How To Set Your RPG Scenes

A setting for a story should be a wonderful trap. Good setting lures you in with exquisite promises of fascinating lands with details that keep you interested. A good setting sticks in your mind like a song that you can’t shake. A story’s setting is an entire ecosystem of people, dreams and mystery. Middle Earth, The Sprawl, and Hogwarts are just a few of the settings that have stirred my imagination in the past.

Creating a game world is always a fun part of any new campaign for me. Just like the real world, geography of a fantasy world creates conflict. In my campaigns one piece of land may be important for two or more groups of people. How these groups interact can create a great conflict for a story. Creating a new world takes time and I’ve learned several tricks that I think help speed the process up while increasing quality. These tips have helped me build cohesive worlds that are believable for my players and help their characters fit more comfortably into the story.

Setting is more than the NPCs that live in the castles and villages you create. It’s the history, politics and everything in between. In this article I’ll take you through basic world building that I like to do when I’m creating a new environment or tweaking a pre-existing world. I like to have an understanding of these things before the players ever start out in the first episode. These aren’t all necessary but the better you understand your world, the more answers you will have for your players when they inevitably ask questions. 

Here are the top five world building tips for creating a new campaign world:

5 Names hold power.

What in the world do you call your world? It seems minor but knowing what the people in your world call their environment is important. The NPCs in your world gained their knowledge of what to name things in the world from somewhere. But do the people in your world even know they live on a planet? Answering that question fills in some gaps about the characters you may be developing. 

 Naming things in my campaigns usually starts with land masses. Your created worlds aren’t Earth, so the easiest place to start would be the name of the continent or land that you will begin play on. This creates a name that can continue to come up during play and remain consistent between the NPCs that your players interact with. Naming the land can help players to feel more involved in the world because it’s a point of common knowledge they share with the NPCs.

As an example, in Game of Thrones most of the action takes place in the land of Westeros. It’s a name that comes up frequently in the story and it’s one way the reader (or viewer), can settle into the narrative. It’s not only referenced in speech but also in maps and histories that the characters read. We know where the story is happening in our mind’s eye and can remember events more easily. Whether you’re creating a city or a whole planet, the same principle applies in any world constructed for roleplaying. If the NPCs use the names you’ve created regularly your players will too. A common naming convention builds player investment.

4 What happened before now?

Trying to recall or create history for a village can be tricky. That creation gets even harder if you have to do it on the fly. There’s a lot to consider when creating a city or village from scratch. Things can get more complicated if your players insist they leave your well prepared town to visit a nearby village that you have mentioned in passing.

 I find it helpful to know what’s been going on in an area leading up to the moment when my players walk in. Nothing too specific, just broad historical strokes. Even if the sleepy little village of Townsburg hasn’t had anything go wrong recently, it still has a history. Think about what you might say to a stranger who comes to you and starts asking about what is going on in your town. What would you tell them? You probably don’t know everything, just some general information about who’s in charge and maybe where the best food in town is. Knowing a general Town history is helpful as a GM but, to me, it’s not necessary that every NPC knows everything. I’ve found that if I operate on the assumption that no NPC will know everything about the history of an area. This feels more realistic to me and also alleviates any need to provide a comprehensive history lesson in game.

When building a new location in your game consider that all places have a local history, some good and some bad. The long term history of a place always affects the people who live there because it helps to establish what is normal. Depending on what normal it is NPCs may or may not care when certain things happen, like a fight between rival gangs or a royal parade. 

Below is a quick table to help spark some inspiration if you find yourself in need of creating a quick backstory for a town. This chart works best when used in a fantasy RPG like Dungeons & Dragons or Pathfinder. It won’t answer all the questions your players could have, but it will help you get the ball rolling in establishing what normal is for that town. You can use percentile dice to help create a random history, or choose a history that fits your cities.

