Post/Author/DateTime	Post
filmus 03-19-07, 08:22 PM	One of the biggest problems I've run into in running a fantasy campaign, is that it is almost impossible to find a published world that all of my players really like. Almost always, we'd loose a player or two because of this "world fatigue" in any campaign we ran. To remedy this, over a number of years, my local group devised a collaborative game for building our campaign worlds. We spent the first evening of the campaign playing god (within a set of rules) and formed the game world from scratch. The turn-by-turn process we used always produced a world with unique and elaborate geography, history, races, and leaders. This approach also ensured that every player knew the world, and was really interested in it. Following a game convention about two years ago, one of the group members asked me to write up the rules so he could share it. I did, and the rules can be found at this link: Dawn of Worlds. (http://www.clanwebsite.org/games/rpg/Dawn_of_Worlds_game_1_0Final.pdf) Since I went to the trouble of writing this stuff down, I'd love to hear any opinions on how it works for other people.
whdr02 03-20-07, 01:04 PM	This seems like a nice little plan you have, I need to try it out now:plotting:
imake13 03-20-07, 06:24 PM	i'm very excited to try this with my group thanks so much. I'll let you know how it goes.
Cyanide300 03-20-07, 09:52 PM	This is an excellent idea. I just wish more of my players had the creative interest to do it.
filmus 03-21-07, 09:31 PM	"This is an excellent idea. I just wish more of my players had the creative interest to do it. " One of the ways I've seen creative interest develop is by letting the players know that the spells/equipment/races/classes available to them will be governed by the world they create. "Sure, if you want, you can play a spider-riding cannibal halfling ... if they exist."* Also, often players will create fabulous artifacts, spells, or places of power that they eventually want their own characters to have. These adventures write themselves. *Strangest thing I've seen so far. Players just couldn't resist meddling with the humble halflings. Can anyone top it?
77IM 03-22-07, 11:16 AM	I discovered Dawn of Worlds about two months ago and fell in love with it. This thing is awesome and I can't wait to try it out. I really like the three Ages, and the simple conflict system. I also like the idea of keeping a log of history -- this could become a real artifact within the world! I do have a great number of suggestions (to the point where I have begun making my own Table of Powers). My general high-level meta-suggestion is that certain powers are a bit too vaguely defined for my taste; it could mostly be solved with some clarification and reorganization. 1. I think the Conflict check should consider more than just technology: it should consider any abstract "Factor" that could influence the outcome. 2. The text is very ambiguous about what exactly an Event can do. My personal solution to this, was that in general an Event can introduce a Factor that can later influence Conflict outcomes (or remove an existing Factor). It can also destroy something, if you pay the creation cost of that thing (similar to how you have to pay the creation cost of a city to raze it during military Conflicts). Under this scheme, certain other powers become just specific types of Events. 3. I think it would be nice if Conflicts encompassed more than just military. I've come up with additional categories of economic, cultural, and espionage/subversion. (I had a number of other categories, like internal, magical, technological, and survival, but most of those are better handled as Factors for the real conflicts.) In general, the outcome of a Conflict is the same as an Event: it can introduce or eliminate a Factor, or destroy something if you pay the creation cost of that thing. Whenever there's a Conflict, before the check is made, you need to determine what the outcomes will be depending on who wins the check. 4. It's very unclear to me what the difference between Event and Catastrophe is supposed to be -- is Catastrophe just bad? It's way more expensive. So, I just eliminated Catastrophe. Instead, destroying something would just be a possible outcome of an Event. 5. I'd like a better distinction between which actions represent divine intervention vs. which represent the mortal creatures doing things under their own power. For example, Advance Civilization: does this mean the gods just gift a civilization with some technology, or does it mean the gods tell the civilization "Why don't you research for a while," and they come up with the technology on their own? Same with things like Create Order. Clearly, things like changing the landscape are divine in nature and when you Command City the mortals have to do all the hard work, but there are some powers that are in-between. My solution was to categorize powers as Natural Changes, Events, Social Changes, and Commands. Certain powers would be available in multiple categories but with different pricing. For example, developing a new technology could be done via an Event or a Command. In the 2nd Age, Event would be cheaper, but in the 3rd Age, Command would be cheaper. For some reason I'm not really happy with that breakdown either and am still thinking about it. In particular, I would want the cost of a change to be based on the effect it has rather than the method it takes, so that people can select whichever method (divine or mundane) seems more fun at the time. I'm still thinking about this. 6. Speaking of Purify/Corrupt Civilization, I'm not sure what this means. I replaced these with a more generic "Change Cultural Values" power, a subtype of both Event and Command. 