The Birth of a World

A while ago I mentioned something about putting something down here about my home brew campaign world (The Valley).

And even though it never made it to here, I did type it out.

It had information that my players had and had not seen. I had it all down in an inception-to-play design. But then I realized that all of the stuff I never had a chance to use would go to waste if I put it on the blog. I could never use them again with this group, and any possible future group who knew how to use Google.

So I scrapped the idea of telling all of you about my world.
Sorry about that.

Hey what can I say? You got screwed again. Welcome to the real world.

Those who have played in that world either loved it or liked it and were ready for more. I’ve ran the world 3 times. The first time ended in a TPK. The second time ended in a TPK. And the third time ended when the WLD came out.

The third time the game ended at a good stopping point and there has been recent mention of the players wanting to go back to where we left off. But the problem with that is that those PCs are going to be 2 years since those PCs have been played. And for myself, I’m not up for running the world again. I kind ruined my world for me. Because several of the players know a lot of the facts outside of the game, the mystery of it is gone.

And it’s not like I can get that mystery back. Imagine watching Lost or Babylon 5 while you already know all of the main plot hooks and resolutions. If you take the mystery out of Babylon 5 all you have are space battles and over-acting.

Plus my world was better off with fewer players who were totally new to the setting. It allowed for a lot of political role-playing sessions that needed to be one-on-one. That can be done with 6 players, but in a session where only 1 die roll is made and the talking is done by only 1 or 2 people, that’s a lot people getting left out. And that isn’t fun.

I have had problems in the past where I played in a game that involved one person talking, and the rest sitting there waiting for something to happen so they can do something. If it happens occasionally, it’s perfectly fine so long as it’s never on the same person over and over. But if it happens every week, it’s a sign of a bad DM and/or a selfish player.

I would take a Monty Haul DM over a DM who does that or lets that happen.

So that all being said, my home brew world is going dormant. I’m sure I’ll return to it one day, but not today.

But here’s a little secret that every DM uses; we steal ideas and incorporate them into our games. Where we steal them from is limitless; other DMs, books, games, TV, and so on. And I made a sizeable chunk of my homebrew world using a Japanese console role-playing game.

And I didn’t want to just let that go. I really liked that game’s story and how well it was done.

But modifying something like that for D&D isn’t exactly easy. Japanese rpgs don’t exactly match to D&D on a 1-to-1 basis (even though they so very obviously used D&D as a base for their system).

So I would have a lot of things I need to smooth out and hammer into submission.

Also, I will have to modify D&D a bit to get things to work the way I want them too as well. But I can’t go too far because we’re all here to play D&D, not my specialized version of D&D. I’m not trying to improve D&D as a game; I’m trying to make things mesh well and move a little quicker because I have grander plans in mind.

If things go as planned the PCs will level about every 2 game sessions, maybe more often early on (I’ve never liked levels 1-3). But I don’t want the game to take an hour pause every time someone levels. I want you to roll your hit points, pick your feats, skills, and spells, and be ready to continue in 20 minutes. This happened in the WLD a lot, and I had to set it up so that the PCs would level at the most convenient times. And even then it took too long.

And then there was choosing what spells to memorize. That got to be a horrid affair towards the end of the WLD. Between Jeff and Aaron (Valden & Krieg) they spent an hour of time doing that every time the party rested. I don’t want a return to that at higher levels.

Plus I really like the gestalt rules. Unlike many people, I never had a problem with first edition AD&D multi-classing. It had its drawbacks, but it certainly wasn’t horrible. And from what I’ve seen with Dale’s campaign, gestalt is only powerful when it comes to buffing. Otherwise gestalt just gives you more resources than a normal party (translation: more fights before resting is needed).

And the problems with a Japanese rpg are apparent to anyone who has played them. Some of them can be ignored (steam power & “Magi-tech”), but one thing can’t be ignored and has to be paid attention to; the unavoidable plot train. And I think I will have to compromise on this.

Ok, so now I’ve got a list of things I need to fix; leveling time, spell memorizing time, gestalt power, and plot trains. I have several ideas in mind, but they aren’t quite ready for me to list them.

My goal for this game is to achieve a new style of gaming.
I want the combats to run faster than usual.
I want PC levels to go higher than before.
I want an entire story line that the players’ actions will affect the whole game world.
I want epic forces clashing against one another.
I want to give the PCs a chance to find and use magic items of power that you just never get anymore, but while still having to work hard to get those items.
I want to allow the players many more options than I usually give them, while still maintaining control of the campaign.
I want the return of hexagons for outdoor movement.
I want quick and easy access to random encounters.
I want more use out of the d12.
I want a PC death to be a hiccup to the game instead of a brick wall.
I want more dragon fights.
I want different monsters.
And I still want this to all be fast and loose.

I’ve got my work cut out for me.