Local History Table

Local History Table(Roll Percentile)	Village(30 – 100 people)	Coastal Town(100 – 1300 people)	Smally City(1300 – 4500 people)	Medium City(4500 – 25,000 People	Big City (25,000 + people)
1-25 Religion	Religious cult recently founded the village	Holy waters, supposed have healing effects	Home to an ancient religious sight used by the town	Holy land. Location of a major religious pilgrimage	Home to a major nationwide religion
26-50 Royalty	Isolated community with strong leader. (Chief, sheriff, mayor)	Home to the naval fleet of the royal family.	The vacation home of a beloved royal family	Home to a minor lordship.	Capital city. Home of the area ruling family. Art, fashion, food, and museums.
51-75 Military	Soldiers  founded the village as a checkpoint	Was a naval base during a war. The navy is gone now.	Home to an ancient gladiator pit and warrior guild.	Major military base.	Major city fortifications against invasion, Knights, Checkpoints.
76-85Merchants	Village is a new mining outpost recently opened.	A famous shipwright started building ships here.	Tourist destination: Town has famous hot springs and gardens.	Home to a bardic college and the setting of several famous ballads.	Major trade hub between land and rivers. Cultural melting pot.
86-95 Crime	Outpost for trading between several gangs.	Pirate town. Fugitives, stolen goods, no real  law.	The domain of an oppressive and corrupt merchant company.	Crime lords run the city as powerful merchants.	Corrupt government. Bribes, blackmail, assassins.
96-98 Arcane magic	Everyone is a magic user of some kind.	A wizard was shipwrecked here years ago and built a port.	Home to a strange relic nobody understands.	Home to a major school of magic.	Magical artifacts power the city. Trams, magic item peddlers.
99 Conflict	Rebuilding after being destroyed by a monster.	Home to a sea monster in the cove that eats ships, sometimes.	Recovering from a large battle that destroyed the city.	Caught between armies fighting for a depleted natural resource.	Recovering from the overthrow of a powerful evil dictator.
100 Unique	Town founded by a lovable intelligent monster who died a few years ago.	The port was constructed and abandoned by an unknown race of creatures.	Isolated city run by blacksmiths crafting items out of a metal only found there.	Pollen from the town’s main agricultural product requires people to constantly wear gas masks.	City built entirely underground and abandoned. Parts of it are still locked and unknown.

3 Weather & Atmospheric effects 

When crafting your fictional land spare at least a few moments for seasons and weather. I like to consider the weather because it can lend character to the landscape your story takes place in. Weather can be used as a character in your story to help set mood and establish daily routines. As an example, go watch The Crow from 1994 with Brandon Lee. The rain in that film is a central character that adds to the mood of the story and also gets referenced regularly by the characters. 

I created a table several years ago that helped me determine weather for the day of the adventure. I would role the table several times at the beginning of each session, Taking notes for each rolled outcome. I would create a ten day forecast of what would be happening during the game. 

You can find the table for temperate environments below. This table is just for temperate environments with four seasons and is supposed to be used with a system like Dungeons and Dragons or Pathfinder of any edition. It can be adapted to fit other hotter or colder environments.

Seasonal Weather Effect Table

Season	2-25	26-50	51-75	76-99	1 or 100
Summer Rainfall: Roll 1D6 1-2 Light rain 3-6 No rain If yes 1D6-3 = Inches of rain per day	Comfortable 75°F-80°F Cloud cover	Sunny and some clouds 81°F-89°F Armored PCs make DC 13 con save after physical exertion. Fail = 1D4 non lethal heat damage (if your system allows)	Hot and few clouds 90°F-99°F DC 12Con saves every 6 hours outside.  Fail =1d6 non lethal heat damage)	Danger Hot No cloud cover 100°F+ DC 13 unarmored PCs DC 16 armored PCs, Con saves each hour unless resting. Fail = 1d8 non lethal heat damage	Flash flood 78℉-82℉ 1D6+1 inches of rain in 1D4 hours. Low lying areas will flash flood.
Fall Rainfall:  Roll 1D6 1-3 Rain 3-6 No rain If yes1D4-1 = Inches of rain per day	Chilly 48°-40°F	Comfortable 49℉-55℉	Comfortable 56℉-65℉	Comfortable 66℉-75℉	Freezing rain 32°F-30°F Sudden drop. 1d4 inches of ice accumulation in 1d4 hours.
Winter Snowfall/ Rainfall: Roll 1D61-3 Yes rain3-6 No rain If yes1d8-2 =Rain/Snow per day.	Bone Chilling 25℉-0°F Rain= Snow-Water freezes-DC 18 Con save if PCs get wet Fail = 1d10 cold damage per/30 min until dry.	Frigid 32℉-25℉ Rain= Snow-Water freezes – DC 15 Con save if a PC gets Wet Fail = 1d8 Cold damage per/30 min until dry.	Cold 39℉-33℉ DC 13 Con save for Improperly clothed characters  Fail = 1d4 cold damage per two hours until warm)	Chilly 48℉-40℉	Blizzard 25°F
Spring Rainfall:Roll 1D6-2 = Inches of rain per day	Comfortable 49℉-56℉	Comfortable 57℉-65℉	Comfortable 66℉-70℉	Comfortable 71℉-75℉	Thunder storms 55℉-65℉ 1D6+1 inches of rain in 1D6 hours. Low lying areas will flash flood.

Charting weather creates several outcomes that can help develop your setting even further. If you’re the type of information hoarder and planner like some of the other storytellers I know, you can actually chart things like average rainfall for the area your players are in. Some of my friends actually take the time to record all the rainfall and other weather phenomena in their game worlds to determine things like drought and flooding.