7. I don't quite get Command Avatar. It looks as though the only real benefit is that you can do certain actions twice in one turn -- is that really all that useful? The pricing of this is unclear to me -- do I pay the cost for commanding the avatar (which is cheap) in addition to the regular cost for the power the avatar is exercising? That would make the second action more expensive. But if I'm not paying that cost, then the second action is super cheap. I think it makes more sense if an avatar is simply another vector for commands similar to an order. The difference would be that avatars are easier to destroy, but easier to recreate as well. I think having avatars is a lot of fun so I would want them to be "balanced" against orders. 8. I added and reorganized some powers. For example Advance Civilization is now Develop New Technology, and Purify/Corrupt is now Change Cultural Values. I also added Create Creature, which is very cheap and is for creating non-intelligent plants and animals, and Create Break-Away Civilization, which is cheaper than creating a civilization from scratch (and is very much cheaper in the 3rd Age). However, I haven't playtested any of these new powers yet. It's possible that the pricing is way off, or that they will prove to be useless. I'm itching to give Dawn of Worlds a try and might be able to persuade my group to create a world in a couple of weeks (we are going to take a break from our regular campaign, a modern-era espionage game where all the secret agents have super powers). Despite my copious suggestions above, my inclination is to try playing Dawn Of World exactly as written first, to see which of my concerns are well-founded and which of my suggestions make sense. If I can convince the others to go along, I will let you know how it turns out. -- 77IM
filmus 03-23-07, 07:52 PM	Facinating stuff, I'll see if I can respond to it all: 1. The conflict resolution should indeed consider factors other than technology. When we play it, we tend to think of technology broadly, inclusive of everything from clever tactics and fortified cities to advanced magic to adamantium arrowheads. Of course, the hope is that the appropriate winner of a conflict will be obvious, and no math will be required. When math is required, players should be encouraged to suggest consideration of any factor they can think of which would influence the result. 2 and 4. Event can do just about anything, that was the idea. I've seen it used for the creation of artifacts, the shifting of rivers, the discovery of mithril veins and so on. Event is a bit cheaper than Catastrophe, because Events tend to require a bit more creativity. This should be encouraged. (This is the same reason why players who continuously spend points get more points than inactive ones. If you contribute, you are rewarded. This is also one of the few places in the system where it can be easier create than to destroy.) Also, Catastrophe should be required if anyone wants to totally remove something from the world. Events should not do this. 3. See above, conflicts should be resolved mostly by concurrence. But I've seen this problem myself... 5. We intentionally avoided harsh distinctions between overt divine intervention and mortal action. The theory here was twofold. First, in most worlds (incuding our own), the existence, alignment, and power of any given "god" is subject to considerable debate by mere mortals. We kept this in for realism. Second, while the players often elect to take on the role of specific gods in creating the world, they are not required to do so. Thus, they are not bound to specific alignments or personality traits, and can change course at a whim. This tends to produce a more realistic and varied world, and helps them avoid thinking about cities, races, or civilizations as "mine" or "yours." One way to look at this is to presume that the gods, whoever they are, work through material means to accomplish purposes incomprehensible to mortal minds. Only the wisest can even guess at which events are natural, and which were encouraged from the outside. Your solution for revising the costs over the ages seems like a good idea. Tailor this to your players as required. The focus of the game should shift from geography to race to politics as each age progresses. Sadly, you've probably noticed how inexact the science of point values can be. If your revised point breakdown works well, please tell me! 6. Purify / Corrupt is designed to move the average alignment of a civilization (and its inhabitants) one step toward good or evil. (And it should be slightly cheaper to go evil than good.) The traditional spectrum in [A]D&D placed Lawful Good on one end, and Chaotic Evil on the other. 7. Command Avatar allows the avatar-based actions do be completed for only the cost of commanding the Avatar. It also allows certain actions to be done twice in one turn. Perhaps most importantly though, Avatars have a cool factor second to none, and are the only way to introduce specific personalities into the creation process. What world would be complete without its great kings, villains, heroes and demons? 8. The power revisions you describe are probably more suitable to your group. (I can't help but sense a little moral relativism in the changing of "Purify/Corrupt" into "Change Cultural Values.") I'd watch out for "create creature" though. Often, players are reluctant to spend points on "boring" things like mountains, rivers, and forests. Inconsequential creatures may suffer the same problem. Please post the details of your results, and give us a description of the players' involved. Personality can have a big impact, particularly in the unfortunate case where one player decides he's going to "win." The best players are those who are as willing to annihilate a city they themselves created as they would be to annihilate one made by some other player, provided it makes for a good storyline.
