I tend to write my campaigns around the players figuring out the secrets of the world and discovering the true lore to it all. One of the few good things I did in my first campaign was I said I was using the Norse pantheon of gods and as the adventure continued on they pickup hints and clues that these gods don’t actually exist and instead all of those gods were killed in ancient times and the rest of the world just still believes that those Norse gods still live and exist and part of the campaign turned into learning how clerics and other holy characters still get powers even if the gods that they worship are dead. But anyway, good video!

Interesting note that seems pretty adjacent, in Game Masters of Exandria Roundtable (with Aabria Iyengar and Brennan Lee Mulligan), Matt mentions that Exandria began as _just_ Stilben, a small town in a swamp for a one-shot. He didn't continue building out into the world until his players emailed asking when the next session would be. See around 52:11 in that video for the question.

My campaign in 5 sentences. Bad dragons bad. Good dragons good. Help good dragons. Kill bad dragons. Add banter as necessary.

For DMs: another way to think about this is the pillar of exploration. Just like how players don't necessarily have to kill every single Goblin you put in front of them but they can gain experience from doing so. You can always just keep information hidden or locations unknown, and when they finally interact with that information or that place, hey! they get some experience points. Think about Dark Souls you may have to go through a stupid room with stupid challenges but at the end of that, challenge you get a little reward.

I always like to say that as a DM/GM, most of the worldbuilding is for your own pleasure, your players are rarely going to see even 10% of your world unless you either spend years playing in that world, or bore them to death with exposition every time they come across even a sliver of lore. Using a world you made is great fun, but always remember that most of the time you are worldbuilding for *you*, and it makes it much easier to swallow when the players run off and start robbing goblins in the hills. Also, you should only do as much world building as you enjoy, if you're not, cut it back to basically what is relevant to the game you want to run and leave the rest ambiguous, as more then likely it'll never come up. As an addendum: players are much more interested in worlds that they helped build, so invite them to do so. Let them make things up in their backstories and add them to the game world (so long as they're not too whacky). It will usually greatly increase their investment in a game and give you a guide on what they players may want to come up in your game. Edit: spelling

I realised during the last couple of sessions that my players are working under a slight misunderstanding. They think each of the islands they're exploring only has one of these important magical statues. I actually set it up so that different islands have different numbers of statues. Biting my tongue for the last few sessions has been hard, but it's going to be worth it when they finally figure out the current island has ten of these things squirrelled away in various places.

summarize my setting in 5 sentences? challenge accepted -it's really cool -it's got dungeons and maybe dragons in it -people can sometimes have magic powers -an unending void that consumes all life, a shadow above the entire multiverse -scary skeleton :( i have an actual setting too, this was just funnier

I really needed to hear the advice about not giving all lore away immediately. Usually I get way too excited about it and want to drop all of it the first chance I get. Hope I can pace myself better by being more conscious about it. For my setting. It's Star Wars the Old Republic. Where a Sith Lord tricked a crime syndicate into freeing his consciousness from a protocol droid. Then he started a war between the Mandalorians and the Republic as a distraction and is now investigating an ancient civilization.

The mention of the Hobbit and the Silmarillion is interesting because Tolkien stated that the mystery was the fascination. He would name drop things with little references towards what it could be. He would eventually expand upon things because people were interested or he himself wanted to. It's something I started to do was just name drop things I've created, dangle it there (a statue of historical figure in a town with a name or a fresco in an ancient abandoned tomb for example) and see if anyone cares. If they don't ask they'll never know. The history is there still, just unknown to the players because they didn't care. It also signals to me I don't have to write more about the topic until it becomes useful to everyone.

"Our brains are bursting with cool ideas and stories we want to share, but if we give them out too fast, they wind up devoid of context". thanks Mike for highlighting the point of context and how much the narrator can pour info to the audience. its almost a year in my first campaign as a Bard. after a while I thought that I need to bring more context to a story. by eliminating or focus on limited story options. and give it time to unfold. my challenge is to give my DM a few index cards to describe the background of my character witch the story will take place in this year or more.

Have been worldbuilding a new setting in my head recently and I think the techniques you describe towards the end (five sentences, proper place name, local history) may even be more important to the DM than the players. The act of condensing a massive world really helps to hone in the details, find any potential flaws to the story, and help you start off with an incredible beginning. Thanks!

I have a significantly large and detailed world that I started writing back in 99'. These days I host the entire breath of content of the world on WorldAnvil both for the players to read whenever they want, but mostly for me as an easier point of reference than sifting through years and years of various word files. I am fully aware that there is far more information there than I will ever actually use, but a significant part of it is that I just flat love writing for and further developing my world.

