this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2023
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In a homebrew world how much lore is minimum to have as a player before you feel you can play in it? (ttrpg.network)
submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Edit sorry I was way to vague and bad explained question. But great explanation everyone.

If you start playing as a player in a homebrew world that I built. How little information would you feel needed to be able read before you can build a character in it?

I have been planing to start looking for players soon but I struggling as I don't want to give them a whole novel of mostly boring lore dump but sending them like two sentients feels just silly.

Not to mention would you as a player like reference to other mediums so you could quickly know what to expect or would you rather have a in game view of it?

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 11 months ago

For my homebrew world, I wrote a two page document covering:

  • Geography: the rough layout of their starting city (the main districts and well-known landmarks), the main species that can be seen around the city (they're not limited to playing these, but I think it's helpful if you're going to play a dragonborn to know whether you're an outsider in this city or not), and a high-level sentence each on the handful of main locations that can be easily travelled to from the city - i.e. the stuff that any resident should know.

  • Magic and religion: the pantheon of major gods and their domains, and a line noting there are other religious/magical traditions but most residents of the city would be unfamiliar with them.

  • Politics: how the city is governed, who the noble houses are, and what reputation is widely known about each of them (not all of these are deserved...)

  • History: some very high-level history of the city and world (at the level that an average resident would know - the equivalent of the name of this world's Roman Empire who founded the city, and what happened to them).

I figured that two pages is short enough for anyone to read and get some sense of the world I'm dropping them in, without going into so much detail that it takes away their ability to explore the world (which is dramatically bigger than the city).

There's also no real cost to people not remembering what's in the two-pager - people can get away with assuming it's a fairly generic fantasy world at first and I can easily resupply key info while DMing - but I figure most players like to know a bit about the game world before they start.