Fantasy Worldbuilding

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Jinumon

I've always been a big fan of the sandbox-style campaign, and so I'm loathe to start the game before I have the majority of the world at least mostly thought out.

Actually for the purpose of sandbox game the important thing is is to thoroughly develop the actual field of play. The grand scope of time and space only matters if the player characters are equipped and willing to operate on that scale. It is more important to populate and furnish what is within the boundaries of your sand box than it is to generate the whole school yard...so to speak.

Authenticity is a big point for me, and so I do want to borrow plenty from historical examples for what is and isn't feasible. Often, in fantasy literature, you here about civilizations that have been around for thousands of years, and yet their technology is still in the middle ages.

Something which of course accurately describes 15th century China. As far as they were concerned they had been around for 3000 years and yet their technology was "still" basically in the middle ages. Now of course 3000 years ago their technology wasn't in the middle ages and they went through many dynasties and several conquests and fragmentations in that time frame but still, as far they were concerned "China" had been around for some 3000 years.

They'll occasionally offer an explanation like, "the existence of magic makes the importance of technology less of an issue, hence a slower progression," but I feel like the ambition of non-mages would drive them to create technology to even the playing field.

Or you know, just learn their own magic and become mages.