Took the challenge for my game (even though it's a solo game) for funsies. It does sound better than the actual play. The military arm of the Enlightened Path has arrived in the Fallen Maze. For over fifty years, this sector has been plagued with sensor interference by Precursor Vaults hidden in it's depths. Since then, only one settlement remains connected to galaxy- Freya Station, a deep space station that has become dependent on illicit trade in order to survive. There, amidst their vaunted architectural beauty, they amass defenses to keep deter a potential invasion, while working diplomatically with the EP. However, distrust lingers, as connections to pirates and smugglers in the sector has become more familiar and trusted, leaving Freya Station's true allegiances uncertain...

@supergeekmike I agree. Ive gone down the world building road of madness many times. However one thing I have done is save all my crazy in a cloud drive, so I don't lose any of it. When I started up in 5e a few years ago, I literally was able to pull the setting we had played in 12 years ago. It was fun to see my longtime friends get so excited to see familiar npc from years ago.

The best thing I learned about worldbuilding was from one of my players. Interacting with things does a lot when they are figuring out the world. Instead of telling them dwarves drink a lot and it's a major cultural thing and blah blah blah. Describe them seeing a lot of old breweries that are still active on their way to the tavern. Have the barkeep be super respected by other NPCs. Have the barkeep act like he's the most important person in the room, because he is. Players love interacting with the world and NPCs are the easiest way they know how so instead of exposition, which they can't interact with really, you give them something that they can and they absorb the information better. Recently, my boyfriend was thinking about this cool flashback scene for our DC game. He wanted to show Jason Todd as Robin to show everyone how things were before the Gotham invasion that ended up costing him his life. I told him that it's a great scene but it won't really do much for the story in general because no one can interact with it. I suggested to have it be a recording of sorts that Tim Drake could stumble across since he wouldn't know this stuff and it would allow the player to interact with it more. He did that and then added more to the recording by adding in how Jason improved when he temporarily Batman during the invasion. That moment snowballed into so many others which never would have happened if it was a cut scene. My other advise is, build the world lil by lil. Think of it in terms of fog of war or when graphics load in a game. They aren't going there yet so it's ok to not have that entirely fleshed out and 'loaded'.

This has been a tough pill for me to swallow, as I’m sure it is for many many others. Need to create a DM support group so we can all spill our guts about the cool shit we think of that we can’t organically insert into our campaigns.

I’ve heard over and over again not to drown players in world detail they don’t need and didn’t ask for. This video finally cemented how to stop doing that. As a new DM, I’d try to engineer players to learn stuff I thought they needed to know, but they didn’t. What I learned from this is that I really need to drop cues, not trap them in exposition. I finally have a strong idea of how to filter out the stuff I want them to know, versus the basic stuff they need to know. And now I’m subscribing. Thanks Mike, this is quality stuff.

Actually I can. I can do it in three. Combine Robert E Howard's Hyborean Age, with some of the Monsters from Warhammer Fantasy. Evil has won, and you can try to fix the problems or you can be an evil sob. Have fun in my sandbox. But I feel this I remember creating 7k years of lore for a world when I first started. I do totally agree with you.

Actually about to have a session 0 where I'm gonna need to start thinking about this, as it's likely to be the first campaign I'm making a setting entirely from scratch. I'm not putting anything concrete down in my notes yet, but just from my players talking, this is what I've had floating around in my head so far: In , the distinguishing line between magic and science does not exist. The same way a wizard may channel the energies in the world around them to weave complex spells, or a cleric might use their spiritual bond to allow their deity to channel holy power through them, so too can mechanics and programmers tap into this seemingly limitless pool of energy to power their machines and create complex codes that bend and warp reality to suit their needs. One thing is known for certain; this energy has a mind of its own, manifesting itself in various ways throughout the history of . Although some remain concerned about

This is simply good storytelling advice in general, not specific to running an RPG. Ironically, I'm pretty good at this with my own content because I want my players to have that feeling of pulling on threads that they feel like they discovered, rather than threads that have been thrust upon them. When it comes to a pre-built adventure though, I'm out here writing up multi-page summaries of the districts and politics in Waterdeep for some reason I cannot fathom, thinking that the players want that "help" >.>

Try thinking about how much you would know about our world if there was no internet, no TV, no radio and visiting the next town over was a full day event. The answer is not much, and you wouldn't need to either.

I can, easily: Everything is frozem, meteors fall all around, and factions of the world fight for the possesion of a ancient red dragon.

I think there is a certain amount about the world that the PCs would know, though the players themselves may not know. If one of my players asks a question about something I determine the character would know (who is in power, what countries there are, etc.) then I'll tell them. Funnily enough, though, one of my players is a Warforged who has been dormant for fifty years, sleeping through the turn of an era and waking up in a completely unfamiliar political system. I'm super excited to see how he comes to terms with all this.

