My Secret To Immersive D&D Worldbuilding

[@des757]

Ley Lines are how I run logistics between cities. I have "fast travel" floating magic hover train cars, ala floating crystal maglev trains. Great ideas, thanks man.

[@IcarusGames]

I love that! Ley Line highways are such a cool idea!

[@Cointelpronoun]

I had a similar idea, regarding nodes, the intersections of the ley lines. It would require World building and mechanics that I am not sure how I would go about doing. But the idea I had in my head is that there are these places of power that can allow spell effects without expensive material components, such as crafting magic items or resurrecting people. The diamonds that are used for Resurrection are found at nodes. The node can only be substantially exploited a little bit at a time, so well you might want to resurrect your late wife and make a hackmaster + 12 or whatever, a whole lot of other people want to do that too. So did any one time these nodes are controlled by one faction or another. I got the idea for this dynamic from Mage The Awakening and also Mage the Ascension. Nodes/Hallows are necessary to recharge quintessence/mana and there are some spell effects that can only be done at a node so different Mage factions have an interest in jealously guarding their nodes. The most powerful nodes only generate five mana per time interval.

[@Denbak80]

Terrific video. One of your best. Fleshes out a great concept but also underscores how cool emergent worldbuilding can be.

[@IcarusGames]

I'm so glad you enjoyed it ☺️

[@rickrogers8735]

My fave video so far. Thanks for the inspiration! My ley lines are a three dimensional web or mesh of power. If a new place of power comes into being in the world, the web reforms around the new site with connections to other nearby places of power. As a place of power declines, it may lose direct connections to one or more other places. I also use divine places of power, and some of them are in the cores of the world, its moons and the binary stars of its system, even one that connects to another star system. All civilized and constructed places are places of power, but some are negligibly weak, while others are overpoweringly strong. So if you created a map of ley lines on a world map, you'd only see the major flows and cells of the mesh, but the more you zoom in, the more detail you would see in the mesh, the cells between the lines becoming smaller and smaller (and weaker) as you zoom in. I haven't used the concepts with my groups to date, but teleportation and communication are influenced by a meshflow between between places of power that are strongly, moderately, weakly, or negligibly enmeshed. The centres of the cells are places where magic is less available for purposes that have an affinity to the mesh. Most spellcasting won't be affected, but teleportation and messaging are less successful if trying to connect to a relatively dead space in the centre of a cell of the mesh. I've been considering creating a series of spells that can be used to investigate, follow, communicate via and travel via ley lines or even accelerate the acquisition of power in a new or weak place of power. I haven't built a campaign pitch that is exciting enough to warrant creating these spells and modifying existing spells in a system to support the concept, but we'll see.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Worldbuilding is some of my favorite content!

[@Grumpypapa-DM7]

Perfect, you've now given me something to use for my campaign using leylines to overlap the various fabrics of worlds as my PC's can travel through the various adventures in the 3.5/5e -24/Shadowdark worlds I'm working in...time to get creative and build.....thanks!

[@IcarusGames]

@@Grumpypapa-DM7 happy to have helped inspire!

[@stickmandude1]

Hell yeah, this video is perfect for my campaign. I recently introduced to my players something the villains call a leyline (a point connected to the fey realm) but this video gave me plenty of ideas to expand upon this. Thanks!!

[@ataraxiediary]

Thanks for the video! It gave me a couple ideas to implement in my world's history and cosmology. I'll definitely add leylines when I'm finished with the main map.

[@Miss_Lexisaurus]

oh l love the idea of using Tarot for DND planning!

[@IcarusGames]

@@Miss_Lexisaurus I love incorporating tarot into elements of worldbuilding and planning. The Book of Many things was a big win for that!

[@rickijoyner2171]

I use a form of ley lines, I call them Astral Veins, meaning anyone or anything that can cast magic and spells have to have some connection to their veins of the world, many people who study magic may only be able to write and read magic but without the connection to the Astral Veins they are unable to conjure the magic to cast those spells. It also helps in releasing any fey or shadow fey and even demonic entities can tear into the world through the Veins.

[@meghan9096]

I quite enjoy tackling world building from a real world perspective, I like making scientifically plausible (to an extent) worlds, and someone mentioned earlier that ley lines follow rivers and mountains and such, but wouldn’t it be neat if the ley lines were related somehow to plate tectonics? I’m going to mess around with some maps and see if anything fun comes of it, but thank you Anto for the inspiration!!!

[@rickrogers8735]

This would be really cool with the places of power concept as well. The major points of resistance to tectonic movement, which are always shifting could be considered natural places of power, and have ley lines between them, which would shift very slowly over time.

[@johnfielder2064]

also lay lines, follow rivers, and mountains

[@tearablemonsters3103]

never thought of using them before but i sure am going to now!!!!

[@IcarusGames]

@@tearablemonsters3103 that's what we like to hear 💪

[@BKPrice]

I use ley lines in my fiction. I don't really want to get into the logistics because I want it to remain unique, but it's quite different, although yours is great.

[@20hermanator10]

I’m curious to think about adding ley lines, but I’m not sure how they’d fit with the world history I’ve already written. Sure I’ve got some cataclysm events and things, but nothing really that “helps me out” with new story ideas.

[@IcarusGames]

Honestly you'd be amazed at how the intersecting of lines can come back to provide inspiration such a long time after their creation!

[@Austin_]

Might be worth drawing the ley lines of a globe as straight lines on a projected map =/= straight lines on a globe. Other than that, really love the ideas.

[@IcarusGames]

@@Austin_ That is true, but it's much more difficult to find a program in which to project lines into a globe, then split that off onto a flat map. It's a situation where we don't need perfect realism to get the fantasy across.

[@Luelle18]

Great video, thank you! Any ideas how to tackle the ley lines in magically closed off areas of the world? Basically, in my world, the subcontinent my party is exploring was sealed off with a magical bubble by the elven gods (mostly to protect them from dragons and securing their species). At some point the party will have the option to dispel the seal and free the subcontinent. It already took some thinking how I solve the problem with people just trying to tp or scry outside the subcontinent. I love the idea of ley lines, but am wondering how it would affect the bubble and the people exploring it. Would love to get your ideas

[@IcarusGames]

The simple solution is to just have it be a null zone with no ley lines, like point a and b connect across a straight line with a void in-between. But if you want to get real funky sauce with it, you could have the barrier act like a prism, and redirect the lines at odd angles and different directions so ley line magic just goes hog wild inside the dome.

[@CantRIP9389]

Hey Anto, is it true that if I eat your liver I can transfer the pact contract to myself???

[@IcarusGames]

Maybe 👀 My favourite thing about this is for most people, who won't know the context, even after watching this video, this comment will seem completely unhinged 😂

[@CantRIP9389]

@@IcarusGames I'm doing my part!

[@the_dewvakiin]

First! Really excited that this is available for us normals!

[@IcarusGames]

Y'all are anything but normal! (In a good way, not in the slightly offensive way that it would read without this parenthesis 🤣 [really, now I'm questioning whether I should have just not made the comment at all rather than end up with parenthesisception over here {we could always throw in a third tangent to get really *weird* with it - though that would certainly be too much}, but I've just got to commit to the bit now], it was meant as a compliment!)