Does Your Campaign Require a Whole New World?

I've been a gamer since I was about 19-20 years old, which at time of writing is more than a decade and a half ago. I've played a pretty wide variety of games since then; some were good, and some were bad. In all the time I've been gaming, though, I've never once decided to run a campaign in a homebrew world of my own design. And I can safely say, having been designing Sundara: Dawn of a New Age for months now, I would never even consider doing all this work if there wasn't a check attached to those efforts.

Speaking of, the floating city of Archbliss just released!

However, since it seems like a good 40-50 percent of people I talk to (and who leave combative remarks on my content) run games solely in worlds of their own design, there is a simple question I'd like us to think about today. Especially the game masters out there who are newer to the hobby, and who think this is some kind of rite of passage, or the "proper" way to run a game.

In case you didn't read the title, the question is to ask whether the campaign you're running really requires a whole new setting in order to make it work?

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The Ups and Downs of a Whole New World

Academically, I understand the appeal of making your own campaign setting for a game. It's world building in a literal sense as you rearrange everything to your liking. From altering the appearance of tieflings, to changing the assumed history of orcs, to drawing your own maps and forging your own timeline, there is something freeing about making your own setting from the ground up.

However, with that said, I feel there are a lot of stumbling blocks in this approach that we don't often think about. Because, as I so often say in comments sections, the ability to build a good world and the ability to run a good campaign are two completely different things.

Worlds are complex things.

First, let's talk about the upsides.

Making your own world can be creatively fulfilling. It can be fun to play around with the primordial goop of a setting, molding it and making something fun and unique. It can get you more attached to it, and if you play your cards right you can even get your players in on the action. Letting them contribute can give them that feeling of attachment that this is truly a shared game that you're all playing.

It can also let you erase aspects you don't like, don't want, or would rather not deal with that would have changed the core setting of the game too much to just make something a house rule.

For every up, though, there is a down.

There are downsides to homebrewing your own setting as well, though.

Perhaps the biggest issue I've come across in terms of homebrewed worlds is that a lot of GMs end up missing the forest for the trees. They focus on the handful of things that they were most interested in, or which they wanted to dedicate the majority of their time and effort to, but they end up forgetting they need to fill out the rest of the world, too.

Some examples of this from my own experience include:

- Completely forgetting to create a pantheon of gods in games with divine casters

- Having 2-3 major cities on a continent, but no other settlements

- Lacking the names and histories of ruling bodies and influential families in the capital city where the campaign was taking place

- Only fleshing out a few species in the whole world, leaving the others vague and unfinished

Even if you make an entire setting with no gaps or missing parts, though, there's often a disconnect between your setting and your players. Because if they can't actually read about things and look stuff up on their own, the world can seem ephemeral. If you are the sole lens that the players can learn information through, it can be frustrating for both of you... especially if you misremember something you told them, or there's a disagreement over an important aspect of the world, and it only exists in your head rather than on a wiki somewhere.

And if coming up with all of this stuff is hard work, then writing it all down and organizing it in anything resembling and engaging fashion is downright exhausting!

Do You Need To Do All This Work?

I'm not trying to discourage anyone from making their own settings to play in. If it's something you want to do, you should do it. However, it is important to take a moment to ask yourself if the story you're trying to tell actually requires that amount of work being done behind the scenes in order for your players to get the proper experience, or if you can just use an existing setting with a few additions in the blank spots on the map to get your game going.

Because if your campaign doesn't require a new setting all its own in order to function, then making one from scratch might be akin to one of those scenarios where a master chef tries to recreate the Big Mac. Even if you provide full flavor, great taste, and masterful presentation, it still took you hours of effort and a lot more work in terms of ingredients, sweat, and resources when just spending $5 at McDonald's would have yielded the exact same results with a lot less energy expended. Energy that you could instead focus on actually running the campaign.

Work smarter, not harder.

Making a whole setting isn't easy. It can take years of work if you're going it solo, and even a team of creators will take months to get all the details straightened out. Everything from the history of the world, to the rise and fall of empires, to the names and lineage of the Elf Kings, to the political relationships between the dwarven holds, to the names, faiths, and philosophies of all the disparate gods, that's all on you to figure out.

So take a moment and ask if you really need to do all of that work yourself, or if store bought is fine.

Because as a game master, and now as someone who's building a setting from the ground up, I can tell you that the reason Sundara exists is that it is the place for all those players and GMs who want a Pathfinder or 5E game where there's no alignment. Who want a game that's about striding forward into progress, rather than constantly referencing some lost, golden age. It's a world filled with bright, unique, and bizarre species options, strange gods, and extremely unusual places to explore.

But if a game didn't require all of that work? And if it wasn't my job to find a niche to fill for other game masters out there who might be struggling? Well, there's very little chance I'd have put this much time, energy, and effort into making Sundara a reality.

Sundara So Far

Speaking of my setting, the first 5 of the Cities of Sundara series have dropped. I'm switching gears after this to Gods of Sundara next month, and then after that delving into the species of the world and what makes them unusual and unique. If you're looking for a setting that's about progress, fresh solutions, and where the old conceits of alignment are thrown right out the window, then Sundara might be for you.

Also, you can slot these locations into existing settings to use on their own, if you're just looking for something to plug into an empty spot on your campaign map!

- Ironfire: The City of Steel (Pathfinder and 5E): Built around the Dragon Forge, Ironfire is where the secret to dragon steel was first cracked. The center of the mercenary trade in the region, as well as boasting some of the finest schools for teaching practical sciences, Ironfire is a place where discovery and danger walk hand in hand!

- Moüd: The City of Bones (Pathfinder and 5E): An ancient center of trade and magic, Moüd was lost to a cataclysm, and then buried in myth. Reclaimed by the necromantic arts of the Silver Wraiths guild, this city has once again become a place teeming with life. Despite the burgeoning population, though, it is the continued presence of the undead that helps keep the city running, ensuring that Moüd is not swallowed up once more.

- Silkgift: The City of Sails (Pathfinder and 5E): Built on the cottage industry of Archer cloth (an extremely durable material used for sails, windmills, etc.), Silkgift is a place that prizes invention and discovery. From gravity batteries that store the potential of the wind, to unique irrigation systems, to aether weapons, the city positively churns out discoveries... and then there's the canal they cut through the mountains that makes them a major center of trade across the region.

- Hoardreach: The City of Wyrms (Pathfinder and 5E): A center of power across an entire region, Hoardreach is ruled over by a Cooperation of five different dragons. A place for refugees and outcasts of all sorts, Hoardreach boasts some of the most unusual citizens and creations from across Sundara. Infamous for their sky ships, which require the cast-off scales and unique arcane sciences of the Dragon Works to take to the air, one never knows just what they'll find in this city built atop a mountain.

- Archbliss: The City of The Sorcerers (Pathfinder and 5E): A city in the sky, Archbliss was legendary among those on the ground. The home of great sorcerers, it took being born with power to ascend to that place. The flying city has stopped its wandering, and opened its gates a crack to those from the world below. Darkness lurks behind the glamour and wonder of the City of The Sorcerers, though... and once someone falls through the cracks, there's no coming out again.

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