Kadasbrass 03-23-07, 10:14 PM	All other attemps at creating a joint campaign have failed with my group. The end result is some bland world that has nothing unique from existing settings already except for a few names. I'm hoping this system will work out since it allows people to conflict over areas instead of people just voting for what they want in a setting. I plan on adding an extra age in the beginning when I give it a try. This first age is for detailing the early coastline. Will divide the map like a pie chart and in turn order each player will define the coast line in their section (have to connect with the coastline in other sections) and can add islands if they want. Players are allowed to alter the land on their side in the following turns after seeing what other people do. This age end when every player agrees to end it but for each round after the first the number of people required to end the age is reduced by one untill the age automatically ends after a number of rounds equal to the players present. After this age players are allowed to alter the terrain across the board as normal. I also am cosidering adding in an age for dividing nonalignment domains in the PHB between the different gods/players to give it a early sense of conflict between the gods. Hoping that the person that takes destruction and death has more interest in destorying/corrupting existing creations instead of creating new ones. Also use this phase to define the alignments of the deities, but if 9 or less players make sure the alignments don't repeat. Thou if I get three players I would just go with one deity to represent collective good aspects of the world instead of being any single alignment, with one to represent collective neutral/nature and one for evil (trying to simplify alignments by ditching traditional law vs chaos aspects). Thou if I get five players will try to go with TN, LG, CG, CE, LE players instead.
Araes 03-24-07, 05:44 PM	Well, first off I find it interesting that the Lords of Creation thread folks apparently came to the same general idea of world creation independently, but with relatively similar rules. Speaks to a general worth of the concept as a whole. It would actually be interesting to try modifying this ruleset for something along the lines of a forum boardgame. Probably would just require setting the points per turn as a flat rate ( maybe 10 or so ) but with the optional +1 to +3 for activity bonus. 2. On the topic of Events, they really do seem like they could do with a rewording, as its kind of vague what's actually going on in that section. The way its currently written it almost comes across as the Events being random things that just sweep through the world and that you're just paying the price to set something uncontrolled in motion. A helpful table of suggestions and a bit more clarity on its use would be quite helpful. 5. For the most part I agree that the outcome of an action is really all that matters, and not whether a god physically did it or just influenced others to work for them. Its nice as a bit of fluff on the side, but its pretty much something a player could just grandstand as they were taking part in the process. 6. I'm confused on this selection in a couple ways. In the text, it seems implied that races can start anywhere in alignment and then get moved around by players who want to tweak them up or down. However, in your explanation it sounds like you intended for them to all start off neutral and then move. (Also don't agree that evil should have any reduction in cost) The other problem was that you talk about a frequency spectrum for alignment, but I'm not sure how you're envisioning it in your head. Does it go: LG - NG - CG - LN - NN - CN - LE - NE - CE ? or is it an axis with GE in one direction and LN in another direction? The main difference being in the number of points it takes to shift from one place to another. 7. The avatars seem broken powerful and subject to abuse. Admittedly, this could probably be houseruled, but it would be nice to have it in the main text. One, there doesn't appear to be a limit on avatars. As it sits, the cheapest way to make races is to make an avatar and then have him make a race. And then have that avatar stick with a race and make cities and orders focused on them. With a lucky roll, I could have a race in the first turn and be doing all the events of Age II and III in Age I. And if there aren't any noted limits on avatar numbers, then I would make two or three so I could be doing tons of cheap stuff every turn. This of course notes that I'm being a powergamer, but most of that type of stuff should be much harder to do. I'm much more in favor of 77IM's suggestion that the avatar be a way for you to get two of the same action per turn, but at a slightly higher cost. This way its prohibitive and useless to have more than one avatar, and they can still do neat things. Also, at the very least, on the (ONCE) race founding ability, I would suggest that this be something that slays the avatar, so there is at least some tradeoff. 8. I like the idea of Create Creature, as its a way for the players to make sure they have some of their favorite badies to fight. As a person creating the world, I can definitely see myself using it, particularly if it wasn't too expensive in the beginning. Other ideas. I like Kadasbrass' extensions of the concepts and think that an interesting way to lay this out might be to follow something vaguely Genesis-like in your creation process. First, create the light and the firmament - this could be a section where you can define the cosmology of your world. How many planes are there? How are they organized? How many gods are there? How are they related? Is your world flat or spherical, or some other crazy shape? Is there one sun, two, some other form of night and day? Moons? Stars? Second, seperate the land and the water - create the outline in steps until the entire grid is filled. My suggestion would be to use a gridded approach with the implicit assumption that players must connect up pieces of dangling shoreline or create self contained areas ( islands, areas of ocean with no land ) Third, follow your basic approach to create the land dwelling terrain, plants, creatures, ect.. Also, in parallel, possibly allow for the creation of similar things in the water squares. "Unda tha sea, unda tha sea, darling its better, down where its wetta..."
