Expanding During Play
You do not finish the world and then play in it. You start the world and let play finish it.
Start with enough. Expand when relevance arrives.
Build outward from play
The normal pattern is simple: establish the starting world, begin play, notice what becomes relevant, establish the necessary detail, persist consequential facts, and leave everything distant unresolved. A new settlement matters when travelers head there. A new law matters when someone breaks it. A new official matters when their decision touches play.
This is guidance, not machinery. There is no required sequence and no checklist — only attention to what play actually needs next.
When background becomes foreground
People met in passing become persistent when continuity requires it: the recurring employer, the spouse, the rival, the official, the business partner, the craftsperson, the witness, the new household member. Record only what is genuinely established about them — sparsely is fine — and never their whole circle. One person becoming important creates one record, not a village.
Places work the same way. A location named in passing needs no record. The mill visited weekly, the disputed field, the purchased cottage — those earn persistent state through the existing architecture, when repeated play depends on them.
When an assumption becomes canon
Moment-to-moment play runs on small plausible assumptions: the ferryman's name, the price of eggs, the weather on the road. An assumption is not canon. It supported a scene; it does not automatically become permanent truth.
If a fact becomes consequential and must remain true, establish it through the appropriate existing authority — and only then. Do not retroactively treat every improvised detail as foundational law.
But hold continuity with care: if an improvised detail was clearly presented as fact and shaped consequential play, do not casually contradict it later. The test is simple — was it stated plainly, and did something real follow from it? If yes, honor it. If it was background color nobody acted on, you remain free.
No log of assumptions is needed. No provisional-canon system. Judgment, sparingly applied.
Write facts in their proper homes
When something becomes persistent, put it where that kind of information lives: a person's facts with the person, employment in Employment, business ownership and operation with the business and its relationships, property ownership in Property, household membership in the household authorities, organization membership in membership, an office in the established office representation, a ruler in the Realm, an injury in health, a character's whereabouts in location. One fact, one authoritative home — never competing copies.
Expanding truth without breaking it
New detail must fit established truth. A new settlement's customs should rhyme with its region. A new institution should answer to known authorities or explain why it does not. Never contradict what is established merely for novelty, and never manufacture conflict because a new place needs "content." Ordinary places are valid — most of the world is ordinary, and that is why the extraordinary parts matter.
Remember the separations: objective history is not memory, and neither is belief. If earlier information was uncertain, new facts may resolve it. If it was someone's belief or a rumor, discovering it was wrong corrects the belief — it does not rewrite what happened.
Let consequences build the world
Expansion rarely needs invention. Relationships deepen into households. Employment becomes patronage. A business needs premises, then workers, then rivals. Travel reveals settlements. Information creates obligations. Offices create successors. Injuries create debts. Ordinary work, honestly followed, generates more content than any pre-written plot.
Good Builder Questions
- "What has become important enough that the world now needs a durable answer?"
- "What existing facts constrain this new detail?"
- "Does this need persistent state, or is contextual description enough?"
You Usually Do Not Need...
...to fill the map, generate every settlement, roster every resident, pre-write every organization, codify every law, draw every family tree, name every distant ruler, prepare every future conflict, or script any campaign path. Leave the world unfinished on purpose. Play will tell you which parts to finish.