Storybuilding

I play a lot of DnD, mostly as a DM. Thing is, I don’t write stories for my players. I build characters, places, and problems, put them in the world, and let the story happen at the table. I really like to think that the true “story” is something thats created while the players interact the world at the table.

This is how I approach storybuilding as a DM, and it took me a while to get here. Early on, I spent a lot of time trying to plan out arcs and anticipate what the players would do. It was exhausting, and it never worked the way I expected. The players always did something I hadn’t accounted for, and I’d improvise (and ended up feeling like I’d wasted so much time). Once I stopped trying to control the story and started focusing on building the raw materials, everything got easier and more fun for everyone at the table.

Start With a Theme

Before I build anything, I figure out what kind of story we’re telling. Is this a story about corruption? About loss? About power and who deserves it?

Theme is the foundation that everything else gets built on. It shapes the kinds of villains I create, the problems I place in the world, and the tone of the campaign. Setting often follows naturally from theme. What do my players want to play? Are they looking for high fantasy, a new space frontier, or perhaps a western? I usually ask up front (or find people who are interested in the theme I want to run). Having people who are engaged in the theme is important.

Villains Are People

When I create a villain I start by thinking about who they are rather than by thinking about what they’re going to do to the party.

What happened to them? What are they trying to achieve, and why? What did they lose that set them on this path? What’s their personality like when they’re not being a villain? Are they calculated or impulsive? Do they believe they’re doing the right thing?

A villain with a real history and a real motivation doesn’t need a script. You know who they are, so you know how they’d react to whatever the players do. If the players disrupt their plans, you don’t have to figure out what happens next from scratch. You just ask yourself what this person would do, and the answer is usually obvious.

This is also where a lot of worldbuilding happens on its own. When you focus in on NPC stories rather than “building a world”, you end up creating the places they’ve been, people they’ve wronged, and factions they’ve built or destroyed. The “world” naturally fills in around you as you start building people and their relationships.

Populate, Don’t Plot

I don’t design a path for the players. I don’t map out a sequence of encounters or story beats that I expect them to follow. Instead, I place things in the world: people with agendas, problems that are getting worse, factions that are in conflict, evidence that something is wrong. Then I let the players loose on the world and show them what’s there.

That doesn’t mean I leave them without direction. NPCs interact with the players and mention things they’ve heard. A traveler might describe something strange happening in a nearby town. The players might find evidence of something larger while dealing with a smaller problem. These are nudges rather than rails. They put things in the players’ field of view without telling them what to do about it.

There’s a lot happening in the world at any given time, and the players get to decide what they care about. Maybe they latch onto the faction conflict. Maybe they’re more interested in the strange disappearances to the north. Maybe they do something I never anticipated and create a thread I hadn’t considered. All of that is fine, and all of it makes for a better story than anything I could have scripted.

Not Every Problem Is Solvable

This is one of the most important things I’ve decided about my style as a DM: the players can’t solve everything, and they shouldn’t have to.

When there are multiple real problems happening in the world at once, the players have to make choices about what they want to deal with. They can’t save everyone. They can’t prevent everything. Sometimes they’ll commit to solving one problem and hear later that another one got worse while they were away. It’s also important to emphasize how that’s not a failure on their part!

This does a few things for the game. It makes the players’ choices feel meaningful because they’re actively deciding what matters to them. There is no correct path. There’s just what the players choose to do and what happens as a result. Of course, it’s important for me to make that path engaging, exciting, and fun.

It also means I don’t have to stress when the players come up with something wildly creative or completely off the wall. If there’s no “right way” to solve a problem, then any approach is fair game. I actively encourage that kind of thinking. Some of the best sessions I’ve run have come from players doing something I never would have thought of, and the sandbox structure means I can roll with it instead of fighting against it. That said, I’m also a true believer in consequence (definition: a result, effect, or outcome that follows as a direct result of an action, decision, or condition). Every action has an effect, and sometimes the players will do something crazy and stupid, causing catastrophe along the way. That’s part of impact - positive or negative.

Every Character Has a Reason to Be Here

The last piece is making sure every player character has a reason to care about the story. Not the same reason, but their own reason.

If the theme and the problems in the world are strong enough, there should be room for different characters to connect to the story in different ways. As an example: say a plague is spreading through the forests, killing wildlife and creeping toward a large township. There’s an evil sorcerer behind it, and the situation is getting worse.

The druid is in it to save the forest and protect his grove. The cleric sees the plague as an affront to the gods and is driven to heal the sick and root out the corruption. The warlock is there because of a pact with his djinni, who has his own reasons for wanting the sorcerer dealt with. Reasons the warlock may not fully understand yet.

Each of them has buy-in. Each of them has a background that ties them to what’s happening. And each of them will approach the same problems differently because of it. The druid might prioritize the forest while the cleric focuses on the township, and that tension between party members is itself a source of interesting story.

I work with my players to build some of these connections before the campaign starts. It doesn’t take much. A conversation about who their character is and why they’d care about the situation is usually enough. But it makes a huge difference at the table, because nobody is just “along for the ride”. Everyone has something personal pulling them into the story.

Build the Pieces

I don’t think a DM’s job is to write a story. I think it’s to build the pieces that a story needs, put them in the world, and then play to find out what happens. Strong themes, real characters, real problems, and players who have a reason to care. The story is something we build together at the table on game night.