Which game has the best descriptions of landscapes and environments, or is most effective at evoking a sense of place?
>>94390684Why would a game describe landscapes and environments? That's something for the GM to do.
>>94390684What kind of setting, atmosphere or other specifics? Do you have anything to share or suggestions?
>>94390684This thread is predicated on you to give specific examples of what you want to see.Any place can give a feeling of place you goof.What matters is what elicits that for you.
>>94390733...by reading them from the book, obviously>>94390984oh god I forgot how much this board sucks>>94391055very helpful
>>94391195I thought it was (you)
>>94391195>...by reading them from the book, obviouslyTotally different anon here, but it strikes me as somewhat odd that you're asking for something that you seem to think exists, but cannot cite. Do you or have you read many RPG books? Do you find a lot of passages with evocative landscape descriptions? Because I don't think you have, but at the same time, you seem to misunderstand RPGs in some fundamental way which doesn't even mesh up to a beginner's level of understanding. Also you could have just asked for a landscape art thread, my dude. Some of us have entire folders of scenery art.
>>94391195>...by reading them from the book, obviouslyWhich RPGs are you playing where the rulebook has evocative descriptions or landscapes and environments?
>>94391359Maybe pre-made scenarios? Or the part where it describes all of the countries and places? Like>The Magocracy of Corneria is a country of high peaks and lush alpine valleys. The Grand College of Mages is itself located as the base of the Matterhorn, a stark crag that thrusts into the sky like the head of some enormous spear. Though the lower valleys are fertile pasturelands where shaggy mountain cattle graze to make the famous Cornerian cheese, the upper reaches are primeval forest, populated by all manner of exotic beast, brought by the mages and run lose by accident or design.
>>94391327I’ve read dozens, if not hundreds of trpg sourcebooks and splatbooks. I’m not asking for art I’m asking for examples of well-written location descriptions. God I hate you useless autistic fucks, goodbye.
>>94391681>I’ve read dozens, if not hundreds of trpg sourcebooks and splatbooksNo you haven't, and that's why you have no fucking examples and you're running away from this thread like the retarded poseur you are.
>>94391763Man, I knew bumpfag was nogames but I didn't think he has zero knowledge of the hobby as a whole. He really is just using this board as a shitting ground.
>>94391327Text describing locations and scenery is a feature of creative writing universal to literally every single RPG product with a specific setting. OP very clearly asks for the best instances of such writing, and your response is to say “That’s not real, you should be asking for my collection of greasy thirdhand lowres jpgs (which are of absolutely no utility for games whatsoever).”Obviously we all know you don’t play games, but you’ve never even LOOKED at one either? Yet you’re here acting smug about being a illiterate retard? What the fuck is wrong with you?
>>94391763Kobold Guide to Game Design>as the game designer, you control the maps, the area descriptions, the flow from one encounter to the next.The Clay that Woke>A nameless minotaur guards from the roof of a wealthy estate as thesun rises over jungle in the background. Sunlight refracts brightly fromthe bronze head of his spear.His city is the Dégringolade, an ancient coalescence of once separateurbs, a vast and unplanned, unmapped sandstone city now in its lateyears, crumbling and penetrated by the encroaching jungle.Zenobia> The Desert Kingdoms comprise aregion of great variation, but in generalterms the climate is warm, often hot,and dry. Waterless deserts anduninhabitable wilderness areas are neverfar away, wherever you find yourself.>The western end of the Taurus mountain chain divides into the northern Pontic chain and the more southerly Tauric chain. Dividing them is a high, dry plateau, windswept and barren save foroccasional rivers and lifeless salt lakes. At their western tip they descend to...Ultraviolet Grasslands has dozens of short descriptions of locations Numenerahalf the text is area flavor prosehttps://www.campaignmastery.com/blog/the-poetry-of-place/>Novels and RPGs have one thing in common – you have to describe a whole boatload of locations every time you play. As a result, every GM learns the basics of doing so very quickly. Unfortunately, once they achieve a level of minimal proficiency, most GMs never give this aspect of their craft a second thought. Please feel free to KYS in shame at any time
>>94392024>>94391763>>94391359>>94391327Pendragon has 30 pages of area descriptionsRunequest Dorastor Land of Doom>Read the the handouts from “The Talastar Papers” which give a concise and flavorful overview of Dorastor. Griffin Mountain>Each citadel consists of a small enclosure or lower bailey and an upper palace area, both surrounded by massive walls of cyclopean stone. The walls are made of stones so massive that surely only a giant could have built them. Within the palace area is the king’s dwelling place, complete with family, retainers,other selected individuals, and some luxury. The major temple of the city may be in the palace compound. The lower bailey was originally constructed as a refuge for the citizenry who live outsidethe citadel walls in huts, and come inside the walls only in times of peril, putting up temporary shacks. As time has passed, the influx of foreigners and their ideas has filled the lower enclosures with more permanent stone structures
>>94391359good ones, like Ryuutama
>>94390984
>>94392100>>94392162Took you that long to ask your AI helper for information? Congrats, you found examples of books yet still failed to fulfill requested information to test your sincerity
>>94390684>the best/most effectiveI wouldn't know, given that I haven't read every single game book that exists.
