Game vs. Setting

[badger2305]

I had something of a revelation when I was posting to the Citizens of the Imperium forums (www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/). I realized that I've always thought of rules sets such as OD&D and Classic Traveller as frameworks that you make your own (and we've talked some about this elsewhere; frankly, that discussion helped me realize this). "House rules" and the like are a natural result of this way of thinking.

So this idea of rules set as "toolbox and construction set" is pretty much implicit to OD&D, as we've been talking about it. I don't think this is quite the same as later rules sets such as GURPS, where there was an explicit attempt to cover all the bases (so to speak). Instead, there's a sense of incompleteness - "hey, we've left this open for you to dream up on your own" along with the more general "if you don't like something, change it."

But then there's the issue of setting. One of the things I've noticed about both D&D and Traveller is how much the "official" settings influence how the rules are interpreted and later revised. And in a game where the setting is tightly woven into the rules, not using that setting is pretty closely related to not playing that game "right" or "correctly."

If we buy into the idea that the rules are a framework and the setting for the game is something you bring to it, then it is only appropriate that you make up your own setting. OD&D is fairly explicit about this on a meta-level: you make up your own dungeon, and your own wilderness (if you like), and out of that you and your players make up your own story. But there are pressures for a stock setting to emerge, as in the case of Traveller.

In the context of Traveller, I've rarely run a game set in the Third Imperium universe as published by GDW. The rather endless debates about "canon" always seemed "off" to me, until I realized that for many people, the "Third Imperium" is Traveller. But my first encounter with Traveller was three little black booklets and no house universe in place. So I took the mindset from Original D&D and applied it to (Classic) Traveller - make up your own setting, and go from there. It's exactly what I would've done with a D&D campaign (and have done, in the past). AS an example of this, in "Around the Campfire" I've been detailing the campaign I first played in with my friend Paul.

I'm not sure where I am going with this idea, but here's a question: what have you done as far as setting is concerned? Not just dungeon design, but how have you imagined the context for adventure, and put that into your game? (This is tangentially related to what books have inspired you, if you think about it.)

[coffee]

In D&D (whichever version) I've always used my own setting; that's just the way it goes.

The only real problem I ever had was in trying to run Traveller. Again, I used my own setting; nobody could deal with it. They all expected it to be GDW's Third Imperium, and that that. (They also expected me to use books 4 and 5, whereas I didn't see the need for such complexity; especially since it only covered three of the six character types.)

Traveller wasn't meant to have one specific background (that's obvious from the original three books, but not so much from the revised three books of 1980). But you're right, that's what's happened with the game since then.

It's as if all D&D took place in Greyhawk, period. And if you created your own background, or map, or whatever, you were a heretic.


I'm not sure where I'm going with this answer, but something in your post resonated so I felt I had to contribute.

[makofan]

I don't use the 3rd Imperium - I roll my own universe each time, and I like to play with lower tech levels. If people don't like it, they don't have to play!

[badger2305]

coffee said:

In D&D (whichever version) I've always used my own setting; that's just the way it goes.

The only real problem I ever had was in trying to run Traveller. Again, I used my own setting; nobody could deal with it. They all expected it to be GDW's Third Imperium, and that that. (They also expected me to use books 4 and 5, whereas I didn't see the need for such complexity; especially since it only covered three of the six character types.)

Traveller wasn't meant to have one specific background (that's obvious from the original three books, but not so much from the revised three books of 1980). But you're right, that's what's happened with the game since then.

It's as if all D&D took place in Greyhawk, period. And if you created your own background, or map, or whatever, you were a heretic.


I'm not sure where I'm going with this answer, but something in your post resonated so I felt I had to contribute.

Thank you - I think part of what I am saying is that in both OD&D and Classic Traveller you are expected to add your own setting for the game. How does this work in each game?

• In OD&D, there are specific rules for dungeon design and for wilderness adventure. The first is detailed far more than the second, and towns and cities are not dealt with much if at all. What this means is that these areas, far from being considered "unimportant" are in reality the very places where it is up to the referee to determine their own way of doing things. That's what makes the City-State of the Invincible Overlord so interesting - it's the first serious look at a "city as 'dungeon'" (and by 'dungeon' I mean as a designed setting for adventure).
  
