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  1. - Top - End - #31
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    In general I think one danger of a multiverse featuring strongly in a campaign is that it makes it much more important for players to feel strongly connected to the world/country/city/etc they're playing in. Otherwise 'eh, things are really bad here with the necromantic tides, let's just evacuate everyone into Elysium, it's literally heaven' or 'go ahead and kill me, that's just a free plane shift to a being such as I' sorts of responses can become easy.

    Why would anyone stay in Dark Sun if they could leave? You have to have a good answer, or the game might just become about trying to find a way out and ignoring whatever is threatening Tyr.

    Or you end up running a campaign about multiverse -scale threats and actors.
    Oh yeah, my players did that last campaign. Nuked Tyr from orbit because they didn't like the king. Let loose a shadow apocalypse that killed 99.99%, then left in their spelljammer. When the sacrifices stopped flowing the prison weakened and the Dragon had to flee. Next campaign features the escaped energy being that eats stars & life force, it's modron "antivirals" will go all Great March to exterminate all life in the universe, and the ancient forerunner weapon that drops whole sectors into the wh40k Warp will restart & take unaimed pot shots at the setting trying to hit the energy being. Also Athas is now lost in the warp like a giant demented spce hulk. Hilarious.

    Didn't start the campaign that way, didn't plan it. Just happened and evolved from the players messing about in the setting.

  2. - Top - End - #32
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    One of the reasons why restricted multiverses exist is post facto rationalization, which is essentially what happened in D&D as well as in DC/Marvel.

    Creators make different settings for a game and then players want to take their Greyhawk characters (for eapxamo,e) into Forgotten Realms (for example) . So the writers of D&D went ummm … new spell - planar travel.

    I am having a lot of trouble thinking of any “restricted multiverse” environments where the restricted multiverse was a core conceit at the time of creation.

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    "The multiverse exists and {setting} is part of it" does not in any way have to mean "going from one setting to another is easy (or even possible) for most people" nor even does it have to mean "the inhabitants of that setting are aware that a multiverse exists."

    You're right that if leaving Dark Sun or Ravenloft were an option for most inhabitants they probably would. But you can have a multiverse without making that option available to them. The PCs are already assumed to be special baseline after all.
    This is a practical matter for players in a campaign that features the fact its a multiverse, not a point of abstract theory or setting stability. If you are using these elements in a campaign, they can be a strong seasoning that takes over the rest unless the world the campaign primarily takes place on actually feels more interesting/worthwhile/connected to the PCs than the other settings they're aware of or have been clued in that they exist.

    If one person brings in a githzerai crewmember from an experimental spelljammer that crashed through the grey and landed on Athas, yes, 'what if we fixed the spelljammer and used it to escape?' is going to be an option they feel when there's warfare building between two of the sorceror kings and their hidden town of escaped slaves is right in the middle of it. Especially if the person playing the githzerai says things like 'let me tell you about these awesome clubs in Sigil'.

  4. - Top - End - #34
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    This is a practical matter for players in a campaign that features the fact its a multiverse, not a point of abstract theory or setting stability. If you are using these elements in a campaign, they can be a strong seasoning that takes over the rest unless the world the campaign primarily takes place on actually feels more interesting/worthwhile/connected to the PCs than the other settings they're aware of or have been clued in that they exist.

    If one person brings in a githzerai crewmember from an experimental spelljammer that crashed through the grey and landed on Athas, yes, 'what if we fixed the spelljammer and used it to escape?' is going to be an option they feel when there's warfare building between two of the sorceror kings and their hidden town of escaped slaves is right in the middle of it. Especially if the person playing the githzerai says things like 'let me tell you about these awesome clubs in Sigil'.
    It's not fixable unless the DM says it is - simple. Presumably they would control the circumstances of a crash. (And how would you fix a spelljammer spelljamming ship on Athas anyway?)
    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
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  5. - Top - End - #35
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    In general I think one danger of a multiverse featuring strongly in a campaign is that it makes it much more important for players to feel strongly connected to the world/country/city/etc they're playing in. Otherwise 'eh, things are really bad here with the necromantic tides, let's just evacuate everyone into Elysium, it's literally heaven' or 'go ahead and kill me, that's just a free plane shift to a being such as I' sorts of responses can become easy.

    Why would anyone stay in Dark Sun if they could leave? You have to have a good answer, or the game might just become about trying to find a way out and ignoring whatever is threatening Tyr.

    Or you end up running a campaign about multiverse -scale threats and actors.
    Build a stupid premise, get an unexpected response, learn to build a better premise, become a better GM. I’m not seeing the downside here.

    “Give me a world worth caring about”. That seems a bar a GM should care about learning to not just meet but to exceed, regardless of what overarching, potentially “end of the world” threats they have planned, no?

    Quote Originally Posted by gbaji View Post
    There are other problems to consider though. Do these different universes all share the same core cosmology, or are they different? Do the "rules" of magic/technology/whatever work the same everywhere, or differently in different places.

    You asked the question: "What is a D&D wizard?", but the more relevant question is the follow up: "And why don't they already exist in Star Trek world?". If the magic a D&D wizard uses works when he travels to Star Trek world, then one has to ask why there aren't already magic users there? And if Phasers and Warp drive work in Star Trek world, why don't they exist already in your D&D setting? Why does a powerful deity in one world, not have a presence in another? Are they restricted to their one world? Maybe a few worlds? All, but only if there's worship there? And how does that work if you have a world where divine spellcasting doesn't exist or work? And if it does, how do you explain why no one there uses it?
    Quote Originally Posted by gbaji View Post
    I tend to lean towards "open" worlds in that you can travel to other worlds, but "restricted" in that it's rare and difficult to travel
    Well, I was going to ask, “has your D&D Wizard travelled to Star Trek? If not, that answers why they’re not there”, but it looks like you already have what is also my answer of “rare and nontrivial”.

    And, unlike most, I agree that things aren’t just guaranteed to work in other universes. Not just “there is no ‘weave/Force’ to power Wizards / Jedi”, but “this D&D world doesn’t have the tech level to let your blasters work (although Placia does)”, “WoD doesn’t believe in your blasters either”, and (canonically) “even your Fighter is slowly losing levels as he remains on Earth”.

    More “Magic? What’s that?” than “Matter? What’s that?”, but still best to learn to look before you leap.

    Within a system, though, reality travel is generally much more forgiving. <looks at Athas> generally.

    Quote Originally Posted by gbaji View Post
    and also that each world has its own rules entirely. Magic may work differently, or not at all. Technology maybe works in one world, but not in another (so that Star Wars blaster is just a crude club in many worlds). So yeah, in my game, the PCs can travel to other worlds, but it's always a risk, most likely most of their magic spells/abilities/items wont work (or wont work the same at least), and they'll be in a world full of people who have developed their own items/magic/tech/abilities that *do* work in their world, so the party will almost always be at a disadvantage. It's a place to visit, if you really have to for some reason, but not a lot of reason to stay or to go back.
    Knowledge is power. Home turf advantage, too. Still, a sufficiently clever party could be the ones with the advantage, if they play their cards right.

