Shane Warne was one of the greatest cricketers since the game began. His specialty was Leg Spin, which involves using your fingers during the delivery process to get the ball to spin so that it curves through the air, and when it bounces off the pitch, it ‘turns’ to one side or the other – frequently in the direction that it was not curving – or dips and speeds up or rises and slows down. Like a baseball pitcher’s slow ball, the objective is to make the ball be somewhere that the batsman doesn’t expect it to be.

It is a measure of his genius that it was said that “Some sportsmen have a purple patch every now and then of twelve to eighteen months, if they are lucky. Warnie’s lasted 18 years.”

Warne passed away recently of a heart attack, at the age of 52. A private memorial for family and selected friends was held a couple of days ago, a state funeral will take place within the next week and is going to be broadcast nation-wide on a commercial network advertising-free – which shows the level of esteem in which he was held; we don’t even do that for the former leaders of the entire country! (As will inevitably happen eventually, when Queen Elizabeth II ultimately passes away, we might accord her a memorial on a similar scale, though of course, she will not be buried here).

Last night, a tribute show was broadcast, and it reminded me of some of the underlying concepts from the Legacies Setting that never saw the light of day. These were intended to form part of the content for the eventual second installment of that series.

The concepts are sufficiently meritorious, I think, that they deserve to be shared. Since it now seems unlikely that this will ever happen in Legacies 2, this is the most appropriate space for that sharing.

1. Every Life leaves a Legacy

Every living being makes a mark upon the world through their interaction with sentience. It doesn’t matter if you are a beloved pet or most learned instructor in some exotic art, prey to be hunted or a hunter of prey; nor does it matter how sentient you are, only that you interact in some manner with a being that is sentient.

The marks we leave are a compound of our every shared experience as perceived both publicly and privately. That sharing can be indirect – the person may have written a poem or song, or an educational or spiritual text, and it matters not how well established the mark they made already is, by the sharing of that work (however misunderstood it might be) with a new generation, the mark of the author is refreshed and deepened.

Doers of great deeds leave especially deep and strong marks, etched in the difference to history that they have made, even if their names were not known at the time. In some instances, it can be that anonymity elevates such contributions from the specific to an overarching generality.

One of the most special people that I have ever met was my uncle Stan; the son of Polish immigrants who I believe came to Australia around the time of WWII and settled unobtrusively in the small country town in which I grew up, he was taken from us quite suddenly and at a very early age. It seemed half the town wanted to speak at his funeral, and he was one of the only people I have ever encountered about whom everyone had a positive story and there were no negative stories whatsoever. Although the family had chosen to anglicize his surname to make it easier for his children to learn to spell, they themselves chose to revert to the original spelling to commemorate him; and that in itself is sufficiently rare to speak volumes of the man. Generous, kind, warm, helpful, loving, intelligent, supportive – name an accolade, and he owned it. He left his mark upon the world, though few from beyond that small country town would even have known his name. I was honored to be one of his pallbearers.

It was at this funeral that I first began having the thoughts that would crystallize into the concept of Legacies, the mark on the world that we leave behind, many years before I would even hear of RPGs.

2. The Hole We Leave Behind

When our personal stories come to an end, the accumulated deeds and thoughts of our lives form a hollow space in the fabric of society, a hole that we leave behind. Although the shape of this hole may change through the years, although its size and depth may vary, we all leave our marks in the form of the impact that we have on the lives of others, for good or ill, and regardless of intentions, however imperfect we may be. The accumulation of those marks, both those still growing and those now fixed, create the strands of history.

These are most noticeable when an individual encounters or creates extraordinary circumstances. The singular and defining events that transpire at such times are what fill our history books, and confer a kind of immortality.

One such thread that remains poignant to me, and which also contributed to this concept, is the tale of the unknown soldier whose remains were used to mislead the Germans ahead of D-Day. While he would have undoubtedly had left a personal mark on the lives of the family and friends who knew him, his death and the role that it permitted him to play in history enabled him to make a deeper impression upon the world. It doesn’t matter to what extent the deception was successful, or to what extent it saved lives during the landings; even if this trickery played no role in the outcome whatsoever, his story has entered the popular zeitgeist, and that alone is a mark made upon society.