I feel like this would be helpful for individual story arcs as well. Not for the players, but just to wrap my head around what's coming next so I can prioritize what clues get dropped to the players. You rock!

I was having a dm chat with my friend the other day (we run for each other, diff editions and diff party sizes) and this topic came up. We have very different styles. He has his whole world completely figured out. The nations and their politics and interplay. The history, magic, mystery, and gods. A lot of it is based on a stream he watches to be fair, but a good amount more is totally his own. Characters fit into the setting and whatever happens happens. Its a lot of fun and allows me the freedom of feeling like I can go anywhere and ask anything and he’ll either know or know how to get/how hard it is to get the info. Ive gone way off the rails and he still knows where I am and how to run it. I on the other hand, am much more inside out when it comes to worldbuilding. My players gave me their characters and I used that to help me come up with the main “plot” (big bad, themes, potential related side quests and npcs) and started building outward. I now know what nation theyre in, and that there was a civil war a little while ago, theres some unrest, magic tech has started to blossom. But thats all sort of incidental to the campaign and ive talked about it maybe once or twice. I dont even know what the world is called, I’m only now starting to look at the pantheon because a character multiclassed into cleric. And weve been playing for a year with a rich and full story. My players feel central to their own stories but know there’s a wider world to explore if they want to. Both methods are awesome, but im definitely team “when you need it.”

I think I needed to hear this.. I've been having anxiety over running my first ever campaign. (I've GM'd in an One Shot System for 2 years now) And.. I've been getting hung up in formulating Plot Twists and Hooks around the main Plot.. I've got my Players Characters and Back Stories. But I cant get my foot in to start playing because theres always more to be done, more to be build, another City to be fleshed out... ..I should just start and prep along with playing, huh?

A very important topic, and an excellent discussion upon it - thank you so much! I know I differ even from other members of my players' group in how invested I am into the DM's lore, and attachment/investment/interest also varied by topic - I might be more interested in things about the race of my character, or things that have themes that resonate for me, etc., while other players might feel similarly but for different things. That can obviously create some slight issues as other players focus on things that don't interest me or vice versa, and can lead to bad conclusions about mysteries or options as people don't always hear/retain all of the important info (or simply misunderstand). This is particularly difficult to deal with if you have very RP-based games, which can have more narrative drift that a game-focus.

As someone who is currently trying to build a world to run my very first campaign, I found this super helpful! Thanks Mike! Love your videos!

About a year ago, I started a pseudo-isekai sort of campaign where the players woke up with absolutely no knowledge of who they were, where the were, or what was happening. I gave them a little intro scene of falling through space and then waking up together in a grove. I had TONs of lore established prior to them starting, but the joy I got from them just bumbling through the world discovering things as they went along was just amazing, better than any other campaign I've done so far. We've been playing that game 2 or 3 times a month, they're level 8 now and next session will be the first session they actually see the no-shit world map for the first time. I can't wait to see the looks on their faces when they see just how much more there is to explore. Great video!

I have a relatively simple way to get players invested in lore. During character creation each player gets a handful of bonuses depending on what part of the world they are from. Doing so makes them instantly incentivized and invested in learning about the nations because it’s immediately tied to their character both thematically and statistically

A campaign idea rattling around in my head: Early 18th century pike and shot. Two massive empires marching to war. Story largely focused on the people caught in the middle. Portals to other planes are ripping open, adding to the chaos and devastation. No one knows why or how to stop it.

This is a good channel. I like Mike. This is definitely becoming a meme, but I really do love your videos and outlook! Easily one of my favorite channels, despite how new it is!

Just as an example to further echo your point, consider what we, the audience know about the Death Star about 40 years after the release of A New Hope: -It is an imperial battlestation capable of destroying planets -It used this planet-destroying capability to destroy Alderaan -Imperial brass such as Grand Moff Tarkin and Darth Vader are onboard -It has a critical vulnerability in its reactor ventilation shaft -It was built during the ending years of the Clone Wars -It was originally designed by Geonosians -The project was adopted and completed by Galen Erso, who built in the afforementioned critical vulnerability Compare this to what Luke Skywalker and the crew of the Millennium Falcon know about the Death Star when they first see it: -It's an enormous space station -It's sitting in an asteroid field where Alderaan should be -TIE fighters are patrolling nearby They will eventually also learn that Princess Leia is imprisoned aboard the ship, which ties into their original mission, but not before the Death Star reaches out to capture them with a tractor beam. What lessons are there to be learned from this? First is that the first 4 points of what the audience knows are critical, need-to-know details about the Death Star and how it relates to the story. These points should be prepared by the dungeon master. The last 3 are fun to know, but not critical info, and unlikely to come up when players are scrounging for details. The second lesson is that even if those prepared points exist, the information that the players receive should be tailored to their perspective on the issue. They might even be able to infer some of the information that the dungeon master knows from what they're given. Overall, worldbuilding is buckets of fun, but it doesn't guarantee effective storytelling.

