30 Day D&D Challenge [Day 4]: My Favorite Gameworld

I'm biased when it comes to this. I like to sit down with my players and build one, tailor it to their needs as a group. Start fresh every time. The reason I'm biased is pretty simple; set a campaign in an established world and it's hard to use anything from it later.

If I have to pick a favorite published gameworld, though, I always find myself coming back to the Forgotten Realms. You can do practically anything there, I know where everything is and what it's supposed to be able to do. If I have to run a game on the fly, you can bet it's probably going to start in some hole-in-the-wall tavern in Waterdeep.

Mind you, ACTUAL Faerun and MY GAMING GROUP'S Faerun are not necessarily the same place. Play in a world long enough and the PCs will eventually alter it. I can't tell you how many times we've had to rebuild Balder's Gate, or how many times we've gotten a few sessions into a campaign and someone goes "The goddess Jaden Vrinn? Who the hell is that, I don't see her in the sourcebook!"

That said, Forgotten Realms is one of those gameworlds everybody knows, so when I tell my players they're in Waterdeep, chances are I don't have to describe it to him. They already know how shitty and how infested with rogues and ne'er do wells it is. Makes it easy to just dive right into the plot.