There is no doubt that the look of the world you create is important to the game and you don't have to be an artist to make your games look great. But you don’t have to draw out your worlds just for the pretty factor. The design of your world can also have a tremendous impact on the enjoyment and playability of the game.
Castles, Fortresses, Dungeons, and Medieval Villages really exist. And they were built not just for how they look, they were also carefully crafted with the thought of war in mind. You should also draw your worlds with this same thought. You should design your worlds with this same goal. Your world should have real impact on the game. It shouldn’t just be a backdrop for the action. To explain this point I am going to take a look at one small aspect of a medieval castle – the tower stairwell.
The Stairwell seems like a pretty simple thing. It’s just a set of steps that go up or down to another level, or a tower, right? Wrong! A stairwell is an opportunity to make an impact on the playability of your game. When castle and fortress designers built their castles they paid very particular attention to every little thing. Everything was designed with a purpose and stairwells are a good example of this. In a circular tower, stairwells, starting at the bottom and going up, curved in a clockwise motion. This clockwise curve made it extremely difficult for right-handed attackers to swing their weapons while going up the stairs. Their weapon hand was against the inside curve of the stairwell wall. Conversely, defenders going down the stairwell had their weapon hand along the outer wall, which gave them more space for weapon swinging. But this wasn’t the only tricky thing about stairwells. The stairs themselves were also carefully crafted to have a very irregular variation in height. Some steps were shallow and some steps were very steep. The inhabitants of the castle would know this pattern and easily go up or down the stairs, but any attackers trying to come up a stairwell like this, particularly if it was poorly lit, would trip on the steps and expose themselves to attack! This was another serious advantage for the defenders of the castle or keep.
Stairwells are just a small example of how the design of a world can have a tremendous impact on what happens in your game world. With a little thought, imagination, or even research, you can transform your drawings from a backdrop for your game into an active participant in your games.
Will Kalif is the author of two epic fantasy novels and a fan of all things Medieval. For a daily dose of all things medieval visit his blog where you can find intersting medieval stories and articles including his recent interview with the Director of the History Channels Dark Ages film. Heroic Dreams – Never Give A Sword to A Man Who Can’t Dance