Why Worldbuilding is Bad

[Abisashi]

Peter Hamilton is a current SF author who has a penchant for lavish, detailed worlds. I find the depth with which he relays his setting as a pure pleasure. If feel more involved with the setting, and knowing the setting better frames the action in my mind.

I just looked up Hamilton on Wikipedia, and, after reading the synopsis of Fallen Dragon, ordered it on Amazon. Thanks for the recomendation (intentional or not)!

 

[The Shaman]

It seems to me that Paizo's adventure paths serve as a large nail in the coffin of the argument that "the world building matters", because they're so easily ported from FR to Eberron to GH. That should tell you something very important about how redundant most worldbuilding is, and about the amount of effort required to write just the adventure components of a fully fleshed out campaign.

Uh, sorry, but no - this ignores the fact that all bog-standard D&D games begin with quite a catalog of shared assumptions, which gives adventure portability home-field advantage.

My 3.0 setting did not have dragons. How easily would "Age of Worms" drop into my game?

World-building may be used to expand upon a setting (i.e., my aforementioned star system detailing), or it may be used to create something that deviates from some to many of the core assumptions inherent in the default setting details.

 

[The Shaman]

Worldbuilding as an end in it's own right is fine and fun, but I don't think it should be given the title of game prep except in a wishful thinking sense.

I disagree.

Going back to my Traveller example, working out the details of the star systems inspired literally dozens of ideas for challenges that I didn't have before I started. Building the worlds helped me to visualize what the players might encounter and why, which translates directly into the experience of playing the game.

 

[rounser]

My 3.0 setting did not have dragons. How easily would "Age of Worms" drop into my game?

This is exactly the cart-before-the-horse traditional way of doing things, IMO. It's my view that thinking this way is back to front, that the adventure needs should be finalised first (or at least conceived of roughly in advance), and the setting created to suit those needs.

Adventure should trump setting if running a good D&D campaign is your objective, IMO, because plainly adventure is simply much more important to gameplay than setting. I know that this attitude is heresy for a lot of those engaged in this thread, but it makes a lot more sense than the traditional approach of setting uber alles.

 

[rounser]

Going back to my Traveller example, working out the details of the star systems inspired literally dozens of ideas for challenges that I didn't have before I started. Building the worlds helped me to visualize what the players might encounter and why, which translates directly into the experience of playing the game.

It also straitjackets the types of adventures that can take place. If you put the question "what adventures do I want to run in this campaign" first and foremost, and brainstorm, you should have a heap of cool ideas that you otherwise wouldn't even consider because they don't fit the setting you've arbitrarily decided to use. For example, you might come up with:

Gladiatorial games where the monsters escape and run amok
Egyptianesque necropolis full of undead
Dolmen gate network used by shadow druids
A flying citadel of avariel bandits

...but you may not even consider these ideas in the "campaign world first" approach because your world doesn't have cultures with gladiators nor egyptianesque undead, nor avariel or dolmens scattered around the countryside for the shadow druids. Or at least, not all in the same area. You could make a decision to make the campaign world flexible, and put them all in the same area, but it's no longer serving much of a purpose if you have to break it's themes to run the adventures you'd like.

Notice also, that the adventures have inspired the campaign world, perhaps moreso than if you'd done it the other way around, so the converse of your defense of the "worldbuild first, shoehorn in adventures second" approach is also valid.

 

[Abisashi]

It also straitjackets the types of adventures that can take place. If you put the question "what adventures do I want to run in this campaign" first and foremost, and brainstorm, you should have a heap of cool ideas that you otherwise wouldn't even consider because they don't fit the setting you've arbitrarily decided to use.

This assumes that he will be more creative if he has no restrictions. My understanding is that the opposite is true - restriction breeds creativity.

Edit: If necessary, he can always go back and modify the setting a bit if his setup leads him to an idea that doesn't quite fit.

 

[rounser]

This assumes that he will be more creative if he has no restrictions. My understanding is that the opposite is true - restriction breeds creativity.

That sword cuts both ways. If your setting is restricted by the needs of the adventures, then maybe you'll get a better setting in the end because it'll be more creative because it's restricted by adventure needs, as well it should be.

