Zeitgeist - one of THE best articles for campaign building on Wizards.com to date!

[Polycarp]

Here's a counterexample for a more proactive approach: There's a certain powerful artifact in the world whose powers can be used once every thousand years at a specific time. And the person in control of the artifact at that time can use it to create a new god according to his specifications - complete with portfolio, character, and so on. Suddenly, the campaign isn't just about keeping it out of the hands of the bad guys, but also how the PCs should use it (or, failing that, whom they trust to use that kind of power responsibly). The options are endless, and it all depends on the choices the PCs make.

So in what way is this not "do this, or the world is doomed"?  The players still have to keep the artifact out of the hands of the bad guys.  It's still reactive - the campaign is a reaction to the presence of the artifact.  It's still a choice dichotomy.  Tacking on a bit of player choice at the end of the campaign is only proactive in a trite, token way.

You may it sound like there is a clear difference between reactive and proactive campaigns; I would say no such difference exists, and that those terms aren't meaningful anyway.  All campaigns are fundamentally reactive, even if the DM doesn't prepare anything - players respond to the world and the DM and make choices accordingly.  We can talk about less railroading vs. more railroading, but that's really a question of good plot design and room for player choice, not some revolutionary new kind of campaign.

[Elemental_Elf]

Well I think the difference is that there are more options and varying degrees of 'freedom' and 'we're doomed' in a proactive campaign than a reactive one.

In Jürgen's example many different enemies and allies could take the artifact, which would each produce a different result than merely being 'free or screwed.' Both can be railroaded but Jürgen's at least lets the PCs have a larger degree of control of the end result.

[Jürgen Hubert]

So in what way is this not "do this, or the world is doomed"?  The players still have to keep the artifact out of the hands of the bad guys.  It's still reactive - the campaign is a reaction to the presence of the artifact.  It's still a choice dichotomy.  Tacking on a bit of player choice at the end of the campaign is only proactive in a trite, token way.

Not necessarily. Consider the following people who are after the artifact:

- An elven druid who is concerned about the human abuse of nature.
- A gnomish inventor who believes that technological progress is capable of solving all problems of the world.
- A paladin firmly dedicated to the ideals of justice and mercy, yet who also believes that a feudal government with responsible rulers (as in King Arthur's Court) is the best of all possible systems of governments.
- A monk who believes that obsession with worldly luxuries and matters will only prolong the suffering of the soul in future lives.
- An urban revolutionary fighting against oppression and tyranny in all its forms.

All of these are good-aligned - and yet all of them want to use the artifact for different ends, and might even end up fighting each other. Will the PCs support one of them and help them acquire the artifact - or take it for themselves to make sure their own beliefs will be the ones who matter?

Suddenly, the list of choices can no longer be divided into a binary "Good" or "Bad" - there's a vast spectrum, and the characters have to make up their own minds about what to do.

[Polycarp]

Well I think the difference is that there are more options and varying degrees of 'freedom' and 'we're doomed' in a proactive campaign than a reactive one.

extreme[/i], as if the essay was written as a response to D&D 1st edition or by someone whose DMs had never done anything but "monolithic Good versus the Ultimate Dark Lord" campaigns.  Hell, even the 3rd ed DMG takes a swipe at "monolithic evil."  This is nothing new and certainly nothing interesting.

The OP is basically a list of examples and tropes for very free-form campaigns, and an article in support of said free-form campaigns that obscures a very simple point (railroading is bad, and it's nice to have your players have some role in changing the world) into a needlessly wordy foray into "zeitgeists" and "threshold eras."

I'm actually disliking this essay more and more as we discuss it.

[Jürgen Hubert]

Well I think the difference is that there are more options and varying degrees of 'freedom' and 'we're doomed' in a proactive campaign than a reactive one.

Planescape was a highly unusual and ground-breaking setting for D&D in many ways, and it certainly went a long way in that direction. While the factions are often more something that the PCs join than something that the PCs define, they still made the players think about the motivations of their characters and caused them to stand for something other than abstract "Good" and "Evil". The best example I can remember was the "Faction War" campaign, in which [spoilers]the PCs get to decide the future character of Sigil.[/spoiler]

But Planescape was fairly atypical for D&D settings. The only other D&D setting I can think of where the PCs are assumed to shape the world according to their own will is Birthright. Others tend to have all sorts of villains and threats who want to change the world in a negative way and who need to be stopped, but few assume that the PCs have their own ideas about how the world needs to be changed and that they actively work towards changing it.

Take the Forgotten Realms, for example. It has no shortage of epic villains and monsters to fight for powerful PCs, and there's plenty of published material for that kind of gaming. Yet when the PCs decide to take over or found a major nation like Amn, Sembia, and so forth and then try to conquer Thay or a similar nation in order to stop its threat permanently, the GM is largely on his own. So the basic assumption is not that the PCs are there to make a difference all by themselves, but to stop others (presumably the villains) from making a difference.

