advance. If our campaign is going to be about dungeon crawls looking for artefacts and someone's making a druid, there's possibly been a miscommunication. Never mind that the bard isn't going to be talking to many people in the bloody forest of death anyway. He's pretty much screwed in either case.

Unless, of course, I should rewrite my world building to suit the players.

On the Conan bit, I'll admit, I've never read the originals. Only the De Camp versions. The first story in that version has Conan running half naked through the wilderness trying to escape wolves. Comments on how much Conan someone has read would depend on which author we'd like to compare no?

In any case, you still get the point without having to get too pedantic about it.

Without world building the setting is completely dependent on the whim of the DM at the time. That seems to follow to me. Can you explain why it doesn't?

Umm, no. We've already established that the setting required by the adventure is created. I've assumed that there were no encounters in the Forest of Death and done a nice cut scene. I could easily have included a nice map of the Forest and set encounters there as well. It is not too far of a stretch to think that the setting for our adventure would include at least a basic idea of the town and the surrounding countryside on the way to X. Pretty much like Keep on the Borderlands. Since that's almost guaranteed to come up in play, I would call that setting.

Um...RC's assertion is that good adventure design should NOT kowtow to the players.

I think I got mixed up when you were answering KM and not me. Sorry, not sure where I was going with that. That was a bloody long post.

 

[Raven Crowking]

By your own definition this isn't world building. How is this moving from generic to specific?

The player comes up with the details of the force, the religious trappings, and duties, all of which are moving from generic to specific.

Hang on, I didn't say that. I asked the player what he was intending to achieve. Granted, I didn't ask it very nicely, but, that is what I asked. I assumed that there were actual plot hooks being given to the players and then Mr Cleric has gone walkabout in town looking for something to do while the other players gather supplies, since that was Darth Shoju's comment.

Where does Darth's example suggest that the cleric has "gone walkabout in town looking for something to do while the other players gather supplies"?

Hang on. One second ago, you were saying that players shouldn't get what they want whenever they want it. Yet, now, we've got the players in an uproar because I've moved the action away from their supposed spotlight.

Which is it? Should I be constantly rewriting adventures to dovetail nicely with the PC's? Or should the PC's be created with some idea of the themes of the adventures I intend to run?

The DM is responsible for creating the setting in which the play takes place. That includes locations, NPCs, adventure hooks, etc., etc. Player input into this process can (and probably should) be solicited at each juncture, but the DM is not required to give the players what they want simply because they want it. In fact, doing so would quickly make the game boring as it loses the tension between desire and the quest to achieve desire.

However, as soon as play begins, the players have an absolute right to have their characters attempt whatever they want. If they want to experience travel, the DM shouldn't simply shift scenes to avoid it, nor should the DM tell them they can't talk to NPCs because he hasn't got a clue what's going on in his world.

That's just bad DMing, and a failure to create a setting expansive enough to meet player needs.

Let's not forget here, I'm advocating that the entire campaign arc be created in advance. If our campaign is going to be about dungeon crawls looking for artefacts and someone's making a druid, there's possibly been a miscommunication. Never mind that the bard isn't going to be talking to many people in the bloody forest of death anyway. He's pretty much screwed in either case.

The bard wanted to talk to people in the town, along with the cleric.

Anyway, this is why the design method you're advocating can so easily lead to a railroad. If your campaign setting is the WLD, once the PCs are in that dungeon, they are allowed to attempt anything they like within the confines of the setting. That they won't necessarily succeed isn't important; setting provides context and meaning to the decisions they make, and failure of some attempts is good in terms of providing both. A druid is out of luck because the setting is a dungeon crawl.

However, if your setting is a larger world, where the PCs are supposed to go from adventure to adventure, ignoring anything that interests them but doesn't interest you enough to develop, you're running a railroad. If the adventure starts in a town, exploring that town is fair play. If the hook leads to a dungeon past a menacing forest, exploring that menacing forest -- or the means to go around that menacing forest -- is fair play.

And, let's not forget, you can have an agreed-upon railroad. "Let's play STAP" is an agreed-upon railroad. "Let's play WLD" is not (IMHO) unless you try to force the PCs to go to the areas you want them to.

On the Conan bit, I'll admit, I've never read the originals. Only the De Camp versions. The first story in that version has Conan running half naked through the wilderness trying to escape wolves. Comments on how much Conan someone has read would depend on which author we'd like to compare no?

You should read the originals if you can. The De Camp versions were what I started with, too, but I was very glad when I was able to actually read Howard's stories as they were attended.

Umm, no. We've already established that the setting required by the adventure is created. I've assumed that there were no encounters in the Forest of Death and done a nice cut scene. I could easily have included a nice map of the Forest and set encounters there as well.

