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Anonymous
How to introduce players to your homebrew setting. 2017-04-16 09:19:48 Post No. 52731769
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How to introduce players to your homebrew setting. 2017-04-16 09:19:48 Post No. 52731769
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How to introduce players to your homebrew setting.
Anonymous
2017-04-16 09:19:48
Post No. 52731769
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I love creating home-brew settings full of rich lore and lots of backstory, history and interesting cultures, and judging by the number of world building threads we have and /tg/ created settings, I imagine many anons here enjoy world building as well.
However, I players very often aren't interested or don't have the time to read through all of the lore of the worlds you create and so very often you have to introduce the world to them through their characters. This can create complications when the character should be familiar with the setting but the player is not. How does one introduce the players to the setting without causing this disconnect.
currently I am creating a setting for GURPS at a Bronze Age tech level, with feuding city states and a powerful monastic order, all under threat from an expansionist empire who sacrifice conquered peoples to their Sun God so that he does not swallow the world. The gods of the setting are also quite active with numerous petty gods demanding prayers for their services, such as speeding your way along a road, or giving you a full harvest.
How should I go about introducing the players to this setting in a manner natural for their characters?
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>>52731769
Two words: prologue fiction. Also give them some time for Q&A.
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>>52731791
Not entirely certain what you mean by prologue fiction.
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I just do It. I just play the game like It's fucking nothing. Should anything make the concerned, explain. If they have no idea what now or close to do something dumb, explain the context, suggest choices.
Just make them explore the world as they go.
Never drop info dumps on them, just vaguely explain what and how and only include details that really matter.
It ain't rocket science. Look at any movie or video game. You don't need like a majority of the universe's lore to enjoy It.
The whole lore thing is mostly for people that are already hooked on the setting. Shame that a lot of your ideas will never see any exposition but this is not what them ttrpgs are about.
Consider writing a book
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>>52731936
Sounds like some fiction that is a prologue...
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>>52731769
Write up a few paragraphs of basic info for the immediate area your players will be adventuring through.
Use the "fish out of water" scenario with the PC's (they are all strangers to this land or otherwise have some reason to be unfamiliar with the day-to-day of the area) so you have an excuse to wax the exposition a little bit.This way the Players and PC learn about your setting at the same time.
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>>52731769
Show them a world map and a regional map of where they start.
Have an overview paragraph almost like the one you posted, and a bullet list of deities. If someone is a priest, they get a short paragraph about their deity. Answer any questions, then start your game.
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>>52731769
Give them a few basic infos, help them make characters that fit, and then show them the world during the game.
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One anon did his game a wholesome favor by writing excerpts from in-universe books and putting them in a doc file. He told his players any info they read could be used in-character and it would be assumed that their character read it during downtime.
Two of his four players got really into it and could be like "i know what that is!" and he'd watch them interpet his setting to the other players who didn't read it
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