Quote from: Marleycat;946243. . . I'm with Black Vulmea on this. Sorry but stupid is stupid.

It's not so much that it's stupid, mmmmmmCat, so much as it's the kind of detail which adds nothing to playing the campaign. It reminds me of the shit that asshole Silverlion posts, which means it's time to trot out my reply to him again.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;720787I think the problem is you ask for feedback and when it's not what you expect you believe others are at fault.

Want an example of what I'm talking about? Read the bill of fare for the Inn of the Welcome Wench in The Village of Hommlet. If I start my campaign with nothing but the village of Hommlet, I know that there's a place called Keoland which exports reasonably priced brandy and wine. That could mean the quality is merely middling, or it's simply closer and therefore less expensive to ship - most likely it's some combination of the two. I get a sense that the vintners of Urnst enjoy some natural advantages over the Keoish, and that the two are probably trade competitors. I'm also pretty sure that Veluna is someplace special, because their wine is in demand enough to be found in a small country inn at a price few locals could ever hope to pay.

I can build a region from a wine list, a wine list that is something with which the adventurers can interact from the first time we sit down to play.

I didn't need to detail Keoland, or how it came to be called Keoland, or what it was called a thousand years before it was called Keoland, or what the terrain of Keoland was like ten thousand years before that and then a hundred thousand years before that, in order to plant the seeds - grape vines, actually - of a place called Keoland in the minds of the players.

My bullshit detector works really well, and it tells me the difference between 'stuff that matters to the players' and 'stuff that's primarily written for me.' My first order of business as referee is create stuff that matters to the players, and that means understanding what they are likely to want to do.

You know why Traveller UWPs work so well? Because they answer the questions player want to know first: can I fuel my starship? will the air kill me? can I pack heat? what kinds of gear are available?

Right now there's a not a gawdamn'd thing in your campaign notes that makes me the least bit curious about where you're going with this. If your goal is to create a campaign setting that excites the imagination, you couldn't be further from it. If you want to know how to draw me into your setting, give me The Hobbit, not the appendices to The Silmarillion.

BCT offers up more of the same Silmarilion-lite masturbatory background detail as Silverlion does.

This came up in our campaign last weekend. Since my characters are in Dodge for a little while, we adapted the adventure "Shootout in Dodge City" from Gunslingers: Wild West Action! to Boot Hill. The adventure began with my characters and his npc hands questioned by the town marshal, then moments later the marshal was gunned down on the streets outside the saloon. The constable and a local judge then asked my characters to form a posse, we rode out after the malefactors, and ambushed them in their camp. The father of the killer then came after us back in Dodge City leading to a shootout in the middle of town.

I was struck by how easy it was to ambush the killers and then the father. In the case of the killers (who are called rustlers, though rustling never enters into the adventure), my posse approached out of the sunrise from the east, crept up a ridge, and had the camp under our guns before they ever knew we were there. The lookout was on a far hill and never saw us coming until a ball from Pancho's buffalo rifle killed him at a range of over a quarter-mile. Once we got back to town, I went all Rio Bravo, circulating the story that the killer was wounded but alive in jail so I could use him as leverage with the father - try to take the jail and your son may get himself shot in the crossfire. I expected a night attack on the jail, so we strategically placed lanterns and rigged a couple of deadfalls to channel them where I wanted them. Instead the father and his gunmen rode straight up Front Street at high noon, right into the posse's kill zone. It was a turkey shoot. - in two rounds five of the gunfighters were dead, two, including the father, were wounded and unconscious and one escaped, ridin' hell-bent for leather out of Dodge.

Now we'd just come off a couple of epic battles, a gunfight between the Pinkertons and family of rustlers back in El Dorado County and my characters' fight against Comanche raiders during the cattle drive. In the former, the rustlers were former Confederate soldiers and the battle took place in an arroyo flanked by rocky hillsides - there was a rattlesnake den, mine shafts, and the ever-present threat of a flash flood. In the latter, the battle was at night, so sighting range was limited. One of my characters came as close to dying as he has since the start of the campaign, getting shot twice and taking an arrow through the shoulder, while killing seven Comanches with a knife in one hand and a pistol in the other, sneaking from one patch of brush or rock to another, shootin' and scootin' to avoid being swarmed.