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    "The multiverse exists and {setting} is part of it" does not in any way have to mean "going from one setting to another is easy (or even possible) for most people" nor even does it have to mean "the inhabitants of that setting are aware that a multiverse exists."
    Not sure what I wanted to say beyond “+1 this”. I find the “multiverse” concept much more enjoyable when it’s rare - perhaps even limited to only the PCs out of everyone the PCs ever learn about or encounter even the rumor or ripples of. And even then, the only way the PCs use it may well be, “nobody knows why I have scales and wings, or seem to learn things <2 tiers of spells> slower than everyone else, but have I got a party trick to show you!”.

    Quote Originally Posted by False God View Post
    thinking about other settings I'm familiar with that use a "restricted multiverse", I seem to notice that the overwhelming majority of them only use "other worlds" as temporary set pieces that never explore the real differences in the world. And I got to wondering, why do we need forest universe, water universe, fire universe, if functionally we're only going to see a single city and a tiny fraction of the population? Why can't these simply be elements of "the universe". We don't really even need different planes or planets, as we could reasonably cover most concepts on the same world.

    So coming around, I actually agree that there's no point in a "limited multiverse" provided they all play by the same rules (even if each has their own unique spin on elves) ad we don't ever see more than a tiny sample of those alternate realities.
    “No, I’m not talking about Earth, or real-world politics, I’m talking about Forest World.”

    It’s a trick a lot of authors pull, and getting that separation can be good for the audience, too.

    Granted, “the message” and/or the metaphor often fall apart, just like any sports analogy. But presenting a “pure” version of an idea, free from the reader’s preconceptions about their own reality, has value.

  6. - Top - End - #36
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Pauly View Post
    One of the reasons why restricted multiverses exist is post facto rationalization, which is essentially what happened in D&D as well as in DC/Marvel.

    Creators make different settings for a game and then players want to take their Greyhawk characters (for eapxamo,e) into Forgotten Realms (for example) . So the writers of D&D went ummm … new spell - planar travel.

    I am having a lot of trouble thinking of any “restricted multiverse” environments where the restricted multiverse was a core conceit at the time of creation.
    There are examples, mostly of the 'person X is the only one who can travel between realities.' The sci-fi series Quantum Leap was built this way, with the title character Sam transiting through time and space. Similar structures are often with some frequency in highly speculative science fiction, with one character, the traveler, being the only person to move through a series of different environments that are otherwise disconnected. Said character is often The Man with No Name and may be drive by some sort of obsessive mission. For instance, Killy, the protagonist of Blame!, wanders endlessly through 'The City' a space the size if the Solar System and containing different levels that are effectively different realities. A fantasy version would be the Dreamlands of HP Lovecraft, a set of bizarre, interconnected spaces that can only be accessed by Dreamers, a set that was extremely restricted because, well, Lovecraft had views.
    Now publishing a webnovel travelogue.

    Resvier: a P6 homebrew setting

  7. - Top - End - #37
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Quertus View Post
    “No, I’m not talking about Earth, or real-world politics, I’m talking about Forest World.”

    It’s a trick a lot of authors pull, and getting that separation can be good for the audience, too.

    Granted, “the message” and/or the metaphor often fall apart, just like any sports analogy. But presenting a “pure” version of an idea, free from the reader’s preconceptions about their own reality, has value.
    While I understand that, you can have a single Fantasy World do all of these things. Specifically I was thinking of Star Wars, which has what I would consider a "limited multiverse". The party travels, via some means, to multiple worlds that fit the OP's description: worlds where travelers are not unheard of, it's possible to encounter any of the playable races at any moment and any one of could serve as a quest hub....BUT we never really see much of the greater world. We visit one town, maybe two, get the plot device we need and move on, while ostensibly all these elements showcased could be on the same planet.
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    "...yeah, but it makes me feel better."

  8. - Top - End - #38
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    It's not fixable unless the DM says it is - simple. Presumably they would control the circumstances of a crash. (And how would you fix a spelljammer spelljamming ship on Athas anyway?)
    And congratulations, now you've fallen into a reactive DM pattern (and potentially an adversarial one if you decide 'the ship will not be fixed' as a constant you bend the world and your rulings around to enforce) to try to keep control over the strong setting element you allowed in on a lark.

    I'd say in turn - don't build a setting with a multiverse and let people bring in characters from that multiverse unless you're willing for it to matter.

    It's not an inherently bad setting element to include, but it's absolutely one to treat with respect and understand that it is going to exert a pull on your game, your campaign, and the way the players - not even their characters - view that world. Use it when appropriate to what you're trying to do. Don't feel ashamed of choosing to not use it or allow it if it doesn't fit what you're aiming for. It's better to tell someone at the start of the campaign 'no, you can't bring in the Doctor from Dr. Who as your character' if it turns out you aren't really on board for all that would imply - because you're going to do a lot worse to that player's agency later on if you feel like you have to keep things under control, than you would just saying 'yeah that doesn't fit, I can't run that for you'.

    Quote Originally Posted by Quertus View Post
    Build a stupid premise, get an unexpected response, learn to build a better premise, become a better GM. I’m not seeing the downside here.

    “Give me a world worth caring about”. That seems a bar a GM should care about learning to not just meet but to exceed, regardless of what overarching, potentially “end of the world” threats they have planned, no?
    It's often easier said than done because of the balance between 'there needs to be enough wrong with the world for there to be things to do, change, resist, or fight for' but also 'there needs to be enough right with the world for it to be worth fighting for it', and add in the mix of each player having their own tastes, views, etc, and also the characters they choose to play bringing perspectives that might be easier or more difficult to engage.

    I'm not saying you can't do it, or you shouldn't try to get better at it. But part of getting better is to recognize the things you're doing to make the job unnecessarily difficult for yourself. You want to run Lovecraftian cosmic horror through the lens of petty small town politics and yet have people not just up and leave the town? Okay, that's challenging. Add to that that the D&D afterlives exist, people go to places like Elysium, and oh by the way one of the characters is an isekai reincarnator from Greyhawk who has memories of that afterlife? I'm not saying it can't be done. But if you do that just because you feel obligated to because some forumite said 'cmon, do it!' and not because you have some idea that actually makes use of that constructively for your campaign, I'd call that bad GM-ing - because its unintentional in nature, and its sort of an active ignorance about what the consequences are of the elements that you're including.

    It's like, maybe a great pastry chef can take a custard base that someone accidentally dropped a habanero into and pivot it into something great. But they do so by understanding what the habanero is doing to the dish, not just pretending that its not there and going on to make creme brulee as if nothing had changed. But if someone comes to their restaurant and asks them to make a habanero dessert, sure, because of their knowledge and skill they can make that happen and make it good - but they probably wouldn't do it the same way they went about salvaging the custard.

