I´m a top-down person. I always had troubles with DMs who´d just prepare the "seven hexes" but YMMV.

Quote from: Benoist;384077Yes. Slippery slopes they are. No question about it.


I don't agree. Not always.
I know what you mean: it's your turf. Your specialty. That's where your heart and soul goes into gaming: the world-building. You're a guy who loves structure, coherent conceptual design, with a particular attention to detail and depth. I feel like I know you, dude.

It's not like that for every GM, though.

If anything, I feel this will HUGELY depend on the particular GM, and his improvisational skills especially (and beyond that, the way his brain operates in terms of imagination - there's no right or wrong answer on this, just different takes according to different types of brains and personalities). I honestly can tell you stories of games that went much better than I could ever have hoped for BECAUSE there was little prep involved, not more.

I guess there will be a "right amount of prep" sort of balance that each GM will have to figure out for him or herself, and sometimes, not prepping extensively means you're opening yourself up to the inspiration of the moment in the game. Some of my best memories of gaming, if not the vast majority of them, really, came from the players doing something unexpected that required from me to basically throw my pile of notes through the window and just run with whatever they had in mind, making shit up as we went.

Yes, specific games...But not campaigns.  
Look again in our comments, and where your is leading you.  I am talking long-term, you are still talking about specific games.
(You also are not wrong on your read on me....mea culpa)

We spoke about World in Motion as an ingredient for immersion, and the consistency one gets from continued prep and bacl work helps this immeasurably.  
Let me ask you, and there is no right answer...Do you feel that Prof. Tolkien's extra efforts in linguistics were wasted, or his historical work?  Do you think they added to the internal consistency and took a very good story and made it legendary?  or was the writing and the plot enough?  
Becasue that is my contention, as i have writtten it a few times.   The detailed prep work can make a bad game tolerable, a good campaign great, and a great campaign legendary.

Quote from: thecasualoblivion;383132Its not as big of a difference as you make it out to be. When you say that something "Is D&D", you also tend to say or strongly imply that something else isn't. The OSR as a whole has a strong undercurrent of defining or implying things as "not D&D". With some people this is intentional, and others don't realize they are doing it, but either way its there. Its the negative side that the aggression/passive aggression stems from.

Saying that it only applies to you isn't as strong a statement than the negative implication itself, and doesn't entirely mitigate it.

"I don't like the Star Wars prequels."

This is not an aggressive statement towards people who happen to like the Star Wars prequels. To interpret someone as being aggressive because they have an opinion that differs from yours would seem to require an immense degree of personal insecurity.

Ironically, OTOH, I think "4th Edition is a fundamentally different game from previous editions of the game" is a statement of fact, not opinion. One can factually compare the rules and demonstrate the difference.

Does this mean that 4th Edition "isn't D&D"? Well, that depends on how one chooses to identify what "D&D" is. Do you mean a game that features the same core gameplay as the game designed by Gygax and Arneson? If so, then 4th Edition clearly isn't D&D. (But Labyrinth Lord is.)

Do you mean anything that has the "D&D" trademark on it? Well, then it clearly is D&D. (And Labyrinth Lord isn't.)

Do you mean any fantasy roleplaying game? Well, then it's clearly D&D. (And so are Runequest and Nobilis.)

All of which drives us back into the realm of opinion.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;384091"I don't like the Star Wars prequels."

Hey! Welcome Justin. Do you know how many times we linked your essay on dissociated mechanics around here?

A lot.

Quote from: LordVreeg;384090Yes, specific games...But not campaigns.  
Look again in our comments, and where your is leading you.  I am talking long-term, you are still talking about specific games.
(You also are not wrong on your read on me....mea culpa)

Okay. I was about to say "I'm talking about long term too" but then I realized what you actually mean. You mean to say (correct me if I'm wrong) that, even if you start with little to no prep, as the campaign evolves and stuff happens, even if you fill in some blanks as the players explore the world in improv-mode, you'll start to invest more and more time to make sense of this stuff between game sessions. Which leads us back to the notion that sooner or later you'll have to pay attention to the details so that the feeling of verisimilitude doesn't suddenly shatter in the game.

I agree.

Quote from: LordVreeg;384090We spoke about World in Motion as an ingredient for immersion, and the consistency one gets from continued prep and bacl work helps this immeasurably.  
Let me ask you, and there is no right answer...Do you feel that Prof. Tolkien's extra efforts in linguistics were wasted, or his historical work?  Do you think they added to the internal consistency and took a very good story and made it legendary?  or was the writing and the plot enough?  
Becasue that is my contention, as i have writtten it a few times.   The detailed prep work can make a bad game tolerable, a good campaign great, and a great campaign legendary.