>>94392190genuine retard shit
>>94392196>Hey anon can you recommend a place to eat?>I wouldn’t know, given that I haven’t eaten at every single restaurant that exists.
>>94391195Sounds like you want >>>/lit/
DESCRIPTION OF SNAKE PIPE HOLLOWThis end of Snake Pipe Hollow is approximately 60 km longand about 30 km wide at its widest point. The cliffs whichsurround it on three sides are very steep, almost always risingsheerly vertical save where marked. They vary in height but atthe lowest point are 30 meters high, and twice that at the highest.The variegated strata of the rock are visible.
>>94392724No, I want GAMES. You know, TABLETOP GAMES? R-o-l-e-p-l-a-y-i-n-g? Have you heard of it? If I wanted long-ass prose literature and a lobotomy, I would go to /lit/. Novels and travelogues are not the same type of written media as tabletop roleplaying games. Literature is produced to entertain a reader at length, whereas game content is designed to be utilized for a social pastime. Long-form fiction and scenic prose can indulge in greater digressions and more descriptive language, whereas gaming is usually better served by brevity and clarity. Genuinely amazed at how new you are to the concept of “setting description.”Imagining the sort if games you hapless dumbfucks (don’t) play in:GM:>Okay, everyone finished rolling your characters or asking chatgpt to do it for you or whatever the fuck the kids do these days? Cool, let’s begin playing.>You are standing in a featureless void, vague nothingness stretching out before you to infinity in all directions, a contextless grid-world unmoored from history and matter. What do you do?Anon:>I find something to kill for XP
A lot of the ones with the best writing that come to mind are set primarily in interiors, not outdoors, so environmental descriptions come up less. Thinking of some classic dungeon crawls, but also things like Maze of the Blue Medusa, those edgy Fire Princess books; or else it’s asubterranean caverns like Deep Carbon Observatory. There might be effective environmental descriptions sometimes, but most of the time it’s basically just rooms in most games. Most games aren’t good at this.
>>94391359>"I have only ever played DnD 5e and think all games are that shitty!"DnD-only players should not be allowed to post outside of their General.
>>94390684I've really enjoyed reading through Dolmenwood of late. It's basically OSE with houserules, and a very focused setting all contained in a single (albeit very large) forest domain, once cursed by a fae lord of winter. It's 200 hexes worth of content, coupled with a few settlements to explore. What I like about it is that it's really good at getting across a sense of place with relatively succinct wording, eg: "Spires and crags of pale, wind-carved rock, like the bones of gargantuan beasts." Fills the imagination and doesn't waste my time. The books also have a bunch of tables filled with unique types of fish, fungi, herbs, booze, etc-- all unique to Dolmenwood with their own traits, sometimes useful, sometimes harmful, which I find adds color to the setting as well. Here's a hex page as example of how the book lays them out.
>>94393049I mostly play universal systems. Glad to hear D&D still doesn't need to pay rent for your headspace, though.
>>94392100>>94392162>>94392745Lmao you demanded stuff that, and I quote, "is most effective at evoking a sense of place" and your examples are >a wealthy estate near a city>a desert>a mountain chain with nothing except some rivers>a book that tells you how to describe things>we went to a place and saw some plants>"a concise and flavorful overview">the citadels are made of stone and people live in it>60km long by 30km wide by 30km highHundreds and hundreds of books under your imaginary belt and the best you can find is scraped from a frenzied searching of some PDFs for several hours and still doesn't even prove you know jack shit about RPGs, nor does it provide examples of evocative scenery descriptions.
>>94390684What the fuck are you talking about? Games do not describe landscapes and environments. People do.
>>94394075fuck off and die useless nogaems
>>94393303>What I like about it is that it's really good at getting across a sense of place with relatively succinct wording, eg: "Spires and crags of pale, wind-carved rock, like the bones of gargantuan beasts." Fills the imagination and doesn't waste my time.that’s effective trpg writing, thank you
>>94394568Take your own advice, faggot.
>>94393303This looks sweet, are the books available somewhere?
>>94396040
>>94396217Wasn't it locked behind some paywall?
>brevityBlue Planet spends like five pages describing the astronomical history of its solar system down to the precise masses, luminosities and orbital distances
>>94396040pdf's are out for kickstarter backers, there may be illegal copies floating around somewhere online...perhaps even in the archives of this very website, considering its seedy reputation...otherwise there's no way to buy them until the physical release which i think has not been announced
>>94396843who the hell writes like this?