• In Classic Traveller, the mapping of subsectors and Universal Planetary Profile gives you a general idea of what each planet is, but the interpretation of those numbers is left to the referee, within the context of the rules themselves. Beyond that, there's a lot of room for elements of science fiction outside of the rules themselves; it's probably worth noticing that Traveller is more "tightly engineered" than OD&D - coming three years later and benefiting as a result.
  
• In general, I would suggest that one element of "old school" games is this sense of "incompleteness" that I mentioned earlier. This is not to say that vital portions were completely left out, but rather that the "sketchy" nature of some rules sets is an intentional choice rather than omission.
  

Just some more thoughts on all of this....

[James Maliszewski]

badger2305 said:

Thank you - I think part of what I am saying is that in both OD&D and Classic Traveller you are expected to add your own setting for the game.

Absolutely. I think that's the biggest shift in gaming from the early days to the present. Mind you, the precedent was set early, with Empire of the Petal Throne in 1975 and then with RuneQuest in 1978 and the love poured on them by their creators exercised, I fear, a net negative effect on the hobby, as many gamers started to expect settings described in as much detail as were Tékumel and Glorantha. When you compare, for example, the original World of Greyhawk or the Wilderlands to these two, the difference is night and day.

The other thing to bear in mind too is that, as gaming grew into the mass market, the audience of do it yourself-capable players and referees didn't grow along with it. Early gaming assumes a high degree of familiarity and facility with making stuff up; later games tend to hand hold and this in turn encourages setting bloat and a shift toward pre-packaged materials. I remember Gygax saying how amazed and frustrated he was that people would write or call TSR asking for answers when he felt they should just make up their own answers, as suggested at the end of OD&D. This is another instance of the same phenomenon.

[Stonegiant]

I think another thing to keep in mind is the fact that the amount of free time people have has also diminished. The target audience of 1974 had more free time for creative work than today. That is one reason that I think you have seen a gradual shift from everyone doing their own thing to people going with a pre-existing campaign world. The few times I have had chances to run games in the past couple of years I have used The World of Greyhawk just for the simple fact that I didn't need to worry about the backdrop, people where familiar with it, and I could focus what little time I had free (between work, kids, the wife, etc.) to creating and playing the adventures. Mind you I don't think this is the only reason for these choices (I have used Greyhawk in the past whenever I also was having an imagination block).

[driver]

I'm increasingly inclined to homebrew. My current campaign is homebrew with several old JG modules informing the backstory, and next I plan to run a scratch-built campaign -- no published material other than 3LB -- set in a different section of the same campaign world.

These days, I feel like making things up myself is actually *less* work because I don't worry about fidelity to anyone else's details, or overcoming my players' preconceptions about how the world is supposed to be. ("No, no, that happened From the Ashes, we're playing folio Greyhawk.")

Obviously, the DM has final say in how things operate in his own version of a published setting, but it's jarring to continually tell players that things work differently in your version than in the version they read about, or played 15 years ago, or whatever. It lessens the utility of having a "setting we're all familiar with."

One of my favorite campaign worlds is Harn, but its level of detail has always made me tense for that reason. I feel paralyzed working with it because I have to either vet my own ideas with published canon, or correct assumptions that the players picked up from canon.

And with published modules, I have to read the module, take a few notes, make sure I understand the physical geography and the factional politics, alter elements here and there, and integrate it with my setting.

On the other hand, with homebrew, I just decide something, jot it down, and move on, and that's the whole of the canon. I don't have to familiarize myself with modules or integrate them with the setting, because I made them up.

And it's cheaper.

I'm not saying I'm never running games in published settings again -- in particular, if I ever get a chance to run The Enemy Within for WFRP 1e again, I'm jumping on it. But I don't personally find that much difference in the real time expenditure between homebrewing and using published settings or modules.

[makofan]

I'm DMing the module "Verbosh" right now, and I change and cut/fit as I go. It's really just a guideline anyway

[badger2305]

driver said:

These days, I feel like making things up myself is actually *less* work because I don't worry about fidelity to anyone else's details, or overcoming my players' preconceptions about how the world is supposed to be. ("No, no, that happened From the Ashes, we're playing folio Greyhawk.")

(nods) - it's less work to do your own thing. I think Gary understood that on an intuitive as well as conscious level - why use somebody else's setting when you could make up your own? Keep in mind that Judges Guild floated the idea of prepackaged adventures as a potentially profitable idea to TSR - and Gary let them go ahead, starting off with the belief that few people would want to use one.

