[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

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OpenCustomPrivate1 / weekAline

This is the Gygax 75 Workshop, where each participant will work their way though the Gygax 75 Challenge. The "game" here will serve as a sort of subforum where we will build our worlds.

Alternative link to the pdf of the challenge, thanks to Dhakhan for finding it:
The Gygax 75 Challenge

The Gygax 75 Challenge is based on an article written by Garry Gygax in 1975, where he lays out his approach to constructing a campaign setting. The challenge summarizes this article and divides it up in to a 5 week program. While written with an OSR mindset, the challenge is very flexible. There is no limit to genre or game system, the only assumption made is that you will have a "town", a "dungeon" and some sort of wilderness separating those. What this means and how this looks like is up to you. At the end of those 5 weeks, you will (hopefully) end up with a fully functional setting to play in. You are strongly encouraged to do just that, here on GP or wherever else you intend to play.

This workshop is intended to facilitate an exchange of ideas as each participant works though the challenge, to keep everyone motivated and to provide help if some one gets stuck in whatever way. Also just chatting is nice as well. :)
To make this work, I envision the following principles:

-There are no restrictions as to what you do with the challenge, any genre, any system that works for you is fine.
-You are free to alter the challenge in any way that benefits your project.
-While it is desirable to have everyone work on the same part of the challenge at the same time, you may work as slow or fast as you want.
-The "game" will be set to private, allowing us to freely discuss things we do no wish potential players to know.
-You can cooperate and collaborate as much or as little as you want.
-Every participant will be given a subforum to work in, they are free to organize it in any way they see fit.
-I will keep the "game" around, but please backup anything you produce here. You never know.
-I can not see a reason to limit the number of participants. If you are interested, but not invited yet, please pm or @me.
-Most importantly, please remain civil and kind at all times. Make sure all criticism is constructive and wanted. Respect the other participants and their work.

Mar 9, 2025 2:33 pm

Mar 9, 2025 2:33 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Over in the OSR interest check thread I raised the idea of setting up a "game" that serves as a workshop space for the The Gygax 75 Challenge.
My idea was that we would each create a campaign world by going through the challenge and exchange ideas, feedback and banter along the way. At the end we would have several GMs, ready to start a game.

I think I finally have the time and headspace to get started with this, so I was wondering if there is anyone interested in joining in.

Despite this idea coming up in the OSR interest check thread, you should not feel limited to an OSR style of gaming. While the article referenced by the challenge was written in 1975 and I certainly approach it with an OSR lens, you can use it to build a world for a wide set of gaming styles. Anything with a "dungeon", "city" and some wilderness between them should work, according to the FAQ of the challenge.

If this sounds like a fun idea to you, let me know and I will set up the "game".

LightOfMidnight

Mar 9, 2025 3:19 pm

Mar 9, 2025 3:19 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Oh this sounds like it could be fun. I'll throw my hat in the ring, but I have just moved and have a couple of other games/character creation to focus on, so chance I may fall behind.

Mar 9, 2025 6:22 pm

Mar 9, 2025 6:22 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Which system would you be using?

Mar 9, 2025 7:56 pm

Mar 9, 2025 7:56 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Totes_McGee says:

Which system would you be using?

If it is Gygax, may I humbly suggest AD&D 1ed? 😈😈😈

Mar 10, 2025 2:15 am

Mar 10, 2025 2:15 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I'd be up for this. Does it matter if we use the same system? I'd like focus on OSE, Swords & Wizardry, or Knave 2e. What about the rest of you? I'm pretty flexible.

Mar 10, 2025 4:08 am

Mar 10, 2025 4:08 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I've had someone try something like this twice but both times the guy starting it ghosted out. I'd certainly be interested in trying it out in the hope of getting a bit more.

Mar 10, 2025 6:55 am

Mar 10, 2025 6:55 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I always thought something like this would be fun, like GM Fight club. If you're in the club, you have to GM.

