Dungeon Master Tools – World Building

Let’s first start off by saying, read what I wrote on story arcs. It is here. And that is going to be the framework for this world building discussion going forward. Why, because it breaks it down and keeps it simple.

So let’s keep going with our example from there and let’s just recap it a little bit:

• Find treasure
• Fight Mid-level boss
• Learn about Big Bad
• Search for way to stop Big Bad
• Get information from wizard
• Find artifact
• Confront big bad

We start with find the treasure. And I broke that down even more.

• Find Treasure
  • Get party together and get quest
  • Find where the dungeon is and travel there
  • Explore dungeon

So now we’re down to “Get the party together and get the quest.” That is the point where you start your world building.

What Elements You Build

So, previously to this I talked about Session 1, you can find that here. And that gives a bit more context to this plan. The group gets a quest, they meet with the quest giver, they fight someone trying to stop them from going on the quest and they get more information about the location of the quest from an NPC. That is my plan for Session 1. And this is where I am going to pull out what elements I need to build.

I look at my description of what I want to do, I see two NPC’s in there. First there is the “Quest Giver” then there is the “Information Giver”. So I need to come up with stuff for both of them. I said in the Session 1 article, let’s have it be a bar where they meet the second NPC. So when I decide that location, that’s another thing for world building, what is the name of the bar. And I get a third NPC with the “Bartender”.

Next I want to ask myself some questions. Where do they get the quest? Where do they meet the “Quest Giver”? And finally, who do they fight? If I answer them with adventurers guild, their estate, and street gang, I now know a few more things for my world building, and that’s about it I need to do to get started.

Building The Elements

I’m going to give a couple examples of how to build. But we start at the top level and work down. And every element that I build is going to follow a standard format.

I want everything I do to have a pretty similar format. It doesn’t matter if it’s a location, country, NPC, they all are going to be pretty standard to try and make my life simpler as the Dungeon Master. I want to have name, defining feature, brief description.

Example – Quest Giver

Name: John Jacob Jingleheimer-Schmidt
Defining Feature(s): Snooty Aristocrat with too much time and money, also a triplet – all named the same.
Brief Description: He has a very fancy estate with lots of gaudy artwork, he himself is even more gaudy than his estate. And for a dwarf that looks out of place, but he doesn’t care and he is always talking about and showing off his wealth.

Example – Inn/Bar

Name: The Crooked Turnip
Defining Feature(s): Cheap as can be with a patronage that looks the same.
Brief Description: From the outside The Crooked Turnip looks like it shouldn’t be open and for a bar, it’s not that noisy. From the inside it looks like it’s just locals, people down on their luck, and the alcohol is the cheapest swill that you can get. If you order the pot roast, you’re pretty sure it’s just turnips.

And that is it. So let’s count, we have the quest giver, the information giver, the bar, the bartender, adventurers guild, estate, street gang, town, and country. I count nine total things that you need to come up with details on, and general details. I think a tenth might be the treasure’s location, but again, not in much detail. You don’t need to know what else is in town really. If you suspect your players will go shopping, as players do, then maybe a shop, and a shopkeeper.

Could you do more. Obviously, but the point is to do as little as possible. And to make it as easy for yourself as the Dungeon Master as possible. Plan what you need only and don’t overthink it.

Final Thoughts on World Building

You probably know the theme for these Dungeon Master Tools, keep it simple. And I want to keep on banging that drum. I love drawing out a good map, but is it needed for a town or country, not really. And if you want to draw a map, start the map with a shape of the country the town, and that’s it. As you add to the world each session build out more.

The final bit of advice for world building is let the player help. They decide to set-up their base of operations at an inn. They get to name the inn. Make your life simpler by only planning for what you know you will need. And everyone pitches in for those surprise elements of the game.

So what is coming next for Dungeon Master Tools?

• Combat
• Exploration
• NPCs/Social Interactions
• Meta Game and Players at the Table

And let me know if there are other things to cover as well that you want to know more about, or help with. I think that there are a ton of different things that new Dungeon Masters are curious about or that feel intimidating. So I hope that I can help make them clearer and simpler for you.

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Dungeon Master Tools – Session 1

What Not To Do

Let’s start out with what you shouldn’t do as the Dungeon Master. And I know that some of these things that I’ll write about are much easier said than done.

Don’t stress about it. This is the one that is by far easier said than done. But your players are going to like your campaign because they are going to like playing Dungeons and Dragons, for example. So the opportunity to play the game is going to be the important part, not that the game is perfect. And I’ll talk more about what you should or maybe shouldn’t do to keep your stress lower.

Don’t over plan it. Now, I’m going to talk more about this in what to do or describe how I plan things. But don’t over plan the first session or really the campaign. You want to plan some for the session. That is going to help with stressing. But don’t build out your whole world. If you won’t go to a town this session, like the capitol of the land, don’t create the capitol and NPC’s who live there, unless they are key to some element that you know the players will get to.

What To Do

Let’s start by talking a bit about what you should plan for your first session of a campaign. My big thing is keep it simple. When I wrote about the campaign itself, I told you know your hook and have an idea of where you want to end. You can read that here.

So now it’s time to play out that hook. And you want to plan out a few things with that hook and for the first sessions.

• How the characters meet
• NPC Interactions
• A Combat

How The Characters Meet

Let’s start out with maybe the simplest but the hardest as well. How do the characters meet? The simplest way to do this is say, you are already in a party. If they are already a party, they come up with how they meet. If not, create some story hook for it.