One of my favorite campaign worlds is Harn, but its level of detail has always made me tense for that reason. I feel paralyzed working with it because I have to either vet my own ideas with published canon, or correct assumptions that the players picked up from canon.

Precisely. And with the sheer accretion of material for many published settings, keeping up with what's "right" or "current" becomes harder and harder. That's true of Greyhawk, Faerun, and I suppose Eberron. It's also true of two settings I am very fond of: Star Trek and Tekumel.

By reverse implication, I suspect this also means that the inclusion of A/H's Outdoor Survival was seen as a stopgap measure - "use this if you have to" - rather than as a real recommendation for an actual setting (and hey, I could be wrong about this, but Outdoor Survival is about a generic a wilderness as anyone could get in 1974). But that also means that the rules were intended to provide some of the tools necessary for constructing your setting - but the bulk of it was left up to you. It's a very different way of thinking than the later mindset that provides us with Interesting Small Businesses of the Realms and That Island on the Map Which Actually Started as a Color Separation Error in Printing (now with 64 pages of description!) as levels of detail.

Following through to its logical conclusion, this suggests that a "mega-dungeon" was not intended to exist without anything much outside of it (even though many games might have started that way, note that Greyhawk and Blackmoor did not, however). Rather, that was the side of the template specifically reserved on a conceptual level for the referee to fill in.

[korgoth]

badger2305 said:

Following through to its logical conclusion, this suggests that a "mega-dungeon" was not intended to exist without anything much outside of it (even though many games might have started that way, note that Greyhawk and Blackmoor did not, however). Rather, that was the side of the template specifically reserved on a conceptual level for the referee to fill in.

As cool an idea as the megadungeon is, I think that it only gets cooler when it exists within an interesting context.

[coffee]

The biggest thing I as DM have against a published setting is that I not only have pay for it but I also have to learn it.

And then there are the players. One will learn every possible detail (and correct me where I go wrong), where the next won't even open the book and make everybody wait while the basics are explained yet once again.

With my own world, I just say what the deal is and people don't have much choice but to accept it. They can even help create it, which gives them a level of connection to the game that they wouldn't otherwise have.

[badger2305]

korgoth said:

As cool an idea as the megadungeon is, I think that it only gets cooler when it exists within an interesting context.

I would agree. A logical extension of what I'm talking about here is something of a conceptual response to what I've read elsewhere about the role, nature and purpose of a mega-dungeon within an OD&D campaign.

Specifically, I'm making a real distinction between the assumption that some people have made that the mega-dungeon is the be-all and end-all of an early game. That assumption is partially or wholly based on an interpretation of what's presented in the three brown booklets as being the entire scope of the game. A different interpretation of the text as presented would be that what isn't there is important for the referee to figure out, and not that wildernesses, etc. are somehow unimportant.

[Finarvyn]

coffee said:

The biggest thing I as DM have against a published setting is that I not only have pay for it but I also have to learn it.

Exactly! I no longer have the time or the inclination to sit down and read through piles of books just to learn somebody else's setting. It's much easier for me to swipe things I like from other places and constuct a setting of my own.

As to the whole rules v setting discussion, I keep trying to chat with my son on this very thing. When I want to discuss which rules should be used (which races, classes, and so forth) the first thing he wants to do is insert setting details. But I want rules which will work for ANY setting!

[BeZurKur]

There are two parallel themes going on in this thread: published setting versus original settings, and implied settings versus boundaryless settings.

On the first, it is my personal opinion that original settings are superior to published ones. The reason is because the players will include the elements that are important to them. Also, the build it as you go, whether it is a megadungeon or countryside, makes it possible to customize it to the campaigns needs. This is a philosophy many of the indie games have taken to heart; group collaboration and joint authorship that is strong in the spirit of OD&D is what is meant by player empowerment. None of that is possible in a pre-packaged campaign world, unless the players go through the effort to change it, but then that kinda defeats the purpose, right?

On the implied setting, this one is more difficult to judge. While I agree that OD&D is open ended enough to introduce new mechanics, one must still be careful not to upset the balance intrinsic in those simple rules. OD&D is still about dungeons and dragons. The dungeons don't have to be made of flagstone and underground; they could be of brick and in a city or of trees and in the wild, but where ever it is, it should be about exploration. The monsters don't have to be dragons, but they have to be an overwhelming, clear and present danger that challenges the players' ingenuity and offers adventure. The simple xp for gp mechanic reinforces this.