  9. - Top - End - #39
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    And congratulations, now you've fallen into a reactive DM pattern (and potentially an adversarial one if you decide 'the ship will not be fixed' as a constant you bend the world and your rulings around to enforce) to try to keep control over the strong setting element you allowed in on a lark.

    I'd say in turn - don't build a setting with a multiverse and let people bring in characters from that multiverse unless you're willing for it to matter.
    I'm not building anything; WotC established a multiverse that all their settings inhabit. Which they, you know, have every right to do. Use it at your table or don't.

    My larger point was that your options are not a binary between letting the players walk all over you like a doormat, and throwing everything out. You can allow X from another setting, like having a Giff crash their spelljamming ship into Athas (or whatever else), without the resulting rubble opening the floodgates to every other setting under creation. It's not hard.
    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
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  10. - Top - End - #40
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    I'm not building anything; WotC established a multiverse that all their settings inhabit. Which they, you know, have every right to do. Use it at your table or don't.
    I'd say to other GMs - just because WotC did something doesn't compel you to take it or leave it as a whole: every table, every campaign, the people are that table are the ones building it, not WotC. They might be borrowing elements from WotC, but they have no obligations to that company or its writers to execute things the same way as written. You can include what you want to use and discard the rest. But you should do so with intention and with understanding of what those elements actually bring to the table, and what pressures they create. Pretending 'oh that pressure doesn't exist because I can go do this in response' is not helpful.

    Instead observe 'oh, because I have this element, it feels like maybe I also need to go and do this other thing'. That feeling is the pressure that is exerted by that setting element. Understanding that, you can anticipate whether or not it would be good to include the thing in the first place - is it pushing you to go somewhere you already want to go, or is it making it harder for you to go where you want to go?
    Last edited by NichG; 2022-11-29 at 07:54 PM.

  11. - Top - End - #41
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    I'd say to other GMs - just because WotC did something doesn't compel you to take it or leave it as a whole: every table, every campaign, the people are that table are the ones building it, not WotC. They might be borrowing elements from WotC, but they have no obligations to that company or its writers to execute things the same way as written. You can include what you want to use and discard the rest. But you should do so with intention and with understanding of what those elements actually bring to the table, and what pressures they create. Pretending 'oh that pressure doesn't exist because I can go do this in response' is not helpful.

    Instead observe 'oh, because I have this element, it feels like maybe I also need to go and do this other thing'. That feeling is the pressure that is exerted by that setting element. Understanding that, you can anticipate whether or not it would be good to include the thing in the first place - is it pushing you to go somewhere you already want to go, or is it making it harder for you to go where you want to go?
    Nothing stops me from going where I want to go, or not going where I don't. Certainly not words on a page in a hobby book.

    The feeling that "because of thing, you need to go and do other thing" is ultimately all in your head. Letting a player in your Athas campaign play something from outside Athas does not force you to run a reality-hopping campaign, or to allow XYZ other things either. And there's nothing wrong with simply telling them no.
    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
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  12. - Top - End - #42
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Mechalich View Post
    There are examples, mostly of the 'person X is the only one who can travel between realities.' The sci-fi series Quantum Leap was built this way, with the title character Sam transiting through time and space. Similar structures are often with some frequency in highly speculative science fiction, with one character, the traveler, being the only person to move through a series of different environments that are otherwise disconnected. Said character is often The Man with No Name and may be drive by some sort of obsessive mission. For instance, Killy, the protagonist of Blame!, wanders endlessly through 'The City' a space the size if the Solar System and containing different levels that are effectively different realities. A fantasy version would be the Dreamlands of HP Lovecraft, a set of bizarre, interconnected spaces that can only be accessed by Dreamers, a set that was extremely restricted because, well, Lovecraft had views.
    A lot of sci-fi uses a de-facto multiverse. In Star Trek TOS each planet the crew encountered was effectively a new plane and the Enterprise a spelljammer ship. Star Wars on the other hand uses a galaxy spanning civilization that mostly makes each new location feel like it’s part of a coherent whole.

  13. - Top - End - #43
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Pauly View Post
    A lot of sci-fi uses a de-facto multiverse. In Star Trek TOS each planet the crew encountered was effectively a new plane and the Enterprise a spelljammer ship. Star Wars on the other hand uses a galaxy spanning civilization that mostly makes each new location feel like it’s part of a coherent whole.
    I'd say Star Trek is kind of mixed, depending on the goals of the specific series. The original series and TNG mostly treated each planet as individualized, while DS9 interacted much more heavily with the galaxy's larger civilizations. In some sense Trek is at an earlier civilizational data compared to Star Wars, in that the various larger civilizations: the Federation, the Klingons, the Romulans, etc. are still expanding and contact with regions outside of their smallish home regions remains extremely limited while in Star Wars the known galaxy is largely claimed and navigation standards have been established to allow easy travel throughout, though there are Unknown Regions where this is not true. This is a matter of locating the 'frontier' in the greater setting sense, and whether or not the story takes place inside the frontier or beyond it.

    This divide is found in many classic settings of this type, especially ones with sailing ships where the act of getting on a ship and sailing beyond now boundaries physically put the characters past the frontier. A classic example is The Voyage of the Dawn Treader in the Chronicles of Narnia. Narnia exists, and the ship's crew essentially carries the conventions of Narnia with them, but they are exploring entirely new worlds one island at a time.
    Now publishing a webnovel travelogue.

    Resvier: a P6 homebrew setting

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by False God View Post
    While I understand that, you can have a single Fantasy World do all of these things. Specifically I was thinking of Star Wars, which has what I would consider a "limited multiverse". The party travels, via some means, to multiple worlds that fit the OP's description: worlds where travelers are not unheard of, it's possible to encounter any of the playable races at any moment and any one of could serve as a quest hub....BUT we never really see much of the greater world. We visit one town, maybe two, get the plot device we need and move on, while ostensibly all these elements showcased could be on the same planet.
    Because flying around on the Millennium Falcon is cooler than “I took the bus”, and lends credence to “why hasn’t someone else done this / why don’t we let someone else do this?”?

    I think Star Wars makes it easier to answer than most GM’s content would, but “it puts the focus on the PCs and their choices, makes them and their choices (artificially) important”?

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    And congratulations, now you've fallen into a reactive DM pattern (and potentially an adversarial one if you decide 'the ship will not be fixed' as a constant you bend the world and your rulings around to enforce) to try to keep control over the strong setting element you allowed in on a lark.

    I'd say in turn - don't build a setting with a multiverse and let people bring in characters from that multiverse unless you're willing for it to matter.