Sometimes, the most significant impact we make upon the world is with our passing. Archduke Franz Ferdinand will forever be remembered as the catalyst that triggered the first World War of the 20th century, and that has forever overshadowed any other contribution that he made to the society around him, for it forever altered the lives of millions. Indeed, it’s entirely possible that had there not been a First World War, we would never had a second.

Even when the mark made stems from our lives, and not the ending of those lives, we are sometimes not the architects of our personal legacies; circumstances occasionally creates singular events in which the course of history can turn on the choices of individuals, sometimes extraordinary, and sometimes not.

Into the hole that we leave behind get placed the interpretations and commemorations of others, the reflections of and upon the deeds and communicated thoughts that we created in life. Over time, as perceptions change, so may the perceptions and interpretation of that legacy. Few ever consider themselves as the villains of a story, however dark and evil the deeds we commit.

Some legacies can be said to cast a shadow, making the person an pivot-point in the lives of others for long after they have ceased to add to that legacy. Take Winston Churchill – although certainly not perfect as a person, he rose to the occasion during the Second World War to leave an indelible mark upon history. He has served as an inspiration to others long after his passing, and even today, the ability of the President Zelenskyy of Ukraine to invoke that memory speaks to the enduring quality of his Legacy.

3. The Worlds That We Create

These things should also be true of the worlds that we create with our imaginations. Every circumstance, every event, every object, all have connections to Legacies both widely known and completely forgotten. Sometimes, caught up the heat of the moment, this gets forgotten; at other times, it is foremost in our minds.

That’s the way it is in the real world, too. Sometimes, you can be so busy living life that you lose sight over the unfolding of events and decisions that have led you to your current circumstance and how you are reacting to it. Everything that we know how to do, everything that anyone ever taught us, all make a contribution to the way that we react and behave, even at such times; the Legacies of others may be overlooked, but remain as profound as ever.

One of the fundamental principles of the Legacies Setting was to make the contributions of the past more impactful, immediate, and noticeable within the campaign world than is usually the case, by giving them greater manifestation within the objects, locations, histories, and circumstances that presented to PCs to create the ingredients of their adventures and to NPCs to create the elements of their lives.

One of the principal sources of inspiration for this comes from the collected DVD extras of the multi-DVD editions of the Lord Of The Rings. First, the One Ring itself can be viewed as a character within the story, one as fully-realized in its own way as any other. Manipulative, deceptive, determined, sometimes malevolent, sometimes seductive, you can’t buy into the story without accepting it as a character in its own right.

But more than that – the heritage of each race is displayed in their architecture, tools, weapons, and armors, and in their characters, characteristics, and preconceptions. The histories of each race are palpable influences over their “modern” representatives and their interactions.

One thread within the epic tale that is barely touched upon in the various commentaries is that what sets the Nine Walkers apart from the others who appear in the tale is their ability to rise above these histories and legacies.

• The friendship between Gimli and Legolas is displayed in the movies, but announced more profoundly in the original books, and forms one example.
• Gandalf The Grey becomes Gandalf The White, in the process ascending beyond what he was, both in powers and limitations.
• Boromir rises above the narrow perspective of his legacy at the last, though it almost destroys him first.
• Aragorn rises above his own experiences to become the King – he doesn’t just accept the titles and privileges, he accepts and feels the responsibilities and cares that we would hope were felt by our leaders, and that changes him, taking him beyond what he was.
• And, of course, the coming of age of the Hobbits is the one aspect of all this that was discussed; one of my abiding criticisms of the movies is that the tales of Merry and Pippin are short-changed in the adaptions, especially the ultimate demonstrations of how much they have grown from their experiences in the Scouring Of The Shire. Still, that means that however much I might enjoy the adaptions, the books themselves have something more to offer, and can’t simply be set aside.

The third significant source of inspiration was the fundamental concept of Legacy Items, in which the past ownership of the item was essential knowledge. They encapsulated the perspective that the most significant participants in the campaign were the Legacy Items themselves, with their owners a necessary adjunct to that story. This is largely the reverse of the traditional relationship – but as the owner grew in power, so the Legacy Item was able to tap into more and more of its own innate power, and so the two advanced side-by-side.

A lot of the early development work that went into The Legacies Setting post-Assassin’s Amulet was geared toward taking this principals and finding ways to reflect them in all aspects of the game universe. Today’s article is intended to share a lot of the notes, thoughts, and concepts with readers.