My world has so much lore rn that the players won’t learn even a fraction of it, but I enjoy writing it anyways, and I don’t expect my players to know everything, I just need them to write down what the present is. Everything my players need to know: They are trying to defeat the evil dude who’s tormenting a city, and there is an evil hag causing issues in the background, easy as that. Nothing else matters too much.

I'm not sure if you wanted to actually see these, or if it was just a prompt, but, I decided to crack my hand at it for my D&D Campaign: "It's been 500 years since a war left all the countries of the world disconnected from each other. Recently the rise of cheap sea travel open to the common man has made everyone scramble to change how to act. The cheapness of sea travel also has lead to a rise in seafaring banditry, thievery, and crime. You are a team of Mercenaries, outlaws, or what-have-you, trying to simply make it in this world!" Honestly, polishing this down to simply these 4 sentences left me realizing how much of the knowledge I wrote and already sent the players wasn't strictly necessary 😅

my five sentence campaign summary: The Ardan Empire is the new political force on the continent of Thaldar. Deep within its ranks, voices call for the resurrection of the ancient civilization of Thaland with its technological and magical marvels. Other voices rise to counter them, citing the terrible power of the weapons of old, fighting with all their might to stop the return of this cruelty. Tensions rise across the Empire and beyond, with the Dwarven Strongholds of Za'Kesh, the noble clans of Eight, the mighty Trinity and the wealthy Pearl Coast. Yet none can comprehend the threat that awaits just beyond this realm, eager to plant a seed in the material plane once more.

My preferred approach is to put an extensive body of world lore out there for the players to read if they want (and where they can refer back to if they want), but assume they haven't read any of it. Mostly, they just skim it. But that is enough that when important story lore is revealed in game, there is a context for it - and the players that do recognise that can explain for the players who don't, and I as the DM don't have to.

Very helpful and insightful. I love The way you explain things. Thanks Mike!

The trick for lore dumps I like is tied into a homebrew tweak I use heavily. I take the rules for handing out experience points/milestones from Cypher System where players get what is effectively both an advantage token and an xp milestone for rolling nat ones, making important discoveries, moving the plot along, and other things the DM wants to reward/encourage. This system revolves around making a lot of rolls because XP are handed out for nat ones, nat twenties, and rolling 5 or more points above the DC. I have the creation myth and a few other stories about important gods/figures written up. If a player asks a lore question, I tell them to make a roll. History, religion, or arcana usually. On a success, they might get part of the story. On a success high enough to score XP they might get a printout of the myth in question. On a nat one they still get the XP Cypher System rules dictate, but they get a lie or piece of propaganda an enemy faction is spreading. "You've heard this rumor circulating, but it's obviously a lie... probably."

First off, I'm currently rewriting my setting and this POV is gonna help me a lot, so thank you Mike. Second hand, I'm gonna take the challenge and try to highlight what my campaign's setting is about, let's go: "Aegis-1 it's a world in peace, ruled by a government of five nations, each divided in its own continent. Each nation has a different history led by an Element which provided a different technological and cultural development during the ages from the others. Races lives apparently in peace and the differences are evened with the usage of sport events, ritual fights or politics. Even with this, the recent event called "Blackout" squashed the foundations of this world, when creatures from another dimension breached, causing the spark of the evolution to be poisoned by the frightening of the unknown. While leaders try to figure out how to not letting a world war happen, into nations some populations and races, previously quiet, are pushing for the search of empowerment and indipendency, while an entire dangerous and mysterious continent emerged from the deep sea outta nowhere. All of this pushes a lot of people to travel and become an adventurer, looking to leave the mark of their existence in the civilization's history books, making revolutions, finding treasures or killing legendary beings. Whatever the reason may be, The Blackout reminded everyone how much thin the edge is between life and death" Challenge aside, writing this down really was interesting. I felt the urge to scream about how I ended up mixing cyberpunk and roman-greek mythology collide in the same world many too times, it's very hard to no tell the aspects you more love about your setting, because they're not enough relevant. Meanwhile my concerns for my world building keep on existing...maybe there's a way in which I could reach you and have a feedback about it Mike? I didn't get to have a proper feedback from other DMs for a lot now xD I think I really could need it

Great stuff! Thank you!

