GMs -- Don't we all want to roll our own?

Mr_Sandman · 06-04-2009, 10:05 AM

When I first started playing and GMing, no one I knew really thought much about "settings" or "worlds." D&D was played in a series of dungeons and towns, in a vague default D&D setting. Traveller was played in a random series of GM made up planets in a vague Traveller setting. Villains and Vigilantes was played in our home town, but our characters had superpowers.

So at the start, I never purchased setting materials and the only prepared dungeon I ever bought was "Dark Tower." Most of the games I've run in a commercial "setting" are those where the game itself is tied to a particular setting: James Bond 007, Paranoia, 2300 AD. I also ran a fairly "off the shelf" GURPS Mage the Ascension campaign.

I've also run and played many games in completely homemade worlds, or worlds adapted from books.

What I have found to be the advantage of a published setting isn't that you don't have to build your own world, that part is fun. It is that is is easier to achieve that "common frame of reference." It is much less work to get players to read a relatively attractive, comprehensive, professionally written and edited book that describes the world they will be playing in -- especially if it has new skills, powers, equipment and other toys and fun concepts that they can use to create their characters, than it is to compile my scattered notes and ideas into a comprehensible document and then persuade players that they have to wade through all my intricately thought out setting concepts before they can sit down and have fun playing.

The alternative is to just give a quick verbal description of your world, tell player what they can and can't do when making a character, and dole out setting information as it comes up in play. That works against a really immersive world though, since players wouldn't know many basic things that their characters would, for example, tribesmen only drive their flocks into town in the rainy season, or technology malfunctions around wizards, unless you tell them when it comes up.

So to sum up, I like making up My own completely original world, but getting players immersed in it takes more work that way. If someone comes up with a really cool idea for a setting, I'm open to paying a little to use it, as a means to get a shortcut to player immersion and common knowledge base. This could be either through buying published setting, or using a setting that all the players are already familiar with -- from novels, TV, movies, or history.

06-04-2009, 10:05 AM	#11
Mr_Sandman Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: L.I., NY	Re: GMs -- Don't we all want to roll our own? When I first started playing and GMing, no one I knew really thought much about "settings" or "worlds." D&D was played in a series of dungeons and towns, in a vague default D&D setting. Traveller was played in a random series of GM made up planets in a vague Traveller setting. Villains and Vigilantes was played in our home town, but our characters had superpowers. So at the start, I never purchased setting materials and the only prepared dungeon I ever bought was "Dark Tower." Most of the games I've run in a commercial "setting" are those where the game itself is tied to a particular setting: James Bond 007, Paranoia, 2300 AD. I also ran a fairly "off the shelf" GURPS Mage the Ascension campaign. I've also run and played many games in completely homemade worlds, or worlds adapted from books. What I have found to be the advantage of a published setting isn't that you don't have to build your own world, that part is fun. It is that is is easier to achieve that "common frame of reference." It is much less work to get players to read a relatively attractive, comprehensive, professionally written and edited book that describes the world they will be playing in -- especially if it has new skills, powers, equipment and other toys and fun concepts that they can use to create their characters, than it is to compile my scattered notes and ideas into a comprehensible document and then persuade players that they have to wade through all my intricately thought out setting concepts before they can sit down and have fun playing. The alternative is to just give a quick verbal description of your world, tell player what they can and can't do when making a character, and dole out setting information as it comes up in play. That works against a really immersive world though, since players wouldn't know many basic things that their characters would, for example, tribesmen only drive their flocks into town in the rainy season, or technology malfunctions around wizards, unless you tell them when it comes up. So to sum up, I like making up My own completely original world, but getting players immersed in it takes more work that way. If someone comes up with a really cool idea for a setting, I'm open to paying a little to use it, as a means to get a shortcut to player immersion and common knowledge base. This could be either through buying published setting, or using a setting that all the players are already familiar with -- from novels, TV, movies, or history.