Source
r/rpg•
Eviledy

Dawn of Worlds - How not to play DOW

So I have been trying to get some time to work on playing a session of Dawn of Worlds. Essentially if you do not know it is a collaborative world building "Game". My goals that I stated to my players was to create a fantasy game world that we all had a part in building with a continent filled with, people and history that we create together.

My players were taking forever to create anything. After several hours of this I asked why and the answer I got was " I am trying to find the best strategy".

I felt like banging my head into the table. It felt like someone was asking me who is winning when I play an RPG. And even after I explained there is no winning, it is not that kind of game.

My prep was to print out the rules, print out 3 sets of the charts for costs and descriptions of what you can create and in which phase. A sheet of about 300 fantasy names for people or places. A modestly sized map with a continent already mapped out, and some islands.

They refused to use the fantasy names I had found at random, we spent 30 minutes waiting for someone to look up a name online instead for a city.

I am not sure I will finish this creating the world, it was very painful. I think I communicated what the goals were. I sent them the links, I told them a week in advance what we were playing, and printed the rules out for each of them. And in the end it was like pulling teeth, although it is a lot richer than what I have ever created by myself.

Anyone have any similar experience playing Dawn of worlds is it always this hard to get them to understand that it is not a competition?

Posted Jul 9, 2011, 11:05 PM UTC

516
rednightmare•

My last experience with DoW was pretty bad as well. There was very little interaction between players. Part of the problem was that our map was too large, so everyone could kind of just do what they wanted in their corners. We also probably had too many players. The DM had thought it would be cool if he got both of his groups together and had each person play a god of a different alignment.

I think DoW gets too bogged down in the details. I've previously played the game with more success, but I find it lacking overall. I'm sure that with some good houserules I could get it into a form that was more to my tastes.

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EviledyOP•

Yeah what really got my group off track was they did not seam to add any detail where one was needed and then wanted a win scenario for the end game.

The person who had spent 30 minutes looking on the internet to name one city suggested I make a list of names and hand them out to the players to name the city. I was more confused than anything else, I handed them a list of 300 fantasy names they could grab any name from and be done, but he wanted me to give him a list he could go down the line and name races and places. And honestly I did not care if they used my list or made up there own, but they should not have needed 30 minutes to come up with a name.

I guess what I was hoping for was confirmation it wasn't just the group I play with but maybe something in the mechanics I could change to make it run smother. I think with my group less rules per phase and very tightly defined rules of what you can and cannot do in a turn would have been much better.

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rednightmare•

Naming can be hard, but it does seem a little crazy that it took 30 minutes to come up with something. Do you think it would have gone better if you had used a name generator, even if it was just a simple dice chart?

I can also kind of see how they were looking for a way to win. It's not exactly a game with a purpose. We had the same problem with the large group that played. Some of them just didn't connect with the purpose being to make a fun world to romp around in. Personally, I really think assigning alignments or keywords to each player(god) gives them some guidance. For example, an a Lawful Evil god of Artifices might try and educate and technologically advance certain races while a Chaotic Neutral god of Nature might try and bring about the downfall of cities.

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EviledyOP•

I used a random fantasy name generator and printed them out roughly about 300 names, the other two people were less than receptive of using the list. And I was pretty careful to use names that were pronounceable. So I don't know what the issue with using the names I provided.

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rednightmare•

I meant having them use an actual generator instead of picking from a list. The problem may just have been that a list of 300 names is pretty daunting.

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ryanspeckSeattle, WA•

Never heard of it, but now you've got me interested. Downloaded it and we'll see how that goes.

Thanks for the heads-up.

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EviledyOP•

Let me know how it goes, I think it has potential but I think I must not have communicated to my group well enough. It would also help if they would have read the rules before we played.

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ryanspeckSeattle, WA•

I'm not sure if I'd "play" it or just kind of try to use it as a project with friends and see how that goes.

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TheJollyLlama875Hunterdon, NJ•

I tried it; everybody got really bored drawing out the little forests and stuff.

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ryanspeckSeattle, WA•

Well, I have too much free time.

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EviledyOP•

Use a smaller map? Then you can end the first phase quicker. Also I would not bother with the 1" rule since there is no advantage to who creates a land mass or anything really, so instead of saying I rolled a 6 and want to build a forest but I want my forest to take up 4" not 2" of map, then go ahead and make a 4" forest.

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EviledyOP•

If I were to try again, I would work at finding a method of speeding up the game. Give fewer options per phases, you are probably not going to be using half of the list at any one point anyway.

I would also encourage limiting or more clearly define what an avatar can do. I would also set rules for creation of species, and even shape land, I was trying to brain storm this a little. And what I am thinking is that creating players are responsible for naming the land or race, and provide an Aspect or two that describes that land. Maybe even come up with a few aspects that people can pick from for weather patterns, racial aspects etc.

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akmark•

Unless you had a group of experienced DM's I am not sure how it is supposed to work. There are people who like playing tabletop and there are people who like running tabletop and not everyone fits very well into both groups. I mean just reading the PDF it seems like even though every attempt is made to downplay competitiveness there is enough strategy in trying to force through what you want to happen that I can totally see people getting bogged down in the details. This DOW really seems like something that only works in the right group of people and rarely somewhere else.

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EviledyOP•

Yeah we have all DM'ed games for the last 20 years but maybe I was asking them to do something they had no interest in but would not tell me? I am not sure, I would hope they could tell me if they have no interest in playing something, I do.

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akmark•

I would hope they could tell me if they have no interest in playing something, I do.

Famous last words there. Sometimes people just roll with it out of charity under the assumption that someone is having fun with it. Sometimes everyone rolls with it and in guarding their own feelings about the situation, are ignorant to the fact that nobody else is having fun. When someone eventually says something sometimes instead of just a drizzle it turns into a downpour of angst over it.

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EviledyOP•

Well I talked to them today and they said it was fun. Maybe my I am the only one disappointed in how the game is running. At the end of the game, I am going to suggest we try it again and watch there jaws drop...hehe

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