What are some good ingredients for a comfy setting?
>>92697800Too vague a question, refine it.
>>92697915What are some specific things you can add to an area of your setting to make it seem "comfy" to the players when they are in at the region/area?EG: Familiar NPCS, lack of consistent danger etc.
>>92697800Familiar NPCs and lack of consistent danger.
>>92697966Also food descriptors and smells. Touching on multiple senses.
>>92697800Settings aren't comfy. Games are.
>>92698054Setting can be comfy. Although I do admit certain games like Golden Sky Stories can have comfyness built into the very concept of the game itself.
Can cities and towns be comfy?
>>92698316Yes
Security + Familiarity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CL_3mlOPnGI
>>92697800Soft brown women who smile at you and give you sweets
>>92697800homosexuality
>>92697800Abundance of flora and fauna that would normally be only occasionally present which implies the locals are well off enough not to harvest and hunt everything around them. I don't mean simply lush gardens, but also scattered patches herbs and mushrooms that would normally be picked clean.Also, bakeries.
Slice of life.
>>92697800Something than taps to your childhood, so it differs a lot be generation, upbringing and nation. To me its green vegetation, cozy hamlets, castles, ruins,elemental spirits, vaguely medieval or classical (or better yet , both), and adventures than are local (dealing with bandits, the local monsters, the local godlings).
>going this long without mentioning the comfiest setting in MtG history
>>92697800The GM loops the same folksy medieval music on his phone. And the players do roleplaying without rolling dice in an inn called the "Red Cockerel Inn".They still ask if they get "milestone levels" after every session regardless of the fact that they never roll.
>>92697800Mild environmental hazards. Snow forcing everyone inside for a few days can be comfy, a flood or wildfire is less so.
>>92704860This, also some mysterious or unsettling elements on the edges to underline safe environments comfyness.
>>92704418lorwyn? I don't remember if I'm mixing up that card, but lorwyn is super comfy. older (lorwyn and before) mtg is generally a great tropey comfy fantasy blend though>>92698054I feel this is true. it's like horror. certain elements are more likely to create comfy/horrific experiences, but a story is comfy or horrific moreso than a setting can be.>>92697800related; obv everyone is going to think slice-of-life hamlets, but what are some unexpectedly comfy settings/elements? I find the start of oblivion when you emerge from the sewer pretty comfy. maybe it's because you replay that part a lot, maybe it's because it's a new day and you have a whole world to explore and nowhere to be.having good NPCs who are looking out for the PCs (even if they can't/won't help them with every trivial thing) can make a setting a lot friendlier
>>92705256Vigor from LRW, yeah. Lorwyn is still my favorite block in all of history.>blocksGod I miss 'em.
>>92705256Oblivion is a comfy game in general
>>92705153Fey and other godlings are good for that, there are parts than aren't exactly dangerous if you know the tabus, but not exactly safe either, they like they pranks, and those can be deadly.
>>92697800Reliable wifi
>>92697800Focus a lot on temperature and smell. When your party enters a tavern at night, talk about how the cold fall air is replaced by a roaring, pleasant warmth, and the smell of dead leaves evaporates is overwhelmed by the smell of baking apple pies and ale.
>>92697800Uses the regular phrases to describe what the party senses. e.g. The Odyssey uses rosy-fingered dawn and wine-dark sea, so write down what an object or event looks, smells, and sounds like alongside usual stat blocks for characters.>>92698316Can't imagine anything denser than a small town's main street as comfy.
>>92697800The first thing you have to do is conceive of what a game is actually like and how the setting can be presented and engaged with. Otherwise, what you want is slice of life and "healing" anime and manga, like Flying Witch or Tiny Little Lives in the Woods.
>>92717950Ooh that sounds cool
>>92698910Both are kinda right, but also not.Setting needs to be familiar to be comfy - but any setting you engage with for a length of time will become familiar anyway. But initial familiary will create the opposite of comfiness - it something is made to be familiar from the get go, it will carry over all the uncomfy connotations with it. And that will prevent it from ever becoming truly comfy. If you want comfiness you need to create the insular feeling of "this is unlike anything else" - either with new ideas, or a fresh take on the old ones.Security is also a not a straightforward point. Your setting still needs to have danger and challenges to not be boring. But those challenges need to be possible to overcome, without terrible sacrifices. Setting feels comfy when universe doesn't arbitrarily decide to fuck you over. If you face hardship, then you can solve it. If you can't solve the hardship, than the hardship needs to be distant and not catastrophic. Even WW2 can look comfy, as long as you are Switzerland.Thirdly, to have comfiness you can't have undefined 'grey' morality where everyone is asshole. If you want to have 'human-like' bad guys, your bad guys need to reachable and open, with redeeming qualities. Evil of human heart whose interactions are limited to 'join them' or 'fight them' is a poor fit for comfy setting. If you want to have unambiguous bad guys, you need to completely dehumanise them - that's how Tolkien pulled off pockets of comfiness in heroic fantasy. Doesn't really fly in modern day though.
>>92697931Depends on the players.
Run pic related, choose green or blue dragons. Put on the Crystal Chronicles OST. Comfort.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4ifdZNy5bU
>>92723732Sounds comfy AF
>>92723732Here is the opening cutscene to the game. SUPER COMFY.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkE5KQsK56k
>>926978001) Playing games2) Having a regular group3) Not shitposting on hobby boards