After these gunfights, the Gunslingers adventure seemed incredibly tame, and when I asked the referee about it, he said he played it straight as it was written and handed me the pages of the adventure. I shit you not, there were three fucking pages of backstory on the feud between the marshal and the badman, stretching all the way back to Ireland decades earlier, and just four gawddamn paragraphs for the ultimate fight of the adventure. People paid real money for this abortion of irrelevant writing.

I refuse to use the word hate to describe anything related to as trivial a topic as roleplaying games, but masturbatory 'world-building' and illusionism get pretty fucking close.

See, I don't think you read my stuff any more than Marleycat did, but that's a blind criticism of it I can actually respect and make use of.   I already know I tend to dig far too deep into the weeds of my setting building, and often at my own table I see huge amounts of my stuff being useless, while things I need to present to teh players is... not there.

My problem is that I can't just say there are reasonably priced wines from Keoland... I, as a setting builder, have to KNOW where Keoland is and all the stuff that goes into it. As a reader I can usually see when an Author has just slapped a name/fact on the table without effort, and I've see all too often what happens when they are forced to build around details that they just slapped down without thinking.


Conversely, I can see the opposite effect currently going on in Star Wars, where they've been putting monumental amounts of effort into what amounts to insane levels of foreshadowing and, functionally, world building... so much so that they can't seem to get a good story going for the very flagship movie of their own lineup.

OF course, this topic might be better explored in a seperate thread.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;946349I refuse to use the word hate to describe anything related to as trivial a topic as roleplaying games, but masturbatory 'world-building' and illusionism get pretty fucking close.

You're probably already familar with it but this seemed like a good time to link to M. John Harrison's piece on excessive 'worldbuilding' but it seems to have been taken down. It was in reference to fiction but applied nearly as well to RPGs too.

Quote from: Spike;946370See, I don't think you read my stuff any more than Marleycat did. . .

You wrote stuff?

I don't pay [strike]much[/strike] any attention to the D[esign] & D[evelopment] forum so it's nothing personal.

Quote from: Spike;946370I already know I tend to dig far too deep into the weeds of my setting building, and often at my own table I see huge amounts of my stuff being useless. . .

That's a shame, but it's not really a problem so much as it's a waste of time.

Quote from: Spike;946370. . . while things I need to present to teh players is... not there.

That, however, is an absolute critical failure.

Quote from: Spike;946370My problem is that I can't just say there are reasonably priced wines from Keoland... I, as a setting builder, have to KNOW where Keoland is and all the stuff that goes into it.

You can if you change how you prep.

Quote from: Spike;946370As a reader I can usually see when an Author has just slapped a name/fact on the table without effort, and I've see all too often what happens when they are forced to build around details that they just slapped down without thinking.

Yes, we've all seen the effect of that, yet the wine list example is rich with setting detail, not just names "slapped down without thinking."

Quote from: Voros;946377. . . [T]his seemed like a good time to link to M. John Harrison's piece on excessive 'worldbuilding' but it seems to have been taken down.

Your Google-fu is weak.

Whatever you need to keep your setting coherency at the forefront of your mind when improvising content at the table!

Stuff like, "elves believe they actually came from trees!" is useful cosmology because it directly impacts campaign prep AND at-table improvisation. Whose dress blew everyone's mind during last century's premiere gala... unlikely as much. (But holy hell, if it did, can I get an invite at your table?! Love you, Killer GM!)

So, unless the content is somehow table playable -- for either the players or the GM -- it slips into the other delightful RPG tangential hobby, world building. And well, if you're not careful it can get into navel gazing.

For example, if I wanted racial cosmology & alignment to take a forefront in my campaign, I could take 9-point alignment, assign a race to each besides human, and say all non-human races come gradually from adhering to X alignment while proximity to Y condition (near magic/mana sources, away from human civilization, using metal, etc.). After too much exposure the transformed human eventually leaves for company of its new kind forever, trapped and breeding more inflexible, warped mutants. Now players must engage this new cosmology (& alignment) of my setting in order to play in my campaign, because it is built into their day-to-day concerns. (If they still don't want to, knowing that such setting conceits will effect their PC regardless their opinion, good to know, get off my table, you are wasting both our time, go have fun elsewhere.)

