Setting Driven Systems

Thoughts on Settings Not Systems

When I first read the article that has been bouncing around the RPG stackosphere, I thought to myself “hmm, interesting,” and went about my day. For a long time I had been putting my setting on the backburner while I tried to figure out the systems. After all, the primary impetus for me to even begin this journey was the systems, the math, the crunch, the interlocking vocabulary and maths. It isn’t a bad article, it has some amazing ideas, but I wasn’t quite ready to hear them.

Then a week went by. Then I heard other people discussing this idea. I read a few articles, listened to a podcast, and got some perspective from creators who are professionally in this ecosystem. You know, the people I should be listening to because I want to be a professional in this space too.

So I listened, and started wondering what my setting was. Of course I had a vague idea, I wanted a post apocalypse just like any other magical fantasy game, but I also loved the idea of far-future tech, I was so greatly inspired by the likes of Worlds Without Number, and hell, all of Kevin Crawford’s work. I am slowly inching my players towards running a game in all of his books; Worlds Without Number, Stars Without Number, Cities Without Number, and the upcoming Ashes Without Number. So excited.

Discovery In a Known World

One of the largest elements I want to be present in my game is discovery, characters going beyond the known and finding things both terrifying and awesome that none have ever seen before, not even the arbiter. I want the players to have a hand in the world building, a stake in its creation and evolution. I want each new game, campaign start, to be in a fresh world full of adventure and intrigue.

The question then follows, how does a group explore a completely new world if I am going to create one? Should I even create one? If I release a setting guide and build a world for them to explore, how will it be new? The answer is simple: don’t.

Rather than build a setting, I will build a tool-set designed to be used in play, or during prep, that will allow the players and arbiter to shape the world and create something wholly unique to their table as they venture out from the relative safety of the origin city. This was a big step for me, given that I wanted to create a cool world with a beautiful map and a bunch of adventure seeds and interesting potential for the arbiter to just pick up and run with. I wanted the players to slot into the system and set off into a new style of game. So now I have to give that up, and that’s okay.

Setting From System

In order to accomplish this I will have to lean on all the great minds that came before me. I have already been exploring the introduction to the game, without making any mechanics really, where the players all will create the Origin City where the remnants of past civilizations survived the latest cataclysm. Using a die drop method they will use a hex map to put together a massive place full of intrigue and politics.

In order to further invest the players, I want each of them to create a Family (lineage maybe?), Guild, or District, somewhere their character is tied to. This tie needs to be loose, this is also going to be a perilous game, but still present. This idea alone led me down the path of what each character could actually be, and how the player may retain their ties when they lose a character. That nugget will have to wait for later.

Together they will draw out the map and take notes to add details, and by the end of the first session they should have a rough outline of what their world looks like. The arbiter will then take that map, do some polishing and refining, and by the next game they should be ready to begin. It is important that PCs are not active members of any guilds or organizations, membership should be earned through play, though they may be associated with them at the start.

Guidance Challenge

I am not sure as of yet, but I think providing guidance will make the task of providing sufficient aesthetic more difficult. Rather than fleshing out a whole campaign setting that will translate the feel and theme of the game to the players and arbiter, I will have to fulfill this task using only guided world-building, which is already difficult when so many great resources for world-building already exist.

Character(s)

Given that this cooperatively built city is the focal point of the setting, it is important that the players remain tied to it, meaning that their characters remain tied to the city as well as the story as it has unfolded. When the game itself is fashioned after older games where characters die easily, this becomes a challenge, but I think I may have a solution. A budding aristocrat does not travel alone, but with servants or guardians paid for by inheritance or wealth of some other source. Knights may have squires. Priests may have acolytes. Many of the traditional characters would not travel alone, even when they are traveling with a party.

The dynamics of the game will heavily involve politics and social intrigue. Nearly every noble would have at least a small retinue, and to appear in Court without them would seem strange if not outright provoking suspicion. Hirelings and retainers are nothing new to these games, and due to my limited number of players I have to use them in my current Shadowdark game to give the crawlers a fighting chance. For my game though, I may be building them directly into character creation, giving the players an option to keep them tied in should their primary character meet an untimely death.

Conclusion

A bit of a shorter article today. I have been stewing on this concept all week and trying to open my mind to the wisdom of others, letting this new perspective shift how I think about and approach my design. So far these are my ideas, and I am not sure if I am moving the needle t all in the conversation, but maybe this will be the first in a series of “how this concept changed my process.”

Thanks for reading.