4. Every weapon has a history

Every weapon has a past, and some of that past matters. It may have been used in a famous battle, or had a past owner of note, or it might have never been tested in battle. When it is so tested, it may find itself unequal to the challenge, or it may come to revel in the blood of enemies – or simply to revel in blood. Past owners may have been flamboyant, or driven by ego, or may have preferred to stay in the shadows.

And, although not sentient, the traits of past owners always leave a mark, in imprint upon the weapon. It can be said that each and every weapon of significance has a personality, in part innate, bestowed upon it by its creator, and in part learned from the styles of its past owners.

When an experienced weapon first comes into the possession of a new owner, it will seek to lead him down a pathway familiar to it. The new owner can resist these urges and prompts, and seek to turn the weapon down a new path; or can identify them and unlock a mundane advantage from them, a small but useful benefit beyond the simple articulation of embedded magics.

Sometimes, the weapon’s preferred approach will compliment the style of the new owner, and sometimes, the two will conflict. In the case of the former, a synergistic bonus may arise, and the owner will quickly realize that this particular weapon “feels right” — for him. Where the approaches are too different, the weapon may feel opposed to the owner, seeking to betray him, producing an ‘anti-synergistic” penalty.

No matter how identical they may appear from a strict retelling of specifications as given in the dungeon master’s guide (or equivalent), no two weapons are ever completely identical.

Unlocking those points of distinctiveness, understanding and harnessing them, can steer a character down paths not contemplated, or advance a character in a journey already underway, or lead to the emergence of temptations and personality traits that the owner resists – or indulges.

A lot of inspiration for this section came from the description of the Elvish swords found in The Hobbit. If you keep that in mind while reading the game mechanics and creation process below, you can almost see Tolkien’s fingerprints running through it.

In game terms, the GM should select 1-2 personality traits to be embodied within the weapon’s ‘approach’ or ‘style’. It may be that a particular enemy type or enemy style are embedded within these traits, eg “Jealous of Elves”, “Hatred Of Salamanders”.

From those traits, he should select 1-2 skills within the system to receive a synergy bonus or penalty of plus-or-minus-1 (other rolls may also be considered, eg +1 FORT save).

If a synergy bonus is in play, it also applies to either attack rolls or damage rolls, not both, and the GM should choose which. Similarly, a synergy penalty should apply to the other of these options.

For every +2 magical bonus in the weapon, or part thereof, the number of personality traits should increase by 1, as should the rolls that will benefit or suffer.

The GM should then craft a brief backstory – past owners / encounters / battles – which give rise to all these personality traits save one, which is deemed to have come from its creator.

Finally, the GM should devise a pathway for the discovery of this backstory – some of it may be easy to find, some of it incredibly difficult, some will lead into potential adventures, some will be suited to the occasional spot of downtime. At least one part should only be discernible by paying attention to when the GM imposes a synergy bonus or penalty.

The same applies to armor and shields; they all have history. These items in particular tend to be customized to reflect the first owner’s identity and interests, which means that a visual clue is far more likely to be the starting point to tracing the history of the item.

Wands and miscellaneous magic items have to be treated a little differently, as they don’t offer the same sort of traceable clues. So these items tend to focus more on the intent of the creator at the time of creation – the purpose of the item – than on the owners.

Each mage should have a specialty, a particular sphere of magic in which they are more interested or gifted. This can either be a type of magic, a unifying concept that ties several spells together, a particular environment, an ally (for whom the item was crafted) or enemy… you get the idea.

Spells that match this unifying category (or that are cast in an appropriate environment or setting) gain +1 on any targeting or saving roll or, if there is no such roll, +1 per die on any effect or damage roll, or, if there isn’t either of these, +1 to the duration in whatever numeric units are used. If nothing else is appropriate, the mage gets +1 to attempt to avoid being counterspelled.

For each such synergy, there should be an opposing vulnerability. This need not be a diametric opposite, it can be something completely different. The mage might have an affinity for water and ice magic, for example, but a vulnerability to kittens and other felines.

Magic items crafted by these mages receive a similar +1 when appropriate. Some magic items will contain some sort of visual clue as to the nature of this synergy bonus, others will not. If there is no such visual clue, the only way to discern the synergies is by communing with the item through deep meditation. At least an hour is required per magical plus or special ability contained withing the item.