    It's not an inherently bad setting element to include, but it's absolutely one to treat with respect and understand that it is going to exert a pull on your game, your campaign, and the way the players - not even their characters - view that world. Use it when appropriate to what you're trying to do. Don't feel ashamed of choosing to not use it or allow it if it doesn't fit what you're aiming for. It's better to tell someone at the start of the campaign 'no, you can't bring in the Doctor from Dr. Who as your character' if it turns out you aren't really on board for all that would imply - because you're going to do a lot worse to that player's agency later on if you feel like you have to keep things under control, than you would just saying 'yeah that doesn't fit, I can't run that for you'.
    Wouldn’t it be better to not try to control the game?

    If there’s a “session 0” premise that would be violated, it’s everyone’s responsibility to deal with that. If there’s not, then there should be no need to “control” anything.

    If the Doctor won’t kill, but you’ve built a game that requires the PCs to kill, that’s bad move. If you’ve built a game that requires the PCs to assassinate the good and rightful king, and the Paladin kills the quest giver for suggesting such, you’ve made a bad game.

    Don’t require - or forbid - anything that isn’t covered in session 0. Create interesting scenarios, and play to see what happens.

    Or you could learn the lesson, “I let the Paladin in on a whim; from now on, PCs are not allowed to have codes of conduct. Or good alignments / morals. Or personalities.”

    I know which lesson I think is the better takeaway.

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    It's often easier said than done because of the balance between 'there needs to be enough wrong with the world for there to be things to do, change, resist, or fight for' but also 'there needs to be enough right with the world for it to be worth fighting for it', and add in the mix of each player having their own tastes, views, etc, and also the characters they choose to play bringing perspectives that might be easier or more difficult to engage.

    I'm not saying you can't do it, or you shouldn't try to get better at it. But part of getting better is to recognize the things you're doing to make the job unnecessarily difficult for yourself. You want to run Lovecraftian cosmic horror through the lens of petty small town politics and yet have people not just up and leave the town? Okay, that's challenging. Add to that that the D&D afterlives exist, people go to places like Elysium, and oh by the way one of the characters is an isekai reincarnator from Greyhawk who has memories of that afterlife? I'm not saying it can't be done. But if you do that just because you feel obligated to because some forumite said 'cmon, do it!' and not because you have some idea that actually makes use of that constructively for your campaign, I'd call that bad GM-ing - because its unintentional in nature, and its sort of an active ignorance about what the consequences are of the elements that you're including.

    It's like, maybe a great pastry chef can take a custard base that someone accidentally dropped a habanero into and pivot it into something great. But they do so by understanding what the habanero is doing to the dish, not just pretending that its not there and going on to make creme brulee as if nothing had changed. But if someone comes to their restaurant and asks them to make a habanero dessert, sure, because of their knowledge and skill they can make that happen and make it good - but they probably wouldn't do it the same way they went about salvaging the custard.
    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    I'd say to other GMs - just because WotC did something doesn't compel you to take it or leave it as a whole: every table, every campaign, the people are that table are the ones building it, not WotC. They might be borrowing elements from WotC, but they have no obligations to that company or its writers to execute things the same way as written. You can include what you want to use and discard the rest. But you should do so with intention and with understanding of what those elements actually bring to the table, and what pressures they create. Pretending 'oh that pressure doesn't exist because I can go do this in response' is not helpful.

    Instead observe 'oh, because I have this element, it feels like maybe I also need to go and do this other thing'. That feeling is the pressure that is exerted by that setting element. Understanding that, you can anticipate whether or not it would be good to include the thing in the first place - is it pushing you to go somewhere you already want to go, or is it making it harder for you to go where you want to go?
    If I responded, “sounds like good practice, learning your craft and your players and your players’ preferences, and if you practice doing so with a handicap, it should become easier, until you can do it automatically”, would you say I’ve completely misunderstood what you’ve said? If not, if I’m at least in the right ballpark, then what smaller details do you think I’ve likely missed, that I seem to be facing the opposite direction? “Know yourself, admit when you’re not up to creating engagement in Lovecraftian horror… yet”? “Create stretch goals, not suicide pacts”? “Learn to evaluate your skill and the CR modifier of various elements”? Anything else?

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    I build my own worlds. I borrow from published settings as little or as much as I want, but ultimately this world is my own creation, and fits the assumptions of the game, even if it contains Castle Greyhawk, the Temple of the Frog, the Feywild, the Spelljammer, Ankh-Morpork, the Shire, Hogsmeade, Dragonstone, Camelot, Caer Dallben, Cimmeria, Lantern Waste, Frostbite Falls, Jurassic Park, and the Alamo.

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Mastikator View Post
    The DMG should tell the DM how to make a cosmology, and the PHB should tell the player how halflings work physically.
    It's not really clear to me why "Halflings have this default culture" is unacceptable, but "Halflings have this default biology" is fine. Defaults are good. The reason Darksun Halfings are interesting is precisely that they exist in contrast to an expectation that Halflings won't be cannibal raiders.

    Quote Originally Posted by gbaji View Post
    "And why don't they already exist in Star Trek world?".
    Have you not heard of Q?

    If the magic a D&D wizard uses works when he travels to Star Trek world, then one has to ask why there aren't already magic users there? And if Phasers and Warp drive work in Star Trek world, why don't they exist already in your D&D setting?
    I don't find these sorts of questions terribly troubling. There are lots of things that are possible in the real world, but had at various times not spread to various places, despite still being possible in those places (as they were possible everywhere, the laws of physics being universal to our knowledge). There certainly is a detailed explanation for why the Aztecs had not discovered gunpowder in 1400 (and if you can figure out precisely what it is, you can probably win some kind of award). But if you're doing a campaign set in Mesoamerica before the Columbian Exchange, all the answer you really need is "they haven't invented it".

    Quote Originally Posted by False God View Post
    We visit one town, maybe two, get the plot device we need and move on, while ostensibly all these elements showcased could be on the same planet.
    Any campaign, unless you do something like destroy a whole world, is going to be something that could happen on just one world. After all, with the exception of a group of people who could just about fill up a large lecture hall, every story any real person has experienced has been experienced on just one world. The reason you have multiple worlds is precisely that a restricted multiverse allows you to support individual character concepts people think are cool (good) without having to retool all your worldbuilding (bad). If Ixalan has to be on the same world as New Phyrexia, allowing someone to play Koth requires you to concoct an explanation for why the phyrexians haven't compleated all the dinosaurs and pirates. If they're on separate planes, you can just point out that there's no way for Elesh Norn to get there and move on to having your dino-pirates campaign.

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    I guess I don't have nearly as much of a problem with

    "There are many worlds and the viewpoint characters visit each one, spending a little time there" (basically treating worlds or universes like more constrained fiction treats cities or regions)

    as with

    "There are many worlds and the viewpoint characters really only belong to one of them and all the adventures happen in that world...except that those other worlds get airdropped in randomly with neither 'plot significance' or explanation" (which treats those other worlds as throwaway elements, sources of things that, in the end, aren't really incorporated into the world the narrative concerns itself with).

