Lore, Game Starts & GM Instructions
Three file types carry the world's edges: lore for truths, game starts for the way in, and GM instructions for what only the GM should read. They're easy to underuse, and they're worth using well.
Lore
Lore holds world truths that aren't a place, a person, or a thing: myths, history, phenomena, rumors, the reasons the world is the way it is. Use it for the origin of the league, the legend of the legendary birds, the reason some routes are abandoned, the truth behind a rumor the players keep hearing.
Lore is a field of hooks, not an encyclopedia of facts. Each entry should be short, concrete, and connected — reference the places, factions, and species it touches so the GM can find it when it matters. The dex is dense with creatures; lore is where you explain why the creatures and the regions are the way they are.
Game Starts
A Game Start file is the card players see in the lobby — name, image, and a description that sells the opening. The card is only the surface; the actual play configuration (the opening scene, the starting location, the playable characters) lives in separate metadata that the platform's game-start tooling writes, not in the file's fields. As a builder:
- Write the card to set the promise: who you are, where you begin, what's already wrong.
- Point the play configuration at a real starting location and real playable characters — files that exist.
- Keep the opening small and human: a town, a partner, a reason to move. The grounded promise means starting with a life, not with a destiny.
GM Instructions
GM Instructions files are for material players should not read — rulings, tone enforcement, adjudication, escalation notes. The split is strict: the Player's Handbook is public and every player may read it; this Builder's Manual is for creators; GM Instructions are for the GM's eyes only.
A good GM Instructions file says how this project runs at the table: what to call for rolls on, how hard to push threads, how far this table's content goes, what the world believes that players haven't learned yet. The project ships with a starter file — expand it as your world develops.
The split test
When you're deciding where something goes:
- Players need it to play → Player's Handbook.
- Builders need it to add content → Builder's Manual.
- Only the GM should see it → GM Instructions.
- It's a truth of the world → Lore.
- It's the opening → Game Start.
If a thing doesn't fit any of those, it's probably not content — it's a feature of the world that belongs inside an existing entry, written as fiction.