Not to knock the idea, but just predicting some challenges that may happen.
Putting together a setting with multiple GMs might be immersion breaking. If one GM wants high power fantasy, and another wants low grim dark. Do characters walk in overpowered with all their magic gear from the previous module? Same with species culture, walk from the Glorious Elven Empire and with the next GM they are a persecuted underclass.
It would take everyone on the same page to have a consistent feel, might as well just agree to a published setting.

Another spin on this is episodic like "Sliders" or "Quantum Leap" (dating myself there)
Where characters jump from one multiverse to the next so inconsistencies are baked into the campaign.
The most collaborative part would be beginning and end. What is the goal, and end-scene of achieving it.

I would like to participate in something like this to learn & grow as a GM from other GMs quickly.
Also gives an opportunity for new GMs to try running a little 1-shot, no consequences because were onto the next episode before you know it.

Mar 10, 2025 7:37 am

Mar 10, 2025 7:37 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

OK, I think there might be a misunderstanding as to what I am trying to do here. I did not mean to create a shared world (although that also sounds rather interesting) but for everyone to create their own thing and just chat along the way. So whatever system or style you want to use is fine.

Mar 10, 2025 8:32 am

Mar 10, 2025 8:32 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I would be interested in a world building project made in parallel with a group. Like a writing group! I would be happy to share and give and get input from the other members about everyone's world.

Last edited March 10, 2025 8:33 am

Mar 10, 2025 8:46 am

Mar 10, 2025 8:46 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Ah* more of a community building, writing work space.

Last edited March 10, 2025 8:55 am

Mar 10, 2025 9:06 am

Mar 10, 2025 9:06 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Aline says:

My idea was that we would each create a campaign world by going through the challenge and exchange ideas, feedback and banter along the way.

There was a thread about pitching the game we don't have time to run, so this sounds like a nice nice opportunity to finally finish preparing them :D

Mar 10, 2025 11:10 am

Mar 10, 2025 11:10 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I'd be interested! I'm always up for world building type games... events? That might be the better word. :3

Mar 10, 2025 1:24 pm

Mar 10, 2025 1:24 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

There are some systems that have players add content to each others characters background history. How about allowing for slots within each world that others could add content to? The original creator of each world can of course take ior leave as they choose but I think this could result in some interesting results or at least give them ideas

I have a world I have been using but never fully built out so wouldn't mind using this opportunity to get more work done on it

Last edited March 10, 2025 1:25 pm

Mar 10, 2025 2:12 pm

Mar 10, 2025 2:12 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I'm seeing this thread veering off into three different directions.

- A shared world-building project where people collaborate on a single setting.
- A group project where people help the other individuals in the group realize a setting/campaign.
- A world-building game.

I would be up for the latter two.

Mar 10, 2025 2:47 pm

Mar 10, 2025 2:47 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Option 1 could be realized with a rift setting where all created worlds are linked by some mechanism or through a gestalt. But I'm less interested in this as well.

How would option 3 work?

Mar 10, 2025 2:52 pm

Mar 10, 2025 2:52 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I have games that are collaborative worldbuilding games, i.e. Ex Novo, or Ex Umbra both by Sharkbomb Games. I've been considering putting one of these up in the Games Tavern so if people are interested I'd be happy to do it.

Mar 10, 2025 3:28 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:28 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

While I've been eying up some world building games; Kingdom and Microscope being the main ones I think of, I feel like option 2 is the closest to what Aline was suggesting here?

Each person completing their own Gygax 75, but with the ability to chat / feedback / workshop each others as we go.

Last edited March 10, 2025 3:28 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:30 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:30 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Phil_Ozzy_Fer says:

I'm seeing this thread veering off into three different directions.

- A shared world-building project where people collaborate on a single setting.
- A group project where people help the other individuals in the group realize a setting/campaign.
- A world-building game.