I use a mix of whole world and Player based world building. My home brew world is large and rich and was built over 30 years but only certain areas are very well developed. When I have new players come to my table I give them the basics and then pull out the map and ask them where they want to be from. If they want to be from a big city that is already developed I walk them through the basics of the city and some of the history and we develop a back story together. If they pick a spot on the map that doesn’t have much to no history, we work together to develop some lore that the PC would know. The table I play at has been playing in my world and another player/DM runs a campaign in Ravenloft. The six of us decided to take certain aspects of our favorite settings and create a new one but draw on real world examples to breath life into portions of the world. We have players from all over Europe and the US so we use that to bring a richness to our virtual table top. I’m running a Ranger/Bard in our new world with one of our other players DMing the initial campaign. In this campaign the Aquan language is based on the Hawaiian language because of a one shot character I played that was a bard that used chants for inspiration and I did a Haka once and they didn’t understand stand a word I said but were so moved by it the DM had me roll two dice and take the highest roll for inspiration. When asked about it by the group at a break I explained that I had lived in Hawaii for six years when I was growing up and loved the culture and wanted to pay homage to it in some way. It is now part of our world building lore that the tritons and sea elf cultures are based in part on pacific island cultures like Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Hawaii, and New Zeland and the Aquan language is Hawaiian.

I've been using a five (technically six) sentence hook as the intro to my current campaign for 20 sessions now, really helps to bring everyone into the mood and remind them what the campaign is about, especially when we have a longer gap between sessions~ The hook, for those interested: THE WORLD HAS ENDED. In an apocalyptic event known as The Convergence, the Earth was torn asunder, and became intertwined with four other worlds from across dimensions. 800 years later, humanity is still recovering from the aftermath. These days, though small centers of civilization have begun to emerge, most folks don’t travel more than a few miles from their hometown. Some, though, have a spark-be it wanderlust, curiosity, obligations, or something else entirely-that drives them to explore this shattered world. These adventurers are few and far between, but the world has a way of finding those who seek its wonders.

Oo, I want to try *ahem.* (1) For the past two years, the Floating City of Cindün has been drifting towards the ground. (2) All of the aristocrats and governing bodies have fled. (3) A faction of priests of Ni are looking for a council of rulers to take charge of their home and raise it back to the heavens, but their journey has yet to bear fruit. (4.) When the restless dead begin clawing their ways out of the crypts, and a lycanthropic plague spawns in the burrows, the citizens feel truly hopeless. (5) They cry out for heroes.

I like to make sure I have a list of NPCs, towns, and cities before I make my campaign. Plus a few sentences to pull upon. Also have a list of “stock” locations and npcs that have a random name race and age that i can randomly pull upon when needed. Kinda like sims townies.

Very useful, yet challenging info. I watched this after a session, to wind down before bed, with a short vid. ... 2.5hrs later, I had risen to the challenge. Sure it took 6 long, but proper, sentences, to describe. And I added a few more, as a post description "invite/challenge" the players to participate in said setting. But I am very pleased with the results. And never would have dreamed I could sum up with that potency. So thank you good sir!!! You have made me a better game writer.

I like the distinction you draw that worldbuilding is cool and you should totally feel free to devote huge amounts of time to it, creating for the joy of creation... but understand that most of what you're doing is for your own benefit and enjoyment. Some of what you create will be for your players, but often even if you're an on-the-fly worldbuilder, most of it is just for you. And that's totally fine. Go nuts and have fun. That's been my big lesson, not just as a GM but as a hobby author. Even when creating a world for a book (or a sprawling series of short stories, in my case) most of what I make is for my benefit. Fantastic point about the Jedi not being mentioned in the opening crawl of the first movie, too. They told us about a civil war against the evil Empire and Leah trying to get the plans to something called the "Death Star" back to the Rebels. That's it, and what was its purpose? To set up THE OPENING SCENE. The equivalent of that in D&D is to give the players enough information to get them through the first 15-20 minutes of Session 1. As you said, if they ask for more during character creation, great. If not, they'll build a character that's a little more isolated in their experience and knowledge of the setting, and that's a perfectly normal trope in fantasy and storytelling anyway. Besides, there's no such thing as an adventure story that doesn't almost immediately plunge the hero(es) in way over their head(s). Save that for in the game, and experience it together.

I very recently started the very early planning stages for my own campaign setting that I may use sometime even if for now I'm sticking to mainly pre written adventures and faerun. My main premise I've been working on though summarised as shortly as I can: Adventurers past have come and gone, after many grand crusades and failed ventures, the gods are dead and gone, every one. Time has passed and most of these proclaimed heroes are no longer with us and the world is left to move on from philosophical revolution. Some zealots still hold fast to old faiths, some finding new comfort in more abstract concepts, and some look only to the next day, hoping to let these stories fade into legends of the past and no longer haunt the present. In a world where the divine became so knowable and conquerable, the people in power grew confident and self righteous and now a deep tension is brewing as warlord nobles plan conquests, cultish zealots recruit members to their ranks through udnerhanded means, and the future looks uncertain.

