Curious to know how other GMs go about designing and filling out their campaigns with different material like items, NPCs, locations, etc. I’ve traditionally gone very deep and sometimes even granular (much to my own detriment because I bite off more than I can chew sometimes), and try to build out enough material to establish the setting and make everyone feel “unique” to the campaign setting.
What do you find works best for you? How deep do you like to go when building out the setting and materials? Are there any specific elements you focus more on as opposed to others?
“Whatever fits on a flashcard” is my golden rule.
If the players are visiting a new city/town, the city/town gets a POI list and a key NPC list on the card. Each major NPC gets a flashcard. Each special item the players get goes on a flashcard that I can hand them when they receive or find the item.
Granted, I usually have a plaintext markdown doc that sketches out how I’m planning to weave the pieces together for each session, but each piece of the story in that doc? Written on a flashcard.