Building a world
World rules
Death, danger, power, growth, companions, pacing and money: what each rule does.
Start from a feel
The Rules and Power tabs start you from one of three feels, and you change only what you want different:
| Feel | In short |
|---|---|
| Classic | Khorvale's own: real danger, room to grow. |
| Heroic | Forgiving: heroes are beaten, not killed, and travel with friends. Sturdier heroes, surer aim, fatter starting purses, capitals safe from razing, no fighting between players, and overreaching can maim but never kill. |
| Grim | Harsh: death is final and quick, purses are lean. Fallen heroes have hours, not half a day; heroes are frailer and enemies aim better; rewards are capped; long journeys don't heal; passage costs more. |
Your world keeps only the choices that differ from its feel, so switching feel later keeps your own changes. Nearly every rule is held by code: the storyteller is told the rules too, but the engine refuses what they forbid.
Death and danger
| Rule | Choices |
|---|---|
| When a hero falls Engine | They die for good · They're beaten, and wake later |
| Time to save a fallen hero Engine | Moments · A few hours · Half a day · A full day · Days |
| Players fighting each other Engine | Allowed · Not allowed. When not allowed, the engine refuses to rob, strip, wound, curse or kill another player's hero, and the storyteller is told not to set such fights up. (Blows traded inside a fight aren't yet blocked by code.) |
Heroes
| Rule | Choices |
|---|---|
| A new hero's purse Engine | Empty-handed · A few coins · Modest · Comfortable · Wealthy: the most a new character can start with. |
| Heroes' aim Engine | Shaky · Steady · Sure · Deadly · Unerring: the base chance to hit. |
| Enemies' aim Engine | Clumsy · Fair · Sharp · Cruel · Relentless |
| Companions who can follow one hero Engine | None · One · A pair · A small band · A company · Any number |
Power
The Power tab holds how strong things get. It shows your ladder of ranks, weakest at the bottom, with where new heroes start, where mortals stop, and where the world's most dangerous things sit.
| Rule | Choices |
|---|---|
| What the ranks are called Engine | Letters (D to SSS) · Titles · Cultivation realms · Street to world · Your own. Only the names change: every screen shows them and the storyteller is told to use them. The ladder underneath is the same. |
| How high a mortal can climb Engine | Any of the top four ranks. No hero's strength or magic grows past the top of it, whatever a people's limits or transformations allow. The tab tells you how high your strongest people can actually reach. |
| A new hero starts as Engine | A nobody · Green · Capable · Seasoned · Renowned. The top of the range is a hard limit on a new character's strength and magic; where they land inside it is judged from their backstory. |
| How fast heroes grow Engine | Slowly · Steadily · Quickly · Swiftly: how much each level grants. |
| What makes them grow Engine | Mostly fighting · Fights and quests alike · Mostly the story. The second pays about twice as much for finishing quests and for hard moments outside fights; the third about three times as much, with fights paying a little less. |
| How many skills a hero learns Engine | Three · Five · Eight · Twelve, over a whole career, one at each milestone level. |
| When they come Engine | One at the start · Mostly early · Spread out · Mostly late. Changing it (or the number) re-plans the milestones of heroes already playing. |
| How the tiers climb Engine | Master skills early · A steady climb · Master only at the end · No master skills. The tab spells out the order for your number of skills. |
| How strong skills are Engine | Subtle · Standard · Mighty: the strength of a skill's effects for its tier. |
| Who can teach Engine | Anyone stronger · A trusted mentor · Only true masters. Heroes can always teach themselves from how they play instead. |
| When heroes can train Engine | Only in a calm moment (not during a quest or straight after a fight) · Anywhere, any time |
| Can the weak hurt the strong? Engine | Not two ranks up · Not four ranks up · Any blow can land. Past the gap, nothing the weaker side does lands. |
| Reaching past your limit Engine | Can kill · Can maim, never kill · Only tires you. It only happens when a player says they push past their limit on purpose; otherwise an attempt beyond them comes out as the most they could manage. |
| How much a hero can take Engine | Fragile · Hardy · Sturdy · Tough as oak: health for a given strength. Changing it, or a people's toughness, updates the heroes and NPCs already in your world. |
| Spellcasters Engine | Glass · Hardy · As tough as warriors: how much magic adds to health. |
| The most dangerous thing the world brings Engine | From rabble and footsoldiers, through veterans, champions and legends, up to myths, primordial things, cataclysms and world-enders. Nothing the storyteller creates, cast included, can be stronger, and encounters are planned within it. |
The world
| Rule | Choices |
|---|---|
| Great powers can scar the map Engine | Yes · No. Craters, floods, razed towns, new roads, kept on everyone's map. With No, devastation can be described but the map never changes. |
| Capitals Engine | Can't be razed · Can fall like any town |
| The story finds dungeons of its own Engine | Never, only mine · Rarely · Now and then · Often. Beyond the dungeons you dig under landmarks: when play leads underground, the storyteller can open a new one under a wild place the story made (never a town, a building or your landmarks). Code holds the pace: a few per region at most, and a while between finds for each character. |
| How often trouble finds the players Engine | Constantly · Often · Now and then · Rarely: the pause, in real time, before a new encounter can begin. |
| How quickly the day passes Engine | Briskly · Steadily · Slowly: how many turns before the time of day moves on. |
| How fast word of a deed spreads Engine | Overnight · In a few days · Slowly |
| The biggest reward handed out at once Engine | Modest · Fair · Rich · Kingly · No limit |
| A failed craft Engine | Still uses up the ingredients · Keeps the ingredients |
| Long journeys rest the party Engine | After a day on the road · After a few days · After a week · Never |
| Sea passage Engine | Cheap · Fair · Dear · Ruinous |
| Players can steer the story with (OOC: …) notes Engine | Yes · No |
Your world's model
Your world's model is chosen on the Studio's AI tab, next to your key. One model does all of the world's writing: every scene, and the work behind it (new NPCs, places, story planning). On OpenRouter you pick it from OpenRouter's list, with each model's price, a rough cost per 100 turns, and how fast it has been answering lately; only models that can use tools are listed, because every turn needs them. It affects cost and voice, not the engine. On another provider, it's the model you connected with, and you can switch it from that provider's own list.
What no world changes
Some things are the engine itself, the same in every world:
- The power scale: the ladder itself, and how a gap between fighters turns into odds and damage.
- How effort is priced: the cost of an action against a character's stamina or mana.
- How a blow is resolved: grades, the roll and the damage formula.
- What code decides: item values, sale and repair prices, how a won fight's experience follows its difficulty, and who can act when.
That's the point of building on Worldtable: your world gets its own premise and its own rules of the road, and keeps an engine the storyteller can't talk its way around.