I wouldn't take JRRT as a good example for RPG game settings. It's probably the worse example of campaign building you could take. Middle-earth probably is one of the worse examples of fully detailed literary world I would use for an long-running campaign, precisely because it is too detailed, too crowded for the PCs to really make a difference in the world without retconing a whole bunch of stuff or going "Ah. To Hell with the canon!" Unless you start talking about Fourth and Fifth Age stuff, which isn't exactly JRRT's Middle-earth, if you see what I mean.

I see your point though, if I interpreted it correctly in the paragraph above.

As to the first para, We are getting closer.  the longer a campaign runs, the deeper it can become, the more backtracking, forshadowing, and detail making that goes on.  And since this is a 'Sandbox' thread, there are a LOT of details thrown out in a sandbox game, more than in other games.  Remembering these is critical, and tying them together...when the players nod and say, 'Oh, yeah, I remember them', then you are winning.  That's the kind of prep we are talking.

And I did not ask about Tolkien's work as an RPG.  I asked if you though his efforts were wasted.  He wasn't trying to write an RPG, and so I was not asking about it in that light.  I asked how his backstory work affected the story, since that is what he was writing.  I think that question translates very well into Prep work that people do in an RPG, as my contention is that it lowers the barrriers to immersion.

I might have to plan a trip for us to have this discussion face to face.  

Quote from: LordVreeg;384101As to the first para, We are getting closer.  the longer a campaign runs, the deeper it can become, the more backtracking, forshadowing, and detail making that goes on.  And since this is a 'Sandbox' thread, there are a LOT of details thrown out in a sandbox game, more than in other games.  Remembering these is critical, and tying them together...when the players nod and say, 'Oh, yeah, I remember them', then you are winning.  That's the kind of prep we are talking.

OK. I get what you're saying now.

Quote from: LordVreeg;384101And I did not ask about Tolkien's work as an RPG.  I asked if you though his efforts were wasted.  He wasn't trying to write an RPG, and so I was not asking about it in that light.  I asked how his backstory work affected the story, since that is what he was writing.  I think that question translates very well into Prep work that people do in an RPG, as my contention is that it lowers the barrriers to immersion.

Alright, assuming the Fellowship is the actual group of PCs, in other words.
You must know this, right?

Quote from: LordVreeg;384101I might have to plan a trip for us to have this discussion face to face.  

Anytime. Just be ready to roll 3d6 in order and get some Black Abbey exploration done as well.

To tell you the truth I don't really see how a "World in Motion" or Immersive campaign can really happen without adequate prep.  Yes, there is going to be a whole lot of improv and smoke and mirrors, but to be honest, Lord Vreeg is right, more prep would be better.

If you don't prep, you're relying on your characters going along with the fact that this is an illusion.  They're not walking down the street to the tavern you didn't mention because they know you don't have it prepped.  Your skeleton works because your players willingly suspend disbelief.  Can they have a crazyass fun time? Yes.  Would it have been even better with prep? probably.

I like to start off small with an area that is prepped to hell and back.  Pick an NPC and I'll tell you what hand he jerks off at night and who he's thinking about doing it.  Players notice that level of prep.  They'll push the envelope trying to find the house that's just a prop, not a home.  If they don't find the curtain in the first couple adventures, then they'll just stop looking.  At that point you ease up a bit because they won't be looking for the curtain, at the same time, they won't be willingly settling for a skeleton campaign either.  At that point the smoke and mirrors actually work, instead of the players making you think it does.

Quote from: Settembrini;384089I´m a top-down person. I always had troubles with DMs who´d just prepare the "seven hexes" but YMMV.

You've got to walk before you can run.

The amount of needed to get adequate detail isn't that much.  To follow my "How to Make a Fantasy Sandbox" will take two weeks worth of evenings with one or two hours to spare each evening. That is assuming you make presentable version of everything. If all you go for is rough sketches then it will take a week or so of evening.

The problem is that Sandbox are so under utilized that it not common knowledge how to approach them. The main examples folks see are fully fleshed out travelogues for settings and detailed keyed locales for adventures. As long as you have a dozen or two ideas to use as seeds it takes far less time to create a sandbox.