    World-hopping can be fun. It's not my preferred mode, as I prefer detailed, as-if-it-were-real worlds built in depth over many game sessions and even campaigns. My personal world is a living world, now with campaigns number 17 and 18 with almost as many different groups, each one having left elements behind and enriched the world. But world-hopping can be fun. Tends toward the episodic/"situation of the week", but yeah. No big deal. And you can have coherent meta-settings that way if you try.

    But throwing stuff into one world that really originated and has a home in another setting? You run several risks, with only a slim chance of getting it right. If the foreign element is one of the PCs (or worse, a key DMPC), you can end up with bad Protagonist Syndrome, the entire campaign warping around this alien element like an oyster with a grain of sand. If the foreign element is just thrown in without taking the effect seriously, it can be jarring and/or forgotten. Or worse, it can completely destroy suspension of disbelief for many people. As a PC, even if it doesn't end up in Protagonist Syndrome, it often leads to characters only glancingly connected to the world and the events. Ones where there's no real reason why the PC should even care about this situation, let alone know anything about it. And while the "naive exposition target/audience stand-in" can work in fiction (sometimes, but is way too often poorly implemented and overused IMO), it doesn't work well in a TTRPG without (to me) strongly contrived circumstances.
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by RandomPeasant View Post
    Any campaign, unless you do something like destroy a whole world, is going to be something that could happen on just one world. After all, with the exception of a group of people who could just about fill up a large lecture hall, every story any real person has experienced has been experienced on just one world. The reason you have multiple worlds is precisely that a restricted multiverse allows you to support individual character concepts people think are cool (good) without having to retool all your worldbuilding (bad). If Ixalan has to be on the same world as New Phyrexia, allowing someone to play Koth requires you to concoct an explanation for why the phyrexians haven't compleated all the dinosaurs and pirates. If they're on separate planes, you can just point out that there's no way for Elesh Norn to get there and move on to having your dino-pirates campaign.
    Or, as the OP IMO rightly gripes about 5E, you could just say "No, this campaign is set on Ixalan, your character is from Ixalan, we're not going to talk about New Phyrexia here." There's no need to accept any concept from anywhere and shove it into the world. Koth has ostensibly no reason to even by on Ixalan, considering his beef is with the Phyrexians and saving Mirrodin, the only reason he's on Ixalan is arguably to get people to leave Ixalan and go fight somewhere else.

    Koth is antithetical to playing a game on Ixalan, because by nature Koth wants us to go play a different game somewhere else.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Quertus View Post
    Wouldn’t it be better to not try to control the game?

    If there’s a “session 0” premise that would be violated, it’s everyone’s responsibility to deal with that. If there’s not, then there should be no need to “control” anything.
    This is in the context of Psyren saying 'the DM can just make the ship not be able to be fixed'. That indicates a dissatisfaction with the campaign going that direction rather than e.g. dealing with the war, and a willingness to intervene to 'keep things on track'. That is, given that they expressed that they did actually care about controlling the campaign, there's a reaction that this multiverse element pushes them to take which leads in the direction of needing to exert more and more control to avoid this now natural idea of 'what if we just escape?'.

    If you're fine with the players saying 'we don't like Athas, lets escape' and having that be the campaign, then of course you don't need to control anything.

    The point I'm making is that you should understand that when you add 'character who knows about a clearly better in all ways place' to 'a crapsack world that no one would choose to be in', you really need to understand that it makes 'lets escape' become a much more obvious and central concept to the scenario. It isn't neutral, it moves things a certain way. If that's a way you're happy to go, then great! If that's a way you're willing to go, then great! If that's a way that makes most of the campaign setting meaningless - you wanted to run Dark Sun, not Planescape - maybe you should say 'no, the Great Wheel cosmology doesn't exist in this campaign' when the player pitches that character.

    If I responded, “sounds like good practice, learning your craft and your players and your players’ preferences, and if you practice doing so with a handicap, it should become easier, until you can do it automatically”, would you say I’ve completely misunderstood what you’ve said? If not, if I’m at least in the right ballpark, then what smaller details do you think I’ve likely missed, that I seem to be facing the opposite direction? “Know yourself, admit when you’re not up to creating engagement in Lovecraftian horror… yet”? “Create stretch goals, not suicide pacts”? “Learn to evaluate your skill and the CR modifier of various elements”? Anything else?
    I think the important thing you're missing is that knowing what to include and what not to include and why is part of the skill to be learned. It's not just 'work your way up to including everything (as a handicap)'. If you're skilled, you should be able to run 'kitchen sink' and make it not bad, but you should also be able to say 'I will take only these spare elements, and by doing so I can make something you just can't experience at all with pure kitchen sink'.

    Basically, 'kitchen sink' is one kind of game, its not the only game. If you master making a soup with every ingredient in your kitchen, that isn't the same thing as mastering every soup that can be made with the ingredients in your kitchen. Stone soup can be good, but so can a soup featuring and amplifying a single central ingredient. And just like eating the same thing every day becomes boring, only being able to run 'the same kind of campaign' every time also becomes boring.
    Last edited by NichG; 2022-11-29 at 10:48 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    This is in the context of Psyren saying 'the DM can just make the ship not be able to be fixed'. That indicates a dissatisfaction with the campaign going that direction rather than e.g. dealing with the war, and a willingness to intervene to 'keep things on track'. That is, given that they expressed that they did actually care about controlling the campaign, there's a reaction that this multiverse element pushes them to take which leads in the direction of needing to exert more and more control to avoid this now natural idea of 'what if we just escape?'.


    If you're fine with the players saying 'we don't like Athas, lets escape' and having that be the campaign, then of course you don't need to control anything.
    You don't need "more and more control." If the player wants to play something from outside the setting and you're okay with allowing that, it's a one-way trip for that character - simple. You seem hell-bent on complicating that and for the life of me I don't understand why.

    You can even make it a long-term hook for the character. "My Astral Elf doesn't want to stay in this grimdark setting she crashed in forever, she wants to find a way home one day." "Great - her ship is irreparable but maybe she and this ragtag group of adventurers that took her in will figure something out eventually. Maybe they'll even want to go with her, Athas being Athas the retirement plans kinda suck." "Cool, let's play this campaign." You don't have to deal with the multiverse at any point until you want to. Get it?

