The process of creating a complete, coherent and convincing world to set an RPG in.
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0answers
71 views
Designing unique architectures [closed]
A robust, design-rich setting should call for unique design elements - and architectural styles are a subset of these.
This "subset of design elements" may seem a bit too specific; still, there is a ...
10
votes
8answers
326 views
How do you make a new NPC likable?
The players in my campaign will soon rescue a woman who's been trapped in an awful dimension (think Jumanji, if that helps) for ten years, and bring her home. After 2 sessions, they'll realize that ...
2
votes
0answers
63 views
Effect of natural environment on the development of cultures [closed]
Let there be this quantitative question: how do the specifics of a natural environment influence the development of a newborn culture?
Please note: I'm not looking for any deus ex machinas, divine ...
2
votes
2answers
95 views
What resources should I use to create a mod for d20 Modern?
This is a tangent off of my question about Looking for a Space marine RPG similar to Starship Troopers (the Novel) where there were some good suggestions about systems to use or modify to meet my ...
14
votes
6answers
332 views
How to make players care about a community
I've built a lot of villages, some towns and a city or two but I've failed to bring them to life and make the PCs feel like they belong there (maybe not much belong but to just make them care about ...
0
votes
1answer
167 views
Why does the ghost of a small peasant girl haunt the castle? [closed]
There's your typical fantasy or medieval castle, complete with some lord or lady owning it, his or her castellan to deal with the daily business needs while they are busy doing their lordly and ...
4
votes
2answers
176 views
Evolving a region from war torn to merchant hub
Currently in my planning for my campaign I have a desert region that would make for a great way to travel, except tribes of Monkeys are at war. One side quest I have planned out has the players end ...
4
votes
4answers
228 views
Can we add trains in 3.5 without breaking Economy/World
Question upfront: Is there a way I can add Trains to the world without “messing up” the world or its' economies?
Reason:
1st: Mainly, it makes no sense to me that with all the resources available ...
9
votes
3answers
255 views
What setting changes need to be addressed in order to convert Golarion to the E6 variant system?
For those who are confused what E6 is, please go here: E6: The Game Inside D&D
I will be running an E6 game in Golarion in a few weeks. Two main assumptions I have made in the E6 version I am ...
40
votes
6answers
571 views
What are the key considerations to creating compelling environments?
An area I am close to revealing to my players was barren rock, until I realised adding a few kinds of plants and some crystal spires (which have very good reason to be there) took the location from ...
19
votes
3answers
327 views
How do you customise swearing to a setting?
Good fantasy books often have 'custom' swearing, and they help provide a more realistic view of the world the campaign takes place in. For instance, in a book where metals are key to magic, a common ...
8
votes
2answers
198 views
Fantasy accent and dialect, or how do I speak like Tom Hanks in Cloud Atlas?
For example, inhabitants of Planescape setting say things like "chant" for news or gossip, "berk" or "cutter" for a kind of adventurer, "barmy" for crazy, etc.
I want to portray a guy from a far away ...
5
votes
5answers
240 views
In depth world building. Making connections [closed]
I was reading an article (I lost the page due to Internet failure and don't have the link) on world building and it was talking about in depth world building, the article begins by talking about ...
18
votes
4answers
307 views
Giving a setting a feeling of ancientness
I'm creating a world for my next game and I want it to feel like a very ancient world with multiple fallen empires and wars in it's history. I want to build a very detailed setting and have my players ...
17
votes
7answers
526 views
How do significantly differing male and female lifespans change my setting?
I am currently creating a dryad-themed fantasy setting and want it to feature a matriarchal society. My patriarchal-raised brain (needlessly) needs a reason for why this is so, and so I have created ...
6
votes
4answers
433 views
Looking for a nice magic system to convert to FATE
I'm playing around a lot with the FATE system at the moment (particularly with Diaspora) and I'm now looking at how I might apply it to a fantasy setting. What I'm looking for is a nice magic system ...
14
votes
9answers
968 views
How to have a realistic set of languages without making adventuring prohibitively difficult?
"Do you speak Common?" "Of course I do! Everyone speaks Common..."
My group is starting a somewhat experimental campaign. We're using a setting that is neither canon (e.g. described in a book) nor ...
15
votes
11answers
897 views
How do you keep the party on the map?
I'm running a fairly sandbox game, where the party can wander around easily from place to place. When the party visits areas I've prepared something for, they generally have a good time. When they ...
13
votes
2answers
253 views
City Services Generation
I'm looking for a way to determine typical numbers of services that would be available for a medieval city/town/village based on population which I can then project into a fantasy setting. (System is ...
12
votes
10answers
602 views
Flat or flattish earth issues
What major effects would having a flat or rather flattish earth instead of a planet on a game world? (Technological, social, physical etc.)
Mind you, I'm not looking for fully detailed scientific ...
2
votes
4answers
278 views
How would society adjust if use of fire is reserved for the elite?
This is an extraction of one of the central questions arising from my original (overly broad) question.
In a society where the use of fire has been restricted, due to religious indoctrination, to the ...