The mega-dungeon is honest in its approach and tells you upfront what it is about in terms of setting and game. Still, I do believe the game can support story as long as it keeps it goal clear: dungeons and dragons (or exploration and adventure) and not deep characterization or plot. There are no mechanics to support the latter, and in fact, it's high mortality mechanics serve more to hinder them than help.

[philotomy]

Re: homebrew vs. published

I'm also increasingly homebrewing; one of the main reasons is because it's faster and easier, for me. (That goes for adventures, too.) Heck, published materials sometimes advise you to "read the module through once to get a general idea, and then read it again while making your own notes/changes/et cetera." Doing all that takes me longer than creating an adventure on my own. And my homebrew creations"fit." And I know the material -- even the stuff that isn't written down. There was a period where I fell into the trap of trying to create my material just like a published module, which was a huge waste of time. These days, I can get by with a very rough key/set of notes and a few maps.

Re: Story

I find that story naturally arises from the PC's actions within the game. That is, I don't create a story, I just put a bunch of elements in place, and the players create the story. Heck, sometimes their actions and questions introduce story elements I never even considered.

[badger2305]

bezurkur said:

The mega-dungeon is honest in its approach and tells you upfront what it is about in terms of setting and game. Still, I do believe the game can support story as long as it keeps it goal clear: dungeons and dragons (or exploration and adventure) and not deep characterization or plot. There are no mechanics to support the latter, and in fact, it's high mortality mechanics serve more to hinder them than help.

I agree about the implicit "honesty" of the mega-dungeon as a place of adventure. But I think you misunderstand the point I am trying to make about what lies beyond the mega-dungeon. Namely, the mega-dungeon in its own way is the most structured part of the game, whereas what lies beyond is up to the referee to construct and the player-characters to interact with.

As far as "game balance" vis-a-vis the setting is concerned, that seems to be a later concept layered on top of the nature of the game itself. There have always been discussions about game balance and the rules - but that is (I would suggest) different from imagining a setting for the game.

[ffilz]

As far as setting goes, I thing I would divide setting into three basic tiers, realizing of course it's a spectrum.

At the low end, we have implied setting. Every game system (RPG or otherwise) has an implied setting. The rules of the game tell us what will be the focus of play, and therefore the important elements of setting.

In the middle, we have skeletal settings. The earliest RPG settings as presented started off skeletal. RuneQuest provided a map, a couple pages of history, and a handful of cults. Even with Cults of Prax, primarily setting was expanded by providing more cults and their mechanics. Traveler started out with implied setting and with the addition of the Spinward Marches provided a skeleton of setting. As more supplements came out, both of these games drifted towards the third tier of setting.

At the high end, we have what I would call "story settings." A story setting is complex and the story presented by the setting publications becomes more important than the game.

I believe it's only the highest tier that is poisonous to play. With implied setting, of course it's pretty easy to expand or change the setting (though too much change may require fundamental rules changes). With a skeleton, and perhaps bits and pieces of flesh, play is still about what the characters do, but there is some prodding from outside the group in the form of an occasional detail brought in from the published setting (perhaps just a name on a map, perhaps a detail of culture, or even an adventure module).

I think the most important thing for a GM to realize is that the important story is the one that arises from play. The GM can poison the game just as much as a story setting by trying to impose his own story on the game.

So back to D&D and it's implied setting: There is no doubt that the rules provide some guidelines for adventure outside the dungeon, however, I have come to believe that the mode of play supported by the core of the rules does not really work for outside the dungeon play. Trying to fit a logical city into the setting implied by the character advancement mechanics of D&D is going to leave one with a headache. Also, taken out of the close confines of the dungeon, the ability to rest up between encounters, or bring large numbers of troops to bear changes the scope of the game (resting up makes magic users the dominating force, while armies soften the focus on the PCs). I also see a lot of pressure to conform the encounters to the party's level. I think it could work if you provided fixed encounter sites (essentially mini-dungeons) with a decent way for a smart group to scout them out, and decide when and how to tackle them (hmm, that woods has a dragon in it, we'd better go back to the dungeon and make a couple more levels and then come back).

