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<blockquote data-quote="Bedrockgames" data-source="post: 7411918" data-attributes="member: 85555">I think we might be conceiving world building differently in that case. To me the setting bloat, particularly the stuff you had in the 90s, seemed more a byproduct of a focus on storytelling than world building. The classic stuff had lots of world building (and you can look at a line like Harn which has a lot of that brevity and still creates a pretty deep world). I don't think world building is about filling books with multi-page entries for each place. In fact, a lot of those multipage style entries are long because of how they are written (the info can often be boiled down to much shorter entries). Still, in general I take a don't throw the baby out with the bathwater approach. I think there is still a lot the 90s stuff did well, and am glad it's available. For example, setting material might have been wordy, but there is a lot of cool seating stuff to be found. And with certain kinds of books, the wordiness isn't as much of an issue as others. I think it is mainly when the books are meant to be used during play that you run into issues. An approach focused on brevity is very good for fast deployment at the table. On the other hand, I drew countless hours of play and inspiration from longer form books like the Van Richten Guidebooks. So personally, I kind of like how things are presently, where both options are available to me as a GM.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Bedrockgames, post: 7411918, member: 85555"] I think we might be conceiving world building differently in that case. To me the setting bloat, particularly the stuff you had in the 90s, seemed more a byproduct of a focus on storytelling than world building. The classic stuff had lots of world building (and you can look at a line like Harn which has a lot of that brevity and still creates a pretty deep world). I don't think world building is about filling books with multi-page entries for each place. In fact, a lot of those multipage style entries are long because of how they are written (the info can often be boiled down to much shorter entries). Still, in general I take a don't throw the baby out with the bathwater approach. I think there is still a lot the 90s stuff did well, and am glad it's available. For example, setting material might have been wordy, but there is a lot of cool seating stuff to be found. And with certain kinds of books, the wordiness isn't as much of an issue as others. I think it is mainly when the books are meant to be used during play that you run into issues. An approach focused on brevity is very good for fast deployment at the table. On the other hand, I drew countless hours of play and inspiration from longer form books like the Van Richten Guidebooks. So personally, I kind of like how things are presently, where both options are available to me as a GM. [/QUOTE]

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