Hopefully the last in my 2025 belated posts series, day 5: ancient.
For the past few years, members of a local gaming group organize one-shots, or mini adventures of a few sessions. These Summer month games fill quickly, and are usually played in a tight schedule.
This year I snagged a spot in a D&D game set in one of Ravenloft’s domains of dread. Other than a few light one-shots, I haven’t played D&D since 3rd edition. The prep for the game got me thinking about in-game realism a lot.
Having ancient things in a game, old, unexplained, mysterious and intriguing … it makes the world feel real to me. I don’t need to, most often I don’t want to interact with those elements; I just want to have them there. Set pieces and decoration that serves a distinct purpose of making it realistic.
Sometimes I’ll have modern things that serve as a very discreet callback to an ancient thing seen or mentioned. I always thought that if someone caught the reference, or notices the evolution of a thing, that it would make the worlds I present better.