I believe that this is what Darth supposed in his example; that there were encounters planned, that the players tried to end-run around them, and that the DM forbid that because it fell outside the planned adventure. He can correct me if I am wrong in this assumption.

I think I got mixed up when you were answering KM and not me. Sorry, not sure where I was going with that. That was a bloody long post.

Like I said, no worries.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Re: WLD & Worldbuilding elements:

For the most part, WLD as a campaign setting has sufficient worldbuilding elements to run, even though they are scattered throughout the text and would be more useful if gathered into a DM Cheat Sheet.

This isn't a setting large enough for reuse with the same players, note. Once the initial campaign is done, there's going to be a lot of material that didn't make it into play, but the layout of the campaign setting is such that it would be difficult to reuse it without making substantial changes (such as porting a section wholesale into another campaign world).

WLD is a small campaign world, but for my purposes it is certainly a complete campaign world. With some real development of flavour text and adventure elements, WLD could rock. In fact, it will rock, because I'm going to include it inside my regular campaign as a place that can be entered and left like a normal dungeon. It'll mean some real changes, but any encounter I like that my changes renders unworkable can always be used elsewhere.

 

[Darth Shoju]

Just a preamble, but the point of my post was to explain how worldbuilding adds depth and verisimilitude, since that is what KM was taking exception to. I wasn't really commenting on Hussar's abilities as a DM since I don't know anything about them. The DM in my example is purely hypothetical. I also would like to point out that I thought I established that he was pretty good at running the dungeon crawl, just bad at improv. I didn't really think of him as a useless lout.

How about we don't assume the DM is a slack jawed moron and actually is a reasonable person? Might make things a bit more realistic. Instead of our knuckle dragger, let me show you how it could go in this "worst case scenario".

RC made a valid point here. Why is it that when the DM slavishly adheres to the adventure as written (thereby restricting player interaction) it is a problem with the DM, while if the DM slavishly adheres to his setting/worldbuilding (thereby restricting player interaction) it is a problem with worldbuilding and NOT the DM?

As an aside, has anyone ever asked you this as a DM? I can't think of a single time I've ever had a player ask me this. Heck, it's usually an uphill battle to get the players to remember the name of the world we are playing in.

This is one of the first things I look at as a player when making a character. Ditto for most of the folks I play with (with a couple exceptions, although I suspect they would find it odd if there was no info on the world available too).

Let me rephrase that in the context of someone who is putting adventure first:

Me: Ok what nations are there? Where can my character be from?
DM: Well, I'm trying something a little different in this campaign. What do you have in mind?
Me:Well, can I be from one that is kind of like ancient China?
DM: Hrm, sounds interesting. What kind of class are you thinking of?
Me: Cleric.
DM: So, like a Shujenja?
Me: Naw, I want to stick with straight cleric, but, I'm thinking more of a Buddhist sort of approach.
DM: Ok, that sounds fine. You don't really need a god with that, so, we'll just use a force. We'll have to hammer out a couple of domains, but that shouldn't be a problem. Really, I hadn't intended for any sort of Asian stuff in here, but, not a problem. We can simply say you are a fish out of water, from far away. Take a free language in something no one speaks. You'll be responsible for coming up with the religious trappings you feel comfortable with. You are a cleric, so, you should have some clerical duties, but, I trust you, so I'll leave that in your hands.

While I'd appreciate the opportunity to flesh out my character's religion, it doesn't do much to develop the setting we are playing in (I still know nothing about the world I'm playing in). Of course, being a fish out of water character, that would make sense. Might be off-putting for the other players though.

And for the record, I was going for a more Taoist-type priest, but that is neither here nor there.

DM: Umm, I gotta ask, why?
Me: Well I want to get into my character.
DM: No, I mean, why are you messing about with this NPC? He's not important, and you're never likely to see him again. Why are you wasting the entire table's time with this? What do you want to get out of it?
ME: Ummm....

There's a problem with this? You, a complete stranger, walk up to a person in a town and ask if there are any problems. And you expect people to just pony up and drop plot hooks? Because you both happen to be clerics? At least gimme a gather information check, something, anything. Because, reading this, it looks perfectly reasonable to me.

If a DM responded to me in that fashion it would be the last night I gamed in one of his sessions. Taking five minutes to give me some interaction with an NPC and flesh out the setting is not going to derail the session. If anything it can help to fill the time while other players are looking up what they are going to buy for the trip (of course, I'd only be exploring this element if I was ready to go...I'm not going to hold up things after I'm done talking to the NPC b/c I haven't even looked at supplies yet).

