Torque2100
Legendary Pubber
- Joined
- May 7, 2020
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- 568
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As much as I love high concept sci-fi or weird fantasy settings, there's always a problem that you run into when trying to DM those settings: exposition.
Communicating the history of a setting that characters should know can be a daunting task. Sometimes you just have to have an in universe history lesson in Session 0 and that sucks. Exposition is boring and most of your players are going to forget half of it by the time you start, your players will have forgotten half of it.
What if there was a way for the world of the campaign setting to be as new to the Characters as it was to the Players?
This is where the Fish Out of Water scenario comes in. Your PCs are characters who are as utterly unfamiliar with the world as the players so anything the players don't know, the characters also don't. Any stupid questions whos answers should be blindingly obvious can be asked in character.
There are many ways to do this, maybe they are people from Modern Earth whisked away by magic or super science to another world/time period ("Isekai" if you're a filthy weeb like me), mayhaps your characters are from an isolated village or mayhaps they all have amnesia?
Have you ever done this before? How did it go? Is this a good idea or is this an obnoxious cliché that needs to die in a particularly hot fire on the Sun?
Communicating the history of a setting that characters should know can be a daunting task. Sometimes you just have to have an in universe history lesson in Session 0 and that sucks. Exposition is boring and most of your players are going to forget half of it by the time you start, your players will have forgotten half of it.
What if there was a way for the world of the campaign setting to be as new to the Characters as it was to the Players?
This is where the Fish Out of Water scenario comes in. Your PCs are characters who are as utterly unfamiliar with the world as the players so anything the players don't know, the characters also don't. Any stupid questions whos answers should be blindingly obvious can be asked in character.
There are many ways to do this, maybe they are people from Modern Earth whisked away by magic or super science to another world/time period ("Isekai" if you're a filthy weeb like me), mayhaps your characters are from an isolated village or mayhaps they all have amnesia?
Have you ever done this before? How did it go? Is this a good idea or is this an obnoxious cliché that needs to die in a particularly hot fire on the Sun?