Let’s say that they are going to get the quest from someone to kickoff the campaign. Like go deal with the goblins who are causing issues somewhere. Well, all the players grab the same notice off of the job board and then go meet at the house or location where the quest giver will give them some more details. That way you form the party.

Or maybe you want to do the classic, “you are all at a tavern when…”. That’s going to be your hook where you bring the quest giver to them, or whatever that jumping off point might be. Even if it’s the fight in the tavern and the players band together to stop the fight.

The big thing is keep this simple and let this hit the plot quickly. So this is an area where you can reduce your stress by not overthinking it. Go with the simple and/or classic option to get the game moving. Or, better yet, in session 0, let the players create a group that is already a party. Now you just need them to show up and get given a plot hook.

Social Interactions

Let’s talk about social interactions then as well. I think you want some social interactions in the first session. There is an obvious one that we already talked about. You talk with the quest giver to give them that first plot hook. But that might be a more one sided conversation. You talk with Tom Bombadil and he gives you the quest. When you do that, though, Tom tells them to go talk to another NPC to get more information.

Now with this second NPC, and you can even hint at it, they aren’t as talkative. You decide, do they just not want to share the information. Or are they traumatized because, in my previous example, the goblins took over their home or killed a party member or something like that? Give them a single simple reason for not being that talkative. Now the players get to use some rolls to try and get that player to talk more.

The big reason for this is to get the players talking more. And when the players do get the NPC to talk more, now they get a bunch of information, including information about maybe a small boss monster or something like that. And maybe some challenges that the players might face.

The reason for those little extra things, you want to players to talk about it. And they players are going to ask questions, to each other, about if they need to prepare, what their plan should be, and maybe if the person who gave the quest was lying or didn’t know there was a bigger monster out there.

Combat

Next up let’s talk about combat. I think that you want some combat. So you want to move the NPC interaction along pretty quickly. But your quest should be, here is what you need to know, here is where you need to go, and it is a quest where you need to fight something. Keep that moving.

And because you know you need to fight something, you can prepare. Now, I recommend that you keep combat to start pretty simple. I suspect what intimated some people about combat is watching Critical Role where there is always a big set piece combat that happens, or nearly always. You don’t need to do that. If you want to do a combat with minis, buy a few cheap minis or use tokens or something to represent the players and monsters and grid paper. Don’t spend a ton of money, this first combat is meant to be simple.

I personally use theater of the mind most of the time. Why, because that is even simpler. We all just need to imagine what the battlefield looks like. Now that is a bit to keep in your head. But it might be a simpler and lower barrier of entry than trying to map out a combat. If it feels like a lot, take notes of where everyone is, generally, in combat. The fighter went up next to the group of two goblins, that is all the note needs to say. But, let’s get to the next point.

Keep Planning Simple

Mainly I want to get to this next and last point of keep it simple. This is on a lot of levels. I’ve really drilled in that you want to keep it simple with the NPC interactions. You want to keep it simple with combat. But there is even more. Keep it simple, still with your world building.

Example

Let’s use the example again of the goblins taking over a dungeon and a previous group having gone in there and gotten beaten. If that’s the case what do I need for the first session as the Dungeon Master?

• Quest Giver NPC
• NPC who was with the adventuring party
• Name of dungeon
• First room for combat in the dungeon
• Goblin stat block

That is about all that you need. It is really a keep it simple. What is missing from my list? There is no world built yet. I think you might add in the name of the town and the name of the bar where you find the NPC who was part of the adventuring party. That is all that you need to kick off this campaign, it is that simple.

Avoid the temptation to build out a ton more. So don’t build out the kingdom, don’t set-up rulers, and other towns, make it only about what you absolutely need for that session. And if someone asks the name of the kingdom, crowdsource, ask the players what they think it should be called. You go with that, and you work it all together, you don’t need to build it alone.

But if that seems like too little for it. There is very little else that I’d add to your plate. At most, a shop, a shop keeper and what they have. Your adventurers should be about broke, so that makes it simpler. But that’s it, nothing more.

Final Thoughts

The whole point of this Dungeon Master Tools series is to keep things as simple as possible for you. And it’s a reminder for me to keep it as simple as possible as well. Because I know the desire to create more than I need or to plan more than I need. And the more you Dungeon Master and play your campaign the easier things will become to not over plan. Why, because you already know all of it, you build a town, the players come back to it. You don’t need to build it again.

But the temptation is that you need it all to be ready at the start. And let’s say that you are with a group of mean players. Those players go the wrong way, they leave town and don’t head in the direction of the dungeon, in your head or that was given to them. Well, make the drunk adventurer be wrong. Yes, it is okay to railroad them into what you’ve planned by just moving the dungeon, in this case. You don’t do that all the time, but always keep it simple for you because when you don’t feel stressed and overworked as the Dungeon Master, the game is more fun for everyone.

So what is next?

• Story Arcs
• World Building
• Combat
• Exploration
• NPCs/Social Interactions
• Meta Game and Players at the Table

And let me know if there are other things to cover as well that you want to know more about, or help with. I think that there are a ton of different things that new Dungeon Masters are curious about or that feel intimidating. So I hope that I can help make them clearer and simpler for you.

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Message me on X at @TheScando
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Support us on Patreon here