 Another outcome of creating a ten day forecast is to give people something to talk about. No matter who you are or where you’re from people always talk about the weather. Giving your NPCs something to gripe about just adds to their realism. The last outcome of weather charting is also really common in daily life. If the storyteller knows what the weather will do they can let the PCs in on it by having some NPC talk about how her knee always aches right before a big storm. Whether or not the storm is real doesn’t matter, your players will react to new information. Sometimes they need to prepare for a large blizzard before they venture out to find a hidden mine. Sometimes the blizzard never happens and it’s just fun to watch the PCs scramble. The world is full of strange weather and people all over the world have been adapting to it for millenia. By including it in your campaign building strategy your world gains depth. 

2 Landscape 

The land your story takes place on cannot be ignored. Throughout history, wars have been fought over it, rivers divide it, oceans cover it, and disasters reshape it. The story of Robin Hood relies upon the environment he hides in, Sherwood Forest. The land gave Robin a place to hide from the Sheriff. His merry men hid with him and made their homes in and among the trees. Without Sherwood Forest Robin Hood would have just been some guy in a field. 

How do you express a landscape to help your players visualize their environment? As a storyteller you’re using more than just what your players can see. You control all the senses your players have. Since the story takes place completely inside the imagination of the people at the table it’s important to use all the senses that your players have. Consider how you would breakdown the setting of Sherwood Forest for a group of players sense by sense. Take a look at this photo of a forest and consider it through the lens of your player’s different senses.

1. Sight Think about the obvious things first, things we can see.  The trees and how tall they are create all the shadows that spot the forest floor. The color of the trees and any moss that covers them. See the rocks and tree roots sticking up out of the ground (maybe a tripping hazard during a chase?) 
2. Sound What can your players hear? The sounds that all the wildlife makes. The sound of any nearby rivers and the wind through the trees. How does it change from day to night? How quiet does it get when the animals are spooked? 
3. Touch How does the forest feel to your players? Your players are probably wearing different things like armor or robes. Is it hot and muggy? Is there a breeze? Is a knight in full plate more or less comfortable than a shaman dressed in robes?  
4. Smell Using smell to help set up an environment can draw players even further into the landscape. The smell of blooming plants can create a sense of (false) calm. Has it rained recently? The forest floor may be thick with the smell of loam and mud. If it was hot before the rain what does the steam smell like as the rain evaporates? Smell can also be used as a sense of danger. Can the party smell their enemy? If the enemy is undead or covered in blood and ichor the answer is probably yes. 
5. Taste using taste can be tricky but it shouldn’t be overlooked. If your ranger tastes the water in a nearby pool and it’s foul how did that happen? Do the berries from this particular part of the forest taste better?

The landscape in your story is the unconscious world the players interact with. It works to pull the story along in the background. The great thing about landscape is it completely changes the way a story gets told. Think about Robin Hood one more time and then change the landscape from the comfort of Sherwood Forest to the ocean. How does that location change the story? Is Robin Hood a pirate now? Change the landscape however you want. Set Robin Hood in a city like ancient Beijing, the arctic wilderness or the middle of a giant desert. The landscape requires the storyteller to fill in gaps to make the story more plausible for the characters. 

1 Who has power and what do they want?

A friend and fellow storyteller once told me that he constructs his worlds based around the politics of the groups in power. I took this to mean as long as he knew what a powerful group’s motivations were, the story was easier to create. Put simply, politics is how groups of people make decisions. On a large scale those decisions have lots of effects in the game world. Groups of people may get power because they take it by force, charm or manipulation. Those groups inevitably want some of the same things like land, wealth or subjects and fight over them. Those conflicts may be open and aggressive like a war or subtle like sending missionaries to the same area to convert the same people. These powerful groups have an agenda or need they are trying to fulfill. 

This idea helped me as a storyteller because it lends directly to the setting. Just like the local history section above, the goals of powerful groups and people help to shape the day to day lives of the NPCs in your story. A local dirt farmer probably doesn’t care about what one king said to the other, but you can bet they will care when there’s an army trampling their crop of dirt. 

Just like with Villains (make a link here) the knowledge of the local politics also helps develop plot for your story and you should know what the various groups have planned. As different powerful groups progress through their plans it may or may not affect the players. However, the world still changes and reacts to the actions of these groups. These reactions give you great jumping off points for plot and side quests for your players. 

If you really want to tie the political happenings of the land into your campaign try to make one of your player characters a member of one of these organizations. A member of a noble family, a member of a powerful clergy, or an officer in a military. As the local politics shift and move in your story that players priorities may change. The player may ignore their responsibilities and cause consequences for themselves down the line. They may also try to fulfil their obligations and take the party on an interesting quest series that pulls them further into the world you have created.

Final Thought

The setting of a role playing game is an essential part of worldbuilding. It’s impossible to build a world without sparing a few moments to consider the world your story will be taking place in. If these ideas are helpful or you feel like you can incorporate them into your own game please leave a comment here and let me know how it went. If there’s anything I missed or you would like to add, please leave it here in the comments section. I believe that the whole RPG community grows when we all share ideas.