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    The point I'm making is that you should understand that when you add 'character who knows about a clearly better in all ways place' to 'a crapsack world that no one would choose to be in', you really need to understand that it makes 'lets escape' become a much more obvious and central concept to the scenario. It isn't neutral, it moves things a certain way. If that's a way you're happy to go, then great! If that's a way you're willing to go, then great! If that's a way that makes most of the campaign setting meaningless - you wanted to run Dark Sun, not Planescape - maybe you should say 'no, the Great Wheel cosmology doesn't exist in this campaign' when the player pitches that character.
    A desire being obvious doesn't make it feasible. I'd love to retire tomorrow, travel the world and never have to work another day in my life. Like people, characters can want all sorts of things they think (or even know) are better than their current situation.
    Last edited by Psyren; 2022-11-29 at 11:14 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    You don't need "more and more control." If the player wants to play something from outside the setting and you're okay with allowing that, it's a one-way trip for that character - simple. You seem hell-bent on complicating that and for the life of me I don't understand why.
    Because your response to nuanced 'these elements have effects and impact player psychology and relationship to the setting' has been basically 'don't bother to think about anything, just wave your omnipotent DM stick'. And my point is, the fact that you feel you would need to do so is itself evidence of the impact of these elements.

    Your response to 'players are influenced by the context they have for understanding the events of the world and may act differently as a result' amounts to 'you can always just railroad them'. Well, what if you don't want to do that, but you also want to have a campaign in a certain thematic setting in which that theme has some chance of actually sticking? Well, then you have to consider those complicated things, and actually bother to understand what you're doing rather than just throw stuff in and hope and rely on heavy-handed DM-ing when its not working.

    I say this as someone who primarily runs multiverse-heavy stuff. I'm very familiar at this point with the pattern of player interest when suddenly 'the world is bigger than you thought'. Everything at the local scale has its perceived relevancy and meaningfulness decrease unless the players have a strong bond with that element - like, something or someone that comes up every game. When you bring in an isekai character, they will tend to dilute the ability for events not directly personally involving the PCs to be taken as heavy or serious. Those are influences that you can lean into and take advantage of, or they can make the campaign feel flat and frustrating.

    A desire being obvious doesn't make it feasible. I'd love to retire tomorrow, travel the world and never have to work another day in my life. Like people, characters can want all sorts of things they think (or even know) are better than their current situation.
    And someone who is looking at a situation as something they want to be over so they can get to the stuff that's important to them will be more disconnected from events than someone for whom those events are the world.
    Last edited by NichG; 2022-11-30 at 01:29 AM.

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    Because your response to nuanced 'these elements have effects and impact player psychology and relationship to the setting' has been basically 'don't bother to think about anything, just wave your omnipotent DM stick'. And my point is, the fact that you feel you would need to do so is itself evidence of the impact of these elements.

    Your response to 'players are influenced by the context they have for understanding the events of the world and may act differently as a result' amounts to 'you can always just railroad them'. Well, what if you don't want to do that, but you also want to have a campaign in a certain thematic setting in which that theme has some chance of actually sticking? Well, then you have to consider those complicated things, and actually bother to understand what you're doing rather than just throw stuff in and hope and rely on heavy-handed DM-ing when its not working.

    I say this as someone who primarily runs multiverse-heavy stuff. I'm very familiar at this point with the pattern of player interest when suddenly 'the world is bigger than you thought'. Everything at the local scale has its perceived relevancy and meaningfulness decrease unless the players have a strong bond with that element - like, something or someone that comes up every game. When you bring in an isekai character, they will tend to dilute the ability for events not directly personally involving the PCs to be taken as heavy or serious. Those are influences that you can lean into and take advantage of, or they can make the campaign feel flat and frustrating.
    There is no nuance here. There are two axes:

    - Either you want to allow players to use extra-setting races in your campaign, or you don't;
    - Either you want to deal with them traveling between multiversal realms in your campaign, or you don't.

    You can say yes to both, no to both, or even yes to one and no to the other. Fundamentally, those are your options.

    The wishy-washy slurry resulting from you wanting to have your cake and eat it, or in this analogy chew your cake and then dribble it back onto the plate and try molding it back into a cakelike shape somehow, is entirely of your own making. Ask and answer those two bullets in session zero, and then stick to your guns. And you can change your mind later if you want to - D&D is a game, not an employment contract - but you should at least leave session zero with a firm answer to those two questions in mind, and your players should be aware of your decision even if one or more of them are disappointed by it.
    Last edited by Psyren; 2022-11-30 at 02:13 AM.
    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    "Restricted multiverse" is IMO very similar to some approach to the idea of "Medieval fantastic", which I will call "easy medieval fantastic".

    In "easy medieval fantastic", the world is assumed to be somewhat medieval (not a historically accurate medieval, but one that looks medieval), and the presence of magic and its influence over the society is artificially reduced.

    Human farmers are still assumed to be doing medieval farming without magical help, the power structure is still assumed to be made of kings and sword-yielding peoples with maybe a few advisors being spellcasters, etc. Sure, non-human races can have fantasy cities, but the "main civilisation" is usually grounded in what peoples will recognise as "real life medieval, but with actual magic sometimes".

    The goal is to get the best of both worlds: let the players and the plot use the cool magic, while having everything non-plot-relevant follow the expectations of a non-magical world. No need to learn the inner working of the magocraty, they're just a wizard guild like we had some artisan guilds. No need to ponder the consequences of resurrections on the justice system, peoples don't use them that often. Etc.

    However, if you go with the mindset of building a fully coherent world, it quickly falls apart.

    And I think that's the core of the "restricted multiverse idea". The whole concept is to artificially maintain a familiar status-quo (so that peoples don't need to learn how the way works, or just to capture a specific theme), while allowing features that would theoretically break apart said status-quo if you think too much about it (but with some sort of gentleman agreement that neither the player nor the GM will actually use them to actually break the status-quo).

    And IME, it's only effective in "low investment" campaigns where you don't expect peoples to care about the universe in details. If you have a group of players that will actually delve in your universe, you don't need to artificially maintain a universe that is already familiar (they'll get familiar with your universe soon enough), and incoherences in worldbuilding might actually break their immersion into the game.

    Quote Originally Posted by PhoenixPhyre View Post
    While guaranteeing bland, homogenous "lore" (because it has to fit any possible setting).
    Only if you try to get everything to fit a priori. You can get a non-bland non-homogenous "lore" that matches the core of the campaign you planned, and then find more and more contrived ways to fit things the players ask questions about.

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by RandomPeasant View Post
    It's not really clear to me why "Halflings have this default culture" is unacceptable, but "Halflings have this default biology" is fine. Defaults are good. The reason Darksun Halfings are interesting is precisely that they exist in contrast to an expectation that Halflings won't be cannibal raiders.
    It's one of the premises of the thread that default culture is unacceptable. It's up to you to agree or disagree with that premise. I was drawing a line from how DMG, PHB and MM all enforce default culture to how all campaign settings in D&D seem to have the same cultures for races, you know as if these two points form a line.

    I mean honestly, why would I bother with Dragonlance or Greyhawk? They're basically the same as Forgotten Realms, if I want to play Basic Default Standard Fantasy™ then FR fills that role and Dragonlance doesn't actually differentiate itself. Hell, even Spelljammer, a setting about space travel, is still Basic Default Standard Fantasy in space. It's an expansion on Forgotten Realms, it's not an independent setting, it's a highly dependent system.