Contrast that with the world of Exalted, where pretty much every locale in the setting is described as something that the PCs might wish to take over and change it according to their own visions - and the difference is obvious.

[Ra-Tiel]

[...] Contrast that with the world of Exalted, where pretty much every locale in the setting is described as something that the PCs might wish to take over and change it according to their own visions - and the difference is obvious.

I definitively see your point, Jürgen, and largely agree with your statements. However, I'd like to point out that most places in Exalted have no way to oppose a typical party of Solar or Abyssal Exalted. It's somewhat similar to running around in Faerûn with level 50 characters - the definition of "resistance" becomes a little futile then in 99 out of 100 occasions. Also, PCs "just" wanting to take over the Dragon Bloodeds' capitol are asking for at least as much trouble and problems as a party in FR does planning to take over Thay Mount. ;)

[Polycarp]

If the argument is that PCs should have more of a say in shaping the campaign world, that's fine, but nobody should pretend that the OP here is somehow groundbreaking or inspiring if that's all it is supposed to do.  Even if not everybody plays that type of campaign, it's been "around" for a long time.  It isn't even a new type of campaign - Planescape, for instance, can be run and has been run as a very linear, good vs. evil battleground.  It takes a certain kind of DM to make Sigil politics and "shades of gray" convincing, colorful, and interesting, and to give players a hand in shaping them.  You're still playing Planescape, however.  The article's presumption seems to be that these things are somehow attributes of a campaign world, when in reality they are attributes of a DM and how a campaign is run.

For example, you say that the published material for FR supports "that kind of gaming."  But "epic villains and powerful monsters" don't support any kind of gaming - presumably even in the most "proactive" of campaigns, villains and monsters still play a role.  Even if the PCs are trying to change things themselves, there will presumably still be opponents, otherwise it would be a rather boring game.  In what way does that published material support any single type of game at all?  A DM who wanted more player initiative could easily run a FR campaign with FR material and achieve just that.

[Slapzilla]

Proactive and Reactive are both 'active' and that is the point, right?  Any game that has a situation to resolve will get play.  I think the article merely lines out many ways to systematize things that good DMs already do.  Lots of folks just need to hear it coherently to crystalize what they already have a sense of and for that, the article was a good one.  Breaking new ground?  No.  Summing up a few thematic frameworks for an epic campaign?  Yup.    

[the_taken]

This article is ridiculous. The supporting arguments are pointless.

The article is accurate. Nothing in it is innately false. And it's not the article's subject I'm at odds with. It's the article's existence. It's an over elaborate waste of time.

All Hal Macleen has done is explained meme theory, with a new label called "Time Spirit", and gone on to categorize memes. Which is entirely pointless. Everyone and their mum is vaguely aware of the concept that and idea can permeate into society and drive people to do something, even if they don't give it a technical name.

I'm believe that this article in a disguised advertisement for "A Tome of Inspiration for Fantasy Game Masters"; A preview of some of the content going into the book. And from this I can tell you, it's going to be a huge disappointment/pile of dragon shit. It's probably going to contain something akin to the imbecile statistics on populations of character classes by population density found in the DMG, the most retarded flavour points that permeates all of the books like a virulent fungus spore, proliferate The Stupid of character wealth by level (or 4e's moronic equivalent), and be priced at a reasonable 55$US.
All this while not actually providing you any meaningful tips on how to make your games better.

[Kindling]

I'm afraid to say that I, too, cannot find anything of any great value in this article. It is, as others have already said, a massive reiteration of things everyone should really already be aware of.

[Knight of Roses]

Well, to play devil's advocate, why are we assuming that everyone is as well read in traditional fantasy, game theory and philosophy as we are?  The D&Di article are design to be read by a wide audience including many new gamers, could this article be aimed mostly at them with an attempt to provide some useful information to experienced gamers as well.  Perhaps it was too wordy and too ambitious but does that make it a bad article?  Or just not as good as it could have been?

[Ishmayl-Retired]

Well said, Knight of Roses, this is similar to a discussion I had with some friends about the article.

Oh, and welcome to the site (I know you registered a long time ago, but I believe tonight were your first posts).

[Hal Maclean]

A friend of mine sent me a link so I thought I'd check it out. Thanks to those who enjoyed the article. Hopefully those who didn't will find a use for some of the other stuff I've got brewing for the DI or the other markets that buy my stuff.

I'll check back in on this thread if anybody has some suggestions for approaches they would have prefered for me to take.

Glad to know there's people who enjoy worldbuilding as much as I do! :)

Hal Maclean

[Ishmayl-Retired]

Thanks for visiting Hal, I would like to say that I think your article is a great introduction on the kind of roles that various eras play in world building.  I (and I believe, many others here) hope to see even more support of world building and campaign creation in the near future, and I believe you've made a great start at possibly sparking interest in those who don't know of the art of campaign building.  Cheers, hope to see you around the site.

[Atlantis]

this article is just long and repetative. i got so bored i think i forgot to read 1 or 2 paragraphs. it states whats pretty obvious. meh