filmus 03-24-07, 09:47 PM	On the subject of racial alignement, we usually have the creator of the race determine starting alignment. My explanation was probably tainted by the fact that my own players often create reasonably neutral races, and then shift them about as the world develops. On the alignment "spectrum," we usually don't think of it in a linear way. Rather, count any one step change, from Lawful to Neutral to Chaotic, or from Good to Neutral to Evil. Thus, to go from LG to CE would require four steps: LG > NG > CG > CN > CE. The Avatar's issue has come up before (and, like event, probably needs to be re-worded.) The use of an avatar to create a race is supposed to be a one shot deal, per player. In actual play, however, each player directing multiple avatars is usually a good thing. First, each avatar is a vital personality in the history of the world. These iconic folks are really important to making an interesting storyline. Second, each player is likely to create multiple races, and multiple avatars, all moving around and doing different things in different parts of the world. Things get complex and expensive, point wise, very quickly. Imagine 5 players, each one creates 3 races, each race creates 5 cities and two 2 orders. That results in 105 different situations where an avatar might do something. Life gets even more interesting if you have two different players directing avatars in the same city, civilization, or race at the same time. Finally, avatars (at least mortal ones) tend to die of old age after a few turns, so it becomes necessary to create new ones.
Araes 03-25-07, 04:02 PM	Alright, more on the issue of avatars. If that's the way that you intend the game to play out, then that's fine. However, it seems like that's really the only logical way to play the game if you have a set of people who are all relatively conversant with the rules. With the current point distribution, in all cases the avatar is the logical choice to do every action that has a choice between avatar and direct divine activation. This is particularly pronounced early on in the game, where you can subvert a lot of the intended game steps with clever avatar use. Also, it is unclear what the difference is between creating an immortal and mortal avatar and as far as I can tell, nowhere is it listed that avatars would die of old age. I had actually assumed they were more like traditional avatars where they just exist throughout all time. On the alignment, I think that that is probably the best way to handle it in general. I like being able to assign whatever alignment I want for a race on creation, and I like being able to shift axis independently. Another issue is the size of the map. In the text you say "a large sheet of paper" which is a fairly vague relation. But then in most action and event areas you talk about certain inch increments. The latter seems highly specific for an undefined overall size. Speaking of the maps and my prior comment about designing the world, one interesting way to do this might be to use an online whiteboard to allow everyone to draw as they saw fit. This one by GE is pretty damn cool http://www.imaginationcubed.com/LaunchPage
filmus 03-26-07, 09:26 PM	I suspect some revision is in order in the explanation of what avatars are, and how they should be understood. (I didn't know there were 'traditional" avatars.) Under the DOW rules, though, avatars can be mortal, immortal, or anything in-between, depending on what the player creating that avatar wants. Avatars do not necessarily have supernatural powers, and are rarely "gods incarnate." Rather, they are supposed to be important historic figures. This includes mortals like Achilles, Beowulf, King Arthur, or Hitler*, just as much as it includes dragons, elves, or other immortal critters. Certainly, if one has a choice between using an avatar and using direct divine action, the avatar will be cheaper. Again, this is by design, but there are certain logical limitations. If I create Hercules the avatar, and place him in Athens, he can't raise an army in Alexandria. (Remember, Avatars must be physically present where the directions are given.) Also, a given Avatar can only perform ONE immortal action per turn. Thus, in order to do *everything* with an avatar, one would need an avatar present at every point on the map. Map size can vary, but so can the number of turns per age. Depending on their median attention spans, players will tend spend as many points and turns as necessary to fill the map with interesting stuff. A good rule of thumb might be, if your players have shorter attention spans, use 8.5 x 11. If they can handle a longer game, go 11x14 or more. I've used as much as 4 square feet before, and had good success. Admittedly, as you note, the system expects the players to be conversant with the rules. It also leaves a lot of stuff very open ended. Perhaps the biggest reason for this approach is that the players, when handed absolute power, tend to exercise the kind of self-restrain that no set of closely defined rules could produce. Instead of trying to dominate the game, they tend to focus on creating a good world. Sure, they COULD wipe out every other civilization on the map, buy why would they do that? Once the campaign starts, they have to live in this world they've made. (If you still anticipate problems, tell your players at the outset that, when the campaign starts, that each of them must play a character from a race that someone else created.) *Appologies to Godwin.