Frank

[badger2305]

ffilz said:

I think the most important thing for a GM to realize is that the important story is the one that arises from play. The GM can poison the game just as much as a story setting by trying to impose his own story on the game.

Sure. And by that standard, sticking only to the dungeon as the setting for adventure is imposing a particular story on the game. With all due respect, Ffilz, it's a cop-out to do that, because the game was incomplete from the start. The referee was expected to add their own setting to the game - that's why it's called "The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures."

As has been talked about here and elsewhere, the progression of character development was seen by Gary and Dave to lead to Lords, Wizards, and Patriarchs. Along with that, there were rules provided (part of that "implied setting" so you can't ignore it) for building strongholds and attracting followers. At some point, the expectation was to leave the dungeon. Sure, you might go back, but the game was expected to expand beyond it. The scope for player-character adventure didn't weaken, it got bigger.

"Exploration and adventure" can be supported by wilderness - one of the common threads among early D&D campaigns was how deadly wilderness encounters could be, given the number of monsters encountered. I would suggest that the very thing you mention - "wilderness encounters as mini-dungeon" - is exactly what I'm talking about. The referee was expected to add their own setting to give shape and context to the campaign. If you look at First Fantasy Campaign, you will see a range of things outside the dungeon that act as challenges for the PCs (e.g. The Egg of Coot). But it is exactly those things that make Blackmoor the unique setting that it was (and is).

Put very simply, the challenge to the referee was not just to build a really massive dungeon, it was to build their own distinctive campaign. And that means they have to add their own ideas about the world-outside-the-dungeon and how it works.

[James Maliszewski]

badger2305 said:

As has been talked about here and elsewhere, the progression of character development was seen by Gary and Dave to lead to Lords, Wizards, and Patriarchs. Along with that, there were rules provided (part of that "implied setting" so you can't ignore it) for building strongholds and attracting followers. At some point, the expectation was to leave the dungeon. Sure, you might go back, but the game was expected to expand beyond it. The scope for player-character adventure didn't weaken, it got bigger.

Absolutely correct. One of my biggest complaints with post-AD&D versions of D&D is that they forget this. They treat characters as eternal adventurers, moving forever on to bigger and tougher dungeons and I think that skews the intention of the game. Even Conan settled down eventually and indeed his entire purpose in adventuring was to achieve the power, fame, and opportunity to become a ruler himself one day. OD&D is no different.

Put very simply, the challenge to the referee was not just to build a really massive dungeon, it was to build their own distinctive campaign. And that means they have to add their own ideas about the world-outside-the-dungeon and how it works.

Quoted for truth, as they say. It is no accident that the sub-title of OD&D includes the word "campaigns" and the histories of the earliest OD&D games quickly expanded beyond the dungeon. I take the examples of both Greyhawk and Blackmoor as archetypal in this regard.

[BeZurKur]

badger2305 said:

As far as “game balance” vis-a-vis the setting is concerned, that seems to be a later concept layered on top of the nature of the game itself. There have always been discussions about game balance and the rules - but that is (I would suggest) different from imagining a setting for the game.

It may be. If the setting is the royal castle and the game about courting the beautiful princess, any version of D&D would be a bad fit – although it may not be a bad game. Setting and rules are very closely tied. The game is open ended enough for you to make your own mechanics, but at that time you are working in a vacuum with little guidance. That's cool, but you'd be designing your own game.

If you want it to remain recognizably D&D, you need to remain within the implied setting: dungeons. If you move into cities and wilderness, they'd then be structured like dungeons. Franks observations on the wilderness structured like a dungeon are spot on. You can do it, and the game will work because it's operating within the implied setting. Trees and trails replace walls and passages; it's just color.

As for the dungeon being the DM's story, that's not necessarily true. The dungeon is about choice within the setting: the dungeon is the setting and not the story. A properly designed campaign provides the setting and leaves the choices up to the players. That is true of the dungeon as it is of the wilderness. I don't think we disagree on anything other than some small semantics.

[James Maliszewski]

bezurkur said:

If you want it to remain recognizably D&D, you need to remain within the implied setting: dungeons. If you move into cities and wilderness, they'd then be structured like dungeons. Franks observations on the wilderness structured like a dungeon are spot on. You can do it, and the game will work because it's operating within the implied setting. Trees and trails replace walls and passages; it's just color.