It is common for religious items to confer a synergy bonus on the wielder and a synergy penalty on all others within range of an effect of the item. The wielders of such items can choose to double the penalty and apply it to themselves instead (so if the synergy and penalty are exact opposites, the net effect is a synergy penalty). Doing so permits the synergy bonus that would normally be granted to the wielder to be conferred on another character within 60′ of the wielder.

Synergy bonuses and penalties can stack, and can stack with any other form of bonus or penalty. That means that if you can gather a set of items, they might confer a synergy bonus of +3, +4, or even +5. However, these benefits must be spread as evenly as possible amongst the different applications or benefits, which keeps them from being overwhelming to the game system. +1 to hit, +1 to damage, and -1 to saves is hardly as big a deal as a modifier of three to any one of these items. The GM is free to modify this rule as he sees fit to construct synergistic collections.

One common choice might be to create a set of items that actually confer a synergistic penalty per item until the entire set is reunited. Throw in some sort of breadcrumbs to lead from one item to the next, and you have a sweeping adventure.

5. Manifesting History

It might be going too far to suggest that you should be able to write history from the place names alone, provided only that you could establish a chronological sequence for the bestowing of those names – but certainly under such conditions, place names should signpost important developments in history.

Too often, we approach the naming of places without a plan, and with no regard for how history will have influenced those names. And that’s a shame, because there’s a win-win to be had here – not only does using history make it easier (and a lot less work) to craft good names, but there’s a payoff in verisimilitude.

It should be no different in a campaign based on the Legacies framework.

Place names come down to

• Commemorations of Notable People
• Commemorations of Notable Events
• Commemorations of Impressions
• Sources of local Pride
• Commemorations of Value
• Commemorations of Past/Native Language
• Commemorations of Identification
• Impositions by Invaders
• Attempts to rewrite History
• Wit and half-wits
• Other

Commemorations of Notable People –

Important people get things named after them. Usually when they do something spectacular, or die. But a lot of things also get named after the first people to discover them, or the first to fully explore them.

Commemorations of Notable Events –

If something significant happened somewhere, a place will often be named or renamed to make a record of the event. The more significant the event was to the locals (or those with the authority to change the name if that isn’t the locals), the more likely it is to be so documented.

Commemorations of Impressions –

Lots of places get named for the way they look, or the way some singular individual thinks they could look. The latter can also reflect a lot of wishful thinking. Strangely, such names often seem to have the opposite effect – name somewhere Paradise Gardens and you’re asking for trouble….

Sources of local Pride –

It’s probably going too far to name a town after the local sporting club, but this sort of thing does happen all the time. It doesn’t matter what it is – the world’s biggest catfish, the best apples in the world, etc (in the eyes of the locals).

Commemorations of Value –

If there is a local commodity of particular value, expect that name to show up in a number of manifestations within the local names. Often with a fair dab of poetic license.

Commemorations of Past / Native Language –

A lot of the place names in Australia derive from the Indigenous Australian names for those places. We’re so used to them, we hardly notice anymore, until it gets pointed out to us. There are probably some places in England that retain names derived from the names bestowed by the Romans – not many, but a few!

Commemorations of Identification –

When communities are formed, they will often virtue-signal that they want to be like somewhere that already exists, or that there are a lot of residents who formerly hailed from someplace else, by taking on some variation of the name. There are a whole host of American towns that are named after British towns and cities, for example.

Impositions by Invaders –

Conquerors and invaders regularly rewrite languages and rename places and objects. If the period of conquest lasts long enough, the changes can outlive the conquest. Nowhere is this lesson more forcefully represented than in the place-names of England.

Attempts to rewrite History –

This is a somewhat contentious one, but places can be named to glorify those who failed to achieve something that was locally supported, in essence, treating the loser as the winner in order to pretend that they won instead of losing. I’ll say no more, lest I offend someone.

Wit and half-wits –

There are always a few who are too clever by half, or not half as clever as they think they are. And sometimes, a name intended as a joke can get taken seriously for whatever reason (no sense of humor, perhaps?) – and so you end up with places bearing extremely unlikely names. Quite often, these names don’t last very long, but there always seems to be another one.