INeedNoSalt 03-26-07, 11:48 PM	I've yet to read the entirety of the pdf, but I did read this far: Soon, each player will be playing god. Usually players do not take on the role of a particular god, but this can make for a fun variant. We're not using any rules (well, we are: Rule 1: Don't be a dick, Rule 2: Remember the goal), but a group of us over on the Penny-Arcade forums are doing exactly that, in play-by-post format.
filmus 03-28-07, 09:57 PM	I've yet to read the entirety of the pdf, but I did read this far: Soon, each player will be playing god. Usually players do not take on the role of a particular god, but this can make for a fun variant. We're not using any rules (well, we are: Rule 1: Don't be a dick, Rule 2: Remember the goal), but a group of us over on the Penny-Arcade forums are doing exactly that, in play-by-post format. I've seen several a few attempts to play Dawn of Worlds online in a play-by-post format. The most common problem seemed to stem from players wandering off between turns and never coming back. Up to now, I thought that this happened because the worlds they created were not usually intended for a later campaign setting - they were just an exercise, but reading your post I have a new theory. Maybe the Dawn of Worlds rules are too detailed for use in a a play-by-post setting? You have only two rules, I'd like to know how that works out. Would more be better or worse?
INeedNoSalt 03-28-07, 11:30 PM	I've seen several a few attempts to play Dawn of Worlds online in a play-by-post format. The most common problem seemed to stem from players wandering off between turns and never coming back. Up to now, I thought that this happened because the worlds they created were not usually intended for a later campaign setting - they were just an exercise, but reading your post I have a new theory. Maybe the Dawn of Worlds rules are too detailed for use in a a play-by-post setting? You have only two rules, I'd like to know how that works out. Would more be better or worse? Well, like I said; we're not using a system, it's a pretty free-form thing. The first time around (this is our second shot), we had a lot of trouble with people showing up, staking out a role and whatnot, and then just never showing up again. We're not using turns or anything, thusly, although we do have a series of 'rounds' that we're moving through; the first round involving Moving Of Godly Cheese, basically building the world, the second round being built around the rise of mortal civilizations, the third round will be based around 'myths', basically covering really heroic things on civilization-wide scale. The fourth round will be focused on legend, things like the Odyssey, the story of Hercules, and so on. The fifth round isn't really a round; that'll be the point where the world is, ideally, fleshed out enough that it's playable. We're using a direct, in-character approach to it, working from the ground up, less-so than an indirect populating of a world (like the examples given in the DoW pdf.) Things have been moving along well enough, although I suspect that there are people involved who are only looking it as a chance to RP as a deity and ignoring the end-goal entirely. So, I personally don't have any experience using your system, but what I read didn't sound unreasonable. While we toyed with the idea of rules for our game this time around, I think the conclusion we came to was that limitting gods was, on the whole, kind of a dumb thing to do, that you should be able to trust other players to play maturely.
filmus 03-31-07, 11:25 AM	I agree with your comments about limiting the deities (or authors, or whatever the players view themselves as). A man's imagination has to be pretty unfettered to create a world from nothing. As for the use of a collaborative system on-line, I wonder if it would be possible to invent a process whereby players that drop out can be seamlessly replaced by new ones that wander in. Has anyone ever tried this with success?