>>94392722OP said "has the best" and "or is most effective", not "can you recommend".States of being are very different from preferential recommendations, since you didn't seem to know that already.You probably still won't understand, despite having it explained to you, and you'll probably retort with some YouTube essayist deflection like "the preference was implied".Faggot.
>>94396891dysfunctional autism
>>94396040>>94394578Uploaded it to a temporary filesharing site. Enjoy, those of you interested, just remove the space and add http: we .tl/t-Q9MScwOMUH
>>94390684It is especially showing when you spam two threads at a time.
>>94390684>Yes, I am this clueless about this hobby, please send help... why are you even on this board?
>>94397335Impotent ad hominem? Wow, you're even more pathetic than I predicted.
>>94396843I'm more of a pshysical copy guy but pdfs to look at in the meantime would be nice. At least I know if the money is going to be well spent.>>94397673Thanks anon.
>>94399641yet you responded, which suggests it has all the power it needs
>>94391763I am happy to wait 15 minutes just to tell you to kill yourself, you obnoxious faggot
>>94390684>>94391195What?
>>94400575>he's still seething days laterHere's the (You) that so strongly motivate (You) to humiliate (You)rself
Do you all have brain damage or is this just literally a dead board
>>94401413The shitposters all came out of the woodwork tonight, wait for next week.
After reading many examples it seems none are good. The biggest issue seems to finding a balance between functionality and aesthetics: either the descriptions are very workmanlike and matter-of-fact, making them informative but unengaging, or else the prose is too purple and the communicative value drops even if interest might rise.
>>94401413>>94405943You've kind of fucked yourself. Basically you won't accept functional worksman like prose because its >too simplebut also reject anything else as >purple prose You can have short and effective descriptions that are evocative. You just have to accept simplicity that requires some elaboration on your part. No one wants to engage with you because we all know it won't go anywhere. You're stuck on being contrarian and smug to the extent its destroyed your ability to converse or have a game. >>94401533/tg/ hasn't even recovered to half the posting pre american election. probably won't. All that's left are the shitposters.
>>94406046So is your entire ego tied up in this thread and this topic, or are you just having a really bad week and you're trying to process it with this armchair inquisitor shtick?
>>94401413they should delete /tg/. It's less than a shell of it's former self
>>94406526Its interesting to notice. We've been able to have a bunch of metathreads lately tucked into the various spam threads. The responses have been fairly text book like your fallback to some sort of mental health psychobabble. If you're not bumpfag you all have the same script.
>>94390684Which traditional game?
>>94411120When you post shit like this>No one wants to engage with you because we all know it won't go anywhere. You're stuck on being contrarian and smug to the extent its destroyed your ability to converse or have a game. People are going to take notice of your inability to have an actual discussion and engage with the topic you so badly want to protect from shitposters, while doing nothing but stoking further arguments and encouraging people to question why you're acting like such a huge faggoty spaz.
>>94411688>people are going to do the thing I'm complaining about and doing instead of engaging with my bullshitlmao even
>>94406046>You can have short and effective descriptions that are evocativeand yet such a thing is so rare this thread has produced at best one or two examples of it
>>94390684The one that makes you feel like you're there.
>>94411977Which ones?
>>94410438I used to disagree because at least /tg/ was keeping the garbage contained, but since noticing some anons who crosspost everything they ask here to Reddit as they ask it (making themselves incredibly obvious in the process) I'm pretty sure it's failed in that regard, too.Been here a long while (not as long as some, for sure, but over 15 years off and on) and it's sad to see how far the board's devolved.
>This shitty thread is STILL going and going nowhereShame, because this is a topic I would have actually liked but bumpfag ruins it like always.
>>94412538Fundamental premise was flawed because OP was an especially huge faggot. Moreso than usual. Should have asked for methods and advice on describing and narrating scenery in a concise, but evocative way, along with images of scenery. Anons could have taken turns giving examples of how they'd describe some scenery art to their players, if they were running a game and discussed how they feel they'd successfully engaged their players in the past. Asking for RPG books with descriptions of places was always going to fall flat. OP's inability to understand that doomed this thread before it was ever made, and now he's just puttering in circles failing to outsnark anyone pointing out his failure and struggling to evoke an iota of wit and intellect with his terrible posts.
>>94412737>OP should have asked for my shitty images>OP should have asked for my shitty advice and methodsNobody should ask for your opinion about anything, get fucked loser
>>94412898OP should touch brass, because this is just extremely pitiful.
>>94412914im OP and i’m not the one you’ve been sperging out at you illiterate jackasssorry you suck and everyone hates you, stop posting
>>94413572What part of>OP should touch brass, because this is just extremely pitiful.Did you not understand?