Again, we have the assumption that without detailed world building we are automatically railroading. Sorry, that's not true. World building and rail roading have nothing to do with eachother. Heck, my world built map could actually have this information on it and be precisely the same railroad.

Well I'm working on the assumption that the DM hasn't done any worldbuilding. The adventure map doesn't detail what is north and south of the forest and the DM is bad at improving. He doesn't want to try and figure out the trip around the forest and he wants the PCs to go through the encounters in the forest the adventure details. I'm trying to prove how worldbuilding brings depth vs going with "the barest threads of a setting". I'd say having options in completing your objective is indicative of depth.

Now, since we're going adventure first, a better solution would be something like this:

DM: Is there anything you need to do in town besides supplies shopping?
Players: Nope, we're good. Just gotta buy that hard tack and oats for the horses.
DM: You stand in awe in front of the entrance of X. Vast stone columns lie broken like toys in front of a massive cave...
Players: Huh? What's going on?
DM: Look, when you watched Raiders of the Lost Arc, how much time did Indie spend in a shop getting food and stuff.
Players: Can't really remember.
DM: Right. Told you this was going to be different. You're in front of X.
Players: You mean we don't have to ponce about for three hours haggling with horse merchants like in Bob's campaign?
Bob: Hey!
DM: That's right. Straight to the action. Just like a Conan novel. Just like Star Trek.
Players: Hrmm...

I'm not really seeing how that is necessarily better. If your group just wants to do a dungeon crawl and isn't interested in anything else then I'd say that is probably the best approach. If your group likes a bit of a build-up before the dungeon then I'd say you might want to flesh out the stuff provided in the adventure a bit.

When I ran Forge of Fury (or started to), I knew my group preferred the actual dungeon crawling to not be terribly protracted, so I wrote up some build-up before it that involved traveling with a ranger and a stop at an inn for the night. The inn had some interesting encounters come of it (thanks to a bit of worldbuilding beforehand) and generated a side-quest to foil some local vampires (that were actually human bandits pretending to be vampires-never thought I'd get use out of Terrible Trouble at Tragidore). I was also able to put a bit more development of the legends of the dwarven hold they were traveling to throughout the lead-up. When we got to the actual dungeon, the group felt like it was a living breathing location rather than a static dungeon (important to my group of gamers).

Quick change on this:

DM: Well, it's a journal so it doesn't really say. It's not like there's an entry - Day 37 Decided to leave my journal behind.

Well, if I were running this I would have done some worldbuilding beforehand and worked with the info provided in the pirate adventure (assuming it has some minimal info on the pirates themselves). I've implied that this plot hook was tossed in by the DM and isn't a feature of the next adventure as written. Since he didn't do any worldbuilding he couldn't really answer anything about the clue beyond "it leads to the next adventure". If I was putting in a hook like this, I'd know who wrote the journal (probably not detailed in the next adventure since I invented this plot hook myself), why he wrote it and a little bit about the contents of it. I'd probably put some thought into the last journal entry since it can tell a lot about the setup for the next adventure (including some clues as to why the journal was left behind). If I had the time (and this would be a low priority), I'd probably even write out some of the pertinent journal entries as the NPC to add some flavour.

Again, we have the assumption that without world building you force railroads, AND, now we have the assumption that the setting cannot possibly be consistent, that the setting is completely dependent on the whim of the DM at the time. Sorry, doesn't follow.

I'm going with this part of your quote here (emphasis mine):

...you can run campaign after campaign, drastically changing setting, without doing any more work.

Now, I'll admit I am being a bit facetious here; my example is certainly an extreme one, but it is meant to illustrate how not paying heed to worldbuilding can lead to inconsistency. As far as the definition in the DMG is concerned, part of the point of worldbuilding is to ensure consistency. AFAIC, if you are ensuring your setting is consistent, then you are doing some worldbuilding.

Because wasting the entire table's time on insignificant setting trivia is a good thing? Let me ask this, how many players, without meta game knowledge, would ask if there were any marriageable daughters around Sasserine? Part of prepping the adventure would be anticipating reasonable questions.

How is anything I suggested there insignificant setting trivia? I don't see how making the setting seem real is trivial-in fact it is the very definition of verisimilitude and the point I am driving at. Now if the group of players consider talking to NPCs a waste of time then I'd say it would be a bad idea to give the NPCs personality and character. But then again, I doubt I could play in that environment for long.

Or, he could have realized that splitting up the party so that one player could hog lots of air time was pointless and since the scenes in the town were pretty much all exposition, he wanted to get to the action before Ted went to sleep.

