Player Knowledge

Game Knowledge

Player knowledge is a peculiar thing in RPGs. The more you play and consume in the RPG community, the more knowledge becomes deeply ingrained in your awareness. Without spoiling too much, things such as needing to stake a vampire through the heart or how to interact with certain dungeon threats becomes second hand whether or not your "character would know that".

As a base rule, I do not delineate between Player Knowledge and Character Knowledge when it comes to the tropes of an RPG game. If you as a player have fought a particular kind of creature before and know things about it, it is your choice whether your character would have that information. However, this is not an invitation to look up monster stats in preparation for a particular threat. The deliberate act of looking for game stats is a form of cheating (moreso cheating yourself but also disrespecting the GM and the rest of the table).

How does your character know this stuff? As an adventurer, you have a complex past that we have not seen all of. You may have learned it in a book or heard in an an older adventurer's stories. If it is common enough of a threat, you may have grown up with a nursery rhyme or folk saying that alludes to it. On the whole, it is okay if you are aware of certain monster tropes. I may even be deliberately playing into those tropes to allow you to be clever and knowledgeable. I don't want everything to be new and surprising. If I need something to be unknown, I will make sure it is new and fresh.

World Knowledge

In creating this World Anvil, I have bartered surprises/revelations for player investment. I must consider all things found within these pages to be known by the players as well as not-required to play in my games. Most of what is learned about Malpos comes down to player fiat on if their character would know the information. I do request some reasonability in that player fiat though. If an extensive amount of information is provided for an Elder Evil or some other esoteric area of knowledge, act with restraint as it might be hard to rationalize why your character knows everything. Equally, my games span across the timeline of Malpos so players can easily know what happens in the near or far future. I attempt to keep individual campaigns focused on their own narratives. If you know that something major will happen across the continent in 5 years, please don't push your way over to attempt to nullify another groups' story.