-The black desert surrounds you in the nation of Nikhon, threatening wonder and wealth, dungeons and dehydration. - The northern oasis town of Hae M’shou is a bustling trade hub, but more hides beneath the surface. - The state church of Ta-Nore is cracking down on the re-emergence of the cult of the moon demon, Shi-Klareth. - The recent influence of the coalition of Antropus to the north is instilling unrest among the populace regarding the long established caste system in Nikhoran. - Heelan raids on caravans are increasingly frequent and deadly.

The campaign takes place on a peninsula made up of five kingdoms. You each are the heir to one of these five kingdoms (We work together to make one that matches your character concept). There are five gods, each kingdom worships two primarily. The god of Balance and Order commands a giant kingdom destroying Behemoth. There's a prophecy that it is returning, and if your kingdoms don't stand together, they will fall, so you're being encouraged to network.

My current setting, the Forsaken Lands, in 5 sentences - long sentences, but even so: Carse is a barony in an isolated valley surrounded by wilderness, the last remnant of a Kingdom of men, dwarves and elves which conquered the more primitive native human and shifter inhabitants over 1000 years ago. The barony survived the collapse of the Kingdom many centuries ago during a great war between the forces of Bahamut and Tiamat which also caused a great reduction in the power of magic and mortal ability to master that magic, a war which is still going on sporadically. The only deities actively worshipped by the folk of the barony for those centuries have been the main deities of the Kingdom's militant forces - Bahamut, Zhentao, and in secret, Tiamat, as well as the main deity of the natives, the Moon Goddess. The Moon Goddess has been stuck divided into her three Aspects - The Matron, called the Storm Witch, The Maiden, called the Bright Moon Witch, and The Crone, called the Dark Moon Witch - ever since her Consort, The Horned God, sacrificed himself to prevent a gate from opening which would have allowed the Great Old Ones to enter the world. Rumors of the Consort's demise may have been exaggerated, as only a couple years ago some adventurers claim to have found a still active Shrine to the Horned God and say that the god is not dead, just resting in the Dreamlands, and could be starting to wake up...

I think its also important for players to take conscience that we do not care about lore if it doesnt impact our characters. After all most of us players are also fan of franchises with lot of lore, so we tend to believe that we would automatically care for it. But we dont. In my current campaign, we had a sorcerer pc, who was looking to get rid of his powers because it was a plague for him, but maybe that old magic city in ruin would have the solution to that. And then that pc died, and the player made a completely different pc with no tie to that city, and a few months later its obvious that he had forgotten some essential lore around that city (and the man built his own world for a comic book project for years, he loves lore!). Lore that the rest of us didnt care in details in the first place, because not only it didnt matter to our characters, they were not even aware of most of it. So if you want to make your dm life easier, try to have a character somewhat involve in part of the lore from the beginning, so they dont work for nothing x)

I'm sending this to my brother 😂 We're about to start a new campaign and he is continually giving me shit (as siblings do) for not having ALL the world-building in place yet. (He's a DM too)

Thank you for including Star Wars as a fantasy story!!

I am definitly the kind of player and worldbuilder who wants to have as much infromation as possible about any given setting. However I just realized that I don't even have five sentences for the setting I am building for my new rpg group. I summ it up in three words. Cogs, crytals, crinolines. Cogs, because it's steampunk. Crystals are kind of the magic batteries in my world. And Crinolines, because I want it to be close to the historical inspiration. So for my setting, think 1850 - 1910, but with magic and fantasy races and lots of crazy mechanical inventions. I do have lore for diffrent aspects of the setting. For some more than others, but its all just a rough concept, that I will build upon as needed. I also really want to give my players the freedom to add there own ideas to the world. And I do plan on structuring the campaign around that lore, so I do actually need to hold back a lot of what I know already. If I tell them all about the cult of the unnown sixth god, who have bound the gods to syphon their power, I can't use that as a plot. Unless anyone asks, or wants to play a cleric or paladin, I wont even tell them anything specific about the gods. I've mentioned that there are five that are commonly worshiped but most people practice animistic religion. That's all they need to know for now. I have given them some options for races (we don't play dnd, by the way) and have roughly layed out the culture and abilities for each race, just enough to give them a starting point to build their characters. Any further information will be given as needed. If no one wants to play a Feragur, they don't need to know that feragese surnames refer to clans rather than families. That's something they can learn in game. Exploration is a big part of rpgs for me, but you can't have that if you lore dump everything in session zero or even before. It has not been easy to hold back all the cool ideas I have for my world, but I am sure it will be worth it.