It's probably important to re-focus on the original point and not accidentally hijack the thread for something else. New threads can be made if people are interested in other types of collaborative worldbuilding. @Aline should probably clarify which one of those she meant just to be clear what she was looking for.

From her last post, I am not even sure it's any of those 3. As I interpret it, I agree with Tickettbror that option 2 is the closest, though I'm not sure it wasn't meant as a "group project".

Aline says:

OK, I think there might be a misunderstanding as to what I am trying to do here. I did not mean to create a shared world (although that also sounds rather interesting) but for everyone to create their own thing and just chat along the way. So whatever system or style you want to use is fine.

Last edited March 10, 2025 3:32 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:33 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:33 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Agreed that option 2 seems closest to the original intent and should stay the focus of this thread.

Option 3 did have some possibilities for those interested to allow a more collaborative approach for their individual worlds

The Ex games are smaller scale than this thread is targeting, but I can see how the principle might be used. Have you tried using those on a larger scale? I'll have to look into kingdom and microscope

Last edited March 10, 2025 3:39 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:39 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:39 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I'm not trying to hijack anything and I don't appreciate that. I tried to refocus the thread to point out that people were interpreting the original question different ways. I responded to a question when prompted for the purpose of offering ideas to play a worldbuilding game.

Mar 10, 2025 3:52 pm

Mar 10, 2025 3:52 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Phil_Ozzy_Fer says:

I'm not trying to hijack anything and I don't appreciate that. I tried to refocus the thread to point out that people were interpreting the original question different ways. I responded to a question when prompted for the purpose of offering ideas to play a worldbuilding game.

Sorry, i didn't mean to imply you (or anyone) did it, much less on purpose. In fact, I don't think it has happened at all, but it feels like we are at risk of drifting away from the thread's original aim, so we should keep in mind to avoid it happening. I was actually (unsuccessfully) trying to agree with you pointing it out and adding the suggestion that maybe we should get the OP to answer which interpretation was intended before we speculate/interpret further.

Mar 10, 2025 4:37 pm

Mar 10, 2025 4:37 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Well this certainly did answer my initial question if there was any interest in this sort of thing. XD

I appreciate all the enthusiasm, but for now let us focus on my initial idea. That is, basically a glorified subforum where a bunch of people workshop their way through the challenge. While all of those collaborative worldbuilding game ideas sound fun, this is not what I am planning here.

The idea for this setup came when I was thinking about doing the aforementioned challenge and was looking in to ways to organize everything. I thought about just creating a private game and use threads to keep things organized. Then I thought about inviting some others along for the ride.

That is really all I had in mind here.

I would set up the game, set it to private so that no spoilers leak, give every participant a subforum and set up a general chat thread. The rest would be up to the participants.
The challenge is ultimately just a framework to pace out the workload and extremely flexible as to what you end up doing with it. You can add things you really want, leave out or change parts you don't need. There would be no obligation to keep pace or anything of the sort. Though everyone working on the same part of the challenge at the same time seems kind of fun to me. How much input you want, anything from quick feedback to full collaboration, is once again up to the participants.

Mar 10, 2025 4:42 pm

Mar 10, 2025 4:42 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

That sounds perfect.

I'd be happy to participate in this and look forward to exchanging content with people.

Mar 10, 2025 5:45 pm

Mar 10, 2025 5:45 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Aline, you keep saying 'the challenge'. Maybe define that term since it seems others don't know what you mean by that and there is misunderstanding. Not everyone is comfortable going to outside sites to get an understanding what what is being offered.

Mar 10, 2025 6:03 pm

Mar 10, 2025 6:03 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I was not aware that would be an issue. Guess I just assumed people would check out the link if they were at all interested.

The Gygax 75 Challenge is a worldbuilding exercise that promises to give you a usable campaign world in five weeks. It references an article written by Gary Gygax, where he lays out how to build a campaign world. The challenge compiles this article in to a step by step workflow that can easily be completed over the course of five weeks.