Sometimes, names acquire a second, more humorous, meaning, because the language changes or evolves.

Other –

And sometimes, names just occur to people out of thin air. Sometimes, these are the results of too much imagination, and sometimes too little.

Do a rough outline of your world’s history in chronological sequence. Rate each event on a scale from 1-10, where a ‘1’ is almost trivial, while a ’10’ is earth-shattering. That’s how many places should be named for something associated with that event. How many places are named for famous Generals?

Next, add these together one at a time, from most recent to most remote. If the most recent event was rated a three and the event before that was rated a 7, then the most recent event would be numbered 3 and the one before that would be numbered 10 (because 3+7=10), and so on.

Go over your map and make a list of the places to be named using a simple coordinate system. If the item is not a specific point, pick a specific point that includes the location and make a note of what it is – region, river, mountain range, whatever. Work out a rough estimate for when the place was last named or renamed. It makes life easier if you do this in a spreadsheet or in some other document that can be sorted. When the list is complete, sort according to the date named.

You can either start with the most recent place-name and work backwards, or the oldest and work forwards. But all you have to do is pick one of the name sources and use your history to correlate historical events with names deriving from those events, or individuals, or whatever.

Each scale of map introduces new locations to be named. There will be some carryover from a larger-scale map, so always start big and work to small.

Easy.

6. Societal Legacies

Social legacies tend to be a bit more subtle and harder to trace. These come under three headings, generally:

• Social Reforms
• Social Evolutions
• The founding of Organizations.

Social Reforms –

For every right and privilege that is enjoyed by anyone but the Clergy and the Nobility, there had to be a time when those rights and privileges did not exist. Even such things as the codification of civility, and the formalities that accompany the most elevated of meals, had to be introduced from somewhere or by someone, and those individuals and their contributions to society tend to be remembered. Sir Walter Raleigh, for example.

Sometimes these formalities start out as personal practices instituted in a particular time and place and never intended to become general to a whole population. But one of two things can happen to spread the practices and embed them within a broader society: Either someone encounters them and adopts them, and they spread because they have some inherent social value or symbolism; or someone sees a way to take advantage of these customs for their own benefit, or for the benefit of a cause they believe in, and so they construct deliberate campaigns to insert them into common practice.

It must also be admitted that oftentimes, social reforms meet heavy opposition, and this too can be a valid legacy.

Social Evolution –

Most changes in society don’t happen because of a Reformer, though; most are simply a matter of something being popular for a while, and then not. The more you look into such things, however, the more you discover connections to more serious and potent sections of history.

During WWI, many women took up work that had previously been the province of men, because the men were off fighting the war. When the men came back, they were forced to relinquish those positions, but many had grown to enjoy the independence and prosperity; the result was a record number of new businesses being founded. This independence of spirit and sense of optimism also found expression in new social activities, which quickly evolved a specific style and dress-code. The ‘flappers’ of the twenties remain icons of the time, even recognizable today. The Great Depression ended the fun and games and destroyed this giddy optimism, and ‘flappers’ went out of style.

So the story of one particular dance craze touches on a Global War, Economic Depression, Employment, Emancipation, and Equal Rights – and that’s just a superficial examination of the story. This isn’t the sum total of the important stories of the day – but it touches on a lot of them.

Some people leave a mark on Society, sometimes deserved and sometimes not. Martin Luther King earned his mark on Society with the optimism of his vision and the earnestness with which he pursued it. For some, his message fell on deaf ears; but others embraced the vision, to a greater or lesser extent. His idealism was not enough to remake the world, but it provided the beginnings of a blueprint for harmonious relations between disparate populations that remains as valid today as it was back then. When he was killed, King became a martyr to the cause of equality, and his legacy reverberates even today.

Other people become the centerpiece of such visions seemingly by accident. JFK was certainly not perfect, and definitely not the best President the US had ever seen; he made many mistakes, and may well have been defeated at reelection because of them. Still, his approach to the Space Program encapsulated a vision of hope for the future to many, no matter how cynical and practically political his motivations may have been. National Prestige and the Global leadership role of the US demanded that the US engage in, and win, the space race; Kennedy had demanded a confrontation on ground that the Americans had a chance to win on, manned flight to the moon. Most other possible achievements in space conceded an advantage to the Russians that made success unlikely. And yet, even knowing all that, the Kennedy aura remains, right up until the moment of his death in Dallas, Texas. Many feel that the optimism with which they saw the future died alongside him, only to be slowly and incrementally rebuilt over many decades, if at all. Kennedy has become larger than life as a result, and his place in history secured; he remains inspirational, not because of who and what he actually was, but because of who and what the myth makes him out to be.

