Re: Whether to have metaplot or not (was Guide to Glorantha)

From: Tim <tim_at_...>
Date: Wed, 12 Dec 2012 16:31:09 -0000

My take on the question of metaplot, History and setting is that anything that tells you what has happened in the setting before the "default start date" is history, and is good. Any scenario/adventure consists of "Plot", which can be affected by the decisions of the players. This is sort of the point of role-playing games Anything that tells you what happens after the "default start date" is Metaplot and is dubious at best and potentially disastrous, especially when it interacts with the "plot". Some games companies like to spring surprises on fans in the Metaplot, which is never a good idea - GM's are "co-creators" - at least in terms of their own campaign, rather than passive receivers like readers of a novel,or viewers of a TV show.

Your Glorantha May, of course, Vary - but (at least to my mind) there is a difference between choosing to vary from a published history, and suddenly discovering that a new product has taken things away from a direction you thought was Canon - especially if that reduces the utility of that product - For Example since WB&RM we have known Androgeus is a Tarshite Superhero, but not much more about him. If, in my Sartarite campaign my players persuade her to join the rebellion against the Lunar regime and throw his support behind a new Tarshite dynasty, it will make a Tarsh book less useful if it reveals that she threw his weight behind the current king, regardless of whether fighting for or against the empire.