    If I want something actually unique and independent then the only two settings I can think of is Darksun and Eberron. We have 3 settings.
    • Eberron
    • Darksun (sadly not published in 5e)
    • Everything else
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by Mastikator View Post
    If I want something actually unique and independent then the only two settings I can think of is Darksun and Eberron. We have 3 settings.
    • Eberron
    • Darksun (sadly not published in 5e)
    • Everything else
    Not that i am really an expert in D&D, but what about the MTG derived settings, are they the same as well in their D&D incarnation?

    Otherwise, yes. Eberron is my favorite D&D setting and it irks me often how many of the assumptions about what D&D is tend to ignore it.
    Last edited by Satinavian; 2022-11-30 at 04:16 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Satinavian View Post
    Not that i am really an expert in D&D, but what about the MTG derived settings, are they the same as well in their D&D incarnation?

    Otherwise, yes. Eberron is my favorite D&D setting and it irks me often how many of the assumptions about what D&D is tend to ignore it.
    As far as I can tell about Theros it seems to me to be standard +, it's not really different from FR, but it does have additional player rules regarding piety.

    Ravnica's main aesthetic is the ecumenopolis and the various factions. It manages to be pretty different, but honestly Darksun and Eberron still feel a lot more alien to FR than Ravnica feels alien to FR.

    Those are the only MTG settings I have anything to say about/own their books.
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    This is in the context of Psyren saying 'the DM can just make the ship not be able to be fixed'. That indicates a dissatisfaction with the campaign going that direction rather than e.g. dealing with the war, and a willingness to intervene to 'keep things on track'. That is, given that they expressed that they did actually care about controlling the campaign, there's a reaction that this multiverse element pushes them to take which leads in the direction of needing to exert more and more control to avoid this now natural idea of 'what if we just escape?'.

    If you're fine with the players saying 'we don't like Athas, lets escape' and having that be the campaign, then of course you don't need to control anything.

    The point I'm making is that you should understand that when you add 'character who knows about a clearly better in all ways place' to 'a crapsack world that no one would choose to be in', you really need to understand that it makes 'lets escape' become a much more obvious and central concept to the scenario. It isn't neutral, it moves things a certain way. If that's a way you're happy to go, then great! If that's a way you're willing to go, then great! If that's a way that makes most of the campaign setting meaningless - you wanted to run Dark Sun, not Planescape - maybe you should say 'no, the Great Wheel cosmology doesn't exist in this campaign' when the player pitches that character.
    If you wanted to run Dark Sun, that should have been stated in session 0, and it’s therefore everyone’s responsibility to make that happen. No control required.

    It’s on the players to not create or to handle that pressure.

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    I think the important thing you're missing is that knowing what to include and what not to include and why is part of the skill to be learned. It's not just 'work your way up to including everything (as a handicap)'. If you're skilled, you should be able to run 'kitchen sink' and make it not bad, but you should also be able to say 'I will take only these spare elements, and by doing so I can make something you just can't experience at all with pure kitchen sink'.
    Suppose you run 3 worlds set in WW2. If one game, one player runs a D&D Wizard who gets gunned down for their cluelessness; in another, a second player runs a Jedi berserker of Khorn, who gets gunned down for charging a machine gun nest; in the last, a third player runs a clerk who changes assignments to keep their brother from going to war, and gets gunned down for lacking the proper training.

    I’m not seeing how “kitchen sink” really affected our ability to tell the story of “clueless/untrained guy got gunned down”.

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    When you bring in an isekai character, they will tend to dilute the ability for events not directly personally involving the PCs to be taken as heavy or serious.
    That’s… not been my experience.

    That is, when my character is connected to the world, they care about those connections… not the adventure that the GM is selling. When my character is an Isekai, they have no such biases, and are more likely to care about what the GM is presenting.

    For example, I care about RPGs and roleplaying, not gardening. You present me with a gardening adventure, well, I already have my interests, I’m not interested. You Isekai me to a strange new world? Then I might care about their gardening.

    Same thing with other connections: when you have none, you’re more open to the connections presented. Corollary: an Isekai is “easy mode” for investment; a GM who can’t make an Isekai invested needs to up their game.

    That’s what my decades of experience with many players playing Isekai characters tells me.

    EDIT: put another way, when the character is a native, the player creates and controls their connections to the world; when the character is an Isekai, it is the GM who does so. Which of these sounds more conducive to the PC having connections suitable to pushing the GM’s agenda?
    Last edited by Quertus; 2022-11-30 at 08:00 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by PhoenixPhyre View Post
    I guess I don't have nearly as much of a problem with

    "There are many worlds and the viewpoint characters visit each one, spending a little time there" (basically treating worlds or universes like more constrained fiction treats cities or regions)

    as with

    "There are many worlds and the viewpoint characters really only belong to one of them and all the adventures happen in that world...except that those other worlds get airdropped in randomly with neither 'plot significance' or explanation" (which treats those other worlds as throwaway elements, sources of things that, in the end, aren't really incorporated into the world the narrative concerns itself with).

    World-hopping can be fun. It's not my preferred mode, as I prefer detailed, as-if-it-were-real worlds built in depth over many game sessions and even campaigns. My personal world is a living world, now with campaigns number 17 and 18 with almost as many different groups, each one having left elements behind and enriched the world. But world-hopping can be fun. Tends toward the episodic/"situation of the week", but yeah. No big deal. And you can have coherent meta-settings that way if you try.

    But throwing stuff into one world that really originated and has a home in another setting? You run several risks, with only a slim chance of getting it right. If the foreign element is one of the PCs (or worse, a key DMPC), you can end up with bad Protagonist Syndrome, the entire campaign warping around this alien element like an oyster with a grain of sand. If the foreign element is just thrown in without taking the effect seriously, it can be jarring and/or forgotten. Or worse, it can completely destroy suspension of disbelief for many people. As a PC, even if it doesn't end up in Protagonist Syndrome, it often leads to characters only glancingly connected to the world and the events. Ones where there's no real reason why the PC should even care about this situation, let alone know anything about it. And while the "naive exposition target/audience stand-in" can work in fiction (sometimes, but is way too often poorly implemented and overused IMO), it doesn't work well in a TTRPG without (to me) strongly contrived circumstances.
    I guess I don’t have nearly as much problem with

    “There are many beings with different personalities that the viewpoint characters visit and interact with, spending a little time with each.”

    As with

    “There are multiple valid personalities for the game, and, rather than merely being bland viewpoint characters that blindly follow the script, the PCs actually have such a personality, airdropped in without Plot significance or incorporation into the narrative.”

    Colorful NPCs can be fun.

    But throwing characters with personalities into my games? You run several risks, with only a slim chance of getting it right.

