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In this third installment in my Aspects of Role-Playing (ARP) series, role-players and potential role-players and GameMasters will explore, with me, the importance of settings and game history in role-playing games.

SETTINGS
Have you ever read a novel and come to a part where a setting, an environment and the people within that environment, is described in such detail you feel you're there, and you feel the importance of the place, how it fits into the story? For instance, in many of Michael Stackpole's novels -he mostly writes for Star Wars and BattleTech, and is among my favorite authors of all time- a description is given of a place, and that place may hold a political meaning, or a religious or spiritual meaning, or some manner of history for the character's involved.

The setting of the place, even if it's described only in minute detail, has been chosen by the author through the character's eyes specifically for the sake of evoking emotions in the characters which, if written well enough, evokes that same emotion in you. Several authors have done this, including Stackpole, from J.R.R. Tolkien to Robert Jordan to Clive Cussler, and on... Many times, in many novels I've read, have I felt those emotions, and all because of a special place with a special meaning set very specifically in the novel.

Movies do not seem to do quite the same job as a good book can, although they do have their moments. I'm unable to think of any movies off the top of my head, but I've included this paragraph specifically to outline the fact that, because role-playing is very cerebral in its essence, it is fact the GM generally needs to be a good enough word smith to get the environment across to their players, so they may see what their characters are going through in a movie house fashion, as well as being able to feel the emotional context of the setting.

Most settings do not require that you, as the GM, elicit a brand of feeling from your players to put into how their characters are acting, although there are sometimes when it is best. For instance, if you are trying to place fear into your players that a place they are about to enter may be detrimental to their health, you might describe a dark stormy night with an ancient house or a black-mouthed cave, either of which should be covered in something vile, such as cob-webs, and the air around the place is electrified... well, I think you get the point.

The level of terminology you use to describe your emotion-eliciting

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