What then do you make of all the rules for the construction of strongholds and baronies? Clearly, even OD&D assumes that the eventual goal of characters is to become actively engaged in the setting outside the dungeon and I would contend that the reason OD&D self-identifies as a "wargame," besides the obvious fact that the term "roleplaying game" hadn't yet been coined in this context, is that, like wargames, there is the assumption that the actions of the characters will have consequences beyond the purely immediate ones. I think it's unnecessarily limiting to look on OD&D as being, even as written, simply about dungeons and dungeon-like wilderness adventures.

[BeZurKur]

Strongholds are the new HQ. The city develops around their castle. Instead of picking up rumors from the local tavern or the word on the streets, the people go to the players at their stronghold instead to plea their case of rampaging dragons or marauding armies.

I've only, however, recently returned to D&D and don't deny I may not be playing it to it's full potential. How are others playing it? I think I understand how the rules support the wilderness campaign, but what else are people doing with it?

[James Maliszewski]

bezurkur said:

How are others playing it? I think I understand how the rules support the wilderness campaign, but what else are people doing with it?

I have always played D&D as if I were playing out rough analogs to the stories of Conan: youthful rootless wanderers fling themselves headlong into danger to acquire wealth, power, and experience and then, as they mature, settle down to rule. Dungeon delving is not necessarily an end in itself; there can be a purpose to it. In my games that purpose is almost always to give the young adventurers a start in life to achieve bigger things later. I may be wrong about this, but I have always gotten the impression that the "heavy hitters" of the Greyhawk and Blackmoor campaigns eventually stopped going into dungeons after a certain point and started to engage in politics, warfare, and other "high level" pursuits that demanded they become involved in the wider world of the campaign setting. That's certainly how I've been playing it for the entirety of my gaming career.

[coffee]

jamesm said:

I may be wrong about this, but I have always gotten the impression that the "heavy hitters" of the Greyhawk and Blackmoor campaigns eventually stopped going into dungeons after a certain point and started to engage in politics, warfare, and other "high level" pursuits that demanded they become involved in the wider world of the campaign setting. That's certainly how I've been playing it for the entirety of my gaming career.

That fits with something I remember reading in the Dragon many many years ago (or it could have been the DMG), about how higher level adventures will often be just one or two characters and their henchmen. The upshot of it was that, at higher levels, Gary wasn't presuming that it would be the same old dungeon crawl.

Funny how I won't remember something like that for literally decades, and then all of a sudden this discussion will trigger the memory off as if I had read it only yesterday.

[badger2305]

In discussions I've had with Michael Mornard, he's mentioned that Gary intended for the game to develop to another level, where player-characters were responsible for larger issues and conflicts, and not focus on dungeon-delving. Not too surprisingly, given the wide range of wargaming milieux that Gary was familiar with, this meant leaving the form and nature of those issues and conflicts up to the referee - much as would be done for a more "traditional" wargame campaign.

[BeZurKur]

Without a doubt, politics and warfare can make for some great games. How does D&D help play out those games? The mechanics allow for some incredible adventures, but I don't see how they help tell plots of intriguing politics. Also, if that's the kind of game I want to play, why should I have to go through the years and character deaths to get to the level that allows me to play that kind of game? Although I never played it, at least Birthright for AD&D offered rules to play that kind of game and right away from level one. I don't know how successful it was.

I'm presently playing my hybrid of OD&D and Classic. I'm sticking to the tropes of D&D fantasy. There hasn't been a dragon yet, but there is an expansive dungeon that hints to a dark past. Although the players are first and foremost concerned with their immediate goal, they've begun to question that past. We are all having a blast because we are remaining true to the implicit setting and themes of exploration and adventure. The mechanics support us with this.

[coffee]

I think the whole point of D&D is to explore.

What you explore, whether dungeon, wilderness, city, political intrigue, etc. is entirely up to the play group; that's where the setting comes in.

Getting back to the start of this thread, one of the reasons the GDW Third Imperium worked so well for Traveller was that it allowed pretty much any kind of exploration the players might want. Ancient outposts, new worlds, border conflicts, espionage, space pirated, palace intrigue -- it allowed for it all.

D&D's settings varied with the individual group because they wanted to explore different things.

Anyway, that's how it looks to me.

[James Maliszewski]

coffee said:

D&D's settings varied with the individual group because they wanted to explore different things.

Anyway, that's how it looks to me.

