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GameMastery Guide / Creating a World / Detailing Your World

The Scholarly Details

Source GameMastery Guide pg. 144
Now we come to the information that perhaps only a sage would need to know, but which forms the underpinning of your world’s physics—and metaphysics. Such details include how the world was formed, how magic works, and where dead heroes go when they fall in battle; many are fleshed out further starting on page 160.

Like the other considerations, these aren’t necessarily outside the comprehension of the player characters. Most people have a basic understanding of them, albeit colored by their backgrounds. It’s been said that sometimes the most exciting and rich worlds are those that don’t answer all the questions, but you’re the final arbiter on that score.

How did the world come to be?

The answer to this question is your world’s creation myth. You can have more than one answer to this, especially if you have multiple races and they don’t all share the same worldview. You can choose one of them as the “real” story, or you might suggest that they are all aspects of the truth. This question leads in turn to questions such as how old the world is, what role the gods played in creation, and possibly even when the world is going to end. There’s a lot of room for mythology.

What is the nature of the gods?

This is the question that your clerics are going to want to know more about eventually. Are the gods omnipotent and omniscient beings far above the world? Are they capricious superhuman beings, like the gods of Greek myth? Is there a pantheon, or a single creator figure? There are many options here, but you should at the very least know for yourself what level of detail you want to maintain for divinity.

What is the source of magic?

The easiest answer to this question is to simply have magic be a part of your world’s physics, a natural force that wizards and sorcerers somehow draw upon to work their spells. But you might also consider having arcane magic stem from the gods or be left over from a deific war. Are there multiple sources of magic? How does this affect the magic of creatures like dragons, fey, and outsiders?

What happens when you die?

Think about whether your world has an afterlife, a place of eternal reward or suffering. Do souls travel the planes, becoming servants of the gods, or do they reincarnate, with the legacy of heroes extending back to the earliest days? Do people even have souls at all? Among the many reasons to consider this question is the existence of spells like resurrection and speak with dead, as well as the nature of undead. If you depart this world for your next life after death, what’s that ghost’s story? Why is it still around?

What cycles or events define the calendar?

One characteristic of a world is the cycle of seasons, the weather, and the passage of time. For more information on this subject, see Time on pages 162–163.

What do you see when you look at the sky?

What are the stars? What about the moon and planets? You can leave most such questions unanswered for a long time, but when the player characters achieve the kind of power or freedom to venture to other worlds, you’ll want to know what they find. For more on this topic, see pages 164–165.

What constitutes cutting-edge technology?

Setting a world’s tech level can be an excellent defining characteristic. Where does alchemy fit in? Does the printing press exist? What about rudimentary steam power? For more on this subject, see pages 160–161.

Where do monsters come from?

While it’s easy to assume the presence of monsters, questions like this one open doors to adventure hooks and new monsters. Was there some event in the history of the world that spawned monsters like chimeras, hydras, and dragons? Are monsters an accident of nature or an integral part of the ecosystem? Thinking about these things can also suggest the origins of PC races like elves, dwarves, and gnomes.

Which is strongest: magic, gods, or nature?

Fantasy worlds often hang in the balance between opposing forces. Is your world all a grand design, woven by cosmic beings? Is arcane magic in opposition to the power of the gods and their clerics? Does nature battle magic’s transforming nature, or do the forces of order and chaos battle for domination? It’s possible that a nonstandard answer to this question can form the heart of a world or campaign.

If I drop this off the balcony, what happens?

This question is actually about verisimilitude, and the answer is usually, “It falls and hits the person standing beneath it on the head.” So the real question is, other than “accepted” weirdness like magic and demons, is there anything you want to change or alter about the physical world? If so, how can you do it without losing the players’ suspension of disbelief? Your world needs to make its own kind of sense to bind the strange and fantastic in a way that feels natural—at least to the world’s residents— thus creating a stage for the PCs’ wondrous adventures.

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