As is my wont, I’m gathering tools to help me develop this campaign setting. All I really know so far are the game system (Fantasy AGE) and general tone (pulpy sword and sorcery).
What tools do I expect to use to build this out? Here’s a list to start.
- The Goat’s Head
- Izirion’s Enchiridion of the West Marches Very handy book for setting up a West Marches style game. That’s not quite what I’m doing here, but what I’m doing is close enough for this to be useful.
- Modiphius
- (Conan 2d20) Ancient Ruins and Cursed Cities has a chapter on Making Ruins that I love to work with. In fact, it was partial impetus for my Making History posts (which I need to continue). Also, I’ll want to review how adventures are set up. I really like how sites are built with distinct interaction options.
- (Conan 2d20) Gamemaster’s Toolkit provides tools for devising an adventure.
- (John Carter of Mars 2d20) Narrator’s Screen + Narrator’s Kit is much like the Conan Gamemaster’s Toolkit. This one has a more (pseudo)science bent to it, but I expect I can find use here.
- (Dune 2d20) Adventures in the Imperium Gamemaster’s Toolkit is much like the two toolkits above. If anything, I feel it leans even more to the science than John Carter… and involves political elements the others don’t.
- Mongoose Publishing, or at least at one point (they no longer have a license for Conan RPG material)
- Ruins of Hyboria, the Creating Ruins chapter is d20 precursor to a similar chapter in Ancient Ruins and Cursed Cities. I like this one because it puts less weight on setting-specific elements.
- Mythmere Games
- Tome of Adventure Design, of course. This one is always at my desk.
- Nomicon. Matt Finch did a great job putting together a suite of tables for making names.
- Tome of World Building. A book for more structured setting design than Tome of Adventure Design, useful!
- Sine Nomine Publishing, excellent purveyor of sandbox development tools..
- An Echo, Resounding: A Sourcebook for Lordship and War is at the top of the list. This is one of the most directly approachable sandbox creation guides I’ve seen.
- Godbound is probably more fantastic/higher level/super powered than I want. As always, though, it includes a bunch of great sandbox material I want to review and consider. The rules for factions (‘courts’ in Godbound) can be useful to me, ditto the ruins section. The Creating Challenges section emphasizes less-combat scenarios; I’ll want to review this even if we go full murderhobo.
- Red Tide: Campaign Sourcebook and Sandbox Toolkit is largely a setting guide, but has some very good sandbox development tools.
- The Houses of the Lost section has material on developing sites of interest (court, borderland, city, ruin).
- Game Resources has useful resources for cult creation, names (setting-specific), room dressing, and mapping.
- Introduces the tag system, which also is used heavily in the … Without Number titles.
- Silent Legions has chapters on Creating Mythos, Building Your World, and Cults that I’m sure I want to look into.
- ‘Adventure Templates’ intrigues me mightily.
- … bugger, I didn’t back this KS at the print level. In my defense, I didn’t realize yet what I would be missing. Time to rectify!
- Worlds Without Number is a later book with more support for sandbox development. I don’t expect to use much of the rules content, but I really should give it another read.
- Creating Your Campaign chapter, of course, absolutely shines for my needs.
- Creating Adventures, ditto.
- Creatures of a Far Age chapter… worth a read, Fantasy AGE bestiary is relatively light.
- Factions and Major Projects chapter I’m a little ambivalent. If this is a points of light style setting I expect factions don’t have a lot of traction between points. If the world is more connected, though, I can see getting a fair bit out of this.
- Legates chapter applies mechanics like those in Godbound. I don’t think I’ll go this way, but I will review to see if I want to incorporate them.
- … there are more, but I’m getting sucked into reading when I should be writing…
- The Story Engine Deck is one of my favorite tools. Or families of tools, there are three main sets, with many expansions and boosters.
- Story Engine Deck, about people and the situations they are in.
- Deck of Worlds, about places and things in them.
- Lore Master’s Deck, building out connections between world elements to better describe and define them.
I’m sure I’ll add to this as I go.