The PDF is pay what you want, so there is no harm in checking it out.

Here is the link once again, in case anyone missed it.

Last edited March 10, 2025 6:07 pm

Mar 10, 2025 6:12 pm

Mar 10, 2025 6:12 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Aline says:

The Gygax 75 Challenge is a worldbuilding exercise that promises to give you a usable campaign world in 5 weeks.

For those not following the link, I find these to be the most important bits of information from the pdf about the implied campaign/adventure structure:

The setting you will create assumes a "dungeon" and a "town" with "wilderness" in between. It also assumes some challenges in the form of "monsters" and rewards in the form of "treasures." Feel free to interpret these concepts any way you like, but the underlying structure supports an adventure game in which characters raid a nearby, leveled and mysterious structure in order to increase their fortune. Aside from that, you can work with any game system or genre. These exercises help you create a world for play, not for publication

There is a lot of room for things that are not D&D or fantasy though

Last edited March 10, 2025 6:12 pm

Mar 11, 2025 1:17 am

Mar 11, 2025 1:17 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I'm all for it if I can do Savage Worlds, as I am supposed to be working up a fantasy world for that system anyway.

Mar 11, 2025 2:13 am

Mar 11, 2025 2:13 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Can I please participate as well? I've been wanting to do something with ShadowDark for a while and this feels like a good opportunity to generate some enthusiasm (in myself) and get the ball rolling.

Great idea!

FYI, the Gygax Challenge document is also available for viewing/download on the Archive.org website.

The Gygax 75 Challenge

Last edited March 11, 2025 2:17 am

Mar 11, 2025 8:02 pm

Mar 11, 2025 8:02 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Alright. So far I have noted @Dhakhan @WhtKnt and @Phil_Ozzy_Fer as interested. There were some others who expressed interest earlier, but that was still with a bit of confusion going on. So anyone else still interested please @ me. I plan on getting stared later this week.

LightOfMidnight

Mar 11, 2025 8:07 pm

Mar 11, 2025 8:07 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

@Aline still interested! It was what I was going for. A bit of accountability on doing some world building as we're all doing it at the same time but separately :P

Mar 11, 2025 8:13 pm

Mar 11, 2025 8:13 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

@LightOfMidnight Noted!

Mar 11, 2025 8:43 pm

Mar 11, 2025 8:43 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

@ Aline, also still interested.

Mar 11, 2025 8:48 pm

Mar 11, 2025 8:48 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

@Aline, definitely still interested!

Last edited March 11, 2025 8:48 pm

Mar 11, 2025 10:53 pm

Mar 11, 2025 10:53 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

@Aline Count me in

Mar 12, 2025 2:35 am

Mar 12, 2025 2:35 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

@Aline I am still interested.

Mar 12, 2025 11:18 am

Mar 12, 2025 11:18 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Nice, glad to see so many people interested.

Mar 13, 2025 2:17 pm

Mar 13, 2025 2:17 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

I'm interested in this, too. Thank you for drawing my attention to the existence of the challenge!

Mar 14, 2025 10:21 pm

Mar 14, 2025 10:21 pm

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

"Game" is up, invites out. Let me know if I missed anyone.

Mar 24, 2025 10:05 am

Mar 24, 2025 10:05 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Aline says:

If this sounds like a fun idea to you, let me know and I will set up the "game".

This sounds like a fun idea to me. I let you know. Please set up the "game."

:D

Really, though, it does sound like a lot of fun, and I would love to have a group to casually workshop settings with. The structure in the article just adds to the fun.

Mar 24, 2025 10:10 am

Mar 24, 2025 10:10 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

We are already in week two, but you are still welcome to join if you want.

Mar 24, 2025 10:12 am

Mar 24, 2025 10:12 am

[IC] The Gygax 75 Challenge

Aline says:

We are already in week two, but you are still welcome to join if you want.

Thank you! I (new to the forum) didn't see page two of this thread. oops

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