Plus if you keep the same setting from game to game and build on it each the prep on subsequent campaigns can be more focused on specifics rather than world building.

Quote from: EstarPlus if you keep the same setting from game to game and build on it each the prep on subsequent campaigns can be more focused on specifics rather than world building.

This, by the way, is one of the great secrets...keep your notes...

Quote from: LordVreeg;384143This, by the way, is one of the great secrets...keep your notes...

Agreed.

30 years of stuff in there.

Quote from: estar;384177Agreed.

30 years of stuff in there.

How do you post your thumbnails in that format?

Quote from: CRKrueger;384109To tell you the truth I don't really see how a "World in Motion" or Immersive campaign can really happen without adequate prep.  Yes, there is going to be a whole lot of improv and smoke and mirrors, but to be honest, Lord Vreeg is right, more prep would be better.

If you don't prep, you're relying on your characters going along with the fact that this is an illusion.  They're not walking down the street to the tavern you didn't mention because they know you don't have it prepped.  Your skeleton works because your players willingly suspend disbelief.  Can they have a crazyass fun time? Yes.  Would it have been even better with prep? probably.

I like to start off small with an area that is prepped to hell and back.  Pick an NPC and I'll tell you what hand he jerks off at night and who he's thinking about doing it.  Players notice that level of prep.  They'll push the envelope trying to find the house that's just a prop, not a home.  If they don't find the curtain in the first couple adventures, then they'll just stop looking.  At that point you ease up a bit because they won't be looking for the curtain, at the same time, they won't be willingly settling for a skeleton campaign either.  At that point the smoke and mirrors actually work, instead of the players making you think it does.

You see I am exactly the oposite. They will never find a house that is just a prop because I can populate any house they go into in a second.
For reasons I won't go into my mum took up rpgs when I was at Uni. She was really into prep and a lot of her ideas were excellent. She ran three parallel campaigns with differnt parties with an over riding story arc that linked it all in. Her prep was huge. Every house had an A5 index card with the folks that lived there , sketches of most of the major NPCs etc etc. But to play it was so slow and felt so stiffled.

What actually happens is the PCs enter a house the DM tells them who is there and what the house is like. The PCs don't care if you look this up in your database or just make it up (provided when they go back the house is the same of course) so long as its interesting plausible and consistent with the game world.

Now I don't think I am an exceptional GM. I am pretty smart and have a good memory and I have an eye for hooks and tapping what the players want. I don't think these are exceptional skills I think all experienced GMs have them.
I can see that in a very heavy game like 4e or even 3e you need to prep monsters if you are going to provides a range of mixed encounters. In earlier versions of D&D and most other games ...no need. I mean in most of my 2e games I adlib the monsters stats. The creatures are certainly goblinoid but they have pronounced hunch-backs and their arms are log enough to reach the the floor and their hands bear 5 wickedly sharp claws... etc... give um 3hd, 2 attacks 1d6, ac 5 due to natural hide, 60 feet infravision your done. Why break the flow to look shit up?

Now as I noted previously a key to good improv is foreshadowing. You make up these Smetin (name just give to creature above) ad a random encounter and then you build that event into a village plagued by Smetin raiders. this really is bread and butter stuff.

As I have mentioned previously I think the really improv challenge would be to improv the whole system based on player votes at the start of the session. So the players want a scifi game with a cinematic feel and lots of space combat. They want these 8 stats and a d20 skills system. They want to build their characters from point buy. All of which were voted for at each point by the players. Now as the GM you adlib all that take the PCs through chargen which you have to adlib of course (tricky with a point buy system but far from impossible) and then play the game that you were sketching out in your head whilst you were also making up the skills sytem and making sure it fitted with the combat stystem which provided what the PCs voted for ... then you play a 4 hour session. Now that would be sweet.

I like sandboxes when they're well-done. I do think a lot of people are pretty shitty at world design, present company excepted, of course.

Setting write-ups tend to be a lot of wanky shit about superheroic gods kicking the shit out of one another, tongue-twistingly useless language families and a million hexes of desert to wander through one random roll at a time, but all the material culture is Ren Faire with superficial reskinning, and the climate and geography make no goddamn sense.

I think that stuff is actually fairly important to sandbox games because it provides a set of stable templates from which the DM can extrapolate as needed, rather than forcing them to become an autistic kid spending days and days mapping the dimensions of every house in town, or some flakey would-be author who just waves the setting aside whenever it becomes inconvenient to his predetermined scenes.