Though I have worldbuilt before, I have primarily used Eberron as my setting for DMing, so here goes, five sentences not for players, but for DMs thinking of checking it out: The year is 998YK, two years after the conclusion of the Last War - the conflict that shattered the Kingdom of Galifar. Though a cease of fire has been reached, the blighted sight of the Mournland serves as a grim reminder to the conspiring nations, nobles and Dragonmarked Houses of Khorvaire, of what might happen should anyone rekindle the flames of war. Elsewhere other threats rise: the tense relation between Aerenal and Argonnessen, the expansion of the Riedran Empire and the many hidden horrors beneath and beyond this world all move on with their schemes. Will Eberron hold up like in the creation myths, keep destruction at bay? Or has the Prophecy already spelled out its end?

It's so funny... I'm doing that right now!! Too much! It's too much, but I cannot stop. Maps, NPC back stories, hee hee ha ha ha, it's too much! But I appreciate your advice. I just won't give them any of it unless it is pertinent. Thanks Mike. It's just ironic that I'm doing what you're talking about RIGHT NOW... so good Mike.

My attempt at condensing my setting to 5 sentences. A varied and diverse place, the continent of Eradonïe has, after 600 years, finally recovered from the invasion of the Hells. Adventurers going place to place solving problems only few can were a large part of that recovery. Rich by trade and prosperous through agriculture Onondonïe lying in the north is stable for now. Dark goblins and orcs and perhaps devilish things are stirring in the north. Will your party be able to save it?

The thing about this is when you want to create a world to give your players more, yeah then this applies, but I like world building as a hobby so the lore could be important to you and you always have to remember that the DM is a player as well, so they should be able to have fun as well even if it won't appear in the campaign. Also don't take this as a hate comment, I just wanted to explain why this didn't feel right with me. Love your content man

I create a lot of lore but the description has what they need for character creation and when they select their character I tell them a little more about that character's knowledge. Not a lot just a little more.

Worldbuilding became so much easier once I started writing "off the seat of my pants" as they say. Akira Toriyama did the same thing for Dragon Ball, he didn't plan story beats he didn't need in advance, he left the backstory he didn't need blank on purpose, so that when the time was right, he could come up with something cool and right for the story he wanted to tell. He found out where Goku came from roughly at the same time we did. BTW, here are all my settings in 5 sentences: 1) An evil god wants to absorb the powers of the other elemental gods, to take over the world as its only Titan. The best warriors from around the globe have to stop him, summoned by the alliance of all the royalty. 2) A group of evil adventurers are conjuring to take over the land. Five of their worst enemies band together to stop them, as violence rises, nations fall and intrigues are brewing. Even within the dark alliance. 3) The most powerful necromancer in recent history is creating uberzombies who are causing mayhem in the land. Some of the most famous people in the land have gone missing and other innocent people are found dead or disfigured. 4) Life sure is crazy, innit?! The world is vast, full of micronations that don't interact much with each other, and great heroes and awful villains are born in the most unlikely of places. (Soon I had to add another sentence: "for example, a goblin Lich that wants to wreak havoc to become famous")

It's hard for me not to over prepare my homebrew setting. I am very meticulous about realism and having it make sense; nothing my players care about. It's a curse

Late to the party, but here's my 5 sentences - Magocratic empire created dragons as weapons - Empire was destroyed in the aftermath of their rebellion - The power vacuum was filled by demon and devil lords - Their 200 years long rule was ended by a confederation of the united humanoid populations - The leader of the confederation used the help of 14 entities, ancient and new, to win the revolution

Copy and pasted from my Session 0: "After the last war 20 years ago in Feldspire, Lodesland has seen a period of peace and prosperity. Something is stirring, behind the scenes, pieces are falling into place. More and more carts are found-robbed and tore apart, more and more magic stores find themselves missing inventory. Will the quiet peace continue or do these small things lead to something more?" ... but they also got a lore sheet (with a TLDR section) and more personal information their characters would know. I wasn't going to build up the gods any more than what I did until I noticed the person who is playing the cleric seemed interested. So I built up a pantheon with some creation myths. I'm trying to balance making what has interest by talking to my players, while also making things that is just for my own joy. But not so much that I'm worrying about being able to make a game for them.

One continent sundered in half by war after years of unity, just recently signing a truce. One continent picking up the pieces after the Lord of Hell attempted invasion. One continent completely devoted to the Gods, finding comfort in a desert wasteland. One continent that becomes a battlefield once a generation, altering the course of history for the next generation. One continent connected to the dead Primordials, developing abilities within that allow them to alter the land around them.