Individuals sometimes evolve Society, but more often, Society evolves around them, captures them in a whirlwind of change for which they are (at most) only partially responsible, and elevates the individual, reshaping them into a perceived figurehead for the cause. This means that sometimes, the cause can be set back or even ended by exposing the feet of clay of the figurehead, but it doesn’t always work.

I have seen documentaries on the Art Nouveaux movement in design, and the Bauhaus movement in design, that shed new light on the great social and political movements of the day.

Not every social era evolves its own artistic style or movement in this way, but when they do, those artistic styles and movements can be a touchstone that ties seemingly coincidental events and concepts together with indestructible bonds that create a sense of inevitability.

The Founding Of Organizations –

In general, though, the most accessible Legacy of an individual is an organization that outlives them and continues to speak for, and work toward, the causes espoused by the individual. These can be anything from private clubs to merchants’ guilds. The modern-day political parties all started off with one individual at their nexus, frequently their first leader.

Every organization that exists within a campaign should have a history, however brief, establishing when and by whom they were founded, where, and why. These never exist in isolation; they should always be related back to the patterns of the society of the time, which gives context to the original organization.

Organizations, Social Changes, Reforms – these are all Legacies left by others, and the impact of those social Legacies should be noticed from time to time within the campaign.

7. Political Legacies

Noble families tend to be better than most at keeping track of the Legacies of the past individual members of those families, but everyone who gets involved in politics leaves some sort of a mark in history, no matter how small. This is true for those born into politics (that’s those Noble Families again) to those who serve and advise them, to those who defend them and conquer for them, and to those who seek to influence them. Elected Politicians and unelected political figures, all make a difference.

Most RPG campaigns view the great events of history as pivoting around larger-than-life individuals, because that implies the promise that when they advance far enough, the PCs will be counted amongst those individuals.

That’s fair enough, but it marks a distinct difference to the observed reality of the world around us, where individual political legacies are mostly feathers accumulating on one side of the scale until sufficient to overcome the resistance of the weight on the other. In other words, they are mostly collective accumulations of small changes that eventually form a significant force to achieve something.

Unfortunately, most GMs don’t recognize the inherent discontinuity in these world-views, and place their societies-driven-by-heroes-and-villains in worlds that have no room for heroes-and-villains. If that is done deliberately, it sets the stage for confrontations between the individual and the faceless masses of the status quo that can act to reaffirm that original perception of history. Social and political inertia become the ultimate enemy with which the individual must contest.

If it’s done carelessly, political elements within the campaign can feel ‘tacked on’ and superficial, and even contradictory, without the reasons for these reactions being recognized (let alone understood); at best, something just doesn’t feel ‘right’. Done correctly, they can be the bedrock and foundation of the campaign.

One of the earliest and most central elements to the Fumanor series of Campaigns was that the political infrastructure of society had a specific place within it for Adventurers, be they PCs or NPCs. This affirmed both the concept of Individuals as driving social forces, and the slower backdrop of collective wills forming a second layer within the society, and defined a relationship between the two.

Such questions can be, should be, the philosophical underpinnings of a campaign.

When creating a campaign, list the three most significant political problems in need of a solution within the game world.

Give each of the leading politicians a stance on these issues, one that makes sense given whatever is already known about them.

Who are the figureheads of the causes? Who are their opposite numbers on the other side of the debate? Where does public opinion lie? What are the consequences of doing nothing? What are the consequences should one side or the other win? What are the consequences that the advocates expect should one side or the other win (often not the same thing at all!)?

Sometimes, these debates and conflicts will form part of the campaign backdrop, a splash of color and nothing more; at other times, they may be a motivator for someone more significant within the campaign; and on rare occasions, the debate may be the central factor in an adventure, forcing the PCs to decide what side of the debate they are on.

8. Economic Legacies

Every business has a history – refer “Organizations”, above. I’m talking about something related to that, but that hasn’t really been covered explicitly.