77IM 04-03-07, 10:21 AM	For play-by-post, this could work as an asynchronous game. E.g., each turn is 48 hours. At the beginning of the turn, everybody gets 7 points (or more, if they begin the turn with few points). However, nobody needs to wait until somebody else's turn to play -- everybody just goes at once. This way, if somebody wanders off, it doesn't stall the rest of the group -- and if they wander back a few days later, they may have accumulated a fair number of points. (A per-turn spending limit might be required, or maybe people who have too many points accumulated start getting less than 7 each turn, to a minimum of 0.) If two people post contradictory things at the same exact time, only the first one goes through (the second one gets retracted and that guy gets his points back). To keep things sane, each post could only contain a single action -- doing multiple things would require multiple posts (that way, if there is a concurrency issue, only one post will need to be stricken). Finally, there would need to be some DM-type keeping track of how many points every body has and keeping an eye out for post inconsistencies. This person (or their delegate) could update a map once every 48 hours and post the new map in the thread. -- 77IM
tankschmidt 04-03-07, 12:19 PM	You wrote Dawn of Worlds? Let me extend a long overdue thank you! I am running a campaign in a world that my group created with those rules. We have all kinds of crazy stuff happening: two separate races of humans, 4 distinct races of elves (including one that rides to battle atop giant eagles), dwarves, hobbits, a race of winged men, sentient gun-toting robot armies, elephant men and mammoth men, a race of kracken and their lizard man allies, angels who live on a floating (in air) island and ride dragons, and fallen angels. Each of us played as at least one god, and each god had a "pet" civilization whom he advanced. We created a detailed history over the course of three gaming sessions. The best part is that I can start a campaign at any point in that history, and my players know what is going on. On the subject of racial alignement, we usually have the creator of the race determine starting alignment. My explanation was probably tainted by the fact that my own players often create reasonably neutral races, and then shift them about as the world develops. On the alignment "spectrum," we usually don't think of it in a linear way. Rather, count any one step change, from Lawful to Neutral to Chaotic, or from Good to Neutral to Evil. Thus, to go from LG to CE would require four steps: LG > NG > CG > CN > CE. We simplified the alignment system, and just called everything good, neutral, or evil, so if a deity sanctified a place to "good," you couldn't really make it more "good." Map size can vary, but so can the number of turns per age. We used your recommendation for number of turns, and then voted to move to the next age. For map size, we went with 17 x 11 inches. Finally, avatars (at least mortal ones) tend to die of old age after a few turns, so it becomes necessary to create new ones. I don't think any of our avatars died, except when someone dropped a mountain on them via catastrophe. And as per your advice, we tried not to completely erase any civilization. One of ours -- the peaceful arctic elves -- was scatter by black elf invasion early in the Second Age, and another -- the winged men -- was completely wiped out at the beginning of the Third Age. The only problem we had was one player who began playing competetively towards the end, but the rest of us managed to keep his armies in line. It set up a good theme for conflict by the time I was ready to write the campaign. If you'd like to hear any more about the campaign -- maps, etc. -- let me know. It's the least I can do to thank you for writing such a great system.
filmus 04-06-07, 07:12 PM	Tank, I'd like to know more, particularly about the players that were involved, their styles, and the kinds of things they did. I suspect, based on what I've heard so far from people who try the system, that one can generate a set of common "types" of players, and perhaps develop some alternative rule tweaks to accommodating them.
