Subject Areas and Guidelines for a World-Building Wiki

[GGambrel]

The idea of creating a wiki to build a setting together with the help of other GMs/DMs (maybe players too) has been bouncing around my head quite a lot lately. I've seen a number of wikis with similar projects such as 'Aquerra', 'The Coming of Zioth', dandwiki, and dnd-wiki which have convinced me this could be a worthwhile enterprise.

What I'd like to do is lay down some basic structure to the setting to help create a uniform feel throughout the wiki/website, even as others contribute. To this end, I am thinking about categorizing new pages into specific subject areas with guidelines about what should be included.

Some categories I'm currently considering:

• Locations: wilderness areas, civilization, and dungeons, should include a map and possible encounters/npcs
• Creatures: types of monsters and humanoids, possibly specific npcs too, should include stats, equipment/loot, etc
• Items: basic equipment and magical items including artifacts with a description
• Events/History: when world-shaping events happened with descriptions of the occurence, includes spans of time
• Factions Groups: groups of individuals including nations, religions/cults, guilds, political parties, corporations, etc.
• Abilities: spells, feats, monstrous abilities, etc.
• Misc: for other things which might not need a whole category

So Bob might decide to add the continent (location) of Ostlichland and create some links to regions within it such as an extensive forest, Eisenwald (location). Then Jane might see that Eisenwald hasn't been described yet and decide to detail it, including new yet-to-be-created creatures, locations, and events/history. My hope is that eventually GMs/DMs will be able to zoom in to a detailed area that fits within a larger world.

What do you think? Are there additional categories that should be included to help flesh out the setting? Should some of these be removed or split (ex. creatures --> creatures and npcs)? What guidelines would you recommend for various categories?

Feedback is greatly appreciated!

[AceOfFools]

I would add at least two categories: cultures and organizations.

Cultures could be described in locations, and regional variation should still be, but without a separate category it becomes awkward to describe cultures that cover large, disparate geographic regions (i.e. multiple locations). It's also helpful in avoiding monoculturalism, which is unrealistic and way overdone.

Having organizations as its own entry allows for cross-cultural, international groups (e.g. the Harpers) and can add depth to any individual nation or location. Large scale conflict, particularly internal conflict (e.g. rival merchant families) will also be between organizations, so defining who these power players are will be helpful.

[GGambrel]

Thanks for your input! I definitely agree about having groups which transcend specific geographic or political borders.

However, I was thinking that both Cultures and Organizations could be covered by the Factions category which is for groups/collections of individuals. Admittedly it is a pretty broad category, but I expect there would still be far fewer contributions for it than Locations, for instance.

So do you think the Factions category is too broad in scope and could be clearer if split into Organizations and Cultures, then? Or is it sufficient to better explain and emphasize the Factions category, with a specific mention of cultural groups?

[Everyl]

My inclination would be to separate Cultures and Organizations, if only because I'd be looking for very different information on those two categories. For an organization, I'd want to know what the group's goals are, who the leadership and some prominent members are, how one joins and/or leaves the group, and what sort of influence they wield on society. For a culture, I'd be looking for things like how people dress, what people eat, the structure of the social class system, the roles of men and women in society, how foreigners and/or members of other races are perceived and treated, how adventurers fit into society (if at all), and common attitudes about things like religion, morality, and magic.

A lot of the cultural information could be in Locations, but I agree with AceOfFools that this wouldn't work well with widespread cultures. You'd either wind up with a lot of information being repeated unnecessarily or fairly awkward references from one Location to another Location page to avoid repeating cultural information (or having two completely different page templates for Factions, I suppose - Factions/Organizations and Factions/Cultures, which seems awkward).

Gotta head to work, might have a bit more to add later.

[AceOfFools]

Obviously, since I proposed it, I think Cultures and Organization need to be separated from one another. But, per your comment I'm not sure where that leaves what you call Factions.

What is the difference between a Faction and and an Organization? Factions agree on some conclusion , organizations have by definition hierarchy and agreed social ties.

I could be in the same Faction as a group of rebels because the current political leadership is evil, even if I was unwilling to join an organization that attacks government officials because I worry about retaliation.

But since both inherently represent having groups of people, having both may be redundant.

Probably the best solution is to make one a subheading in the other. Either have an organization heading under Factions that indicate how these people get arrange themselves (including rival organizations within a faction e.g. differences between the regional branches of a large organization); or have a factions section within organization when there are internal conflict within a group (e.g. some supporters of a queen disagree with her choice on some significant policy decision, but still support her overall).

[GGambrel]

After speaking with my roommate about this a bit, I've come to the conclusion that Factions may have been poorly named. However, I think that Groups could fill the role I had in mind more clearly.

The way I'm (currently) looking at it, a culture is shared by a group of people rather than necessarily existing in a given location, much as the two of you have said. However, without the group of people practicing it, the culture only exists in a historical sense (just as the group does). This makes me think that a culture can be elaborated upon within the practicing group's entry rather than having a separate category.

With regard to having sub-headings, I intend to at least have a way to sort entries by a 'type' to help aid in navigation. I could certainly have 'types' which include cultural, political (such as rebels or political parties), religious, government, business, etc. There would also be the option to create groups within groups to represent internal conflict or other differences from the core group.

Everyl's mention of magic reminded me that I don't yet have a category covering abilities, spells, powers, feats, class features, etc. How does Abilities sit with you as a category for these sorts of things (things creatures can do/learn)?