halomachine said:
Lets pretend for a minute that you didn't have your own homebrew world.....that you wanted a world to set games in without the need to come up with everything yourself? What does this world need to have in order for it to be usuable by you "out of the box"?
Post you suggestions, requiremnents, and "must have" items for a world....What does a campaign world need!??
Primarily a
raison d'etre. If there's nothing different about this world, then I'm going to play Greyhawk (or whatever).
Detailed maps - these don't have to cover the entire world. In fact it is sometimes preferable that they do not so that I can place something else where I want it. It is extremely helpful to have maps for terrain, elevation, wind and ocean currents, climate, major roads, etc.. Only the terrain and elevation ones need to be large, though; the rest can be smaller maps with less detail. It is also beneficial to come up with some population number and list every town, city, etc. that exceeds that population threshold in the world. That way a DM can quickly tell where he needs to fill things in. It's alright to place additional cities that are below this threshold if they are important. All of this is important for a DM to quickly determine what type of area the adventure is in and what kind of conditions are prevalent.
History - If elves and orcs dislike each other, please make sure we know why. A fight between pantheons does not count. A timeline is a must and should be very detailed for the last 100 years (maybe an entry every year or two), detailed for the next 500 (every 10 years, perhaps), somewhat detailed for the next 2,000 (every 50 years or so), and vague beyond that (important events only; maybe 100-1,000 years as you go farther back).
Organizations - there should be many organizations. Some should be for players, some for villains, some for NPCs. Some should be world spanning (but not all important; you cannot, I repeat you cannot base the entire world around the conflict with a single group), while others should be specific to a very small region. The smaller the organization, the more likely it should receive a prestige class (see below).
Goods - major trade goods, where they come from, where they go to. Many adventures can be inspired by trade routes.
Races - where do the races fit in the campaign. Where are their lands, what are their cultures, who do they like, who do they war with, what do other races think of them, what do they produce as far as global economics is concerned, etc. You do NOT need to tweak the core races (ruleswise). It's alright to do so, but it is wholly unneccessary to define a world. Try to include as many of the core races as possible and add as few new races as possible.
Classes - adding a full (non-prestige) class or two might be a good idea. Removing a core class is probably not, unless you replace it with something very similar (in which case you might as well just tweak the core class). Keep down on the prestige classes (half a dozen AT MOST). Only ones necessary to support subcultures or organizations. If a prestige class is designed for a particular new race, think about incorporating the class defining features into the race, and skip the new class.
Feats - none. Worlds do not need feats. At all. There may be important exceptions, but there had better be a good reason. Putting them in complicates the game, and makes the world harder to use. They rarely add flavor.
Skills - go over the skills and see if there is any skill that might apply in a special way to the world. A desert world, for example, might have some additional rules for using Search to find water, or something like that (bad example, but...).
Magic - how is is viewed, how common is it, how is it utilized. If adding new spells or magic items they should have historical context, be very important to how a culture operates, or be extraordinarily cool (way cooler than anything every seen in a Wizards book). Artifacts are something to pay special attention to, but many should see larger write-ups in the history section than the magic section.
...just some ideas...
!
. Actually this question is very difficult. A setting has to click with me, somehow, and this is not easy to predict. Dark Sun clicked with me. However, my homebrew is not like Dark Sun.