tankschmidt 04-09-07, 03:46 PM	As I am trying to organize a response to you, I am realizing the difficulty in separating events in the history of this world. The fact is that everything is intertwined, and that's really neat. Player 1 played a god known as "The One," a truly neutral being. His avatar was a simple human in a robe, "The Wanderer," who wandered throughout the other gods' civilizations, playing them against each other and taking pieces of them to build an order devoted to neutrality. Since this player is a big LOTR fan, The Wanderer led the Gold Elves away from the ruins of the pacifist Winter Elf civilization (which was crushed by the Black Elves) to found a great wooded city on a hill. The Golden Elven city of Iv eventually became a mecca of learning and culture in the world, even as the golden elf race sank into decadence. Pretty standard fantasy stuff, huh? Player 2 played two gods, an evil sea deity, and another neutral being with a ying-yang nature. The "Ying-yang" god had two avatars who fought eternally against each other, eventually creating a deep chasm from the island of their people to the mainland. From this chasm awoke a civilization of Kraken, which would plague the seas for a long time. Eventually conquering the pirates another player created. Player 2 reads a lot of Conan books, and wanted an asian influence in the campaign. Eventually, his warlike "ying-yang" race conquered several corners of the world and connected its holdings with a network of permanent magical portals. By the end of the game, this (rather competetive) player was looking to take over the world. Player 3 reads a lot of diverse fantasy, and he created a nation of winged men called the Eloi (I'm not familiar with the reference), who achieved great things in the fields of music and theatre. They were eventually conquered by the "ying-yang" people. As a separate god, this player created a race of dwarves to fight of the "ying-yang's", and yet another god created a race of primitive elephant men in the jungles. Player 4 is a huge LOTR fan, and made the hidden city of Gondolyn, inhabited by white elves who ride eagles to battle. Their avatar was a giant eagle. This player also created a volcanic and mountainous landscape, home to the black elves, who worshipped a Balor as an avatar. The Black elves tempted several of player 5's angels to fall and join their evil armies. They also constructed the Black Forge, which could make the strongest weapons and armors in the world. Player 5 came only on the last day and created a race of dragon-riding angels on an airborne floating island above the seas. When several of his people were tempted to fall, he launched a war against the black elves, and was joined by the white elves, the elephant men, the dwarves, and my human race. But the alliance could not penetrate the walls of the black elves' homeland. This player is one of those old-school Dungeons and Dragons since the late 1970's guys and is probably the most serious player we have. He's very good with rules. As DM, I had in mind what I wanted coming into this game, so I created an Eberron-esque society of humans with robots, guns, airships, and all that kind of stuff. Another player hit me with a catastrophe, in which the robots revolted, and several hundred years had to be spent putting down the uprising. Since I was DMing in this world, I made it clear that I was going to cheat on my dice rolls pretty early on in the game. This spawned our house rule that a player would gain a minimum of seven points per turn. I hope my long-winded, unorganized rambling has been somewhat helpful. If you have any other questions, feel free to ask.
Delfedd 04-09-07, 04:03 PM	Wow... This is much more creative than the Lords of Creation thread. No offense you guys... I think that when I head off to college I'm going to get a group of D&Ders together and use this system to make a world that they want to play in. Any other tips? This sounds fun as a game as well as for use as a tool. (The Eloi where the pacifist human cattle, the servants and food of the Morlocks from the Time Machine.)
filmus 04-18-07, 08:13 PM	Wow... This is much more creative than the Lords of Creation thread. No offense you guys... I think that when I head off to college I'm going to get a group of D&Ders together and use this system to make a world that they want to play in. Any other tips? This sounds fun as a game as well as for use as a tool. (The Eloi where the pacifist human cattle, the servants and food of the Morlocks from the Time Machine.) The best general tip I can offer is, spend some time commanding the races/cities/civilizations/orders created by OTHER players. Make them do what YOU want them to. Remember, this is not a chess game, you can move any piece you want.
Delfedd 04-18-07, 09:44 PM	Huh... I just noted that there is no option to create a cosmology. I presume this is the DMs job?
filmus 04-19-07, 10:11 PM	Huh... I just noted that there is no option to create a cosmology. I presume this is the DMs job? ... There are no rules for that. To be honest, we never thought about it that way. Often where actual gods with personalities were required, the DM usually just made them up (often based on the players or the orders players created.) On the other hand, rules for creating actual gods (which of course any of the other players can control) might have interesting results.
Delfedd 04-19-07, 10:25 PM	Sorry. What I meant was different planes. As in the Cosmos.
filmus 04-20-07, 11:27 PM	Sorry. What I meant was different planes. As in the Cosmos. Ah, perhaps that was my mistake. Cosmology is a word with a lot of meanings. As for different planes, there are two ways to go about it. First, one can assume that alternate planes will somehow mirror certain aspects of the world you've created. Alternatively, one can run the game over several times, and tweak the rules to produce certain flavors of world depending on the nature of the plane. Personally, I haven't touched planar issues in [A]D&D since the Manual of the Planes came out all those years ago. I can't speak for your own players, but once we started using the very detailed and integrated worlds we'd created ourselves, players rarely had any interest in getting other planes involved. They were far too busy with their own worldly machinations.