For new GMs: Worldbuilding is storytelling: complication, complexity, micronarratives, and your precious little fantasy world-baby

Wax Banks has been blogging quietly in a corner since 2002 or so.   His recent RPG obsession annoys his regular readers.

Here are two worlds.

First, Ptolus, by highly-regarded RPG designer/writer Monte Cook:

Of all large cities in the Empire, Ptolus is probably the least devoted to Lothian, a fact made all the more ironic because this has become the traditional home of the Prince of the Church. Since 657 IA, the heir apparent to the Holy Throne has lived in Ptolus, with the idea that the heir should not live in the same city as the current Emperor of the Church. However, since the sacking of Tarsis by barbarians in 710, the Holy Emperor, Rehoboth, has lived with his son in Ptolus. Although Rehoboth’s stay has been officially declared a “visit,” he has now dwelled in Ptolus for eleven years.

Ptolus has a bishop – a man named Nireus Pard (human male cleric12)—but he does not enjoy the power of most bishops in a city the size of Ptolus. In fact, he has almost no power at all. His traditional roles are filled instead by the Prince of the Church and the archbishop, Adlam Theobold (male human cleric20). And now, with the Holy Emperor himself living in Ptolus, the bishop is virtually ignored, except for issues dealing directly with St.Valien’s Cathedral. And even St. Valien’s prominence comes into question when the temple within the Holy Palace is becoming a more “important” church than the cathedral; when the city’s powerful and influential elite need to visit a Lothianite church for any reason, they go to the Holy Palace more often than St. Valien’s.

In addition to St. Valien’s Cathedral, Ptolus has various satellite churches: St.Gustav’s Chapel at Delver’s Square in Midtown, Daykeeper’s Chapel in Midtown, St. Daris’ Church in the Guildsman District, Church of the Lawgiver in the North Market, Church of Lothian the Redeemer in Oldtown, St. Chausle’s Chapel in the South Market, and the Chapel of St. Thessinain Rivergate. With the temple inside the Holy Palace, that makes nine churches altogether.

Now, Uresia, Grave of Heaven, by highly-regarded RPG designer/writer S. John Ross:

Four gods are now known to have survived the Skyfall. There may be others, too, but there has been no sign of them in over a thousand years. The surviving gods are an odd mix of “unimportant” gods – morally ambiguous and largely unapproachable.

The Primal One: The god of animal urges – want, hunger, instinct, and lust. Some mistake her/him/it for “evil,” but it’s both above and beneath such things. It’s the shadowy essence of the Id, and of unthinking motive impulse. It cares only for its native worshippers, the wild animals. Paradoxically, it’s the secret ruler of a mortal kingdom.

The Sea Dragon: The serpentine goddess of wind and storm at sea, and the protector of the secrets of the deep. A fickle and destructive god, driven by alien motives and fond of drowning anything weak enough to require air to breathe. Villains who attempt to get on her good side end up just as drowned as anyone else. She commands a tiny secret cult of children.

The Arbiters: Their genders and personalities vary according to which culture you ask, but their area of concern is straightforward. They like any contest, as long as it is fair. They have no preference between violence and peace, or between right and wrong, so long as men are competing and striving for a judgment of victory. These cosmic referees inspire most Uresian kingdoms with an obsession for some kind of sport or contest.

The Wine God: In Helt, he is called Tom Beer, a laughing party-animal. In the Volenwood, she is Nysha, Goddess of the Vine, and the patron of the vintners’ art. In Sindra, they call it Golu: The Shadow of Drunkards, a semi-sinister spectre of alcoholism, the dark image that the drunkard can only escape by plunging into darkness. Each representation of a facet of the whole truth, but that the Wine God makes more personal appearances in Helt than anywhere else tells Man something, even if it is only how he prefers to be seen. [Read the rest of this article]