Every mine has a history, every orchard, every granary – and every trade agreement. At the global campaign scale, these are usually trivial and irrelevant; but at the local scale, they can be all-consuming, or merely significant, factors.

Who has heard the concept of the Company Town before? When there is one major employer, or one industry that dominates the local landscape, the people tend to support that employer or industry over others. The company / industry becomes the central binding focus of everyone in the town, because even if they don’t get their income directly from the company / industry, they will get their money from people who do.

Who has recognized that the same principle holds true in RPGs like D&D? A mining town that exists purely to mine silver, or copper, or slate, or shale, or marble, or whatever, will place the ongoing interests of that source of wealth at the heart of their community interests. It doesn’t matter if the mine is owned by some nobleman or other who doesn’t give two hoots for the workers; what income and sustenance they receive is still directly bound to the productivity of the mine.

The history of the town is the history of the mine; the two are completely intertwined and interconnected. And the history of the residents, collectively, is also part of the history of both the town and the mine. The town, therefore, can be viewed as the collective legacy of past generations.

This is the level of Economic Legacy that most PCs will usually have to deal with, because it creates motivations for adventures.

Something is interfering with the workings of the mine? Send in some PCs.

The mine has petered out, so the locals have taken up banditry to get the gold they need to buy stolen ore from another mine? Send in some PCs!

The PCs are just passing through when word gets out that falling production means that the owners are imposing still more draconian living conditions in order to cut their expenses? You’ve already sent the PCs into the middle of this powder keg, they just don’t know that they are at ground zero – yet!!

But there’s another order of Economic Legacy that most GMs ignore: Trade between nations or regions.

For each of the economic units for which you are looking at trade, list their three biggest exports, who they go to, and – on a scale of 1-10 – what the annual revenue generated by each export is.

When you’ve finished, draw up a very crude map of these economic units and place a dice or markers totaling a value of (say) 40 in each of them.

Simulate a year’s trade by increasing the money in the exporter and decreasing the money in the people they are exporting to – this simulates the buying of that commodity.

Repeat two or three times more.

In an ideal world, imports should balance exports, so everyone stays at the starting money you gave them. In the real world, this is never the case – there is always some inequity. Money will begin pooling somewhere, and someone else will begin running short.

In those places running short, the standard of living takes a hit, and causes a readjustment of the price charged for their exports, but there’s a limit to that – said limit being the point at which someone else will sell to the importer the product that they want at a better price than the current suppliers want to charge.

So make those adjustments to values, and simulate another two years of trade.

The concluding balances give you some indication of the relative prosperity and levels of economic distress within the regions or nations of your game world. This is a simple Economic Generator. What’s more, you have just simulated the last 50 or so years of trade between each.

These trade factors indicate who can dominate who, who is dependent on whom, and who each nation is most likely to resent. These aren’t the only factors dictating relations between these economic units, but they are a start. Factor in relative military strength and you are just about there.

These relations will have an influence over every adventure, over the attitudes of every NPC, and even the relationships between PCs. Powerful juju, then.

All of thee economic transactions exist because some individual made the arrangements for them to happen – made offers, accepted offers, haggled over prices, etc. These figures are no less famous than generals – within their particular sphere of interests.

And now realize that in many RPGs, the participants in international trade behave like Mafia Dons (but are more careful not to get caught)…

9. Every Dungeon Is A Tombstone

This is the one part of the Legacies structure that most GMs will recognize. Every Dungeon should have a history – who created it, and why, and when – and the identity of the creator and circumstances of creation should influence the construction and contents of the dungeon.

There are a couple of milestones that GMs should keep in mind – the discovery of Steel being the most significant amongst them. Key discoveries/inventions in architecture are others – when the Lintel was invented, for example. Your PCs should be able to read the architecture of a dungeon and be able to guesstimate an approximate age of construction.

Now, that’s a lot of research work – the first time you do it. But once you have done it, it takes only moments to apply it on subsequent occasions.

10. Every Hole Has A Depth

I’ve made this point a couple of times already, but its time to look at it squarely. Some Legacies are local in nature, the person being basically unknown beyond a specific local region. Others are known internationally, and there are all sorts of scales in between.

The more widely-known an individual, the deeper the hole that they leave behind, and the longer the shadow that the hole casts upon the world. The more fields in which an individual is well known, the larger the hole.