4
votes
1answer
207 views
How can I represent the use of fire being misrepresented in a campaign?
This is an extraction of one of the central questions arising from my original (overly broad) question.
I would like to know how to best represent the concept that there is a god who is, through a ...
8
votes
2answers
206 views
How to make rituals a part of everyday life
I would like to know how to make it clear that little, non-magical rituals such as a blessing before eating, drawing water, harvesting grain, starting a fire and the like are a part of everyday life, ...
4
votes
2answers
233 views
Looking for help on expanding my campaign concept while avoiding railroading
I have split this into two more specific questions:
How can I represent the use of fire being misrepresented in a campaign? and How to make rituals a part of everyday life.
Below is the broad-strokes ...
10
votes
6answers
855 views
Fantasy economy: how to design a deep, sophisticated crafting system?
I want to construct an immersive, complex and functional fantasy economy in order to inform my world-building process. I'm interested in finding a working economic model and applying that into ...
12
votes
5answers
487 views
Dark Ages/Middle Ages marriage age?
I am trying to keep a fair degree of verisimilitude in my fantasy games (outside the obviously fantastical elements like magic and dragons). As part of that, the normal/average marriage age for ...
5
votes
4answers
245 views
World Development - A Fresh Start
If this is not the place for this type of question, redirect me - I am new here, and apologize in advance.
So. My group is looking for something new. Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 in my own setting is our ...
4
votes
1answer
136 views
How to adapt a 3e community-building system for a larger-scale use in a 4e game?
This question is a follow up to Point buy/structured system for cooperative 4e campaign building?.
I've found a system that is quite close to what we want/need, but there's a catch: it's for 3e and ...
5
votes
2answers
241 views
Point buy/structured system for cooperative 4e campaign building?
Our group is currently building a campaign world (one nation per player) for the Pillars of the State campaign (as suggested in the DMG2 somewhere around page 170).
Today we encountered the "problem" ...
6
votes
3answers
152 views
Is there a game that places a similar amount of emphasis on the creation of worlds by player characters as the Myst series?
A major part of the premise of the Myst series is that a number of characters in the setting can 'write' worlds (mostly ones you could walk across in a few minutes). The gameplay of the series is ...
7
votes
4answers
231 views
How do I get my dresden files players involved in city creation?
I've tried to involve my players in city creation a few times through the course of the game, usually whenever they are about to finish up a story arc, but I usually all I get are just get a few ...
33
votes
7answers
1k views
Pre-modern farming: What percent of the population is in agriculture?
I'm running a premodern setting where the characters will be involved in local administration. Assuming no magic, how many farmers does it take to support one non-farmer? Any statistics/estimates ...
6
votes
1answer
322 views
Stats for a Sorcerer King in 4E's Dark Sun?
I am in the middle of building a campaign and part of it takes place in the Athas. I am wanting to present the party with an actual threat towards the end of their stay in the hellacious world of Dark ...
23
votes
7answers
857 views
Has anyone produced a drop-in well-reasoned economy for a fantasy game?
I've seen so many attempts to justify this or that crazy thing in various fantasy RPG economies, but they don't tend to hold water as far as I've seen. I realize that suspension of disbelief is ...
8
votes
4answers
461 views
List of (small northern US town) occupations?
Let's say I'd like to run a campaign inspired by David Lynch's Twin Peaks, and would like to learn a bit about the everyday life of such towns outside what's been presented on the show - as a first ...
12
votes
6answers
373 views
Regional Resource Management and Trade Rules
I've been looking at TSR's old Birthright setting lately, searching for an easy way to quantify trade between political entities. I'm thinking about ways for a city or region or planet to develop ...
12
votes
7answers
351 views
Looking for resource material for a dream world
I have started working on a world that is set in a dream realm. I am using it to create one-off gaming sessions that I can do in a single day and pull in any characters that are currently being used. ...
12
votes
3answers
2k views
Does anyone have any templates for Scrivener?
I want to start using Scrivener to plan a game and am looking for some templates for characters, locations, encounters, etc.
8
votes
2answers
306 views
Resources containing practical, yet non-combat, non-adventuring D&D spells
Continuing the train of thoughts emerging from the discussion of this previous question (about magocracies and theocracies in DnD), I'd like to know if there are any good official or unofficial ...
13
votes
14answers
520 views
Magocracies and theocracies in Dnd?
Anyone has (links to) well thought-out, logical explanations for why magocracies and theocracies are not the dominant governmental forms of DnD worlds? I'd also be really interested in similarly deep ...
11
votes
5answers
350 views
I want to design and write a setting book. Where do I start?
I want to design and write a professional quality setting book for FATE 3.0, with the possibility of adding custom mechanics later and turning it into a full on game of it's own. I have the outline of ...
32
votes
14answers
988 views
How can GMs make their game worlds more inclusive?
Many published roleplaying settings reflect our own cultural biases, for example, by putting white people in the "core" of the setting with "exotic" (i.e., not white) cultures around the less-detailed ...