Setting is just the board that the game is played on, it shouldn't define what the game is. It's as ridiculous as building stage props, and then going "hmm, what script will fit with these props I've come up with" instead of custom building the props you actually need, as the script calls for them. And with the "adventures first" approach, you get a lot more control over the campaign arc, because you're not slaved to merely what is possible within the arbitrary parameters defined by worldbuilding.

 

[Abisashi]

That sword cuts both ways. If your setting is restricted by the needs of the adventures, then maybe you'll get a better setting in the end because it'll be more creative because it's restricted by adventure needs, as well it should be.

You certainly could - but if the primary goal is to have cool adventures, this isn't that exciting.

Setting is just the board that the game is played on, it shouldn't define what the game is. It's as ridiculous as building stage props, and then going "hmm, what script will fit with these props I've come up with" instead of custom building the props you actually need, as the script calls for them.

I disagree that that would be ridiculous - I think you might come up with unique ideas that you wouldn't normally think of.

And with the "adventures first" approach, you get a lot more control over the campaign arc, because you're not slaved to merely what is possible within the arbitrary parameters defined by worldbuilding.

Most worldbuilding still leaves a lot of room for adventure design, and again, the arbitrary parameters may create much more interesting adventures than you would normally come up with.

Certainly, one could create an overly-constrained world, but that doesn't mean worldbuilding is always bad. The same goes for being completely inflexible or bludgeoning the players over the head with the setting.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

That sword cuts both ways. If your setting is restricted by the needs of the adventures, then maybe you'll get a better setting in the end because it'll be more creative because it's restricted by adventure needs, as well it should be.

Setting is just the board that the game is played on, it shouldn't define what the game is. It's as ridiculous as building stage props, and then going "hmm, what script will fit with these props I've come up with" instead of custom building the props you actually need, as the script calls for them. And with the "adventures first" approach, you get a lot more control over the campaign arc, because you're not slaved to merely what is possible within the arbitrary parameters defined by worldbuilding.

The approach you're advocating is entirely too much work. I'd like to build my setting once and then use it for a whole bunch of adventures. Building a world for every adventure is impractical, and changing the setting for every adventure damages verisimilitude. Besides, as someone already stated, restrictions encourage creativity. Given a setting, I can come up with all sorts of adventures that I would never have thought of without the context of a given setting. So what if some ideas I have don't fit the setting? Good adventure ideas are cheap: you can come up with dozens in just a few minutes.

 

[rounser]

You certainly could - but if the primary goal is to have cool adventures, this isn't that exciting.

You guys are the ones enamored with setting. I'll go with the freewheeling, serve up what the adventures need setting over your straitjacket any day.

I think you might come up with unique ideas that you wouldn't normally think of.

No, you'd normally think of them because your way is the traditional way. By throwing off the shackles of setting you'd come up with "unique ideas you wouldn't normally think of", because you'd otherwise be only framing ideas in terms of the setting. As usual.

The approach you're advocating is entirely too much work. I'd like to build my setting once and then use it for a whole bunch of adventures. Building a world for every adventure is impractical, and changing the setting for every adventure damages verisimilitude.

Then you're doing entirely too much worldbuilding than is needed to support a D&D campaign; refer to earlier in this thread.

As far as work goes, an entire campaign's worth of adventures, written up, should dwarf the setting notes required. If it's the other way around for you, I suspect that your priorities perhaps need to be reviewed.

Besides, as someone already stated, restrictions encourage creativity.

This is an argument from last resort; I've stated already that it goes nowhere, because the converse is also true - a setting restricted by adventure needs will be embiggened by your logic, and I know how much importance you guys place on setting.

Good adventure ideas are cheap: you can come up with dozens in just a few minutes.

Ideas in general are cheap; it's the following through that counts, and it's much harder to write a good adventure than good setting material. I could also say that setting ideas are cheap. Why is your world so precious to you? You don't "play" a world, you "play" an adventure and a campaign arc. Why are your priorities set that way? I suspect the answer is, "because worldbuilding is fun" and "because that's the way it's always been done".