All this is a metaphor, of course, a way of applying dimension to a persons reputation post-life. Reputations derive not only from public deeds, but from private ones that become publicly known afterwards, and the enduring impacts that a person had. Reputations often morph and change over time, as ‘less-relevant’ or side-issue facts get forgotten. Most reputations shrink in relevance over time, anyway.

But the holes left behind when a person dies can be more significant than the direct impacts of the living on any given issue, if the person in question was significant enough or influential enough with respect to the issue or some associated tangent to it.

At least one essay that I have seen describes the titans of the past as the mythological giants of the society. George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Winston Churchill are all globally recognized as Giants in our modern society; in the metaphor that I am using of holes with depth and shadow, they have left very deep holes into which many people have deposited interpretations of their significance, and which cast long shadows, which are capable of shifting narratives and perspectives on issues even today.

Every campaign world should have its Giants, too – people whose reputations have grown beyond their personal control, who have become larger than life, and who have died either before or after that has occurred. Who are the Giants of your campaign world? How large a hole has their passing created, and how long a shadow do they cast in the modern or near-future setting of your campaign era?

11. Big Shoes: Filling A Void

It doesn’t always happen, but often someone will step forward and attempt to fill a void, replacing a lost champion of a cause with themselves or someone else. Often, these attempts fail, because the successful replacement to fill a void has to be able to capture the public imagination to the extent that the hole is deep, but someone trying earnestly will often score enough brownie points to at least be partially successful.

Many of these attempts go astray because they require the candidate attempting to fill the void to subordinate his personal opinions, philosophies, and preferences to the documented opinions, philosophies, and preferences of the person in whose shadow they intend to dwell, and that can be a very hard thing to sustain. And if their sincerity is ever seriously questioned, the whole reputation can unravel.

On very rare occasions, the replacement manages to carry an issue further than the original ever could, and can become larger than the hole he was seeking to fill. Once that has happened, the individual has more scope to be themselves so long as they don’t directly contradict the interpreted morality and principles of the original void.

GMs have to ask themselves, who has left the greatest voids in their campaign worlds? Who is trying to fill that void, however poorly, and how is that going, and how is it likely to go in the future?

12. The Times Always Elevate The Ordinary

Even in the presence of those who seem to have been always destined to be Giants, Ordinary people find themselves elevated by extraordinary times into positions of unexpected prominence. Tales of ordinary people doing exceptional things in dire circumstances become legends. The fact that nothing in their lives prepared them for such roles makes those legends all the more significant, because they have further to climb in order to achieve.

Such stories tend to get spread far and wide because they give people heart in difficult times, and morale is a powerful determinant of outcomes. A weak force can be outnumbered significantly, but if morale is high, and the more numerous forces have more typical morale (or worse), the weaker force can still emerge victorious.

A key factor in such tales that often gets overlooked is that it is much harder to raise the morale of a large force than it is to do so for a smaller one. Asymmetric forces are a breeding ground for such legends.

Who are the Ordinary Heroes of your campaign world, and where did their legends unfold?

13. A World Of Interlocking Legacies

The history of a game world should not be about the events that transpired, it should be about the characters and personalities who made those events occur. The world should be full of references and signposts to the legends of the past. Every time a group of PCs go somewhere for the first time, the GM should be able to insert a small factoid about the place and its role in history. “Birthplace of the Lion of El Tridad, who held off an entire tribe of Wild Orcs single-handed until relief arrived.” — “Scene of the final victory over the forces of the Black Viceroy.” — “Famous for its melons, first planted by the man who would become mayor for 112 years.”

Such little factoids bring the campaign history to life, and unify that history with the landscape.

Some legacies cast long shadows, and that includes the remnants of the evils of the past – places of vile ritual, of abject villainy, of fell creatures and foul magics. Every dungeon to be cleansed should have a context within the history, and these facts should have practical value to those who seek to expunge such legacies.

Every magic item should touch on or tell a story, or several, and those stories should being manifest benefits and penalties that connect the current owner with the legends of the past.

The result is an epic quality that cannot be achieved through shortcuts. The amazing thing is that creating that epic quality doesn’t have to involve that much extra work, if any; on the contrary, it can actually be less work in some respects.

Let the legends live on!