I think you're quite right. And, as I said, we have the examples of Gary and Dave's campaigns to show that wilderness and city adventures have always been a part of the exploratory themes that are at the heart of D&D, as have political and military games. There's no need to alter the game to accommodate them; they were included in the game from the beginning, which is why we have rules in the three little brown books to deal with them.

I have to admit to some confusion as to why anyone should see these types of games problematic. "D&D" in its most primitive form (the fantasy supplement to Chainmail) predates dungeon adventuring. That's not to deny the importance of dungeons to the feel and flavor of OD&D at all, but it's important to remember that one can still play D&D without ever stepping foot in a dungeon. The game supports that type of play and we know that Gygax and Arneson ran games that roamed far and wide beyond their mega-dungeons. Why should we restrict ourselves unnecessarily now?

[ffilz]

The problem is that the game doesn't support any sort of resolution to conflict other than combat.

The leveling system also plays havoc with any sort of logic to a "world."

War game campaigns with Chainmail are a different animal. Chainmail units don't gain levels. A figure is a normal man, a hero, or a superhero, it doesn't change.

I don't think it's possible to play a logical "outside the dungeon" campaign (that doesn't just look like a dungeon with different props) without starting to ignore the rules, and that's what I've seen. It's summed up in the "role playing not roll playing" mantra, or calling dungeon campaigns "hack 'n slash." The stories you hear of where not a single die was rolled in combat during a whole session because everything was handled with negotiation (and essentially comes down to how much does the GM like you, perhaps moderated by your charisma, but then the "role" players decry anyone falling back on anything so crass as their charisma).

Perhaps others have had different experiences, but that is what I've seen time and time again. I also see a tendency to make encounters "challenging" to the PCs (such method formalized in 3.x).

I'm really curious what a high level "outside the dungeon" Blackmoor run really looks like. I also wonder about Greyhawk (I've not heard of nearly so much "outside the dungeon" play in Greyhawk).

And back to Chainmail - war game campaigns in my experience are all maneuvering to decide what forces go on the table for a miniatures battle. The resolution is still all tied up in the combat system (perhaps with some player to player negotiation). The GM in such a campaign is also theoretically neutral.

Frank

[badger2305]

ffilz said:

The problem is that the game doesn't support any sort of resolution to conflict other than combat.

The leveling system also plays havoc with any sort of logic to a "world."

War game campaigns with Chainmail are a different animal. Chainmail units don't gain levels. A figure is a normal man, a hero, or a superhero, it doesn't change.

I don't think it's possible to play a logical "outside the dungeon" campaign (that doesn't just look like a dungeon with different props) without starting to ignore the rules, and that's what I've seen.

With all due respect, Frank, there's a lot in the rules that can't get handwaved away just because you don't understand how it might work. Simply asserting that "it's not logical!" doesn't invalidate their presence, nor does it deal with the basic premise I suggested at the beginning of this conversation - namely that the rules are incomplete and require further work to build a campaign, and that is expressly left to the referee to do.

Here are some things cribbed directly from Underworld & Wilderness Adventures:

• "The so-called Wilderness really consists of unexplored land, cities and castles, not to mention the area immediately surrounding the castle (ruined or otherwise) which housed the dungeons."
  
• Referees need a ground level map of the dungeons, a map of the terrain immediately surrounding this, and a map of the town or village usually used by the adventurers as a base of operations.
  
• Blackmoor and Greyhawk are both mentioned, the first as a small town and the second as a large city
  
• "Both have maps with streets and buildings indicated, and players can have town adventures roaming around the bazaars, inns, taverns, shops, temples, and so on. (Venture into the Thieves Quarter at your own risk!)"
  
• Potential adventures in the wilderness include: jousting with Lords, being sent on treasure finding expeditions by Wizards, being sent on a Quest of some sort by a Patriarch or EHP. There are also possibilities of rumors, legends, and other information.
  

And if you add in all of the things necessary and possible for starting your own stronghold, there's a lot of potential adventure ideas. Simply finding and recruiting specialists to work at your castle, or overseeing your demesne, or infrastructure development (yes, it's there!), or "exploration, ship building, sea trade (great article about this in The Dragon #6), land trade, trapping, and tourism (!)"

There is even a section on "Other Worlds" - so really, there is a LOT of space beyond the dungeon for adventuring. How it works and how things are resolved start with adventuring and exploration. Past that, it's up to the referee.