It's been a long time since I talked about the original theme of this column: world building. I think it's time for a temporary return to that, less I move too far from my focus on creating game worlds and running games. It's easy to do, seeing as how I don't run games anymore. My current group has three GMs in it, which I think would be enough to daunt any barely-experienced game master and scare them away from ever running anything. However, I am still writing. In one of my old columns, I said that when I decided to write my fantasy novel again, I'd do it right by developing the world first. Yeah. That went out the window. Inspiration grabbed me and once again I started writing. I was slightly more prepared, having thought about it for months before writing, and having actually taken some notes. But I'm still falling back on my old standard, "make it up as you go along." And actually, it's working out for me. I build the world to suit my needs as the story progresses. I started out with just some basics, major places that I knew would play pivotal roles in the story. I used them to sort of set the tone for the rest of the world. As the story has been progressing, I've added other minor places as needed, leaving the rest of the world a formless void. I've done this in games, too. The one game I ran which I felt was moderately successful was a D&D game. I started out with a basic map with important places marked down, but I didn't really have a set idea of what was in this important places. As the characters moved throughout the land, I developed the towns they were going towards, and developed the places they would go if they decided to pursue certain story elements. I had vague ideas of what was going on in other places, ideas that I could have expanded on if I needed more storyline ideas or NPC backgrounds or whatever, but if the characters never went in that direction, I didn't have to put too much work into it. I really recommend this approach for busy game masters. Sure, we'd all like to create fully-developed worlds with unique cultures who interact with each other, and fascinating cities just waiting for the characters to explore them, but who has that kind of time? Now that I'm an adult, with a husband, a house, and four pets to care for (not mention a small business to run, an e-zine to write for, and various and sundry other responsibilities), I find that I'm less prone to creating worlds just for my own pleasure. What's the point if no one's going to read about or play in them? I need to focus my time on something I can share with the world. The most important thing is to keep good notes as you go along. In my book, I kept having to scroll back up to previous chapters to find the name of the one stupid little town someone was heading to (I kept having the same problem remembering the names of minor characters, and let me tell you, it's really embarrassing when you discover that for the past two chapters, you've been referring to the dead king by the name of the king of the dwarves in Earthdawn, because some wires in your brain got crossed). It's a big waste of time, and if you're running a game, you don't have a file to scroll up in. You have to rely on the memories of your players, and it really looks bad if you're asking them for the name of the princess they're supposed to rescue. What I used to do when I ran a game was to keep a notebook and pencil at hand, and every time I had to come up with a random NPC, inn, or town name unexpectedly, I wrote it down with a brief note about what it was. If it was important, it would later go into my computer file for the game world. If it was minor, I could just look it up in the notebook if the group came back to it later. Sometimes I do the same thing in games I play in, just so I can impress the other players by remembering the name of an innkeeper whose place we stayed in six months ago. I know, I lead a sad little life. You also have to be sure to have enough of an idea of the game world that if the group suddenly goes off in a surprise direction, you don't have to railroad them into the areas that you do have developed. Of course, there's nothing wrong with using "random" encounters to delay them along the way, giving you an extra session to fully develop the place they want to go and come up with some story hooks... but it's a good idea to at least have a sketch of what a place is like. "Zenmar is a mining town nestled in the foot of the mountains; its primary products are iron and coal" etc etc. (As a side note, do not name the mountains "The Spine of the World" or any such related name. If I hear that in one more game or read it in one more novel, I'll gag.) If you do it right, and put just enough work into your world between sessions, your group will never even catch on to the fact that you're flying practically by the seat of your pants. That's all for this month. Remember that next month is December, which means that I will be presenting my annual Geekmas gift giving guide. Until then, happy gaming!

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Copyright © 2008 By AJ Reardon E-mail AJ at: ErtheFae@aol.com Visit AJ at: www.erthefae.com