kulrath

[kulrath]

Dungeon World Worldbuilding #1

You might have seen my post about my D&D group taking a break and making a setting to play Call of Cthulhu. Well, it went well until it didn't. We played ExNovo to set up the city and... they haven´t written anything since. I am craving TTRPG so I'm going to GM a one-shot to play Dungeon World, partly to try to entice my players to other TTRPGs and partly because any game based on the Powered by the Apocalypse system is infinitely hackable, and has less narrative and mechanical restrictions than any D&D edition.

So, worldbuilding for a one shot. If I don't have a very particular idea for a one-shot (I've done a Sunless Skies setting, and some others more contained to an idea or a vibe) I tend to approach it as a piece of a world that might be expanded later, you never know when a one-shot is going to turn into a full campaign down the line, and no one likes to retcon stuff. That being said, you don't need to invest 100 hours to just play a 4h game. Make details that would be on the corner of the adventure, throw the name of some city outside the map, some NPC from a distant land, a religion from a god irrelevant to the story... This makes the world feel more grounded AND gives you things to work with in the future.

I've decided to start with a map. I am not artistically gifted but I like to put pen to paper to doodle and draw some maps, it's relaxing to me. Oh, and I like to use post it notes a lot for map-making and doodling, so that's the size of paper that I'm working with.

I've started with the rough pencil shape of the coast, some mountains, some rivers, the usual.

I then give details and let the shape of things inform a bit of the worldbuilding. I really liked the gulf on the center of the map, so I exagerad it and thought it could serve as an important port city, and that the two river deltas that seem to have helped form it could host two military ports and to help keep the peace on the gulf from pirates and bandits. I got rid of the idea of hills on the bottom right corner just because I don't really like drawing them on a map and proceeded to select a couple of points of interest for villages: One on the forest to the north and one on the lake to the south-east.

In the end I give some more details, erase the pencil lines and presto we have a map to worldbuild in.

One last note: Naming things.

I hate naming things but it has to be done and has to be mildly serious to not beak immersion. I chose to call the land Lanria because it's the first name that came to mind and a quick Google search came up empty of already existing fantasy concepts. Not that paying homages isn't a good thing, and if you are not publishing your work go nuts, but I don't like to deal with the preexisting concepts associated to known names. Port Numen is one name that works unplanned, "Numen" was what came to mind when coming up with a name for the city, I knew it was a real world but didn't know it's meaning, and it´s perfect for a settlement and we can play on the motif by cranking up some religion on it. Folstia is just a name with a city-sounding ring to it. North and South Grip because it looks like the land is pinching the sea, gripping it, and Pond Village on what's probably going to be Pond Lake because I said mildly serious, and there are also many real world places with funny names (Looking at you Torpenhow Hill).

And so it begins this woldbuilding exercise, with a map and a dream.

[kulrath]

What's to come

I've come to a realization about my creative process. I LOVE world-building and game design, but if I don't plan on sharing it with someone (and I rarely plan to), I'm contempt with keeping it just in my head, and I would really like to have a backlog of things just to be able to show eventually, or as a referencie in case I forget things.

So, I'm planning on doing some Tumblr content about what I design/write, and treat it like some kind of journal.

A blog, I'm talking about a blog, you know, what Tumblr is for...

SO, get ready for some content in the near future I guess.

[kulrath]

We are on a hiatus on our TTRPG group, and we've decided to do a Call of Cthulhu game next, as a mini campaign. We are planning to do seasons on the same setting, so we are trying to build the city/region in coop, using ExNovo, a fun city building coop game.

Anyway, here´s the map we have made before adding the last population tokens to make it chonky.

[kulrath]

I used to code, write, play videogames, do a little bit of drawing... I don't know what my thing is anymore

[kulrath]

I've also been trying to resume my failed attempt at Zettelkasten with Obsidia, I'll try to keep you posted.

[kulrath]

I bet you work at the anti-soup kitchen, which steals soups from the poor. 

[kulrath]

So, now that the bird app is dying, might give tumblr a serious try for real this time I swear

[kulrath]

I've opened my Tumblr page again in hopes of journaling my trip into game developping, worldbuilding and/or descent into madness.

Stay tuned, will try to post my first headbutts with GODOT tonight (GMT+1)

[kulrath]

I'm currently playing in a Strixhaven inspired campaign in Exandria: Whitestone Community College.

I'm playing a Muscle Wizard, my man wanted to be a Paladin, but his mothers wanted him to be a powerful wizard, and he cannot say no to them, so here he is: a 17 STR 13 INT Wizzard with a staff and Polearm Master.

[kulrath]

What is the tumblr etiquette

[kulrath]

in batman 2022 bruce wayne's parents were killed in 2001 he would have been like 10? i think. the black parade was released in 2006 when he would have been ambiguously high school aged and obviously very emo and unpopular. what i'm saying here is that i think battinson heard the lyrics "when i was a young boy my father took me into the city to see a marching band he said son when you grow up will you be the savior of the broken, the beaten, and the damned" and decided to become batman then and there.

[kulrath]

- Quick little Rya felt!

[kulrath]

I'm once again upset over the fact that If I want my story to be ready, I have to actually write it myself.

What the hell is that bs?

[kulrath]

Dudes rock

[kulrath]

[kulrath]

I've been commanded to reblog

literally if you’re new to tumblr: reblog shit

“it wont fit my aesthetic” make a sideblog. reblog to it.

“i hate tagging” don’t tag then. reblog it anyway.

“but my likes are public” ppl here dont fucking look at your likes. they dont do anything anyway. reblog it.

“you just want attention” jokes on you, I dont make shit anymore. I’m talking about other artists.

“it’s embarrassing” tumblr is an anonymous platform. make a sideblog if you’re too cowardly

“but on twitter its fine to have lurk accounts” well they suck ass here and are assumed to be bots. reblog.

[kulrath]

My players have spent the last two sessions going around a zombie-like Yuan-ti infested dungeon, nearly dying twice (once against the first two enemies, labeled by the party as the "janitors of the dungeon", and once against a group of 8 of them plus a giant homebrew one, saved only by sorcerer point conversion into fireball slots).

They short rest after the near-death-experience, keep searching the dungeon. Find the boss room,A Bone Naga mind controlling Yuan-ti priests summoning Vroks #fun and they decide to say "fuck it, we engage them".

They gonna die.