World Building Let's Build a DND Continent

[Bronco]

Greetings all! I've noticed a sudden craving for fantasy, specifically dnd based, rps in a number of threads. I myself have been feeling this genre starting to nag at me and figured it's time to satiate that itch. I'm currently taking any interested parties, and their ideas, in hopes that we can formulate a setting and story to play through. From cities to regions to dungeons, feel free to post anything you have in mind and we can probably combine these things into a land of sorts.

 

[Bronco]

Well I can't really say I'm a dm, though I can say that I ADORE the atmosphere that comes with dnd. So are we using dice? Nope. But we are going to be utilizing the species and tone of the world.

Speaking of the world, if you have any ideas (including those for items perhaps) feel free to drop them in a reply.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Is this more of a classic D&D universe, where it's created by god's, or more of a naturalistic one that also has magic? Because I have a ton of ideas for the latter!

 

[Bronco]

naturalistic with gods. They're not really going to be a part of the creation of the world but they will have control over it like most settings.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Okay, sweet!

So, one idea I have is that dragons are literal dinosaurs that survived the extinction event by hiding underground or in the ocean. Over time, they came to the surface, and began rapidly evolving due to exposure to magic, thus creating the different versions of dragons. By now, they're nearly extinct. The only one's you'll find are beyond ancient. You won't find baby dragons here.

 

[Bronco]

Alright this works great. Because this world is going to by GIGANTIC with a massive number of oceans between continents. Perhaps it's theorized that the reason the continents are so distant, is because the dragons coming from underground broke away so much land.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

That is awesome! Imagine dragon's the size of tarrasques, bursting from the ground.

 

[Bronco]

damn I never realized how big those things were before looking them up.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

They're literal world enders. Think Godzilla in terms of size.

 

[Bronco]

that is FANTASTIC, considering one of them punching through the ground could make a moderate lake then. I was basically thinking, "damn how do I avoid making massive continents with varying climates for people's characters to come from?", before I remembered how Star Wars does it. They just have entire worlds with one continent with a ton of space between them. So I figured I'd make the ocean "space" and the "worlds" just nameless continents that the players can describe if they decide to in their bio.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

I really like that idea! That's a really unique way of doing things.

 

[Bronco]

As for fast transport between continents, I figured we'd take another page our of the sci fi book. Jump gates are a popular method for universes that don't have ship bound lightspeed (kind of like ours, but we also don't have space ships). These "gates" would take their literal form to fir out world, as ancient magical structures protruding from the vast seas. These structures would be portals of sorts, which link to others that open up near differing continents.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Makes sense. I imagine these portals are really old, right? Maybe from some ancient magical civilization?

 

[Bronco]

yeah they were put their by someone, as to who did that I have no idea.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

What if it was put there by basically the Roman Empire, but with a massive understanding of magic? To the point scholars are still trying to find the innovations they made?

 

[Bronco]

I'd say that works, and I'm assuming they were erased from existence when the dragons broke out from underground. Instead of a roman aesthetic maybe we try something more primal, I'm thinking they might have been a civilization charged with ensuring they stay under or something.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

That would be interesting! I like that, yeah.

 

[Bronco]

I'd say think of the crystal portion of this gate sticking out of the water.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Looks awesome!

 

[Bronco]

OOOOO, and maybe there's some kind of way that these things need to be calibrated. Like an alter at the base of the spires where something has to be done to reach certain continents. I'm thinking something similar to stargate, where there's a multi-ringed turning dial and certain symbols have to be matched up for continents. Think the ancient nord puzzles from Skyrim.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Ooo, yeah! The symbols could work something like a frequency? You give two gates the same combination of symbols, and it connects them?

 

[Bronco]

So I'm just gonna put the current ideas list down here:
1- Massive Oceans created by beasts (dragons or tarrasques) punching out of their subterranean dens.
2- Countless continents of origin for characters, all of them separated by varying distances on a theoretically infinite ocean.
3- Access between continents granted by ancient "gates" jutting out from ocean. Usually manned by a few people in order to dial in the correct combination of symbols for the desired continent a ship wishes to traverse to.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Looks good!

 

[Bronco]

I kinda want to figure out the set number of dial rings at least for this process. I'm thinking each ring stands for something, not constellations like stargate though, because we're only really dealing with 2D travel instead of 3D.

 

[Rusty of Shackleford]

Yeah, true.