Quote from: Black Vulmea;946452You wrote stuff?

I don't pay [strike]much[/strike] any attention to the D[esign] & D[evelopment] forum so it's nothing personal.

I referenced it in my first post in the thread.  Its not a terribly big deal, and I do get a bit embarrassed to keep flogging it, seeing as its a project from.... what full decade ago now?  

QuoteThat's a shame, but it's not really a problem so much as it's a waste of time.

That, however, is an absolute critical failure.

Eh, this is why I suggested a separate thread, since we've sort of moved away from demihumans into the process of building backgrounds.  The very first session I ran in that setting had my players leaving the major city I'd set up, with a modestly complex backstory to join a pepper caravan that they stumbled across in the marketplace, because it looked so very colorful. If I hadn't worked out those particular details of international trade in my exploration of the weeds... or for that matter the cultures that lay along the major river that they traveled for must of the journey... the campaign might not have gone nearly so well. First and only travelogue campaign I think I've ever run.  

QuoteYou can if you change how you prep.

Prep is weird for me. Building, or learning in rare cases, a setting so I can riff and improvise pretty much IS my prep work. I have never, not since the bad old days of learning the ropes, given players a singular quest they must perform 'for the sake of the world!', so a lot of my learning to GM was learning how to lay out possibilities for players without limiting them. Put me in a situation, a setting, as a player with no quest and I'm in hog heaven. I'll create the adventure all on my own, and I give my players the same opportunities... but again: I had to learn how to give them quest like options so they could get started, as it turns out most people aren't like me, and won't... maybe can't... leap into a setting and situation and just start DOING.  

QuoteYes, we've all seen the effect of that, yet the wine list example is rich with setting detail, not just names "slapped down without thinking."

Maybe.  I doubt any of the places named in the wine list (Seriously: Sometimes i feel like the only gamer never to have played or ran Homlet) were well detailed, they were just names given to wines. That can work, especially if the guy expanding the setting remembers that he named some wines, and keeps that in mind when he details the setting, but if he doesn't you later find out that Keoland is a desert country that has a religious sect that abhors alcohol and only exports giant-scorpion carapaces or some such.  Or its on a dark and mysterious continent that no one from 'setting continent' even knows exists, much less has trade with... and sure, the existance of said wine could be used humorously to spin a wild tale of mysterious mystic wine merchants... it's most likely to just be one of those 'oops moments' that so often crops up when settings expand after they've been written/published.

Hardly the worst, admittedly. That's a minor goof that not even super-diehard geeks would normally catch.

I think sometimes its good to establish early on in a campaign wether or not cross compatibility with races exists or not. Not necessarily the WHY. But that it exists in the campaign and any known ones.

Example: Half orcs are well know in the area. But no one local has ever seen or heard of a Half elf. And no ones even aware that Stout Halflings are descended from halfling/dwarf pairings while Tallfellow Halflings are from some halfling/elf union in the past.

Quote from: Opaopajr;946467So, unless the content is somehow table playable -- for either the players or the GM -- it slips into the other delightful RPG tangential hobby, world building. And well, if you're not careful it can get into navel gazing.

I'm always going around with myself about such things. Writing classes and animation classes and graphic novel classes all stressed worldbuilding to some extent... long lists of details to consider that will make your creation 'live'. But most of the time it feels more like sucking the life out of the thing... leaving a dull grey husk.
Same as a reader/player. Give me small bits of information and I'll fill in the blanks with questions and imaginings... but spell it all out for me and my mind will wander somewhere, anywhere, else.

I've got half a dozen explanations of 'goblins' in my fantasy settings (the ones that have them) and I try to keep them all equally true/false. Same for how magic works and who/what the 'gods' are.

My world is based on Earth.

Humans = cro magnons. Orcs = Neanderthals, Elves = Homo Erectus (or rather, a more evolved form of them). Since they are all on the same branch, so tp speak, they are all compatible with each other

OTOH, goblins are like evolved versions of Chimps, Hobgoblins are Gorillas, Bugbears Orangutangs.  So they aren't compatible, being on different branches.