    If the PC has a personality, you can end up with a Protagonist, the entire campaign warping around this alien element like an oyster with a grain of sand. If the personality is just thrown in without taking the effect seriously, it can be jarring and/or forgotten. Or worse, it can completely destroy the planned campaign, when the Paladin refuses to assassinate the Just and rightful king. As a PC, even if it doesn't end up in Protagonist Syndrome, it often leads to characters caring about how they are connected to the world and the events, instead of just following the script as viewpoint characters. Ones where there's no real reason why the PC should even care about this situation.

    Having a personality can work in fiction (sometimes, but is way too often poorly implemented and overused IMO), it doesn't work well in a TTRPG without (to me) strongly contrived circumstances.


    As much as I jest, I can say that, having vast experience with both “characters with personality” and “off-worlders”, the former is much more likely to cause problems than the latter. EDIT: and that’s been true regardless of whether I was running the character, running the game, a fellow player in the game, or merely a bystander.

    Also, per your “I prefer detailed, as-if-it-were-real worlds built in depth over many game sessions and even campaigns”, I can only say I prefer detailed, as-if-it-were-real characters, built in depth over many game sessions and even campaigns. (I like your wording.)
    Last edited by Quertus; 2022-11-30 at 08:04 AM.

  29. - Top - End - #59
    Bugbear in the Playground
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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by PhoenixPhyre View Post
    But throwing stuff into one world that really originated and has a home in another setting? You run several risks, with only a slim chance of getting it right. If the foreign element is one of the PCs (or worse, a key DMPC), you can end up with bad Protagonist Syndrome, the entire campaign warping around this alien element like an oyster with a grain of sand.
    Why? If your world breaks down because someone shows up with a weird race or class, I think that's an issue with your world-building, not a reason to blanket-ban weird races and classes. It's just not that hard to deal with "this guy is weird" without the campaign warping around it.

    Quote Originally Posted by False God View Post
    Or, as the OP IMO rightly gripes about 5E, you could just say "No, this campaign is set on Ixalan, your character is from Ixalan, we're not going to talk about New Phyrexia here." There's no need to accept any concept from anywhere and shove it into the world.
    The need is "someone wants to play this concept, and will have more fun if they're allowed to". The point of the game is to have fun, and you should reasonably accommodate people in things that will allow them to have more fun. Now, yes, you have to weigh that fun against whatever less fun people are going to have because of the foreign element. But, frankly, if "this dude is weird and has weird powers" breaks your worldbuilding, I don't think that worldbuilding is well-done. In any world, particularly any world at the level of advancement D&D postulates, there are going to be large sections of the world that anyone in some particular part of the world doesn't know about anyway. If Koth shows up in Ixalan for a campaign focused on the pseudo-Mesoamerican parts of the world, how are the people there (who are the ones from which any campaign-breaking would arise) supposed to tell that he is weird because he is from a separate reality that is a world full of metal people that has been taken over by the fantasy Borg and not because he is from the pseudo-Asian part of their world and people there simply happen to be like that? After all, some of the people where they live are fish dudes and some of the colonizers are literal vampires, is "there are metal dudes out there" really something beyond the pale for them?

    Koth has ostensibly no reason to even by on Ixalan, considering his beef is with the Phyrexians and saving Mirrodin, the only reason he's on Ixalan is arguably to get people to leave Ixalan and go fight somewhere else.
    By "Koth" I mean "a character like Koth, who is a Vulshok with geomantic powers", not "exactly Koth with precisely his motivations and characterization". Presumably this guy's response to the evens of Scars block was to cut his losses and run. Because the thing the player wants is to play a dude with metal sticking out of him and lava powers, not to do a whole "topple New Phyrexia" campaign.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mastikator View Post
    It's one of the premises of the thread that default culture is unacceptable. It's up to you to agree or disagree with that premise. I was drawing a line from how DMG, PHB and MM all enforce default culture to how all campaign settings in D&D seem to have the same cultures for races, you know as if these two points form a line.
    They don't "enforce a default culture", they provide a suggested culture, which is a different (and entirely acceptable thing). Books can't enforce a damn thing, they're books.

    Dragonlance doesn't actually differentiate itself.
    Not to defend Dragonlance or anything, but doesn't it have very strong opinions about how its crazy gods are good and a bunch of dragon-obsessed stuff?

  30. - Top - End - #60
    Ogre in the Playground
     
    SwashbucklerGuy

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    Default Re: Sell me on the "restricted" multiverse idea

    Quote Originally Posted by RandomPeasant View Post
    The need is "someone wants to play this concept, and will have more fun if they're allowed to". The point of the game is to have fun, and you should reasonably accommodate people in things that will allow them to have more fun. Now, yes, you have to weigh that fun against whatever less fun people are going to have because of the foreign element. But, frankly, if "this dude is weird and has weird powers" breaks your worldbuilding, I don't think that worldbuilding is well-done. In any world, particularly any world at the level of advancement D&D postulates, there are going to be large sections of the world that anyone in some particular part of the world doesn't know about anyway. If Koth shows up in Ixalan for a campaign focused on the pseudo-Mesoamerican parts of the world, how are the people there (who are the ones from which any campaign-breaking would arise) supposed to tell that he is weird because he is from a separate reality that is a world full of metal people that has been taken over by the fantasy Borg and not because he is from the pseudo-Asian part of their world and people there simply happen to be like that? After all, some of the people where they live are fish dudes and some of the colonizers are literal vampires, is "there are metal dudes out there" really something beyond the pale for them?
    Then we don't need Koth to be from Mirrodin at all, and we don't need to introduce Mirrodin. We can just frame Koth as "some weirdo from some other part of Ixalan". That was my point originally. Introducing entire other worlds for nothing more than window dressing or to justify the existence of one person is unnecessary and wasteful. It's unnecessary to the world we're in and it's wasteful of the world we're creating. Not to mention it just introduces potential problems (world-hopping) that are antithetical to playing a game on Ixalan.

    When I pitch a game, and I always pitch a game first, and someone says they want to play something totally outside of that, my first thought is not "Will this enable this guy to have more fun?" it's "Was this guy listening?" followed by "What else is he not going to listen to me on?" followed by "Why is this guy here?"

    My history with players is that when I pitch Game A, and player comes back with Totally Unrelated Concept B, there's going to be trouble. Not just because of the disconnect between the character and the gameworld, but because of the disconnect between the DM, the other players, and this guy. If he is unwilling or unable to bring himself to invest in the very basic concept of the game, lets say "Ixalan", why is he here? Because we all enjoy each other's company so much? Okay that's fine, but if that's true, couldn't he have bent his concept to fit the world, rather than relying on our mutual enjoyment of his company to tolerate his disconnect?

    In short: I find this sort of behaviour to indicate not just a disconnect, but a level of disrespect for the DM and the other players, who all chose to play in this game.
    Knowledge brings the sting of disillusionment, but the pain teaches perspective.
    "You know it's all fake right?"
    "...yeah, but it makes me feel better."

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