My world summarized in 5 sentences: 1. A lot of water 2. Kuo'Toa created the current pantheon 3. Old Gods are dead/absent 4. Krakens and whales are sacred animals 5. The inner planes, the fey wild and the shadowfel are rumoured to be the dead bodies of the Old Gods

What are you referring to about Matt colville’s lore? I’m interested in checking it out if I haven’t already

And in those days the cities were ruled by might kings, whom where Heaven Made Flesh, Dragons. And they did have a chosen people, the Dragonborn, whom did wield the Whip and the Blade such that the people of the rivers would submission. And in the deserts, and hills, and marshes there dwelt peoples who knew not grain nor proper submission, nor did they dwell near the graves of their ancestors but did wander the lands. And some among these peoples where men who had never knows city walls, and others were those who had fled their proper masters to go unto the wild places. And in Meshant, there came a great King among the Kings, Ukrik, who did rule with mighty and terrible strength, such that many captives from all the lands around where brought to enrich his lands. Although one thing I find handy is after the players have a basic idea of what their character might look like i give them a little more information that's specific to their character's background.

That’s the whole point behind history, religion and arcana checks. You can roll to see if your character knows something you don’t.

5 sentences you say? let me just channel the ghost of james joyce real quick...

How do you work around lore related to races? Gnomes haven't been seen for over 1000 years what do you do if a player wants to be a gnome?

Perhaps because I'm a huge fan of thrillers and crime books (and read a lot of Detective Conan manga) I find interesting what you sugest here. Everything is a mistery and let the players try to connect the dots and solve "the crime".

Mortals, Primal, Chaos, these are the fundamental forces of this universe. In a world where the greatest of magiks are wielded by mortals against the invasion of the gods, you are born with, or acquired later in life the Heros Essence capable of harnessing the Primal Magik of existence. With the Gods locked behind a divine gate and more and more mortals being born of this world leads to great uncontrollable magiks, the most recent of which sent the great content of "unnamed" into disorder. Several large city states dot the content as beacons of light and bring 'modern technology' and education to the masses. It hasn't even been 100 years since the end of the last great calamity when Ratanis broke though the divine gate from a different dimension and asserted himself as the Mortal God of magic, rewriting the rules of the world in a way no God could.

love world building and creating. some of used some of it recycled. some on going gags from other campaigns. but i like letting like an archeological dick where they slowly find things here and then there. piece them together. formulate their own ideas and even include some.

As someone who is interested in Matt's World, but doesn't participate with online communities much....what was the lore dump?

I can't summarize my setting in a few sentences, not because i have too much info to tell but because i don't... I started building the setting for my PCs who were all new to D&D so I decided to make it the most generic med-fan setting possible, so it has really nothing special or original about it... or at least nothing that relates to any player who would enter this world. There's political conflict in the kingdom but it's built around the Rogue's backstory. There's an ancient prophecy of an evil dragon who will eventually to come back but it's tied to the Druid's backstory. There's a war with orcs tribes cooking in the south but it's because of the half-orc Fighter's backstory... so if I want to start another campaign with others PCs, what could I tell them? There's no way to summarize the setting because every player might need different info depending on what character they want to play. There's no big original thing affecting everyone in my world. So what should i do? If anyone has thoughs about this feel free to tell me ^^

It's all fine and dandy until you loose players becasue they "couldn't relate to the world".

Being an atheist and a historian, I have kicked the can down the road with mythology, for I can find none that makes sense. So yea...

What's your favorite part of worldbuilding? Thanks so much to WorldAnvil for sponsoring this video! Visit www.worldanvil.com/supergeekmike and use the promo code SUPERGEEK to get 40% off any annual membership! www.worldanvil.com/supergeekmike

1) stealing that story idea 2) not me sitting here making a political drama with a mountain orc clan and why the halforc npc is where she is now. 🙃

Dude I wish you'd stop spoiling random bits of lore without at least a warning, it happened before with drawing parallels between your wizard and Caleb and now with the celestial bodies bit at around the 10 min mark, I think I'm gonna stop watching your channel which is sad because I was enjoying it so far, but I don't wanna be caught off-guard by spoilers

I love having maps at hand, which is why I usually present them with a world map, gives me an easier time for setting up locations and knowing where everybody comes from etc. What I mostly dont show are the settlements. I tell them about the settlements, but only show what they had discovered and then revealing the map as they go along in the campaign. This gives them a reason for exploring the world and asking NPC on where to go in the world rather than just looking at the map, seeing the city on it and say: "we go there" I do a similar thing with big cities, cities that got thousands of houses, paths and possible locations. To allow my players to explore the city and find out new things. Does it take ages to make these maps? Yes, yes it does. I only make them where I know they will spend a lot of time in.