(The trouble with gods creating humans and elves and dwarves and so forth is that they really probably wouldn't. At best they'd create a base form and have it adapt and evolve. But you'd have to be a very silly god to create a human, much less a dwarf or gnome)

Quote from: Simlasa;946523I'm always going around with myself about such things. Writing classes and animation classes and graphic novel classes all stressed worldbuilding to some extent... long lists of details to consider that will make your creation 'live'. But most of the time it feels more like sucking the life out of the thing... leaving a dull grey husk.
Same as a reader/player. Give me small bits of information and I'll fill in the blanks with questions and imaginings... but spell it all out for me and my mind will wander somewhere, anywhere, else.

I've got half a dozen explanations of 'goblins' in my fantasy settings (the ones that have them) and I try to keep them all equally true/false. Same for how magic works and who/what the 'gods' are.

There's something to be said for mystery, isn't there? Well, it's what inspired humans for generations to go, "what's over there?", "how does that work?", "why does it do that?", & "where did it come from?" There is a reason for that grey pablum distaste -- it has no appliable reference in reality.

Even in world building, I think Logical Unifying Theory Uber Alles is the wrong approach. Nothing's that "logical" and devoid of mystery, especially our only reference point Planet Earth & Sol System. Abstract models presuming omniscience is the proper tone, but rarely the proper structure. The world's too big for comprehension, let alone "perfectly logical & objective consistency."

I like to think of such world-divorced pursuits as a sterile pipe dream. Things need to be messier, like life.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;946452Your Google-fu is weak.

Thanks. I always liked the Elvish mythology in The Complete Book of Elves and the GAZ for Shadow Elves. Course nerds get mad about the OP kits in the Complete but that's their own fault for not having the spine to just exclude something if they find it OP.

Quote from: Spike;946511I doubt any of the places named in the wine list (Seriously: Sometimes i feel like the only gamer never to have played or ran Homlet) were well detailed, they were just names given to wines. That can work, especially if the guy expanding the setting remembers that he named some wines, and keeps that in mind when he details the setting, but if he doesn't you later find out that Keoland is a desert country that has a religious sect that abhors alcohol and only exports giant-scorpion carapaces or some such.  Or its on a dark and mysterious continent that no one from 'setting continent' even knows exists, much less has trade with...

This wine list is actually a bad example as Keoland, Veluna, and Urnst are countries that are detailed in the World of Greyhawk Folio, published 1980, one year after The Village of Hommlet. Both products were written by Gary Gygax. We can assume that Gary had the details of his long-played campaign setting firmly in his head when he wrote Hommlet for publication.
So this could be an example for excessive world building that turned out so well that Gary was able to give setting info via a wine list - info that a casual DM might be oblivious to but a Killer DM could use to great effect.

That said, I am more on Vulmea's side in this argument. Give me playable info, no backstory that doesn't help me bringing the setting to life or that players will never be able to learn.

Off topic still. But I think setting info can be useful to a DM for getting a feel of an area. Even if its never used. It might spark ideas.
But excessive setting info can end up with anything interesting lost in the sea of data. Kingdom or area histories can be useful too in the same way. Especially in fantasy settings where events of the past can very easily trigger events in the present in some way. Ancient rivalries reach a boiling point. Whatever brought a kingdom to ruin has re-awoken. etc.

Back on topic. The Dwarven+Elven union in Thunder Rift example noted previously. The killers were never brought to justice. And elves and dwarves have long lifespans.

Quote from: Omega;946588Off topic still. But I think setting info can be useful to a DM for getting a feel of an area. Even if its never used. It might spark ideas.

My view is that for the referee if the detail develops the motivations and personalities of NPCs then it useful at the table. Note motivations and personalities, setting detail work better if it shown through how NPCs act not telling in a big o' infodump.

But like all such advice sometimes the infodump is what needed. However in my experiences that is few and far between.

Where i strongly disagree with Black Vulmea and others is that setting detail is always bad. I believe the general issue is that RPG authors don't do enough to show how does a particular detail impact play.

Historical context and world detail doesn't matter.

Horseshit.

Anything that can provide insight into someone's motivation matters.  If you don't know your enemy's WHY, you're just flailing in the dark.