So the party must always act in unison otherwise time is being wasted? If the players are interested in the town how is it simply exposition? And who said the cleric was looking to "hog lots of air time"? If the DM had done some worldbuilding beforehand, he could have handled a lot of what came up (since he isn't gifted at improv). I'm talking stuff like:

-A quick map of the world. A brief note on the major nations and where the core races fit in. This could be done in a page (two if you count the map itself).
-A more detailed map of the area where most of his adventures are going to be taking place. Assuming he is using unrelated adventures and not an AP, this will ensure consistency and allow him to know what possible ways the PCs might go to get where they need to be.
-A few details of the town they start in beyond what level of cleric it has and the max sell price for magic items. What is the chief industry of the town? Let's say it has orchards. When the PC cleric asks about the agricultural challenges of the town, the NPC could say a) Not much, the apple harvest (or whatever) looks good this year. b) Not so great; we're having a lot of trouble with giant beetles. Either answer is just fine and both provide depth to the setting. The second can even be an adventure hook the party could look into. What influence does the only church have on the town? This could dictate how the NPC reacts to the PC cleric. If they are the only religion in town because they chase out all others, then he will be defensive towards the PC. If not, then he might be glad to have another nature-oriented priest around.

Again, this is depth. Is it required for a dungeon crawl? Nope. Like I've said depends on what your group wants to do.

Of course, this assumes that there was anything in the forest. How is this different than RC's assertion that good adventure design should kow tow to the players? If the players expect to find adventure around every hill, why bother making more than three hills?

Well, it was my assumption that the adventure had encounters in the forest. My bad for not making that clear up front.

Can world building add depth? Of course it can. I would be an idiot to say that Forgotten Realms doesn't have depth. Good grief, it has so much depth it has its own gravity well. But, at the end of the day, who cares? Most of it is irrelevant. Square windows and all that.

Well my point of my post was to explain what I meant by "depth" in the context of D&D and how it relates to worldbuilding. If you don't value depth then it doesn't really matter then does it? But again, that is matter of taste and the subjective definition of "fun". I could have fun playing tiddly winks but that speaks nothing to the point of depth. Frankly, at the end of the day, *I* care about depth (although I'm not really a FR fan for other reasons). And that isn't any less valid than someone who doesn't and is looking to kill and take stuff. "Irrelevant" is dependent on your objectives and I wouldn't go tossing it around as a universal truth.

 

[nethervoid]

I didn't read the whole thread, so this has got to be a restate, but I HAD to say:

Tolkien must be a total idiot.

 

[Hussar]

Originally Posted by Hussar
...you can run campaign after campaign, drastically changing setting, without doing any more work.


Now, I'll admit I am being a bit facetious here; my example is certainly an extreme one, but it is meant to illustrate how not paying heed to worldbuilding can lead to inconsistency. As far as the definition in the DMG is concerned, part of the point of worldbuilding is to ensure consistency. AFAIC, if you are ensuring your setting is consistent, then you are doing some worldbuilding.

Note, I did say campaign, not adventure. Campaign, at least I think, is defined as more than a single adventure. The setting can be drastically changed between campaigns, but, within a given campaign, that's just bad. A long ways back I mentioned that if you turn left into the throne room in chapter 2, you should turn left again in chapter 4.

However, as soon as play begins, the players have an absolute right to have their characters attempt whatever they want. If they want to experience travel, the DM shouldn't simply shift scenes to avoid it, nor should the DM tell them they can't talk to NPCs because he hasn't got a clue what's going on in his world.

And, of course, you should take your players into account when designing adventures as well. That's just good sense. Designing a campaign of nothing but dungeon crawls when your players hate dungeon crawls is bad. World building or not isn't going to help here.

As far as letting the players do world building - hey, if it floats their boat, why not? I'm talking about the DM allocating his resources better. Letting someone else do the work sounds good to me.

Ok, y'know what, if you something done half assed, you should do it yourself. Take a look at what I'm trying to do over there. I don't know if it will pan out. It may very well not. But, I'm going to give it a shot.

 

[Darth Shoju]

Note, I did say campaign, not adventure. Campaign, at least I think, is defined as more than a single adventure. The setting can be drastically changed between campaigns, but, within a given campaign, that's just bad. A long ways back I mentioned that if you turn left into the throne room in chapter 2, you should turn left again in chapter 4.

I guess I kinda had it in my head that you were using the same characters in different campaigns or setting them in the same setting. Upon reflection, I guess each campaign would likely have different characters so changing the setting won't be a real issue, since the implication is that it is a different world from campaign to campaign (particularly since the world isn't really that fleshed out in this archetype). It makes more sense to me now.

But I still stand by my point.